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Funding For Program To Stop Next Stuxnet From Hitting US Expired Sunday

1 month 3 weeks ago
Government funding for a program that hunts for threats on America's critical infrastructure networks expired on Sunday, preventing Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory from analyzing activity that could indicate a cyberattack, the program director told Congress on Tuesday. From a report: Nate Gleason leads a team at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory (LLNL) focused on nation-state threats against critical infrastructure, and this includes the CyberSentry Program. It's a public-private partnership, managed by CISA, that looks for malicious activity on IT and operational technology (OT) networks in America's energy, water, healthcare, and other critical facilities. This includes threats along the lines of China's Volt Typhoon and Salt Typhoon intrusions -- network activity that may look like, or even start as, espionage, but ultimately enables the digital invaders to backdoor critical orgs and deploy cyber weapons to aid in a kinetic war.

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COVID Pandemic Aged Brains By an Average of 5.5 Months, Study Finds

1 month 3 weeks ago
An anonymous reader quotes a report from NBC News: Using brain scans from a very large database, British researchers determined that during the pandemic years of 2021 and 2022, people's brains showed signs of aging, including shrinkage, according to the report published in Nature Communications. People who got infected with the virus also showed deficits in certain cognitive abilities, such as processing speed and mental flexibility. The aging effect "was most pronounced in males and those from more socioeconomically deprived backgrounds," said the study's first author, Ali-Reza Mohammadi-Nejad, a neuroimaging researcher at the University of Nottingham, via email. "It highlights that brain health is not shaped solely by illness, but also by broader life experiences." Overall, the researchers found a 5.5-month acceleration in aging associated with the pandemic. On average, the difference in brain aging between men and women was small, about 2.5 months. "We don't yet know exactly why, but this fits with other research suggesting that men may be more affected by certain types of stress or health challenges," Mohammadi-Nejad said. [...] The study wasn't designed to pinpoint specific causes. "But it is likely that the cumulative experience of the pandemic -- including psychological stress, social isolation, disruptions in daily life, reduced activity and wellness -- contributed to the observed changes," Mohammadi-Nejad said. "In this sense, the pandemic period itself appears to have left a mark on our brains, even in the absence of infection." "The most intriguing finding in this study is that only those who were infected with SARS-CoV-2 showed any cognitive deficits, despite structural aging," said Jacqueline Becker, a clinical neuropsychologist and assistant professor of medicine at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. "This speaks a little to the effects of the virus itself." The study may shed light on conditions like long Covid and chronic fatigue, though it's still unclear whether the observed brain changes in uninfected individuals will lead to noticeable effects on brain function.

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The Escobar Phone Scam Saga Has Finally Come To an End

1 month 3 weeks ago
Olof Kyros Gustafsson, former CEO of Escobar, pleaded guilty to fraud and money laundering charges related to the company's phone scam operation. The Department of Justice says Gustafsson took orders for phones branded with Pablo Escobar's likeness but failed to deliver products, instead transferring customer money for personal use. When customers sought refunds, Gustafsson fraudulently referred payment processors to certificates of ownership as proof of delivery. The phones were Samsung devices with gold stickers. Gustafsson faces up to 20 years in prison and $1.3 million in restitution at his December 5th sentencing.

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