Author name: Kris Guyer

massive-china-state-iot-botnet-went-undetected-for-four-years—until-now

Massive China-state IoT botnet went undetected for four years—until now

Biz & IT, Security / /

OVER 260,000 PWNED —

75% of infected devices were located in homes and offices in North America and Europe.

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Massive China-state IoT botnet went undetected for four years—until now

Getty Images

The FBI has dismantled a massive network of compromised devices that Chinese state-sponsored hackers have used for four years to mount attacks on government agencies, telecoms, defense contractors, and other targets in the US and Taiwan.

The botnet was made up primarily of small office and home office routers, surveillance cameras, network-attached storage, and other Internet-connected devices located all over the world. Over the past four years, US officials said, 260,000 such devices have cycled through the sophisticated network, which is organized in three tiers that allow the botnet to operate with efficiency and precision. At its peak in June 2023, Raptor Train, as the botnet is named, consisted of more than 60,000 commandeered devices, according to researchers from Black Lotus Labs, making it the largest China state botnet discovered to date.

Burning down the house

Raptor Train is the second China state-operated botnet US authorities have taken down this year. In January, law enforcement officials covertly issued commands to disinfect Internet of Things devices that hackers backed by the Chinese government had taken over without the device owners’ knowledge. The Chinese hackers, part of a group tracked as Volt Typhoon, used the botnet for more than a year as a platform to deliver exploits that burrowed deep into the networks of targets of interest. Because the attacks appear to originate from IP addresses with good reputations, they are subjected to less scrutiny from network security defenses, making the bots an ideal delivery proxy. Russia-state hackers have also been caught assembling large IoT botnets for the same purposes.

An advisory jointly issued Wednesday by the FBI, the Cyber National Mission Force, and the National Security Agency said that China-based company Integrity Technology Group controlled and managed Raptor Train. The company has ties to the People’s Republic of China, officials said. The company, they said, has also used the state-controlled China Unicom Beijing Province Network IP addresses to control and manage the botnet. Researchers and law enforcement track the China-state group that worked with Integrity Technology as Flax Typhoon. More than half of the infected Raptor Train devices were located in North America and another 25 percent in Europe.

Raptor Train concentration by continent.

Enlarge / Raptor Train concentration by continent.

IC3.gov

Raptor Train concentration by country.

Enlarge / Raptor Train concentration by country.

IC3.gov

“Flax Typhoon was targeting critical infrastructure across the US and overseas, everyone from corporations and media organizations to universities and government agencies,” FBI Director Christopher Wray said Wednesday at the Aspen Cyber Summit. “Like Volt Typhoon, they used Internet-connected devices, this time hundreds of thousands of them, to create a botnet that helped them compromise systems and exfiltrate confidential data.” He added: “Flax Typhoon’s actions caused real harm to its victims who had to devote precious time to clean up the mess.”

Massive China-state IoT botnet went undetected for four years—until now Read More »

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14 dead as Hezbollah walkie-talkies explode in second, deadlier attack

bombs, hezbollah, Israel, Security, walkie-talkies / /

Day 2 —

People aren’t sure what devices will detonate next.

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14 dead as Hezbollah walkie-talkies explode in second, deadlier attack

Aurich Lawson | Getty Images

Wireless communication devices have exploded again today across Lebanon in a second attack even deadlier than yesterday’s explosion of thousands of Hezbollah pagers. According to Lebanon’s Ministry of Health, the new attack has killed at least 14 more people and injured more than 450.

Today’s attack targeted two-way radios (“walkie-talkies”) issued to Hezbollah members. The radios exploded in the middle of the day, with at least one going off during a funeral for people killed in yesterday’s pager attacks. A New York Times report on that funeral described the moment:

When the blast went off, a brief, eerie stillness descended on the crowd. Mourners looked at one another in disbelief. The religious chants being broadcast over a loudspeaker abruptly stopped.

Then panic set in. People started scrambling in the streets, hiding in the lobbies of nearby buildings, and shouting at one another, “Turn off your phone! Take out the battery!” Soon a voice on the loudspeaker at the funeral urged everyone to do the same…

One woman, Um Ibrahim, stopped a reporter in the middle of the confusion and begged to use the reporter’s cellphone to call her children. The woman dialed a number with her hands shaking, then screamed into the phone, “Turn off your phones now!”

The story appears to capture the current mood in Lebanon, where no one seems quite sure what will explode next. While today’s attack against walkie-talkies is well-attested, various unconfirmed reports suggest that people fear an explosion from just about anything with a battery.

At the time of publication, The Associated Press was currently leading its coverage of the attack with the line, “Walkie-talkies and solar equipment exploded in Beirut and multiple parts of Lebanon on Wednesday.” It later added that “a girl was hurt in the south when a solar energy system blew up, the state news agency reported.” Whether this actually happened, or if it was in any way connected with the attacks, remains unclear.

The Jerusalem Post rounded up a slew of rumors making the rounds in the region, some far less plausible than others:

Unofficial reports claimed that iPhones, video cameras, IC-V82 radios, and other devices also detonated.

According to unconfirmed reports, Hezbollah has told its operatives to distance itself from communication devices.

Unofficial reports also claimed that Hezbollah told its members to dispose of devices containing a lithium battery or that are connected to the internet.

Additional unconfirmed reports claimed that lithium batteries for solar energy storage had detonated and that some houses were on fire.

Yesterday, multiple news outlets reported that the pager attacks had been caused by explosives built into the devices, likely as part of an Israeli supply chain attack.

Today, similar reporting suggests the same kind of attack was used against the two-way radios. Axios cited two of its own sources who confirmed that the “walkie-talkies were booby-trapped in advance by Israeli intelligence services and then delivered to Hezbollah as part of the militia’s emergency communications system,” adding that “the decision to conduct the second attack was also driven by the assessment that Hezbollah’s investigation into the pager explosions would likely expose the security breach in the walkie-talkies.”

14 dead as Hezbollah walkie-talkies explode in second, deadlier attack Read More »

age-of-mythology:-retold-is-surprisingly-playable-with-a-controller

Age of Mythology: Retold is surprisingly playable with a controller

gaming / /
I hope you like radial menus, because you'll be looking at a lot of them.

Enlarge / I hope you like radial menus, because you’ll be looking at a lot of them.

Age of Mythology: Retold brings a lot of the usual advancements that you’d expect for a reboot of both the increasingly dated 2002 original game and its previous reboot: 2014’s Extended Edition, which is still perfectly playable and available on Steam. The newest version of this real-time strategy classic comes with the requisite improvements in graphics and user interface, making the whole game much easier to look at and parse at a glance. And while the updated voice acting isn’t going to win any awards, neither is the stilted, bare bones dialogue that those actors are working with (which seems faithful to the original game, for better or worse).

But Retold does add one thing that I wasn’t really expecting in a modern real-time strategy game—full support for a handheld controller. Developers have been trying to make RTS games work without the traditional mouse and keyboard since the days of SNES Populous and Starcraft 64, usually with limited success. Microsoft hasn’t given up on the dream, though, fully integrating controller support for Age of Mythology: Retold into both the PC version (which we sampled) and, obviously, the Xbox Series X|S release.

The result is definitely the best version of an RTS controller interface that I’ve tried and proof that a modern controller can be a perfectly functional option for the genre. In the end, though, there are just a few too many annoyances associated with a handheld controller to make it the preferred way to play a game like this.

Too many functions, too few buttons

A detailed map.

Enlarge / A detailed map.

Microsoft

To get a feel for what I mean, just look at the “Controls Popup” summarizing all the things a single controller needs to do in a game like Age of Mythology. The game makes full use of every single button and directional input on the Xbox gamepad for some function or other. Things are so crowded that commands like Stop and Delete need to be mapped to a combination of two shoulder buttons, with different functions for holding and tapping (and there are a few other multi-button menu toggles that aren’t even listed here).

If anything, this diagram undersells the control complexity here. Tapping either trigger brings up context-sensitive radial menus full of general commands or construction options for the currently selected building. Finding the right option then often means scrolling through multiple pages of radial menus in this full-screen interface, an awkward solution to the problem of having too many options for too few buttons.

To the game’s credit, it does its best to limit how much of this menu-based fumbling you have to do. Tapping the Y button when a building is selected, for instance, automatically starts construction on the most common unit you’d want to create with that building. And holding down the Y button maximizes the production queue for that building quickly, saving the need to spend a few seconds clicking through menus to do so.

Age of Mythology: Retold is surprisingly playable with a controller Read More »

backlash-over-amazon’s-return-to-office-comes-as-workers-demand-higher-wages

Backlash over Amazon’s return to office comes as workers demand higher wages

Amazon, minimum wage, Policy, unfair labor practices, warehouse workers / /
Warehouse workers at the STL8 Amazon Fulfillment Center marched on the boss Wednesday to demand a $25 an hour minimum wage for all workers.

Enlarge / Warehouse workers at the STL8 Amazon Fulfillment Center marched on the boss Wednesday to demand a $25 an hour minimum wage for all workers.

via Justice Speaks

Amazon currently faces disgruntled workers in every direction.

Office workers are raging against CEO Andy Jassy’s return to office mandate, Fortune reported—which came just as a leaked document reportedly showed that Amazon is also planning to gut management, Business Insider reported. Drivers by the hundreds are flocking to join a union to negotiate even better work conditions, CNBC reported, despite some of the biggest concessions in Amazon’s history. And hundreds more unionized warehouse workers are increasingly banding together nationwide to demand a $25 an hour minimum wage. On Wednesday, workers everywhere were encouraged to leave Jassy a voicemail elevating workers’ demands for a $25 minimum wage.

Putting on the pressure

This momentum has been building for years after drivers unionized in 2021. And all this collective fury increasingly appears to be finally pressuring Amazon into negotiating better conditions for some workers.

Just last week, Amazon ponied up $2.1 billion—its “biggest investment yet”—to improve driver safety and increase drivers’ wages.

Unionizing warehouse workers told Ars that they’re seeking a similar investment from Amazon, which currently pays on average a $20.50 minimum wage.

“We work at a breakneck pace,” Christine Manno, an Amazon Fulfillment Center worker at Amazon site STL8 in St. Louis, Missouri, who was injured and never expects to work again, told Ars. “We put smiles on the billionaire’s faces, and we feel it’s prime time for a real raise for the employees. There’s too many of us struggling with food and housing, yet Andy Jassy took home over $14,000 an hour last year and Amazon is making billions in profit.”

On Wednesday, Amazon seemed to finally bend to the warehouse workers’ pressure, announcing a compromise on wage increases. The company said it was investing $2.2 billion to raise the base salaries of hourly fulfillment workers to “more than $22 an hour, and more than $29 an hour including benefits,” Reuters reported. Amazon’s spokesperson told Ars that STL8 workers’ starting wage “increased to $19 per hour coupled with our industry-leading benefits” and claimed that the company’s “biggest ever investment” in fulfillment workers was simply “part of an annual process where we review wages and benefits to ensure they stay competitive—and in many cases industry-leading.”

But while workers claimed the victory, they’re not going to sit back and take the pay bump. An STL8 worker on the organizing committee with Manno, Ash Judd, told Ars that workers “made this $1.50 raise happen through our tireless organizing, and we’ll keep fighting until we reach $25.”

Because of recent gains and the increasingly dire economic plight of workers, Amazon workers likely won’t be easing off the e-commerce giant any time soon. Some office workers told Fortune they are seeking other remote work to avoid returning to the office, threatening to “soft quit” and claiming that Amazon is going “backwards” with a stricter office policy than pre-COVID times. “This is a layoff in disguise,” one apparent worker complained on Reddit. “Return to the office or you’re fired and we don’t have to pay any severance or unemployment.”

With so many workers upset, it could now be a question of when Amazon will cave to their growing demands—not if—according to Beth Gutelius, the research director of the University of Illinois Chicago’s Center for Urban Economic Development.

“Research shows that the presence of collective bargaining agreements creates upward pressure on wages and working conditions, both in facilities that are unionized and those that are not,” Gutelius told Ars. “Based on that evidence, I would expect working conditions at Amazon to improve.”

Gutelius co-authored a May report documenting the financial insecurity of Amazon warehouse workers by surveying more than 1,400 across 42 states.

Backlash over Amazon’s return to office comes as workers demand higher wages Read More »

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A key NASA commercial partner faces severe financial challenges

artemis, axiom space, CLDs, NASA, Science, Space, space station / /

Station struggles —

“The business model had to change.”

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Spacious zero-g quarters with a big TV.

Enlarge / Rendering of an individual crew quarter within the Axiom habitat module.

Axiom Space

Axiom Space is facing significant financial headwinds as the company attempts to deliver on two key commercial programs for NASA—the development of a private space station in low-Earth orbit and spacesuits that could one day be worn by astronauts on the Moon.

Forbes reports that Axiom Space, which was founded by billionaire Kam Ghaffarian and NASA executive Mike Suffredini in 2016, has been struggling to raise money to keep its doors open and has had difficulties meeting its payroll dating back to at least early 2023. In addition, the Houston-based company has fallen behind on payments to key suppliers, including Thales Alenia Space for its space station and SpaceX for crewed launches.

“The lack of fresh capital has exacerbated long-standing financial challenges that have grown alongside Axiom’s payroll, which earlier this year was nearly 1,000 employees,” the publication reports. “Sources familiar with the company’s operations told Forbes that co-founder and CEO Michael Suffredini, who spent 30 years at NASA, ran Axiom like a big government program instead of the resource-constrained startup it really was. His mandate to staff up to 800 workers by the end of 2022 led to mass hiring so detached from product development needs that new engineers often found themselves with nothing to do.”

The report underscores a lot of what Ars has been hearing about the financial struggles of Axiom in recent months. Dozens of employees have been laid off, and Thales officials have made no secret of their discontent at not being paid in full for the production of pressure modules for the Axiom space station. Although the departure of Suffredini as chief executive was framed as being his decision for personal reasons, it seems probable that he moved out of the company for performance reasons.

Space station troubles

All of this raises significant questions about Axiom’s ability to deliver on the primary reason the company was created—to build a successor to the International Space Station. Suffredini joined Ghaffarian in the venture after serving as manager of NASA’s space station program for more than a decade. When they founded the company in 2016, the plan was to launch an initial space station module in 2020.

The timeline for station development has since been delayed multiple times. Presently, Axiom plans to launch its first module to the International Space Station no earlier than late 2026. And the company’s ambitions have been downsized, according to the report. Instead of a four-module station that would be separated from the government-operated space station by 2030, Axiom is likely to go forward with a smaller station consisting of just two elements. This station would have lower power and reduced commercial potential, according to the article.

“The business model had always counted on having significant power for microgravity research, semiconductor production, and pharmaceutical production, plus supporting life in space,” a source told the publication. “The business model had to change… and that has continued to make it challenging for the company to get around its cash flow issues.”

Axiom is one of several companies—alongside Blue Origin, Voyager Space, Vast Space, and potentially SpaceX—working with NASA to devise commercial replacements for the International Space Station after that facility retires in 2030.

NASA plans to issue a “request for proposals” for the second round of commercial space station contracts in 2025 and make an award the following year. Multiple sources have indicated that the space agency would like to award at least two companies in this second phase. However, Ghaffarian told Forbes that he would prefer NASA to decide next year and award a single competitor.

“Today there’s not enough market for more than one,” he said.

This may be true, although some of Axiom’s competitors may dispute it. Nevertheless, Ghaffarian’s desire for an award next year, and for a sole winner, underscores the evident urgency of Axiom’s fundraising needs.

Dragons and spacesuits

The report also notes that Axiom has lost significant amounts of funding on three private astronaut missions it has flown to the International Space Station to date. Ghaffarian said these missions were conducted at a loss to build relationships with global space agencies. This does make some sense, as space agencies in Europe, the Middle East, and elsewhere are likely to be customers of commercial space stations in the next decade. However, Axiom is ill-positioned to absorb such launches financially.

The publication reveals that Axiom is due to pay $670 million to SpaceX for four Crew Dragon missions, each of which includes a launch and ride for four astronauts to and from the station encompassing a one- to two-week period. This equates to $167.5 million per launch, or $41.9 million per seat.

Axiom’s other major line of business is a $228 million development contract with NASA to develop spacesuits for the Artemis Program, which will allow astronauts to venture outside the Starship lunar lander on the Moon’s surface. According to the Forbes report, this initiative has pulled resources away from the space station program.

Multiple sources have told Ars that, from a financial and technical standpoint, this spacesuit program is on better footing than the station program. And at this point, the spacesuit program is probably the one element of Axiom’s business that NASA views as essential going forward.

A key NASA commercial partner faces severe financial challenges Read More »

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Russian state media outlet RT banned by Facebook “for foreign interference”

meta rt ban, Policy, russian state media / /

Still on X, though —

US said Russian media worked with Kremlin to influence election, foment unrest.

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Russia President Vladimir Putin hands a bouquet of flowers to editor-in-chief of Russian broadcaster RT Margarita Simonyan.

Enlarge / Russia President Vladimir Putin presents flowers to editor-in-chief of Russian broadcaster RT Margarita Simonyan after awarding her with the “Order of Alexander Nevsky” during a ceremony at the Kremlin in Moscow on May 23, 2019.

Getty Images | Evgenia Novozhenina

Meta yesterday announced a ban on Russian state media outlets RT (formerly Russia Today) and Rossiya Segodnya, taking action three days after the US government imposed sanctions on the outlets for covert influence activities.

“After careful consideration, we expanded our ongoing enforcement against Russian state media outlets: Rossiya Segodnya, RT and other related entities are now banned from our apps globally for foreign interference activity,” Meta said in a statement provided to Ars. Meta is the owner of Facebook, Instagram, WhatsApp, and Threads.

Meta already blocked RT and Rossiya Segodnya’s Sputnik network across Europe in March 2022, following a ban imposed by European Union government officials. YouTube blocked the channels worldwide. At the time, Vladimir Putin’s government was telling Russian media outlets not to call the invasion of Ukraine “an attack,” “invasion,” or “declaration of war.”

Although Meta didn’t block RT worldwide in 2022, it did impose worldwide restrictions on Russian state media. Meta said today that those restrictions prevented Russian state media from running ads, placed the state media content lower in people’s feeds, and added “nudges” asking users to confirm that they want to share or navigate to content from those outlets.

US says RT worked with Kremlin to foment unrest

Meta’s new worldwide ban comes after the US State Department said on Friday that it was designating Russian state media outlets “for their connection to Russia’s destabilizing actions abroad.” The US said it obtained new information from employees of RT and other sources showing that RT has “engaged in information operations, covert influence, and military procurement. These operations are targeting countries around the world, including in Europe, Africa, and North and South America.”

The US State Department said the government is “not taking action against these entities and individuals for the content of their reporting, or even the disinformation they create and spread publicly. We are taking action against them for their covert influence activities. Covert influence activities are not journalism.”

The US alleged that “RT and employees, including Editor-in-Chief Margarita Simonyan, have directly coordinated with the Kremlin to support Russian government efforts to influence the October 2024 Moldovan election. Specifically, in coordination with the Kremlin, Simonyan leverages the state-funded platforms for which she serves in leadership positions… to attempt to foment unrest in Moldova, likely with the specific aim of causing protests to turn violent. RT is aware of and prepared to assist Russia’s plans to incite protests should the election not result in a Russia-preferred candidate winning the presidency.”

The US also said that people “affiliated with Rossiya Segodnya coordinated with the Kremlin to attempt to foment unrest in Moldova, likely with the specific aim of causing protests to turn violent.” While RT is funded by Russia, Rossiya Segodnya is both state-owned and state-funded, the US said.

The US action blocks most transactions involving the designated entities, and “all property and interests in property of the designated persons described above that are in the United States or in possession or control of US persons are blocked and must be reported to the Department of Treasury’s Office of Foreign Assets Control,” the US said. The designation applies to Rossiya Segodnya and TV-Novosti, the latter of which is a federally funded organization that is “associated with Rossiya Segodnya and controls the RT media channel,” the US said. The US also designated Dmitry Konstantinovich Kiselev, the director general of Rossiya Segodnya.

RT: “We’ve been broadcasting straight out of the KGB”

RT has issued sarcastic responses to the US government and Meta actions. “RT Editor-in-Chief Margarita Simonyan joked that RT had learned from the Americans, rather than from Russian intelligence officers,” an RT article on the Meta ban said today.

When contacted by Ars today, RT’s press office gave us a statement saying the organization will “find the cracks to crawl through” despite the Meta ban. RT’s statement read in full:

It’s cute how there’s a competition in the West—who can try to spank RT the hardest, in order to make themselves look better. Meta/Facebook already blocked RT in Europe two years ago, now they’re censoring information flow to the rest of the world. Don’t worry, where they close a door, and then a window, our ‘partisans’ (or in your parlance, guerrilla fighters) will find the cracks to crawl through—as by Biden administration’s admission we are apt at doing.

After the State Department action last week, “RT responded with a mocking email that read in part: ‘We’ve been broadcasting straight out of the KGB headquarters all this time,'” according to CNN.

RT is still active on X, formerly Twitter. “On behalf of our team: Silence us all you want, but there’s no way to silence the truth,” the organization said.

We contacted Rossiya Segodnya today and will update this article if it provides comment.

Russian state media outlet RT banned by Facebook “for foreign interference” Read More »

how-crypto-bros-wrested-flappy-bird-from-its-creator

How crypto bros wrested Flappy Bird from its creator

crypto, flappy bird, gaming / /
Imagine owning one of those funky birds as an NFT!

Enlarge / Imagine owning one of those funky birds as an NFT!

Fans of ultra-viral mobile gaming hit Flappy Bird who were stunned by the game’s sudden removal from the iOS App Store 10 years ago were probably even more stunned by last week’s equally sudden announcement that Flappy Bird is coming back with a raft of new characters and game modes. Unfortunately, the new version of Flappy Bird seems to be the result of a yearslong set of legal maneuvers by a crypto-adjacent game developer intent on taking the “Flappy Bird” name from the game’s original creator, Dong Nguyen.

“No, I have no related with their game. I did not sell anything,” Nguyen wrote on social media over the weekend in his first post since 2017. “I also don’t support crypto,” Nguyen added.

No, I have no related with their game. I did not sell anything.

I also don’t support crypto.

— Dong Nguyen (@dongatory) September 15, 2024

“Flappy Bird was designed to play in a few minutes when you are relaxed,” Nguyen said in a 2014 interview after removing the game from mobile app stores. “But it happened to become an addictive product. I think it has become a problem. To solve that problem, it’s best to take down Flappy Bird. It’s gone forever.”

“A decade-long, convoluted journey to get here”

So how can another company release a game named Flappy Bird without Nguyen’s approval or sale of the rights? Court filings show that a company called Gametech Holdings filed a “notice of opposition” against Nguyen with the US Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) in late 2023, seeking to invalidate his claim on the “Flappy Bird” name. When Nguyen, who lives in Vietnam, didn’t respond to that notice by November, the US Patent and Trademark Office entered a default judgment against him and officially canceled his trademark in January, allowing Gametech to legally claim the name.

But Gametech’s efforts to legally acquire the Flappy Bird name seem to go back much further than that. Back in 2014, an outfit called Mobile Media Partners tried to claim the Flappy Bird trademark in a filing made mere days after Nguyen pulled the game from the App Store. Coincidentally enough, the specific New Jersey address listed by Mobile Media Partners on that 2014 application matches an address used by Gametech Holdings in the paperwork for its 2023 legal efforts.

Mobile Media Partners’ 2014 application makes reference to a (now-defunct) FlappyBirdReturns.com and asserts that the company had “reserved/acquired the name from Apple in their Apps Store [sic].” It also claims that “Flappy Bird” is “not being used by any other companies and/or people,” taking quick advantage of Nguyen’s decision to take the game down.

A section from the USPTO's 2018 trademark certificate granting

Enlarge / A section from the USPTO’s 2018 trademark certificate granting “Flappy Bird” to “Mobile Media Partners.”

With this “evidence,” the USPTO actually granted Mobile Media Partners a Flappy Bird trademark in 2018, a fact that Gametech cited in its successful 2023 opposition to Nguyen’s use of the mark.

In a press release, a spokesperson for the newly formed Flappy Bird Foundation—which acquired the trademark from Gametech—summed this all up as “a decade-long, convoluted journey to get here.” The new company said it also acquired the legal rights to Piou Piou vs. Cactus, a little-known 2011 web game that seems to have heavily inspired Flappy Bird.

The newly launched FlappyBird.org website proudly refers to “the decade-long mission” to revive the game, which “involved acquiring legal rights.” The post also mentions “working with my predecessor to uncage me and re-hatch…” in phrasing that seems to imply a link to the original Flappy Bird but which could also reference the Piou Piou vs. Cactus acquisition.

How crypto bros wrested Flappy Bird from its creator Read More »

brazil-judge-seizes-cash-from-starlink-to-cover-fine-imposed-on-elon-musk’s-x

Brazil judge seizes cash from Starlink to cover fine imposed on Elon Musk’s X

elon musk brazil, Policy, starlink brazil / /

Forced withdrawal —

Starlink and X treated as one economic group, forcing both to pay X fines.

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A supporter of former Brazil President Jair Bolsonaro holds a sign that has a picture of Elon Musk and the text,

Enlarge / Supporters of former President Jair Bolsonaro participate in an event in the central area of Sao Paulo, Brazil, on September 7, 2024. Bolsonaro backers called for the impeachment of Supreme Court Justice Alexandre de Moraes.

Getty Images | NurPhoto

Brazil seized about $2 million from a Starlink bank account and another $1.3 million from X to collect on fines issued to Elon Musk’s social network, the country’s Supreme Court announced Friday.

Supreme Court Judge Alexandre de Moraes previously froze the accounts of both companies, treating them as the same de facto economic group because both are controlled by Musk. The Starlink and X bank accounts were unfrozen last week after the money transfers ordered by de Moraes.

Two banks carried out orders to transfer the money from Starlink and X to Brazil’s government. “After the payment of the full amount that was owed, the justice (de Moraes) considered there was no need to keep the bank accounts frozen and ordered the immediate unfreezing of bank accounts/financial assets,” the court said, as quoted by The Associated Press.

The suspension of X’s social platform, formerly named Twitter, remains in place. The dispute began several months ago when Musk said he would disobey an order from de Moraes to suspend dozens of accounts accused of spreading disinformation. De Moraes later ordered the X social platform to be blocked by Internet service providers. X closed its office in Brazil and did not pay the fines.

Starlink initially said it would refuse to block X on its broadband service until the government unfroze its assets. Starlink quickly backtracked, agreeing to block X, but said it would fight the asset freeze in court. The Brazil Supreme Court’s announcement of the money transfers said that Starlink and X missed a deadline to appeal the finding that they are part of the same de facto economic group.

Shotwell accused justice of “harassing Starlink”

Starlink has called the order to freeze its assets “an unfounded determination that Starlink should be responsible for the fines levied—unconstitutionally—against X.” SpaceX President Gwynne Shotwell accused de Moraes of “harassing Starlink.”

X has said that de Moraes targeted the platform “simply because we would not comply with his illegal orders to censor his political opponents.” X also argued that it is not defying Brazilian law.

“We are absolutely not insisting that other countries have the same free speech laws as the United States. The fundamental issue at stake here is that Judge de Moraes demands we break Brazil’s own laws. We simply won’t do that,” X’s Global Government Affairs account wrote.

As noted by CNBC, Brazilian news agency UOL reported last week “that some of the accounts de Moraes ordered Musk to suspend at X belong to users who allegedly threatened federal police officers involved in a probe of former right-wing Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro.”

Bolsonaro was accused of instigating the January 8, 2023, attack on the Brazilian Congress that occurred after Bolsonaro’s election loss. Bolsonaro and his supporters praised Musk in April of this year after Musk’s decision to defy the orders to block X accounts associated with Bolsonaro supporters.

Brazil judge seizes cash from Starlink to cover fine imposed on Elon Musk’s X Read More »

ufo-50-is-the-best-retro-gaming-homage-i’ve-ever-played

UFO 50 is the best retro-gaming homage I’ve ever played

gaming, retro games, Retro Gaming / /

A blast from the future? —

Collection of 50 new ’80s-era game concepts brims with originality, care, and joy.

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Just some of the inventive character designs included in <em>UFO 50</em>.” src=”https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2024/09/ufo50_keyart-800×450.png”></img><figcaption> <p><a data-height=Enlarge / Just some of the inventive character designs included in UFO 50.

Mossmouth

If you’ve spent any time with retro gaming emulators, you’re likely familiar with the joy of browsing through a long list of (legally obtained) ROMs and feeling overwhelmed at a wide range of titles you’ve never even heard of. Picking randomly through such a game list is like wandering through a foreign country, searching for hidden jewels among all the shovelware in the bewildering and wildly imaginative early video game history.

UFO 50 captures that feeling perfectly, combining the freewheeling inventiveness of old-school game design with modern refinements and more consistent baseline quality bred over the ensuing decades. The result is an extremely playable love letter to the gaming history that will charm even the most jaded retro game fan.

A loving homage

UFO 50 presents itself as a collection of 50 dusty game cartridges made by UFO Soft, a fictional developer that operated from 1982 to 1989. Working through the company’s catalog, you’ll see evolution in graphics, music, and gameplay design that mirror the ever-changing gaming market of the real-world ’80s. You’ll also see the same characters, motifs, and credited “developers” appearing over and over again, building a convincing world behind the games themselves.

The individual games in UFO 50 definitely wear their influences on their sleeves, with countless, almost overt homages to specific ’80s arcade and console games. But there isn’t a single title here that I’d consider a simple clone or knock-off of an old gaming concept; each sub-game brings its own twist or novel idea that makes it feel new.

  • Ah, the joys of marching through a cavern of hallways with perfect 90-degree angles.

    Mossmouth

  • Aw, you always get to be the shirtless muscle guy. Can I be Player 1 this time?

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  • A giant animal wearing only high-top boots? Sure, why not?

    Mossmouth

  • The real-time positional strategy of Attactics feels like chess mixed with Advance Wars

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  • The titular “UFO” appears in a lot of different UFO 50 games, naturally

    Mossmouth

Bubble Bobble homage Kick Club, for instance, replaces its inspiration’s bubble-blowing dinosaurs with a soccer player that has to constantly chase down his only weapon: a soccer ball. Vainger combines Metroid-style shooting and gated, maze-like exploration with the gravity-flipping of Metal Storm. Magic Garden combines the avoid-your-own-tail gameplay of Snake with items that let you eat up obstacles, Pac-Man-style.

Anyone who remembers playing games in the ’80s will instantly clock plenty of other clear references. A small sampling of ones I noticed includes: Bad Dudes, Blaster Master, Gradius, River City Ransom, Shadowgate, Super Dodge Ball, Smash TV, Space Harrier, and Super Sprint. And, just like any list of ’80s ROMs, you’ll also encounter plenty of grid-based puzzle games and shoot-em-ups, each with their own take on the popular genres.

But other UFO 50 offerings are retro-stylized versions of genres and games that didn’t really exist in the ’80s. If you ever wondered what a caveman-themed tower defense game would look like on the NES, Rock On! Island has the answer. Or if you want to see a positional arena fighter in the style of Super Smash Bros. (complete with original characters that sport their own moves and weapons) then Hyper Contender has you covered. Then there’s Velgress, which combines the retro run-and-gun platforming of the NES with the roguelike procedural generation of a modern classic like Downwell.

Still, other UFO 50 games squeeze completely original concepts (as far as I can tell) into the limited technology of the time period. Lords of Diskonia is a tactical battler that has you flinging units represented by Crokinole-style disks at the other side. Party House asks you to manage a Rolodex of party guests to maximize your money and popularity without attracting unwelcome attention from the cops. Waldorf’s Journey involves flinging the titular walrus on lengthy blind jumps while carefully adjusting his landing with hilarious, energy-consuming flaps of his flippers.

  • Hot Foot is an incredibly endearing and fun take on the Super Dodge Ball formula.

    Mossmouth

  • Magic Garden combines the addictive qualities of Snake and Pac-Man.

    Mossmouth

  • Each game comes complete with its own title screen, cut scenes, etc.

    Mossmouth

  • There are a lot of shoot-em-ups in UFO 50, as befits the time period.

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  • It’s not all action. Night Manor is a full-fledged point-and-click adventure title.

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The sheer variety of different gameplay ideas on offer here is incredible. There are real-time strategy games and cooperative two-player brawlers. There’s a full-fledged golf RPG and also a 2D golf game with pinball-style hazards. There’s a Dave the Diver-esque undersea exploration adventure and a couple of Final Fantasy–style RPGs. There’s a game that combines Crazy Taxi and the original, overhead Grand Theft Auto. There’s a Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles homage that combines five different genres with five unique, fully realized anthropomorphic human-animal hybrids.

UFO 50 is the best retro-gaming homage I’ve ever played Read More »

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Also releasing today: New iOS 17, macOS 14 updates for the upgrade-averse

Apple, iOS, ios 18, ipad, iPadOS, IPhone, Mac, macOS, macOS 15, macos sequoia, Tech / /

safe space —

Security updates without the headaches for the risk-averse (and bug-averse).

–

Also releasing today: New iOS 17, macOS 14 updates for the upgrade-averse

Today is the official release date for the public versions of iOS 18, iPadOS 18, macOS 15 Sequoia, and a scad of other Apple software updates, the foundation that Apple will use for Apple Intelligence and whatever other features it wants to add between now and next year’s Worldwide Developers Conference in June. But for those who value stability and reliability over new features, you may not be excited to update to a new operating system with a version number ending in “0.”

For those of you who prefer to wait for a couple of bugfix updates before installing new stuff, Apple is also releasing security-only updates for a bunch of its (now) last-generation operating systems today. The iOS 17.7, iPadOS 17.7, and macOS 14.7 updates are either available now or should be shortly, along with a security update for 2022’s macOS 13 Ventura. An updated version of Safari 18 that runs on both macOS 13 and 14 should be available soon, though as of this writing is doesn’t appear to be available yet.

Apple has historically been pretty good about providing security updates to older macOS releases—you can expect them for about two years after the operating system is replaced by a newer version. But for iOS and iPadOS, the company used to stop updating older versions entirely after releasing a new one. This changed back in 2021, when Apple decided to start providing some security-only updates to older iOS versions to help people who were worried about installing an all-new potentially buggy OS upgrade.

Eventually, iOS and iPadOS users will need to install iOS 18 and iPadOS 18 to keep getting security updates. But for the handful of older iPads that can’t run iPadOS 18, Apple will usually keep supporting those specific devices with security updates for a year or two. Apple was still providing new security updates for 2022’s iOS 16 as recently as August, keeping older devices like the iPhone 8 and the first-generation iPad Pros reasonably secure even though they were incapable of running newer operating systems.

Also releasing today: New iOS 17, macOS 14 updates for the upgrade-averse Read More »

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macOS 15 Sequoia: The Ars Technica review

AI, Apple, apple intelligence, Apple silicon, Features, iMac, Mac Pro, Mac Studio, MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, macOS, macOS 15, macos sequoia, Reviews, Tech / /
macOS 15 Sequoia: The Ars Technica review

Apple

The macOS 15 Sequoia update will inevitably be known as “the AI one” in retrospect, introducing, as it does, the first wave of “Apple Intelligence” features.

That’s funny because none of that stuff is actually ready for the 15.0 release that’s coming out today. A lot of it is coming “later this fall” in the 15.1 update, which Apple has been testing entirely separately from the 15.0 betas for weeks now. Some of it won’t be ready until after that—rumors say image generation won’t be ready until the end of the year—but in any case, none of it is ready for public consumption yet.

But the AI-free 15.0 release does give us a chance to evaluate all of the non-AI additions to macOS this year. Apple Intelligence is sucking up a lot of the media oxygen, but in most other ways, this is a typical 2020s-era macOS release, with one or two headliners, several quality-of-life tweaks, and some sparsely documented under-the-hood stuff that will subtly change how you experience the operating system.

The AI-free version of the operating system is also the one that all users of the remaining Intel Macs will be using, since all of the Apple Intelligence features require Apple Silicon. Most of the Intel Macs that ran last year’s Sonoma release will run Sequoia this year—the first time this has happened since 2019—but the difference between the same macOS version running on different CPUs will be wider than it has been. It’s a clear indicator that the Intel Mac era is drawing to a close, even if support hasn’t totally ended just yet.

macOS 15 Sequoia: The Ars Technica review Read More »

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Final trailer for Venom: The Last Dance introduces Knull, god of symbiotes

culture, Entertainment, film trailers, Sony Pictures, Sony's Spider-Man Universe, Trailers, Venom: The Last Dance / /

The end is near —

“This world can’t survive if you stay together.”

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Tom Hardy returns for one more round as host of an alien symbiote, in Venom: The Last Dance.

Tom Hardy is back for one last hurrah as investigative journalist Eddie Brock, host of an alien symbiote that imparts superhuman powers to its host, in the final trailer for Venom: The Last Dance. The trailer has all the wise-cracking “buddy cop” vibes and fast-paced action we’ve come to expect from the franchise, including a trip to Vegas where Venom discovers the addictive allure of slot machines. But there are also hints of an inevitable bittersweet farewell—because this time they’ll face off against Knull, god-creator of the symbiotes.

(Spoilers for Venom and Venom: There Will Be Carnage below.)

As previously reported, the first film in the franchise served as an origin story for our antihero. A bioengineering firm called the Life Foundation discovered a comet covered with symbiotic lifeforms and brought four samples back to Earth. Brock’s then-fiancée, Anne Weying (Michelle Williams), showed him classified documents revealing that the foundation was conducting human/symbiote experiments. The symbiotes needed oxygen-breathing hosts to survive, but they invariably ended up killing those hosts.

Brock ended up infected with one of the symbiotes, named Venom. Venom revealed that the symbiotes are intent on taking over Earth by possessing/devouring all humans, but Brock ultimately struck up a bargain with Venom, and they decided to protect Earth instead. Together, they took on Life Foundation CEO Carlton Drake (Riz Ahmed), infected with a symbiote called Riot. Naturally, they won.

Venom was released in October 2018 and was roundly panned by critics, several of whom specifically bemoaned the lack of a Spider-Man connection. Audiences, however, begged to differ. Venom racked up $856 million globally. Hardy had already committed to two sequels, and a mid-credits sequence featured Harrelson’s Cletus Kasady taunting Brock (who was interviewing Kasady for a story) from his cell. Kasady vowed to escape and bring “carnage,” leaving little doubt as to the villain’s identity in a sequel.

Venom: Let There Be Carnage, directed by Andy Serkis, was released in 2021, also to mixed reviews and a strong box office, grossing $506.9 million worldwide. That film ended with Brock and Venom victorious over Kasady and heading off for a well-deserved vacation while the duo pondered their next steps. In a post-credits scene, Venom told Brock that he and his fellow symbiotes knew about other universes, at which point there was blinding light, and they were transported into the Marvel Cinematic Universe—a direct result of the spell cast by Doctor Strange in Spider-Man: No Way Home. (At the time, there were plans for a future crossover film with Tom Holland’s Spider-Man.)

“With you to the end”

Serkis was unable to return as director for The Last Dance, but Kelly Marcel, who wrote the screenplay for Carnage, stepped in to make her directorial debut. Per the official premise:

In Venom: The Last Dance, Tom Hardy returns as Venom, one of Marvel’s greatest and most complex characters, for the final film in the trilogy. Eddie and Venom are on the run. Hunted by both of their worlds and with the net closing in, the duo are forced into a devastating decision that will bring the curtains down on Venom and Eddie’s last dance.

In addition to Hardy, Peggy Lu is back as convenience store owner Mrs. Chen, who befriended Eddie and Venom early on. Also returning is Stephen Graham as Detective Patrick Mulligan, who figured prominently in There Will Be Carnage and is now infected with his own symbiote named Toxin.

Cristo Fernández will reprise his role as the bartender in 2012’s The Amazing Spider-Man. Rhys Ifans played Curt Connors/Lizard in that film but will play a man named Martin in The Last Dance. Is there a secret connection? We’ll have to wait and see. (It seems after two outings, Williams won’t be reprising her role as Anne in the third and final film.) The cast also includes Chiwetel Ejiofor as a soldier intent on capturing Venom; and Alanna Ubach and Clark Backo in as-yet-undisclosed roles.

Venom: The Last Dance hits theaters on October 25, 2024.

Listing image by YouTube/Sony Pictures

Final trailer for Venom: The Last Dance introduces Knull, god of symbiotes Read More »