The World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) has rejected Google's and Mozilla's objections to the Decentralized Identifiers (DID) proposal, clearing the way for the DID specification to be published a W3C Recommendation next month.
The two tech companies worry that the open-ended nature of the spec will promote chaos through a namespace land rush that encourages a proliferation of non-interoperable method specifications. They also have concerns about the ethics of relying on proof-of-work blockchains to handle DIDs.
The DID specification describes a way to deploy a globally unique identifier without a centralized authority (eg, Apple for Sign in with Apple) as a verifying entity.
A cyberattack on a software company almost a week ago continues to ripple through labor and workforce agencies in a number of US states, cutting off people from such services as unemployment benefits and job-seeking programs.
Labor departments and related agencies in at least nine states have been impacted. According to the Louisiana Workforce Commission in a statement this week, Geographic Solutions (GSI) was forced to shut down state labor exchanges and unemployment claims systems, and as many as 40 states and Washington DC, all of which rely on GSI's services, could be affected.
In a statement to media organizations, GSI President Paul Toomey said the Palm Harbor, Florida-based company "identified anomalous activity on our network," and took its services offline. Toomey didn't elaborate whether GSI was hit with ransomware or some other type of malware.
It seems promoters of RISC-V weren't bluffing when they hinted a laptop using the open-source instruction set architecture would arrive this year.
Pre-orders opened Friday for Roma, the "industry's first native RISC-V development laptop," which is being built in Shenzen, China, by two companies called DeepComputing and Xcalibyte. And by pre-order, they really mean: register your interest.
No pricing is available right now, quantities are said to be limited, and information is sparse.
Investigators at a blockchain analysis outfit have linked the theft of $100 million in crypto assets last week to the notorious North Korean-based cybercrime group Lazarus. The company said it had tracked the movement of some of the stolen cryptocurrency to a so-called mixer used to launder such ill-gotten funds.
Blockchain startup Harmony announced June 23 that its Horizon Bridge – a cross-chain bridge service used to transfer assets between Harmony's blockchain and other blockchains – had been attacked and crypto assets like Ethereum, Wrapped Bitcoin, Binance Coin, and Tether stolen.
According to blockchain analytics company Elliptic, the attacker immediately turned to Uniswap, a decentralized exchange, to convert most of the assets into 85,837 Ethereum, which researchers said is a common method used by hackers to avoid the stolen assets from being seized.
There's more than one path to net zero emissions by 2050, but the only practical one runs straight through nuclear power, according to the International Energy Agency.
In a report [PDF] released yesterday, the IEA said worldwide nuclear power output, currently at 413GW, would need to double to 812GW by 2050 to meet carbon neutrality goals and limit global warming to 1.5°C, per its own framework.
The IEA doesn't see nuclear power as the solution to net zero emissions, though, rather a part of the transition process to preferred forms of renewable energy like wind, solar, and hydroelectric. "Building sustainable and clean energy systems will be harder, riskier, and more expensive without nuclear," the IEA said. "Nuclear power has the potential to play a significant role in helping countries to securely transition to energy systems dominated by renewables."
Good news for especially determined fans of Ubuntu's formerly in-house desktop: there's a new version.
Unity 7.6 just appeared, although there is a more complete list of changes in the earlier announcement that it was in testing.
Cloud data lake vendor Cloudera has announced the general availability of Apache Iceberg in its data platform.
Developed through the Apache Software Foundation, Iceberg offers an open table format, designed for high-performance on big data workloads while supporting query engines including Spark, Trino, Flink, Presto, Hive and Impala.
Iceberg started out as a Netflix project before it was donated to the Apache foundation two years later in 2018.
NASA's Moon rocket is to trundle back into its shed today after a delay caused by concerns over the crawlerway.
The massive transporter used to move the Space Launch System between Vehicle Assembly Building (VAB) and launchpad requires a level pathway and teams have been working on the inclined pathway leading to the launchpad where the rocket currently resides to ensure there is an even distribution of rocks to support the mobile launcher and rocket.
The latest wet dress rehearsal was completed on June 20 after engineers "masked" data from sensors that would have called a halt to proceedings. Once back in the VAB, engineers plan to replace a seal on the quick disconnect of the tail service mast umbilical. The stack will then roll back to the launchpad for what NASA fervently hopes is the last time before a long hoped-for launch in late August.
Datacenter operator Switch Inc is being sued by investors over claims that it did not disclose key financial details when pursuing an $11 billion deal with DigitalBridge Group and IFM Investors that will see the company taken into private ownership if it goes ahead.
Two separate cases have been filed this week by shareholders Marc Waterman and Denise Redfield in the Federal Court in New York. The filings contain very similar claims that a proxy statement filed by Switch with the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) in regard to the proposed deal omitted material information regarding Switch's financial projections.
Both Redfield and Waterman have asked the Federal Court to put the deal on hold, or to undo it in the event that Switch manages in the meantime to close the transaction, and to order Switch to issue a new proxy statement that sets out all the relevant material information.
Google is to pay $90 million to settle a class-action lawsuit with US developers over alleged anti-competitive behavior regarding the Google Play Store.
Eligible for a share in the $90 million fund are US developers who earned two million dollars or less in annual revenue through Google Play between 2016 and 2021. "A vast majority of US developers who earned revenue through Google Play will be eligible to receive money from this fund," said Google.
Law firm Hagens Berman announced the settlement this morning, having been one of the first to file a class case. The legal firm was one of four that secured a $100 million settlement from Apple in 2021 for US iOS developers.
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