Category: World

Is The Loonie The ‘Most Hated Currency’ In Markets Right Now? | CBC News

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The Canadian dollar has seen its share of volatility this year as trade tensions between the U.S. and Canada reached a fever pitch over the weekend. The currency is down more than five per cent against the U.S. dollar since hitting its highest point this year at the end of January. Even as it moved higher on Wednesday after the U.S. Federal Reserve’s decision to raise interest rates, Mark McCormick, head of North American foreign exchange strategy at TD Securities, said the loonie “is probably the market’s most hated currency now,” based on his discussions with investors.…

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VPNFilter Malware Infecting 500,000 Devices Is Worse Than We Thought | Ars Technica

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Two weeks ago, officials in the private and public sectors warned that hackers working for the Russian government infected more than 500,000 consumer-grade routers in 54 countries with malware that could be used for a range of nefarious purposes. Now, researchers from Cisco’s Talos security team say additional analysis shows that the malware is more powerful than originally thought and runs on a much broader base of models, many from previously unaffected manufacturers. Besides covertly manipulating traffic delivered to endpoints inside an infected network, ssler is also designed to steal…

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How Do Apple’s Screen Time And Google Digital Wellbeing Stack Up? | The Verge

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Developer conference season is coming to an end with Apple’s WWDC this week, and the main takeaway is that between Google’s “Digital Wellbeing” and Apple’s “Screen Time,” the two biggest smartphone developers are taking some time to discourage smartphone overuse. On the surface, the two companies are taking very similar approaches with the tools they’re offering to present information to users. Apple and Google are both adding new dashboards, with options for more zoomed-out perspectives on how you’re spending your time, along with more granular views of how often you’re…

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FBI Urges Everyone To Reboot All Routers Immediately | Digital Trends

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Following reports that a type of malware has infected more than 500,000 routers used in homes and small businesses in more than 50 countries, the FBI is urging all consumers to reboot their routers. The VPNFilter malware was discovered by Cisco’s security researchers and affects routers made by Linksys, Mikrotik, Netgear, QNAP, and TP-Link. The U.S. Department of Justice said the authors of the VPNFilter were part of the Sofacy group that answered directly to the Russian government, Reuters reported, and that Ukraine was the likely target of the attack. “The VPNFilter…

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Electric Car Adoption Is Slowed Down By ‘Dismissive And Deceptive Car Dealerships’, Finds New Study | Electrek

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In the US, a study found that the electric vehicle shopping experience at car dealers is quite poor and a problem for EV adoption. Now, a new study finds a similar problem in Europe where “dismissive and deceptive car dealerships create barriers to electric vehicle adoption at the point of sale.” That’s the actual title of the research paper published in the Nature Energy science magazine by researchers from Aarhus University, Denmark and the University of Sussex. The study is based on “126 shopping experiences at 82 car dealerships across Denmark, Finland,…

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Google’s Selfish Ledger Ideas Can Be Found In Its Patent Applications – The Verge

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I trust by now we’ve all seen and been at least a little disturbed by The Selfish Ledger, the nearly 9-minute-long concept video from inside Google’s “moonshot factory” X labs. In the wake of it becoming public this week, Google quickly disavowed the video, claiming it was just a thought experiment “not related to any current or future products.” And yet, the company’s patent applications exhibit a mode of thinking that runs at least in parallel, if not on the exact same tracks, as The Selfish Ledger’s total data collection…

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Technical Ignorance Is Not Leadership | TechCrunch

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There is a peculiar pattern that I have noticed among elites in the United States outside Silicon Valley, which is the almost boastful ignorance of technology. As my colleague Jon Shieber pointed out today, you can see that ignorance among congressmen throughout the whole Facebook/Cambridge Analytica saga. Our president has rarely sent an email, and seems to confine his mobile phone activities to Twitter. One senior policymaker told me a few months ago that she doesn’t know how to turn on her computer. Such a pattern is hardly unique to…

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FCC Approves SpaceX Plan For Satellite-Provided Internet | Engadget

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The SpaceX plan for a global wireless internet network provided by 4,425 satellites has been approved by the FCC. The $10 billion Starlink proposal calls for the satellites to launch in two phases between 2019 and 2024, then fly between 714 and 823 miles above the Earth providing a 1 Gbps connection. Commissioners voted 5-0 to approve, with the plan following similar requests by OneWeb, Space Norway, and Telesat. The Starlink network will consist of 4,425 satellites around the world. Read full story here: FCC Approves SpaceX Plan For Satellite-Provided Internet…

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Dog Bites: It May Not Be Them, It Could Be You – Health – CBC News

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Having a nervous personality could boost your chances of being bitten by a dog. Results from a recent survey compiled by the University of Liverpool show that those who scored as being more “emotionally stable” on a personality test were less likely to be bitten by a dog. The research could have consequences for anyone who has ever cowered in the presence of a dog, even if they may not be able to control their emotional responses enough to avoid being bitten. Experts say that although a dog’s reason for becoming excited or upset…

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Forget $9,000… Bitcoin Falls Below $7,000 [Updated] | Ars Technica

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Further ReadingMore bad news pushes bitcoin’s value below $9,000If there were any lingering doubts about whether the Bitcoin bubble was over, those should be gone now. After falling below $9,000 last Thursday for the first time since November, Bitcoin has fallen south of $7,500 as of this writing. Bitcoin was trading at right around $8,250 at the start of Monday, so it’s down nearly 9 percent so far today. Bitcoin had rallied a bit over the weekend, peaking at nearly $9,500 on Saturday, but Monday’s news that Lloyds Bank has…

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