An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: A Philadelphia man has been freed after a federal appeals court ruled that his continued detention was violating federal law. Francis Rawls, a former police officer, had been in jail since 2015, when a federal judge held him in contempt for failing to decrypt two hard drives taken from his home. The government believes they contain child pornography. After losing that appeal, Rawls raised another challenge: the federal statute that allows judges to hold witnesses in contempt for refusing to testify, passed in 1970, states that "in no event shall such confinement exceed eighteen months." The government argued that this provision didn't apply to Rawls because he was a suspect, not a witness. Also, the rule applies to a "proceeding before or ancillary to any court or grand jury." But because the government hadn't formally charged Rawls with a crime, the government argued, there was no court proceeding under way. Last week, a three-judge panel of the 3rd Circuit rejected this argument in a 2-1 vote. The court's two-judge majority held that Congress had intended for the 18-month limitation to apply broadly to any legal proceeding, not just a formal trial. And while Rawls was a suspect in the case, he was also a witness. The practical result is that, at least in federal court, someone can only be imprisoned for 18 months for refusing to open an encrypted device. The government says it has other evidence suggesting that Rawls possessed child pornography, "so prosecutors may be able to piece together enough evidence to convict him, even without access to his encrypted hard drives," the report adds. "One of the two judges who formed the 3rd Circuit's majority urged the trial court judge to consider the four years of imprisonment Rawls has already served if he eventually has to sentence Rawls after a child pornography conviction."

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On January 16th, Facebook users received an error message when posting in Jinghpaw, a language spoken by Myanmar's ethnic Kachin and written with a Roman alphabet. From a report: "We couldn't post this. Tap for more info," the message said. When clicking, a second appeared: "Your request couldn't be processed. There was a problem with this request. We're working on getting it fixed as soon as we can." A Facebook representative told The Verge that the issue was caused by "a bug in our language infrastructure," and coincided with the launch, the same day, of an updated language identification model supporting ten new languages, including Jinghpaw. The representative said Facebook fixed the issue within hours of receiving reports on January 17th. But while the disabling of Jinghpaw was not an active move of censorship, it alerted many Kachin people that Facebook had the capability to identify their language, an alarming thought for the embattled minority group. That realization has evoked a visceral reaction from the Kachin, and brought forth new calls for the company to be more transparent about its technology and the ways it will be used.

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Every person in the world is wasting about 500 calories of food a day, according to a new study.

Epic Games CEO Tim Sweeney opened a game event in Las Vegas today with a call to make the industry more open and liberate it from the monopolistic practices of platform owners such as Google and Apple. From a report: In a talk about his vision for games in the next decade, Sweeney alternated between criticizing all of the big players in the game industry to criticizing specific players with examples of how their behavior isn't good for consumers or for competition. [...] Sweeney called Android a "fake open system" for putting up barriers in front of users when Epic Games wanted to enable players to sideload Fortnite directly from the Epic Games site, rather than through the Google Play store. Sweeney said that Google put up "scary" pop-ups in front of users about the risks of sideloading (viruses, malware) and other steps that users had to engage in order to get Fortnite on Android. Epic also had in "tough discussions" with Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo to make Fortnite available as a crossplay title (meaning you can play against people on other systems, and your progress, items, and so on are available regardless of device) across the platforms. One of the principles that Sweeney argued for was that "gamers should be free to engage in any game with their friends anyplace they want without any unnecessary friction." He said that the platforms have been too balkanized, and Microsoft lost a whole decade of progress as it tried and failed to make its Windows marketplace more like Apple's closed system. Microsoft has since backed off on that. Gamers and game vendors should be "free of lockdown." He drew a comparison to Visa and Mastercard and the global credit card payment system, where vendors charge 2.5% to 3.5% fees for transactions, while store vendors such as Steam, Apple, and Google charge 30%. He said the global payments industry is proof that highly profitable companies can arise from just taking the 2.5% to 3.5% cut.

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This is my new anthem when someone asks or tells me about what Trumpers think or believe.

I think we've had just about enough of Lisa Murkowski.

Braintrust query: I have a JavaScript app running in the browser. I want it to quit when another copy of the same app is opened in another tab. I used to do this with a localStorage value. Set it to a random string of 25 characters. Periodically compare the string in localStorage with the one I set at startup. If it's different I know another copy of the app is running, and I (used to) exit via window.close. This no longer works. There's an error from the browser, "Scripts may close only the windows that were opened by it." So is there no way for an app to quit on its own without a user interaction?

Chief Information Security Officers (CISOs, or CSOs) across the industry are reporting high levels of stress. From a report: Many say the heightened stress levels has led to mental and physical health issues, relationship problems, medication and alcohol abuse, and in some cases, an eventual burnout, resulting in an average 26-month tenure before CISOs find new employment. The numbers, reported by Nominet, represent a growing issue that's been commonly acknowledged, but mostly ignored across the information security (infosec) community, but one that is slowly starting to rear its ugly head as once-ignored infosec roles are becoming more prominent inside today's companies. [...] The survey's results paint a gloomy picture about one of today's most in-demand jobs. According to the numbers: 88% of CISOs reported being "moderately or tremendously stressed." 48% of CISOs said work stress has had a detrimental impact on their mental health. 40% of CISOs said that their stress levels had affected their relationships with their partners or children. 32% said that their job stress levels had repercussions on their marriage or romantic relationships.

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In an emailed statement, John Hoffman, the CEO of GSMA, which organizes the trade fair, said the coronavirus outbreak has made it "impossible" to hold the event. Further reading, from earlier today: MWC Hangs by a Thread After Nokia, Vodafone, DT and Other Big Names Back Out

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Essential, Android creator Andy Rubin's high-profile phone startup, is shutting down. From a report: As a result of the shutdown, Essential says it will no longer support the Essential Phone with further security updates or customer support. Additionally, Newton Mail, which Essential acquired when it purchased developer CloudMagic in 2018, will stop working on May 1st. On its blog, Essential cites Project Gem, the tallish concept phone the company teased late last year, and its inability to find a "clear path" to get the device to consumers as the main reason for the shutdown. The startup had raised about $330 million.

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Nilay Patel, a lawyer and editor-in-chief of The Verge, on court's approval of T-Mobile and Sprint merger: The decision itself is extremely surprising: Judge Victor Marrero of the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York basically decided that the various data and experts put forward by the 10 state attorneys general who sued to stop the merger weren't worth taking seriously and that he would decide for himself whether T-Mobile and Dish seemed like cool companies worth trusting. And... it turns out that Judge Marrero thinks CEO John Legere and the rest of T-Mobile's executives are extremely cool and smart and that Dish Network is definitely trustworthy and that everything is going to work out great. Also, the judge thinks that Sprint sucks. Really, if there's one major takeaway here, it's that Victor Marrero, a federal judge selected by Bill Clinton for a lifetime appointment on the federal judiciary, thinks that Sprint is a bad company with a crap network run by dummies. This is the law now. Let's go through the decision.

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The Czech data protection authority has announced an investigation into antivirus company Avast, which was harvesting the browsing history of over 100 million users and then selling products based on that data to a slew of different companies including Google, Microsoft, and Home Depot. From a report: "On the basis of the information revealed describing the practices of Avast Software s.r.o., which was supposed to sell data on the activities of anti-virus users through its 'Jumpshot division' the Office initiated a preliminary investigation of the case," a statement from the Czech national data protection authority on its website reads. Under the European General Protection Regulation (GDPR) and national laws, the Czech Republic, like other EU states, has a data protection authority to enforce things like mishandling of personal data. With GDPR, companies can be fined for data abuses. "At the moment we are collecting information on the whole case. There is a suspicion of a serious and extensive breach of the protection of users' personal data. Based on the findings, further steps will be taken and general public will be informed in due time," added Ms Ivana Janu, President of the Czech Office for Personal Data Protection, in the statement. Avast is a Czech company.

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Even if Biden were 30 years younger, even if he were a great candidate who inspired love and trust, the fact that he came from the Obama presidency means he could not get elected. We can remember Obama the way we remember FDR or JFK, he was dreamy, and he did the ACA, and dug us out of a depression, but in the end the US lost under Obama. We now know that for sure. Whoever leads us next, if we're lucky enough to have that be in 2021, that has to be someone who accepts the US as it is, not as it was.

35.3% said Klobuchar would finish third in New Hampshire. Not bad. The number one answer was fourth or lower, at 45.4%.

DoNotPay, the family of consumer advocacy services meant to protect people from corporate exploitation, is launching a new app aimed at helping end our long national nightmare surrounding robocalls by giving you a burner credit card to get their contact details then giving you a chatbot lawyer to automatically sue them. From a report: DoNotPay Founder and CEO Joshua Browder's Robo Revenge app is unique from every other app looking to protect you from robocalls in that it can get you cash while stopping them completely. "All of the big companies like AT&T and Apple have failed to protect consumers," Browder told Motherboard over the phone. "Consumers have to protect themselves. The only way the problem will end is if the robocallers start losing money every time they call someone." In the past, DoNot Pay has offered various apps to help consumers fight back. DoNotPay's Free Trial Card creates a virtual, one-time-use credit card to protect you from getting charged by "industrialized scams" like free trials. DoNotPay's original offering was a chatbot lawyer program that automatically disputed parking tickets in small claims court. Robo Revenge combines both features to automatically add you to the Do Not Call Registry, generate a virtual DoNotPay burner credit card to provide scammers when they illegally call you anyways, use the transaction information to get the scammer's contact information, then walk you through how to sue them for as much as $3,000 per call under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA), a law already on the books meant to protect consumers from calls that violate the Do Not Call Registry. The app also streamlines the litigation paperwork by automatically generating demand letters and court filing documents.

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