A U.S. immigration advocate sued the government after a border agent searched his phone without a warrant and copied data. He believes the government targeted him due to his activism and political work on immigration rights. (arstechnica.com)
URSALA, RAQUEL, and FARRAH are top secret satellites with undisclosed missions. Their existence and details are classified and not publicly available. (thespacereview.com)
The daily digest
Today's best Hacker News stories, summarized and screenshotted, one email a day.
TLA+ is effective at verifying complex concurrent system behaviors using temporal logic and invariants. However, it cannot verify properties that are not explicitly expressed or properties of actual implementation correctness beyond design verification. (buttondown.com)
The daily digest
Today's best Hacker News stories, summarized and screenshotted, one email a day.
The NRC issued its first U.S. construction permit for a BWRX-300 small modular reactor at TVA's Clinch River site. This milestone signifies progress in deploying advanced nuclear reactors in the United States. (gevernova.com)
The daily digest
Today's best Hacker News stories, summarized and screenshotted, one email a day.
A security researcher discovered a flaw in Microsoft's internal analytics service that could have allowed unauthorized access to 17.3 trillion records by bypassing login token verification. Microsoft acknowledged the vulnerability, thanked the researcher for reporting it, and took steps to improve security. (blog.faav.net)
Saved game files of SimCity 2000 stored on disk could be edited, revealing the ability to manipulate game progress. This discovery sparked an early interest in hacking and understanding computer data at a low level. (log.schemescape.com)
WebGPU data layouts can differ between Rust and WGSL, causing subtle bugs in GPU compute shaders. Using unit tests with naga helps verify struct member offsets to ensure correct data sharing between host and shader. (mattkeeter.com)
The federal government released mortality reviews showing a pattern of medical neglect in ICE detention centers. The reviews were removed from the ICE website shortly after being made public, raising concerns about transparency and accountability. (prospect.org)
Delhi reduced its electricity loss from 50 percent to just 5 percent through a comprehensive grid upgrade. This achievement improved efficiency and reliability in the city's power distribution system. (spectrum.ieee.org)
The U.S. Postal Inspection Service shut down LabelsBank.com, a website operated by Faheem Akram that sold over 5 million counterfeit USPS postage labels for $2 each. The scheme caused over $126 million in losses to USPS and involved charges of conspiracy, counterfeiting, and wire fraud. (postalemployeenetwork.com)
Backblaze's Q2 2026 Drive Stats report analyzes the performance of over 354,000 hard drives, highlighting failure rates and durability. The report also discusses emerging storage technologies and the impact of higher-capacity drives on data center reliability. (backblaze.com)
Android developers face new requirements to publish apps, including a $25 verification fee and identity verification, even for small-scale projects. These policies have caused frustration among developers who want to share their apps freely without extensive registration processes. (twitter.com)
AI companies have been leaking user data to advertisers, raising privacy concerns. The leak involves sharing sensitive information without user consent. (jorgegarciaherrero.com)
Over 44,000 legal objections have been filed against Palantir's NHS data platform, demanding it be blocked from handling medical data. The campaign follows backlash over the company's involvement with the Israeli military and US immigration enforcement. (theguardian.com)
A new jailbreak exploit called Relapse has been released for the PlayStation 5, targeting specific firmware versions. The exploit allows users to modify their consoles beyond official restrictions. (github.com)
Reddit users are increasingly using AI-generated bot comments to promote products, making it difficult to distinguish genuine opinions from paid astroturfing. Analysis of Reddit comment histories reveals that some accounts heavily influence product discussions, suggesting a significant astroturfing problem. (petervijeh.com)
A bug in the 1985 Commodore 64 game Mercenary causes the player to crash-land and be transported into the Colony Craft when standing on an invisible patch of grass at the start. This exploit demonstrates how specific in-game conditions can trigger unintended game states. (gamesexplained.com)
A cybersecurity researcher discovered a major vulnerability in the Brazilian federal system in 2020, highlighting the risks of untested systems. By 2026, advances in machine learning have created new security challenges, especially as many models operate without proper safeguards. (blog.christianperone.com)
A 16-year-old researcher discovered a security vulnerability in Microsoft that allowed access to databases containing 17.3 trillion rows. The bug enabled the researcher to gain administrative control over the large-scale databases. (theregister.com)
The federal government is using a program from the 1980s to force cities to share license plate reader data with national surveillance centers. This system allows multiple law enforcement agencies to access and share local data, raising privacy and transparency concerns. (404media.co)
The Federal Trade Commission has initiated an investigation into major artificial intelligence companies including Anthropic and OpenAI. The probe aims to examine potential antitrust issues and competitive practices in the AI industry. (reuters.com)
Most data centers in Europe, including the Netherlands, do not disclose their water and electricity usage despite regulations requiring reporting. Data centers consumed 5.1 billion kilowatt-hours of electricity in the Netherlands in 2024, representing 4.6% of the country's total energy use, with projections rising to 10-15% by 2030. (nltimes.nl)
The 1990 AT&T long distance network experienced a major outage that disrupted communications across the United States. The collapse was caused by a combination of technical failures and overloads in the network infrastructure. (users.csc.calpoly.edu)
Coding is not solved, especially regarding maintenance, reliability, and security in production systems. AI cannot be held accountable or responsible for its actions, highlighting the ongoing challenges in software engineering and AI safety. (blog.alexewerlof.com)
Cal Newport urges Congress to investigate AI labs like OpenAI and Anthropic due to concerning behaviors and safety issues. He emphasizes the need to scrutinize specific AI projects, safety procedures, and the labs' motivations. (calnewport.com)
A security professional with experience at OpenAI shares insights on the challenges and risks of AI safety, emphasizing the importance of transparency and preparedness. They highlight the intense recent period for AI security and advocate for learning from internal experiences to better protect against future incidents. (twitter.com)
A Cold War-era U.S. spy satellite named USA-32, part of the FARRAH program, exploded in orbit on September 13, creating debris. The cause of the breakup is unknown, but no immediate threats to other spacecraft have been identified. (gizmodo.com)
The message indicates that access to Reddit has been restricted by network security measures. Users are prompted to log in or file a ticket if they believe the block is a mistake. (reddit.com)
A six-month trial of live facial recognition at London railway stations scanned over 500,000 faces but resulted in only one false alert and no arrests. The trial cost over £320,000 and used nearly 100 police hours, highlighting limited effectiveness. (theguardian.com)
Cloudflare is developing a global certificate authority to improve internet security and trust. This initiative aims to provide a more secure and reliable infrastructure for websites and online services. (blog.cloudflare.com)
Yash Garg demonstrates how to hijack the PS5's RTMP streaming protocol by manipulating DNS to redirect the stream to a custom server. The process involves understanding how the PS5 resolves Twitch hostnames and bypassing security measures like certificate validation. (yashgarg.dev)
The USPS is testing a pilot program to install cameras in mail trucks that scan roads, signs, and sidewalks to improve community safety. The cameras, provided by Next Base, will record road conditions and traffic but do not include license plate recognition features. (404media.co)