Guardian: Kamala Harris introduces running mate Tim Walz at raucous Philadelphia rally
06.Aug.2024
Harris announced the 60-year-old governor as her running mate on Tuesday morning, hours after she formally secured the Democratic nomination, becoming the first woman of color to lead a major party ticket. With the governorâs selection, Democrats capped one of the wildest periods in American political life that led Biden to abandon his re-election bid and endorse his vice-president last month.
Arriving on stage to BeyoncĂ©âs Freedom, the newly minted Democratic ticket rode a weeks-long wave of momentum from an unusually exuberant party happy to be looking forward.
Guardian: Polls show Kamala Harris moving ahead of Donald Trump in 2024 US election
Among recent national head-to-head polls, SurveyUSA put Harris up three points ahead of Trump, 48%-45%; Morning Consult put her up four points, 48%-44%; YouGov and CBS News made it a one-point Harris lead, 50%-49%; and University of Massachusetts Amherst put Harris up three, 46%-43%.
Those results were mostly within the margin of error.
But Tatishe Nteta, provost professor of political science at UMass Amherst and director of its poll, pointed to a key finding: a seven-point swing to the Democrat since January, when Trump led Joe Biden by four.
UPI: SpaceX delays Crew-9 astronaut launch amid uncertainty over Boeing Starliner
SpaceX has delayed this month’s Crew-9 astronaut launch to Sept. 24, to accommodate a traffic jam at the International Space Station as Boeing’s Starliner remains stalled at the orbiting laboratory.
Kansas Reflector: Spyware turned this Kansas high school into a ‘red zone’ of dystopian surveillance
I’m convinced of this because I’ve been following the news coverage of Lawrence High School. Just imagine you’re a student at Lawrence High (go Chesty the Lion!) and every homework assignment, email, photo, and chat on your school-supplied device is being monitored by artificial intelligence for indicators of drug and alcohol use, anti-social behavior, and suicidal inclinations.
That’s been the reality since last November, when the district began a $162,000 contract with Gaggle, a Dallas-based student safety technology company to provide around-the-clock surveillance. If a word or an image triggers an alert in the AI software, the result could range from the student being sent to an administrator to being referred to online counseling to getting a visit from local police.
LapCat: Deluge of Fake Mac App Store Reviews
Yesterday I discovered a deluge of recent fake customer reviews for a number of top paid apps in the United States Mac App Store. (Each country has its own version of the App Store with separate reviews.) I’ve now checked the reviews for all of the current top 40 paid apps in the Mac App Store, and 8 of those apps have a large number of fake reviews during the period of June 11 through July 19. What the 8 apps have in common, besides the top paid list and the fake reviews, is that they’re all relatively cheap, from $1.99 to $4.99 USD in price. Note that only buyers can leave App Store ratings and reviews for upfront paid apps, which makes this deluge of fake reviews especially odd. (Recipients of promo codes from the developer cannot leave ratings and reviews.) Here’s the list of apps I found: âŠ
On my Om (Om Malik): Google Is Mind-Bogglingly Bad
A few days ago I wondered aloud, âWhat would happen if Google CEO Sundar Pichai decided to sign up for Google Cloud using a secret identity, without getting help from any of his staff?â I added, âEvery single CEO should try to use their service as if they were a new customer that the company is going to try and win over. That alone will be a 10x boost in tech products!â
Itâs too bad Sundar isnât going to do this, because if anything his company needs a real kick in the pants. It makes so many bad product decisions that itâs mind-boggling.
My most common under-my-breath muttering these days: âDo they even use their own product?!â
CBC: Trump repeats conspiracy theory that PM Trudeau ‘could be’ son of Fidel Castro
Former U.S. president Donald Trump repeated a baseless claim about Justin Trudeau’s parentage in an interview on Monday, suggesting that the prime minister “could be” the son of former Cuban president Fidel Castro.
The current Republican presidential candidate sat down for an interview with streamer Adin Ross and was asked to react to photos of various U.S. and world leaders.
When shown a photo of the prime minister, Trump immediately brought up the conspiracy theory, citing an unnamed “they” as his source.
Of course, the Trudeaus didn’t visit Cuba until four years after Justin was born!
âPay no attention to the Kamala behind the curtain!â
MacRumors: Apple to Address ‘0.0.0.0’ Security Vulnerability in Safari 18
This decision comes after researchers from Israeli cybersecurity startup Oligo Security said they discovered a zero-day security vulnerability that allows a malicious actor to access private data on a user’s internal private network. The researchers will present their findings this weekend at the DEF CON hacking conference in Las Vegas.
“Exploiting 0.0.0.0-day can let the attacker access the internal private network of the victim, opening a wide range of attack vectors,” said Avi Lumelsky, a researcher at Oligo Security.
The researchers responsibly disclosed the vulnerability to Apple, Google, and Mozilla. More details are available on the AppSec Village website.
9to5Mac: Apple releases iOS 17.6.1 for iPhone with ‘important bug fixes’
Appleâs release notes for iOS 17.6.1 and iPadOS 17.6.1 say: âThis update includes important bug fixes and addresses an issue that prevents enabling or disabling Advanced Data Protection.â
Advanced Data Protection is an optional feature that expands end-to-end encryption to a number of additional iCloud services, including iCloud device backups, Messages backups, Photos, and much more.
Last Updated: 07.Aug.2024 13:24 EDT
