Agreguesi i feed

"We've now replenished 90% of the stolen assets, and we're committed to covering the remaining 10%," Binance co-CEO Richard Teng posted on X, adding that "Our users will not bear the financial impact of this incident." "Binance said it was able to replace the funds taken in the record hack by using company money to buy new tokens," reports NBC News: The remaining 10% consists of tokens that are less liquid, meaning they may take longer to buy, it said in a statement posted on X... Binance said it has set aside around $6.34 billion of company funds internally to cover the losses. The money spent re-buying tokens came from using part of its $1 billion Secure Asset Fund for Users, a bitcoin reserve it holds to protect customers in the event of security breaches, as well as some of its Futures Insurance Fund, and the company's own corporate treasury, it said on X. NBC News reports that the FBI blames the breach on a North Korea-sponsored group known as TraderTraitor: Members of [TraderTraitor] were observed by law enforcement converting stolen assets into the cryptocurrency ethereum, the FBI said in a statement, adding that it expects "further laundering" of the assets through the use of related technology... After the hack, the exchange stopped allowing customers to withdraw their funds, but it said Saturday it was still on track to reopen withdrawals Sunday. CNBC reports: The world's largest crypto exchange initially said the hack may involve "a compromised DevOps engineer's laptop, which allowed an attacker to gain access to a service container and submit unauthorized withdrawal transactions." However, Co-CEO Richard Teng later said the attack involved a more complex process rather than the misuse of a single engineer's permissions. The New York Times describes what happened when Binance first spotted "a multibillion-dollar deluge of digital coins" pouring out of its accounts: As the news spread, Binance's top executives put together an informal war room on Wea, the company's internal messaging system, with about 100 participants, including specialized cryptocurrency tracers and security personnel. They eventually transitioned to a mass conference call, with 100 boxes on the screen, where employees took turns muting and then unmuting, communicating in a mixture of English and Chinese. Among them was He Yi, Binance's co-chief executive, who is seven months pregnant, and worked through the night from her base in Abu Dhabi, taking a call at 3 a.m. local time.... Much of the drama played out in public. Almost all crypto transactions are recorded on the blockchain, a ledger of money movements that anyone can look up. That meant crypto analysts could see funds leaving Binance in real time... North Koreans have targeted crypto companies for years, using the proceeds of those thefts to fund its nuclear program, according to Western officials. The hackers have developed increasingly complex strategies to steal crypto and launder the proceeds, a painstaking endeavor that can take months to complete. In a blog post on Friday, Chainalysis said the attackers had deployed "laundering patterns we have not seen before," conducting thousands of transactions over a short period, probably with the help of automation. At the same time, Binance's colleagues in the industry mobilized to intercept some of the laundered crypto. Certain digital coin issuers can freeze funds, allowing them to halt a money-laundering operation in its tracks. Soon after the hack, Tether and Circle, two major issuers, announced that they had frozen stashes of their own coins that the hackers had seized from Binance, a combined total of more than $2 billion in crypto. Binance is now working to gain access to those funds, the company said. But $2.4 billion in crypto is already "beyond any issuer's reach," according to [blockchain intelligence firmm] TRM. The article also includes President Trump's reaction when asked Friday about the breach. "I've always felt it was a little bit dangerous. But they say they have it pretty much under control. We'll see."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

CNN reports: The popular theory that comets were crucial in kick-starting life on Earth billions of years ago may not hold up, according to new computer simulations that counter decades of scientific thinking. The finding suggests the fragile organic molecules supposedly carried by the icy objects would have been destroyed on impact, upending an established origin of life theory that dates back to at least 1961 [with earlier versions postulated in 1908]... Early in its history — over 4 billion years ago — Earth may have experienced a period of heavy bombardment from more than 100,000 comets larger than 100 meters (328 feet), according to the new study, published Wednesday in the journal Scientific Reports. Those impacts, however, were mostly too heavy for life-starting molecules to withstand. The team used the latest models of comet formation and evolution to simulate this early planetary period 100,000 times. "Given what we know about surface environments on the early Earth, on average, our simulations found that there were no successful impacts," said lead study author Richard Anslow, who conducted the research while completing his doctorate at the Institute of Astronomy of the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom... "The typical velocities of these comets when they impact the Earth meant that actually very few, if any, would have been able to deliver intact organic molecules, so comets actually don't seem to be as useful for prebiotic chemistry as was previously thought," Anslow said. More precisely, 54% of the simulations showed no impact at all, while the remaining 46% had at least one and a "tiny minority" returned up to three collisions, Anslow said. "We can't rule out confidently that there was never a successful impact — there could have been one of these fluke impacts." However, such flukes had to occur in a "perfect location" that already met several important conditions, including the presence of liquid water and other chemicals needed to support life. That combination makes the overall process unlikely, he added. The article notes his argument that even if a successful impact occurred, it's unlikely an important chemical like hydrogen cyanide (HCN) could survive the impact, and would've dissolved in an ocean impact. Plus, "many other precursor molecules are also needed, such as compounds that contain phosphorus and sulfur, but these are not routinely found in comets, Anslow said." An alternative cosmic source of organic material could have been asteroids, which typically struck Earth more slowly and in greater numbers. Anslow pointed to recent findings on samples from asteroids Bennu and Ryugu, which contain the majority of protein-building amino acids. The recent study also raises another intriguing possibility: While Earth may not have had the ideal conditions to foster HCN from comet impacts, ancient Mars might have been better suited. "Because Mars is much smaller than Earth and further away from the sun, the typical impact velocity of comets is much lower, so while these impacts on Earth were destroying most of the HCN, this wasn't the case so much for Mars," Anslow said. This idea could add another dimension to the long-standing question of whether the red planet once supported life. While the authors closely analyzed how HCN could have survived comet impact, the chemical may have undergone reactions before the icy bodies entered Earth's atmosphere, said Queenie Chan, an associate professor of Earth sciences at Royal Holloway University of London, who was not involved with the study. This process could have created biologically important compounds, such as those protein building blocks, that are less volatile and more likely to survive.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

BBS-era "door" games are preserved by the site Break Into Chat, along with their history. Now the site's actually traced the origins of several ANSI art screens in the 1980s and "how different people later transformed the original images," starting from one of the most popular bulletin board systems in St. Louis, Missouri. Slashdot reader Kirkman14 writes: "Fire Escape" was curator of the authoritative list of bulletin board systems in St. Louis's area code and sysop of the area's most popular board. Like many sysops of that time, Fire Escape enlivened her bulletin board by finding and repurposing older ANSI art. Eventually her BBS had 18 different logon screens in its rotation, many of which featured flames or mushroom clouds or made liberal use of red and yellow. Break Into Chat follows the trail: Some, maybe even most, of Fire Escape's logon screens had actually been adapted from old school "public domain" ANSI art drawn in the late 1980s and early 1990s by folks such as Michael C. Ling, Lora Ruffner (aka "Ebony Eyes") and Violet Stymacks.... Stymacks was unusually generous with her ANSI art. When she first began drawing, she combed through Fidonet node lists looking for bulletin boards with interesting or inspiring names. When she found one, she would draw an ANSI screen that fit the board's theme, then send it to the sysop. Eventually, sysops began seeking her out, too. By late 1990, she claimed that 500 bulletin boards were using her screens. Three years later, that total had tripled, according to Boardwatch . I believe it — I have located more than 1,100 of her pieces so far. She was so prolific that it would be surprising if she hadn't reused or remixed her own work over the years... [D]id they intend for other people to do so? Or would they have considered such borrowing or adapting as "ripping" or just plain "stealing"? These questions have dogged the BBS, ASCII art, and ANSI art scenes from the beginning. A freelance writer named Patrick Grote grappled with this ethical dilemma in 1990. He had begun to publish archives of ANSI art that he had collected from various public messageboards and networks. But what were people allowed to do with the ANSI screens in these collections? Was it okay to modify them? "Tough call," Grote said. "I know some people copyright their screens by inserting a little '(C)' on it," Grote wrote in a README file included in these collections. "Is this 'true' copyrighting? I would say yes, but then again, I don't feel like having any legal action taken against me for using an ANSI screen. In my opinion, I would say leave the ones that say '(C)' alone, but make every effort to contact the artist and ask for permission...." When I corresponded with Fire Escape this year, she admitted her memory wasn't what it used to be, but felt certain that she had not asked any artists for permission because she didn't know who they were or how to reach them. "I figured if anyone had an issue, I'd just remove the screen," she said. "But no one ever said anything about it."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Companies like Google, Netflix, TikTok, and Meta may soon owe the French government, reports Tom's Hardware: France has approved a proposed tax that aims to tax the amount of internet data per gigabyte sent to French users in the country... According to minutes released by the National Assembly, members voted 11-10 in support of the motion on October 30 — which now means the new law has been added to the country's next budget, despite major opposition from the government side and the finance committee rapporteur. The latest amendment, introduced by socialist lawmaker Laurent Lhardit, could see content providers pay €0.055 (roughly $0.06) to the government for every gigabyte of content distributed to French users. With approximately 154 million users and counting in France, the proposal's authors say such a tax could generate around €10 billion ($11.2 billion) in annual revenue for the government. The said proposal, though yet to be passed as it must survive further parliamentary scrutiny, aims at companies that generate substantial internet traffic as opposed to taxing their advertising revenue, profits and subscriptions. Its explanatory notes particularly mention Google, Meta, Netflix, Amazon, and content delivery network Akamai as major potential contributors. Notably, TikTok and other similar platforms could fall under this broader scope depending on how these rules are applied. Internet service providers, including Orange Free and Liad, would be required to measure the volume of data and identify the companies responsible for sending it to French users. The Data will then be collected and submitted quarterly to France's tax administration under the supervision of telecommunications watchdog Arcep. The measure becomes law if it clears the remaining stages of France's budget process, the article points out, "with parliament scheduled to vote on the budget's first section in early November." "VideoLAN, the French nonprofit organization behind the VLC media player, warned that the proposed levy could cost it more than €1 million annually," reports CircleID. "Its response illustrates how traffic-based taxation could affect organizations distributing large volumes of data without corresponding commercial revenue."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The Hubble Space Telescope "will plunge back into the atmosphere in the early-to-mid-2030s," reports Ars Technica. So now NASA has released a Request For Information (RFI) "asking commercial companies for ideas on how to reboost, service, or a controlled disposal of Hubble." Specifically, NASA is looking for information about companies' current and near-term capabilities for capturing Hubble and boosting it to an altitude of at least 373 miles (600 km), enhancing the telescope's performance, or guiding Hubble to a controlled reentry. "The requirement includes that the boost and/or servicing mission must not harm the HST and that this mission is expected to occur by 2032," NASA wrote in the RFI. The contractor would be responsible for providing the launch vehicle, servicing spacecraft, mission operations, and "crew if applicable." NASA is not committing to buying a Hubble rescue mission, but officials want to know who might be interested in mounting such a mission, how much it would cost, and which companies would have a realistic shot at reaching Hubble before it falls out of orbit and burns up on reentry. Orbital dynamicists currently predict that it will likely happen in 2033 or 2034 without intervention, but reentry forecasts can change based on solar activity... A reboost to NASA's requirement of 373 miles (600 km) would likely keep Hubble in orbit for at least 25 more years. "NASA last raised the orbit of Hubble in 2002," the article points out, "when the Space Shuttle Columbia visited the observatory for a servicing mission." The final shuttle servicing flight in 2009 did not reboost the telescope's orbit, and with the retirement of the shuttle fleet two years later, Hubble has steadily lost altitude with no way to stave off eventual destruction... NASA's newer flagship observatories, sometimes described as successors to Hubble, are not actually one-for-one replacements. Hubble is tuned to observe the Universe in visible and ultraviolet light, while the Webb and Roman telescopes peer deeper into the infrared Universe. Astronomers will likely have to wait for the launch of NASA's Habitable Worlds Observatory in the 2040s for an improvement on Hubble's visible and ultraviolet vision.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Slashdot reader ElectricVs shares this report from American Buildout, a new site covering "the intersection of data centers, energy and power, finance, and Main Street." Dozens of unexplained drones flew over and near U.S. nuclear facilities between February 2024 and March 2026, according to records the Nuclear Regulatory Commission made public this week. In all, facility operators filed 67 reports of drones over or near 28 sites in 17 states. They include the Three Mile Island site near Middletown, Pennsylvania., where Constellation Energy plans to restart Unit 1 as the Crane Clean Energy Center. In one incident, about five drones flew roughly 100 feet above the [970-megawatt] reactor building at River Bend Station in Louisiana. The story was first reported by the publication The Liberation Times. The NRC published the documents on its website in response to the publication's freedom of information request... Every entry carries the status "Closed Unresolved." "Most of the incidents happened after dark," the article points out, "and none of the records identifies a drone operator. About half of the incidents, 33 of 67, occurred in an eight-week window between Dec. 3, 2024, and Jan. 24, 2025." (Virginia's Surry Power Station experienced five different incidents in December of 2024, including one involving "at least eight drones in two waves.") 100 miles west of Chicago, "drone activity" continued for more than two hours at the Byron Nuclear Station, where two separate drones were reported. In Waterford, Connecticut, "security observed four drones flying back and forth..." The article notes a 2024 paper from the Nuclear Regulatory Commission citing a 2019 analysis that "concluded U.S. plants had no risk-significant vulnerabilities that adversaries could exploit with commercially available drones to cause radiological sabotage, or theft or diversion of special nuclear material."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.