The co-founder of messaging app Telegram and very popular Russian social networking platform VK, Pavel Durov, was arrested over the weekend after his private jet landed in France. According to Reuters, Pavel was arrested "as part of a preliminary police investigation into allegedly allowing a wide range of crimes due to a lack of moderators on Telegram and a lack of cooperation with police". Telegram posted on X that "Telegram abides by EU laws, including the Digital Services Act — its moderation is within industry standards and constantly improving. Telegram's CEO Pavel Durov has nothing to hide and travels frequently in Europe. It is absurd to claim that a platform or its owner are responsible for abuse of that platform. Almost a billion users globally use Telegram as means of communication and as a source of vital information. We're awaiting a prompt resolution of this situation. Telegram is with you all". Might have to wait a few days to get some facts on this story.
Those astronauts "trapped" on the International Space Station because Boeing's Starliner craft can't bring them back due to thruster issues, are gonna stay on the ISS until February when a SpaceX Crew Dragon craft will pick them up. Starliner will undock from the ISS and "attempt to make an autonomous return to Earth and land in a desert in the southwestern United States". NASA and Boeing tried to re-create the thruster issue in the lab and ended up discovering other problems that eroded NASA's confidence in the craft to the point where they just couldn't risk astronaut's lives in it. Yet another L for the once great Boeing. Like Intel, they are too big to fail and the US government will prop them up, but how long will the suck? Will they learn from their mistakes? Will they ever return to be the peak of science and manufacturing?
Legislation to create an SMS Sender ID Register has passed both houses of Parliament last week and will become law soon. It will "require telcos to check whether messages sent under a brand name correspond with the legitimate sender on the list, and either block the SMS or warn recipients about its origin". It's got $10m of funding and a pilot was launched late last year with a few banks and government agencies. ACMA will now "develop an industry standard, with the expectation that the full register will be in operation in late 2025", but it's still unknown if ACMA will make it mandatory, even though it has "in principle" support from industry. It's gotta be mandatory, yeah? If not, you're just giving scammers a list of brands ripe to take advantage of.
As of today, folks in NSW that call 000 will be able to live stream what's going on back to emergency services thanks to a new platform called BluLink. To use it, "members of the public click on a link that is sent to their smartphone when they call triple-0". Once you tap the link, "you will then be able to share information such as your GPS location, stream live video, or have a text message conversation if you're in a situation where you're unable to speak". Police may also send a link so you can "upload files such as photos or video to help with investigations, or provide a statement to help with investigations". No app is required, it's all web based. It seems to be police only for now, but I could see this being very useful for ambos too.
Mobile phone and packaging, Apple iPhone 3GS 16GB, plastic / metal / glass / electronic components / paper, designed by Sir Jonathan Ive and the Apple Industrial Design group, California, United States of America, made for Apple Inc by Foxconn, Shenzhen, Guangdong, China, 2008 (Powerhouse Museum)
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