NEW RESOURCES

Royal United Services Institute for Defence and Security Studies: RUSI and NK News Release New North Korea Reports Database. “The database contains over 5,000 entities and their relationships, as described in successive reports by the UN Panel of Experts on North Korea from 2010 to 2023. The data allows countries and organisations to track sanctions compliance in a more easily accessible format. It is fully searchable and downloadable, and its fields are structured with ISO standards, making it easy to incorporate the data into existing databases.”

Deutsche Welle: The first digital Palestinian embroidery database. “Award-winning entrepreneur Zain Masri has so far digitized about 1,000 traditional Palestinian cross-stitching patterns, which are now available for download on her platform, Tirazain.”

Nature: Why two scientist-mums made a database of parental-leave policies. “By scouring websites and pestering university human-resources departments, Amanda Gorton and Tess Grainger are tracking the vast differences in leave entitlements across North America.”

TWEAKS AND UPDATES

ABC News: Judge revokes bail for disgraced FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried. “Disgraced FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried has had his bail revoked and he has been immediately remanded to custody of the U.S. Marshals. Judge Lewis A. Kaplan made the ruling to send Bankman-Fried to jail during a hearing Friday in U.S. District Court in New York City. Bankman-Fried’s attorneys shortly filed a notice of appeal of the judge’s decision to revoke his bail.”

USEFUL STUFF

WIRED: How to Move Your Instagram Feed to Pixelfed, the Photo App That Doesn’t Track Your Every Move. “Pixelfed is an open source, decentralized alternative to Instagram that recently added a tool for importing all your Instagram photos. This means you can automatically give all of the photos and videos you uploaded to Instagram a new home. Whether you want to shut down your Instagram account entirely or just back them up somewhere else, here’s how.”

AROUND THE INTERNET WORLD

CBC: Saint John-born writer delves into Google’s failed attempt to build a smart city. “The Quayside project was formally announced at a ceremony in October 2017, when Prime Minister Justin Trudeau said the proposed high-tech neighbourhood would ‘create a test bed’ for new technologies. But the plan soon fell apart amid worries about privacy and the potential over-collection of data from people within their own homes. Saint John-born author and Globe and Mail technology reporter Josh O’Kane delves into the story behind Quayside in his latest book, Sideways: The City Google Couldn’t Buy.”

CNN: ‘It gave us some way to fight back’: New tools aim to protect art and images from AI’s grasp. “Generative AI technology has also wowed users with its ability to spit out works of art in the style of a specific artist. You can, for example, create a portrait of your cat that looks like it was done with the bold brushstrokes of Vincent Van Gogh. But these tools also make it very easy for bad actors to steal images from your social media accounts and turn them into something they’re not (in the worst cases, this could manifest as deepfake porn that uses your likeness without your consent). And for visual artists, these tools threaten to put them out of work as AI models learn how to mimic their unique styles and generate works of art without them.”

The Register: India launches contest to build homegrown web browser. “India’s government has decided the nation needs an indigenous web browser and has launched the Indian Web Browser Development Challenge (IWBDC) to make it happen.”

SECURITY & LEGAL

Washington Post: Cop-watchers are now YouTube celebrities. They’ve changed how police work.. “With varying degrees of antagonism and legal expertise, the online movement known as cop-watching or First Amendment auditing has swelled in popularity in recent years, capturing the imaginations of millions of Americans who are examining their relationship with policing after George Floyd’s murder at the hands of police in Minneapolis in 2020.”

Reuters: Snapchat under scrutiny from UK watchdog over underage users -sources. “Britain’s data regulator is gathering information on Snapchat to establish whether the U.S. instant messaging app is doing enough to remove underage users from its platform, two people familiar with the matter said.”

RESEARCH & OPINION

Fast Company: Google Maps is an eyesore, part two: 5 more examples of how the app has lost its way. “Last week I wrote a piece highlighting how Google Maps has become a bit of an eyesore in recent years. While Google Maps’ data on businesses and other points of interest is second to none, using the map to navigate has become a challenge, mainly due to excess visual clutter. Since the story ran, others have chimed in about their gripes regarding Google Maps, particularly as navigation and map browsing is concerned. With that in mind, I’ve rounded up some of the most frequent complaints Google Maps users have. These are the top five.”

FedScoop: Homeland Security to launch explosives research database to help combat threats. “The Department of Homeland Security plans to launch a database of explosives research, testing and evaluation data to assist personnel in mitigating threats in the fall.” Good morning, Internet…

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