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WHO declares H1N1 swine flu an official pandemic
Declaration will activate a slew of government pre-orders for pandemic vaccine, which will take precedence over recent orders for H1N1 vaccine; countries that do not have pre-orders will also face delays
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E-Verify implementation delayed yet again
DHS created E-Verify to allow employers to check on line the eligibility of employees to work in the United States; implementation of the system has been delayed for the fourth time; new deadline: 8 September 2009
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U.K. white supremacists plotted to use ricin against minorities
White supremacist cell in the U.K. plotted to use ricin to kill black people and other ethnic minorities in the United Kingdom; ricin is 6,000 times more poisonous than cyanide
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Congress requires competition for for aviation security services
Despite heavy lobbying by airport managers, Congress insists that TSA must hold open and full competition for security background screening services for aviation workers
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More companies use DHS immigration database
DHS says that more than 118,000 public, private, and government employers enrolled in its E-Verify database as of 1 May; enrollment is growing, but E-Verify still is used by less than 2 percent of the nation’s more than 7.4 million employers
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Identity fundamentals. pt. 1: Who cares who you are anyway?
Identity can be defined as a combination of the uniqueness of an individual (or device) and the attributes which are associated with that uniqueness; in the absence of a standard unique personal identification number, personal names are often used to build a single view across different unconnected applications
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Flying car's proof-of-concept testing now complete
Terrafugia says its Transition flying car has completed the proof-of-concept testing; company now to build a beta test prototype; the company is taking reservations, and deliveries are expected in 2011
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Nuclear power may be considered for carbon credits
Te 2001 Kyoto protocol excluded nuclear power from clean energy technology schemes; now, more and more countries appear to support the idea that developing countries should be given carbon credits if they build nuclear power stations; carbon credits could cut the capital cost of building new nuclear stations by up to 40 percent
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Congress offers relief to Washington State cherries growers
Congressional mandate, going into effect last Monday, requiring 100 percent screening of cargo on passenger planes, threated Washington State cherries grower; Congress offers growers relief
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Obama's emphasis on IT security a boon to Michigan companies
Focus on cybersecurity technology offers Michigan IT companies chance to grow; the state has been quietly building a respectable range of network security companies
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Smarter Security Systems shows vascular reader
Austin, Texas-based company shows its new vascular patterns reader; low false acceptance rate (FAR) of 0.0001 percent, quickness (0.4/seconds per person), the ability to performs with skin conditions such as scars or dirt and any lighting conditions makes it ideal for industrial applications
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Aussie Defense Department trials sneaky cameras
One of the biggest shortcomings of facial recognition devices is the angle of image capture; DSTO is toying with “attractors” — lights and sounds emitting devices that draw the attention of passers-by so they inadvertently look directly into a camera
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Biometric: Promise and peril
The trend toward digital identification and biometrics appears inexorable; this trend is a boon to companies in biometrics — but it also raises serious privacy concerns
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Biometric technologies improve, offering greater reliability
Biometrics is not perfect — but it is improving; biometrics is developing along two lines — physical, which is often more intrusive for the user, and behavioral, which is usually less intrusive; Fujitsu’s Jerry Byrnes: “What was James Bond 15 years ago is biometric reality today”
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Pakistan's security gadgets market booming
Dealers say people more interested in installing CCTVs, night-vision cameras at houses, filling stations, jewelry shops, hotels, restaurants
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The long view
Are We Ready for a ‘DeepSeek for Bioweapons’?
Anthropic’s Claude 4 is a warning sign: AI that can help build bioweapons is coming, and could be widely available soon. Steven Adler writes that we need to be prepared for the consequences: “like a freely downloadable ‘DeepSeek for bioweapons,’ available across the internet, loadable to the computer of any amateur scientist who wishes to cause mass harm. With Anthropic’s Claude Opus 4 having finally triggered this level of safety risk, the clock is now ticking.”
A Brief History of Federal Funding for Basic Science
Biomedical science in the United States is at a crossroads. For 75 years, the federal government has partnered with academic institutions, fueling discoveries that have transformed medicine and saved lives. Recent moves by the Trump administration — including funding cuts and proposed changes to how research support is allocated — now threaten this legacy.
Bookshelf: Preserving the U.S. Technological Republic
The United States since its founding has always been a technological republic, one whose place in the world has been made possible and advanced by its capacity for innovation. But our present advantage cannot be taken for granted.
Critical Minerals Don’t Belong in Landfills – Microwave Tech Offers a Cleaner Way to Reclaim Them from E-waste
E-waste recycling focuses on retrieving steel, copper, aluminum, but ignores tiny specks of critical materials. Once technology becomes available to recover these tiny but valuable specks of critical materials quickly and affordably, the U.S. can transform domestic recycling and take a big step toward solving its shortage of critical materials.
Microbes That Extract Rare Earth Elements Also Can Capture Carbon
A small but mighty microbe can safely extract the rare earth and other critical elements for building everything from satellites to solar panels – and it has another superpower: capturing carbon dioxide.