Ex-Flight Centre employee jailed for stealing $40,000 from Canberra branch
A 39-year-old man has been jailed for two years after stealing cash from a secure drawer at Flight Centre in Canberra at least seven times, and then mountinga campaign of dishonesty” to delay sentencing. ⌘ Read more

‘We Built a Database of 290,000 English Medieval Soldiers’
An anonymous reader quotes a report from the Conversation, written by authors Adrian R. Bell, Anne Curry, and Jason Sadler: When you picture medieval warfare, you might think of epic battles and famous monarchs. But what about the everyday soldiers who actually filled the ranks? Until recently, their stories were scattered across handwritten manuscripts i … ⌘ Read more

Top Consultancies Freeze Starting Salaries as AI Threatens ‘Pyramid’ Model
Major consulting firms including McKinsey, Boston Consulting Group and Bain have frozen starting salaries for the third consecutive year as AI reshapes how these companies think about their traditional reliance on large cohorts of junior analysts. Job offers for 2026 show undergraduate packages holding steady at $135,000-$140,00 … ⌘ Read more

Airbus Says Most of Its Recalled 6,000 A320 Jets Now Modified
Airbus said Monday that the vast majority of around 6,000 A320-family jets affected by an emergency software recall have now been modified, leaving fewer than 100 aircraft still requiring work after a frantic weekend of repairs prompted by the discovery of a vulnerability to solar flares. The unprecedented recall – described as the broadest emergency a … ⌘ Read more

More than 1,000 dead after extreme flooding across Asia
Indonesia, Thailand and Sri Lanka are reeling from flooding that has killed hundreds in each country and destroyed communities. ⌘ Read more

AI Helps Drive Record $11.8B in Black Friday Online Spending
Earlier this month MasterCard noted that even Walmart now allows its customers to make purchases through ChatGPT. And after polling more than 4,000 consumers in the U.S., Canada, U.K., and UAE, they found “more than four in 10 consumers already use AI tools to help them shop, including 61% of Gen Z and 57% of millennials.”

Many (50% of Gen Z and 49% of millenn … ⌘ Read more

Why tiny Barbados said good by to the royal family
With countries like Australia still debating whether or not the time has come to become a republic, what prompted tiny Barbados with its population of less than 300,000, to take the leap? ⌘ Read more

Airbus Issues Major A320 Recall, Threatening Global Flight Disruption
Europe’s Airbus said on Friday it was ordering immediate repairs to 6,000 of its widely used A320 family of jets in a sweeping recall affecting more than half the global fleet, threatening upheaval during the busiest travel weekend of the year in the United States and disruption worldwide. From a report: The setback appears to be among t … ⌘ Read more

DNA study backs archaeological evidence of Indigenous Australians’ arrival
A new genetic study has found Indigenous Australians travelled over two distinct routes, and 100 kilometres of open water, to reach the ancient landmass that would become Australia 60,000 to 65,000 years ago. ⌘ Read more

Robots and AI Are Already Remaking the Chinese Economy
China installed 295,000 industrial robots last year – nearly nine times as many as the United States and more than the rest of the world combined – as the country races to automate its manufacturing base amid rising labor costs at home and tariff threats from abroad.

The nation’s stock of operational robots surpassed 2 million in 2024, according to the Intern … ⌘ Read more

Seven Years Later, Airbus is Still Trying To Kick Its Microsoft Habit
Breaking free from Microsoft is harder than it looks. Airbus began migrating its 100,000-plus workforce from Office to Google Workspace more than seven years ago and it still hasn’t completed the switch. The Register: As we exclusively revealed in March 2018, the aerospace giant told 130,000 employees it was ditching Microsoft’s productivit … ⌘ Read more

Controversy over City of Perth’s $125,000 workplace culture review
Internal revolt intensifies at the City of Perth over the newly elected lord mayor’s pursuit of a ratepayer-funded workplace culture review, in a process deemed unlawful by his own administration. ⌘ Read more

AI Can Technically Perform 12% of US Labor Market’s Wage Value, MIT Simulation Finds
Researchers at MIT and Oak Ridge National Laboratory have built a simulation that models all 151 million American workers and their skills, then maps those skills against the capabilities of over 13,000 AI tools currently in production to see where the two overlap. The answer, according to their analysis: 11.7 … ⌘ Read more

Victorian premier demands answers after copper thieves trigger Optus crisis
Jacinta Allan has sought an urgent briefing after another Optus outage left more than 14,000 customers in the lurch. ⌘ Read more

75,000 without power as ‘ferocious’ storms lash NSW
A man suffers multiple injuries in a wild storm that brings down trees and powerlines and cuts electricity to tens of thousands of people in the NSW Central West. ⌘ Read more

HP To Cut About 6,000 Jobs By 2028, Ramps Up AI Efforts
HP plans to cut 4,000-6,000 jobs by 2028 “as part of a plan to streamline operations and adopt artificial intelligence,” reports Reuters. From the report: HP’s teams focused on product development, internal operations and customer support will be impacted by the job cuts, CEO Enrique Lores said during a media briefing call. “We expect this initiative will create $1 billi … ⌘ Read more

Breaking: Optus investigating ‘significant’ outage south of Melbourne
Calls to emergency services have been impacted by the outage, the telco confirmed, with more than 14,000 customers affected. ⌘ Read more

Newly formed Queensland company secures 1,000 coal mining jobs
A newly formed Queensland company has taken over a majority shareholding in a Bowen Basin coal mine, securing 1,000 jobs. ⌘ Read more

Adolescence Lasts Into 30s - New Study Shows Four Pivotal Ages For Your Brain
The brain goes through five distinct phases in life, with key turning points at ages nine, 32, 66 and 83, scientists have revealed. From a report: Around 4,000 people up to the age of 90 had scans to reveal the connections between their brain cells. Researchers at the University of Cambridge showed that the brain stays … ⌘ Read more

Former ANU vice-chancellor Genevieve Bell paid more than $400,000 in severance
Former ANU vice-chancellor Genevieve Bell received a severance package of more than $400,000 after resigning in September. ⌘ Read more

Analyzing 47,000 ChatGPT Conversations Shows Echo Chambers, Sensitive Data - and Unpredictable Medical Advice
For nearly three years OpenAI has touted ChatGPT as a “revolutionary” (and work-transforming) productivity tool, reports the Washington Post.

But after analyzing 47,000 ChatGPT conversations, the Post found that users “are overwhelmingly turning to the chatbot for … ⌘ Read more

780,000 Windows Users Downloaded Linux Distro Zorin OS in the Last 5 Weeks
In October Zorin OS claimed it had 100,000 downloads in a little over two days in the days following Microsoft’s end of support for Windows 10.

And one month later, Zorin OS developers now claim that 780,000 people downloaded it from a Windows computer in the space of a month, according to the tech news site XDA Developers.

… ⌘ Read more

Court Ends Dragnet Electricity Surveillance Program in Sacramento
A California judge has shut down a decade-long surveillance program in which Sacramento’s utility provider shared granular smart-meter data on 650,000 residents with police to hunt for cannabis grows. The EFF reports: The Sacramento County Superior Court ruled that the surveillance program run by the Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) … ⌘ Read more

Amazon Cut Thousands of Engineers in Its Record Layoffs, Despite Saying It Needs To Innovate Faster
Amazon’s 14,000-plus layoffs announced last month touched almost every piece of the company’s sprawling business, from cloud computing and devices to advertising, retail and grocery stores. But one job category bore the brunt of cuts more than others: engineers. CNBC: Documents filed … ⌘ Read more

Astronomers may have glimpsed evidence of the biggest stars ever seen
The distant universe might be littered with supermassive stars between 1000 and 10,000 times the mass of the sun, which could solve a cosmic mystery about the origins of extremely large black holes ⌘ Read more

Fired Techie Admits Sabotaging Ex-Employer, Causing $862K In Damage
An Ohio IT contractor pleaded guilty to breaking into his former employer’s network after being fired, impersonating another worker and using a PowerShell script to reset 2,500 passwords – an act that locked out thousands of employees and caused more than $862,000 in damage. He faces up to 10 years in prison. The Register reports: Maxwell Schu … ⌘ Read more

Nvidia Brings Ad-free Cloud Gaming To New Chromebooks
Nvidia and Google announced today a new cloud gaming plan called GeForce Now Fast Pass that is exclusive to Chromebooks. Anyone who purchases a new Chromebook will receive a year of the service included with their device at no additional charge. Fast Pass allows Chromebook owners to stream more than 2,000 games from their existing Steam, Epic or Xbox libraries.

The … ⌘ Read more

Verizon Cutting More Than 13,000 Jobs As It Restructures
An anonymous reader writes: U.S. wireless carrier Verizon said Thursday it will cut more than 13,000 jobs in its largest single layoff as it works to shrink costs and restructure operations. Verizon also said it plans to convert 179 corporate-owned retail stores into franchised operations and close one store.

Verizon’s new CEO, Dan Schulman, said in a note to employe … ⌘ Read more

More Than 60 US and Canadian Police Units Now Use Boston Dynamics’ Robot Dog
Boston Dynamics’ Spot robot is now deployed by more than 60 bomb squads and SWAT teams across the US and Canada. The 75-pound four-legged machine starts at around $100,000 and has been used in armed standoffs, hostage rescues and hazardous materials incidents since its commercial debut five years ago. The Massachusetts … ⌘ Read more

An AI Podcasting Machine Is Churning Out 3,000 Episodes a Week
fjo3 shares a report from TheWrap: There are already at least 175,000 AI-generated podcast episodes on platforms like Spotify and Apple. That’s thanks to Inception Point AI, a startup with just eight employees cranking out 3,000 episodes a week covering everything from localized weather reports and pollen trackers to a detailed account of Charlie Kirk’s as … ⌘ Read more

Ancient figurine may show sexual encounter between woman and goose
A 12,000-year-old clay sculpture found in Israel depicts a goose on the back of a woman, and archaeologists suggest it may be a depiction of an animistic mythological scene ⌘ Read more

Cybercriminals unleash fake Centrelink scam on vulnerable Australians
More than 270,000 malicious emails impersonating Services Australia and Centrelink have flooded Australian inboxes. ⌘ Read more

Security Researchers Spot 150,000 Function-less npm Packages in Automated ‘Token Farming’ Scheme
An anonymous reader shared this report from The Register:

Yet another supply chain attack has hit the npm registry in what Amazon describes as “one of the largest package flooding incidents in open source registry history” — but with a twist. Instead of injecting credential-steal … ⌘ Read more

She Used ChatGPT To Win the Virginia Lottery, Then Donated Every Dollar
An anonymous reader quotes a report from the Washington Post: Winning the lottery isn’t what brought Carrie Edwards her 15 minutes of fame. It was giving it all away. Standing alone in her kitchen one day in September, the Virginia woman was thunderstruck to discover she had won $150,000 in a Powerball drawing. As she was absorbing h … ⌘ Read more

Man charged after police seize $35k worth of cocaine from apartment
Police have thwarted an illegal drug trafficking operation to supply cocaine across St Kilda after seizing $35,000 worth of drugs from an apartment. ⌘ Read more

Oldest ever RNA sample recovered from woolly mammoth
RNA from an exceptionally well preserved woolly mammoth gives us a window on gene activity in an animal that died nearly 40,000 years ago ⌘ Read more

World’s First Flying Car Factory Begins Production In China
Xpeng’s flying-car subsidiary Aridge has begun trial production at the world’s first dedicated flying-car factory in Guangzhou. Euronews reports: The 120,000-square-meter facility has produced its first detachable eVTOL aircraft for the modular “Land Aircraft Carrier.” With an annual capacity of up to 10,000 modules, the factory will eventually assemble one … ⌘ Read more

Jack Dorsey Funds diVine, a Vine Reboot That Includes Vine’s Video Archive
An anonymous reader quotes a report from TechCrunch: As generative AI content starts to fill our social apps, a project to bring back Vine’s six-second looping videos is launching with Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey’s backing. On Thursday, a new app called diVine will give access to more than 100,000 archived Vine videos, restor … ⌘ Read more

Verizon To Cut About 15,000 Jobs
Verizon is planning to cut roughly 15,000 jobs, looking to reduce costs as it contends with increased competition for wireless service and home internet, according to WSJ, which cites people familiar with the matter. From the report: The cuts, the largest ever for the carrier, are set to take place in the next week, the people said. The majority of the reduction is expected to be made through layoffs. Verizon … ⌘ Read more

Ignore these neo-Nazis at our peril: Evil left unchallenged will be normalised
They lie and hijack the ANZAC legend while defiling the memory of almost 40,000 Australians who died fighting Nazi Germany. ⌘ Read more

Cost of treatment for deadly cancer slashed
The cost of a crucial treatment for a deadly cancer will drop from nearly $13,000 a month to just $25 after it was added to the PBS. ⌘ Read more

The average Australian wedding is $34,000. Polly and Riley’s choice starts at $480
In a year when Jeff Bezos’ wedding was slammed for its excess, registry weddings are on the rise. ⌘ Read more

Synopsys Plans 10% Job Cuts After Ansys Deal Closure
An anonymous reader shares a report: Synopsys will lay off about 10% of its workforce, or roughly 2,000 employees, as the chip-design software maker looks to redirect investment towards growth opportunities, according to a regulatory filing on Wednesday. The move comes after the company completed its $35 billion cash-and-stock acquisition of engineering design firm Ansys earl … ⌘ Read more

‘A breeding ground for misogyny’: Calls to shut down popular review website
A Melbourne-run sex review website with more than 250,000 members has been labelled a breeding ground for misogyny and unacceptable behaviour towards women. ⌘ Read more

Cradle of humanity is still revealing new insights about our origins
The Omo-Turkana basin in Africa is home to a treasure trove of ancient human fossils and tools that span 300,000 years – today it is still yielding new discoveries about our species ⌘ Read more

My goodness, a new level of stupidity.

The bots are now doing things like this:

GET http://uninformativ.de/projects/lariza/feednotify/datenstrahler/slinp/countty HTTP/1.1

1. That URL does not exist.
   
2. By including http://uninformativ.de in that request, this instructs the webserver to do an HTTP proxy request. Of course, this isn’t allowed on my webserver (and shouldn’t by allowed on any normal webserver), resulting in HTTP 400. And even if it were, the target would be the exact same server, making a proxy request unnecessary.
   

And of course, it’s not just 50 hits like this or 100 or 1’000 or 10’000. No, it’s over 150’000 in the last 2 days. All from vastly different IP ranges of different cloud hosters.

This almost looks like a DDoS attack, but it’s just completely stupid. This feels more like some idiot vibe coded a crawler.

Turkey Seeks More Than 2,000 Years Jail for Istanbul Mayor | The sentence request raises the prospect that President Erdogan’s strongest challenger will be barred from the next election ⌘ Read more

Non-harmonic two-color femtosecond lasers achieve 1,000-fold enhancement of white-light output in water
Scientists at Japan’s Institute for Molecular Science have achieved a 1,000-fold enhancement in white-light generation inside water by using non-harmonic two-color femtosecond laser excitation. This previously unexplored approach in liquids unlocks new nonlinear optical pathways, enabling a dramatic boost in supercontinuum generation. The breakthrough lays a foundation for next-generation b … ⌘ Read more

‘Where’s the $2.4 million?’: Brittany Higgins’ bankruptcy order delayed by court technicality
Higgins and her husband, David Sharaz, have been ordered to pay Higgins’ former boss, former Liberal senator Linda Reynolds, upwards of $341,000 in damages. ⌘ Read more

DOJ tells Republicans that Epstein files even worse for Trump than they thought: report
Carl Gibson,  Staff Writer  -  AlterNet

_Stephan: We do not have a functioning Congress in large measure because the Republican members are trying to protect “king” Trump from what the release of the complete Epstein files will reveal about him. That’s why Rep.-elect Adelita Grijalva (D-Ariz), has yet to be sworn into office. Over 800,000 citizens in A … ⌘ Read more