### Issue 1717 - Thursday 20th October, 2022

## In Today's Issue

- Private health insurer Medibank is currently experiencing cyber security issues
- Intel demonstrates Next-Gen Thunderbolt and USB4 v2
- Senate committee floats an Australian "right to disconnect", Starlink satellite internet for planes, EU wants to stop crypto mining over winter
- DiscMaster makes the Internet Archive's collection of CDs and floppy disks easy to search and view
- Cheap Logitech keyboard case for iPad Pro, Sonos home theater kit, TCL 65" Mini LED TV, Sony camera & lens cashback, Samsung Galaxy Watch 4, Alienware QD-OLED monitor

## The News

### Private health insurer Medibank is currently experiencing cyber security issues

Medibank's IT crew have had a very shit week. They first noticed "unusual activity on its network" on October 13th. On October 17th they put out a media release saying there is "no evidence that any customer data has been removed from our IT environment". Yesterday they informed us they've "received messages from a group that wishes to negotiate regarding their alleged removal of customer data" and the ASX halted trading of their shares. According to the SMH, hackers are threatening to contact 1000 of the "most media persons" in their database "criteria is: most followers, politicians, actors, bloggers, LGBT activists, drug addictive people, etc" and "email them their information". Sucks to be an Optus customer with Medibank private health insurance!

### Intel demonstrates Next-Gen Thunderbolt and USB4 v2

It's that time of the decade again - Intel's got a new version of Thunderbolt. Intel reckon "Next-Gen Thunderbolt" (aka Thunderbolt 5, but Intel isn't calling it Thunderbolt 5 for some reason) will be capable of up to 80Gb/s of bandwidth and has a mode that'll allow "dynamic re-balancing" so you can have up to 120Gb/s for transmission and 40Gb/s for receiving, making it capable of dual 8K displays running at 60Hz. Intel also showed off USB4 v2 (why not call it USB 5???), which can also supports up to 80Gb/s and also carry DisplayPort 2.1 signals across 4x PCIe 4.0 lanes, so I'm not quite sure what Thunderbolt 5 brings to the party except perhaps one less layer of abstraction? Modern external I/O is very fast and very confusing.

### Senate committee floats an Australian "right to disconnect", Starlink satellite internet for planes, EU wants to stop crypto mining over winter

- The Senate Select Committee on Work and Care has suggested that the government introduce a "right to disconnect" law so "workers have the capacity to disconnect from their job and to work their contractual hours" as technology introduces "availability creep" where "employees feel they need to be available all the time to answer emails, calls or simply deal with their workload". Good idea, huge vote winner. Get it done Albo.
- SpaceX is promoting a new variant of Starlink for aviation designed to replace the relatively the slow internet on commercial aircraft. They claim Starlink can provide 350Mbps to each plane, with latency "as low as" 20ms so passengers can enjoy "video calls, online gaming, virtual private networks and other high data rate activities". The sanctity of the skies has already been violated by the internet so we may as well make it good internet.
- Winter is approaching for the northern hemisphere, which means more electricity use as people heat their homes to avoid freezing to death. They're still having trouble with their gas supply thanks to Russia, so as a last resort to make sure there's enough energy to go around the EU wants member states "ready to stop crypto-assets mining". It's the least useful application of precious electricity, so yes, fuck it off. Maybe even do that permanently.

## Something I Saw On The Internet

### DiscMaster makes the Internet Archive's collection of CDs and floppy disks easy to search and view

The Internet Archive's Jason Scott and a merry band of anonymous hackers on Discord have created DiscMaster - a website "that is sifting through the CDs and floppy disks in the Internet Archive and making it all into a searchable database". It makes all those ISO and IMG and BIN files explorable on the web, no downloads required, unlocking the gems inside. To sweeten the deal even further, DiscMaster can play, convert and display all those weird and old media formats right in your browser. It's one thing to collect and hoard all this data, but it's another to make it available in a way that's easy to browse and accessible to people. The difficulty of that should not be understated. Now the fun bit is wading through it all and curating the interesting stuff. Go check it out.

## Bargains

- Logitech Combo Touch for iPad Pro 12.9" - $179 from Amazon
- Sonos Arc, Sub Gen 3 and 2x One SL to use as wireless rear speakers - $2750 from Sight & Sound Galleria
- TCL 65C835 65" Mini LED 4K TVplus bonus $100 Good Guys gift card and $70 "StoreCash" - $1695 from The Good Guys
- Sony camera and lens cashback. $50-$500 back depending what you buy. Can combine with 7% cashback at Cashrewards too.
- Samsung Galaxy Watch 4 with LTE, 40mm, 44mm, 46mm - $299/$349/$499 at JB Hi-Fi
- Alienware AW3423DW 34" QD-OLED curved 3440x1440 gaming monitor - $1839 at JB Hi-Fi

## Image Of The Day

Prime Minister Bob Hawke and student unveiling computer under Coles 'Apples for the Students' programme Coburg North Primary School, 1991 - Credit: State Library of Victoria

## The End

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