Officials from the city of Hartford, Connecticut, were forced to postpone the first day of the new school calendar year after a ransomware infection impacted the city's IT network. From a report: According to a statement published by Hartford Public Schools, the school district serving the city of Hartford, the ransomware attack impacted several of the school's internal IT systems, causing a prolonged outage. IT staff have been working to restore services, but these were not completed in time for the first day of the new school year, scheduled for today, Sept. 8. Following the COVID-19 pandemic, in-person schooling has been suspended since the spring. In the city of Hartford, today marked not only the first day of the new 2020 school year but also the first day of in-person attendance in months. According to the district's school re-opening plan, today, PreK-Grade 2, Grade 6, and Grade 9 students were supposed to have the first school classes in months.

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: AT&T smartphone users who see their network indicators switch from "4G" to "5G" shouldn't necessarily expect that they're about to get faster speeds. In PCMag's annual mobile-network testing, released today, 5G phones connected to AT&T got slower speeds than 4G phones in 21 out of 22 cities. PCMag concluded that "AT&T 5G right now appears to be essentially worthless," though AT&T's average download speed of 103.1Mbps was nearly as good as Verizon's thanks to a strong 4G performance. Of course, AT&T 5G should be faster than 4G in the long run -- this isn't another case of AT&T misleadingly labeling its 4G network as a type of 5G. Instead, the disappointing result on PCMag's test has to do with how today's 5G phones work and with how AT&T allocates spectrum. The counterintuitive result doesn't reveal much about the actual differences between 4G and 5G technology. Instead, it's reflective of how AT&T has used its spectrum to deploy 5G so far. As PCMag explained, "AT&T's 5G slices off a narrow bit of the old 850MHz cellular band and assigns it to 5G, to give phones a valid 5G icon without increasing performance. And because of the way current 5G phones work, it often reduces performance. AT&T's 4G network benefits from the aggregation of channels from different frequencies. "The most recent phones are able to assemble up to seven of them -- that's called seven-carrier aggregation, and it's why AT&T won [the PCMag tests] last year," the article said. 5G phones can't handle that yet, PCMag analyst Sascha Segan wrote: "But 5G phones can't add as many 4G channels to a 5G channel. So if they're in 5G mode, they're giving up 4G channels so they can use that extremely narrow, often 5MHz 5G channel, and the result is slower performance: faux G. For AT&T, using a 5G phone in testing was often a step backward from our 4G-only phone."

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Uber has announced several new commitments, initiatives, and product expansions designed to address climate change. From a report: In a virtual press event this morning, Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi cited the positive impact that the global lockdown has had on the environment, with "blue skies replacing smog above city skylines" and many cities using the pandemic to "rethink their infrastructure." However, with pollution rising again as normal routines resume, Khosrowshahi said that rather than "going back to business as usual," it's making moves to reduce its environmental impact. "COVID-19 didn't change the fact that climate change remains an existential threat and crisis that needs every person, every business in every nation to act," Khosrowshahi said. First up, Uber said that it intends to be an entirely zero-emission platform by 2040, with 100% of all rides booked through its app -- be that cars, public transit, or scooters -- taking place on zero-emission vehicles. Before that, though, the company is setting a goal of 2030 for all cars on its platform to transition to electric in the U.S., Canada, and Europe, as well as hitting net-zero emissions on the corporate side of its business during the same time frame.

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Apple on Tuesday shot back in its legal battle with Fortnite creator Epic Games, filing a response and counterclaims alleging that the gaming company breached its contract with Apple, and seeking an unspecified amount in damages. From a report: "Epic's lawsuit is nothing more than a basic disagreement over money," Apple said in a filing with the District Court for the Northern District of California. "Although Epic portrays itself as a modern corporate Robin Hood, in reality it is a multi-billion dollar enterprise that simply wants to pay nothing for the tremendous value it derives from the App Store." [...] Apple's response suggests it was blindsided by Epic, and even notes that Epic executives "recognized and thanks Apple for its support and promotion of Fortnite events," as recently as April 2020. "Unbeknownst to Apple, Epic had been busy enlisting a legion of lawyers, publicists, and technicians to orchestrate a sneak assault on the App Store. Shortly after 2:00 a.m. on August 13, 2020, the morning on which Epic would activate its hidden commission-theft functionality, Mr. Sweeney again emailed Apple executives, declaring that 'Epic will no longer adhere to Apple's payment processing restrictions.'" Apple said in the filing that Epic Games has earned over $600 million from the App Store.

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The Federal Trade Commission has been investigating Intuit and its marketing of TurboTax products, following ProPublica's reporting that the Silicon Valley company deceived tax filers into paying when they could have filed for free. From a report: The FTC probe, run out of the commission's Bureau of Consumer Protection, centers on whether Intuit violated the law against unfair and deceptive practices in commerce. One focus of the investigation is whether TurboTax marketing misdirected customers who were eligible to file their taxes for free into paid products. The investigation, which has been underway for more than a year, was revealed publicly in a recent Intuit filing in which the company's lawyers appealed to the commission to limit the scope of its investigation. Intuit produced half a million pages of documents in response to the FTC's first civil investigative demand -- a kind of subpoena -- last year. The request for records came after ProPublica's reporting on how Intuit used a variety of tactics to divert customers away from a free TurboTax product and toward paid versions. Under a longstanding agreement with the IRS called Free File, Intuit and other tax prep companies promised to offer free products to most Americans; in exchange, the IRS agreed not to create a free government tax filing option that would compete with the industry.

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Google today is introducing a new feature for Android phones that will help legitimate businesses reach their customers by phone by having their brand name and reason for calling properly identified. From a report: The feature, known as "Verified Calls," will display the caller's name, their logo, a reason why they're calling, and a verification symbol that will indicate the call has been verified by Google. The feature arrives at a time when spam calls are on the rise. U.S. consumers received 61.4 billion spam calls in 2019, according to a recent report from RoboKiller, representing a 28% increase from the prior year. The U.S. Federal Communications Commission also says that unwanted calls, are its top consumer complaint. Google's new system gives legitimate businesses a way to share their information with consumers along with their reason for calling on the incoming call screen. This, however, only works with those participating businesses who have chosen to sign up with one of Google's partners in order to have their calls verified. According to Google's website for the service, businesses can get started with Verified Calls by working with a partner such as Neustar, JustCall, Telecall, Zenvia, Prestus, Aspect, Five9, Vonage, Bandwidth, IMImobile, Kaleyra, Quiubas Mobile, or Datora.

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How does a person, much less a president, come to see fallen soldiers as losers or suckers. Then imagine what the president thinks of people who defend us against the virus. This is the opposite of leadership. He is the enemy.

Google today launched Android 11, the latest version of its mobile OS, and pushed the source code to the Android Open Source Project (AOSP). From a report: Unlike previous major versions, Android 11 is not only arriving as an over-the-air update to Pixel phones first, but also on OnePlus, Xiaomi, Oppo, and Realme phones "with more partners launching and upgrading devices over the coming months." That's a major departure for Android, updates for which take months to arrive thanks to carriers and device makers dragging their feet. It doesn't help that Android is the dominant mobile operating system available on thousands of different device configurations, powering over 2.5 billion monthly active devices. [...] Android 11 brings a long list of new features. Google originally split them into three themes: People, Controls, and Privacy. But there is also support for 5G, new screen types, and call screening. There's even a frame rate API for helping apps and games adopt variable refresh rates, which will be a big focus over the next few years as phones and TVs adopt the feature from computer monitors. Google also expanded the Neural Networks API for running computationally intensive machine learning operations.

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The camera detector for the Vera Rubin Observatory takes its first test images in the laboratory.

An anonymous reader shares a report: Microsoft has seen success with its budget friendly Surface Go tablet thanks to its $399 starting price, and it appears the company is hoping to further capitalize on that success with another price conscious Surface PC, this time in the form of a laptop. Codenamed Sparti, I'm told that Microsoft is working on a lightweight midrange clamshell PC designed with students in mind. According to my sources, Sparti has a 12.5-inch display with a 10th-generation Intel Core i5 processor, 4GB RAM, and 64GB storage in the entry-level model. It'll ship with Windows 10 in S mode and be priced somewhere between $500 and $600. I'm told that Sparti is being positioned as a more affordable Surface Laptop, similar to how Microsoft positions the Surface Go alongside the Surface Pro today.

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BingeWorthy's hotlist requires a minimum number of ratings to be included in the list. Previously it was 5. I just changed it to 25. Soon it'll give you the ability to set the value for yourself, but the default for new users and people not signed in will be 25.

Apple just announced a digital-only event on Sept. 15 where it's expected to reveal its newest iPhones. Apple typically unveils its new iPhones during an event at its headquarters in Cupertino, Calif. in September, but this year it will host it online-only due to the ongoing spread of the coronavirus. From a report: It's possible Apple also announces the Apple Watch Series 6, a refresh to its iPad Air and other products at the event. The event starts at 10 a.m. PT. Apple didn't provide any additional details but will likely stream it online, as it usually does. Apple is expected to announce four new iPhones this year, including two "regular" iPhone 12 models and two iPhone 12 Pro models with new designs that include sharper edges around the corners. For reference, the new design will be similar to 2010's iPhone 4, according to TF International Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo. Screen sizes include a 5.4-inch model, two with 6.1-inch screens and a big model with a 6.7-inch display, according to Kuo, who also said that Apple won't include headphones or a charger in the box.

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Viewers are flocking to games during the pandemic, entranced by a charismatic grandmaster and his lightning-fast play. From a report: On a recent afternoon, thousands of noncombatants watched from the sidelines as their general ordered his troops across the battlefield and became locked in a fierce duel with the enemy. At one point, he berated himself for a tactical misstep that could have cost his side the high-stakes conflict. Then he smiled and began outmaneuvering his foe. "I can't lose," Hikaru Nakamura, 32, said to the exultant onlookers. Victory seemed close as members of the opposing army were vanquished one by one. "I win again -- there you go, guys. Wow." Mr. Nakamura gave himself just a moment's respite, then plunged into another fray. Pawns, knights, bishops and even kings fell before him as the chess grandmaster demolished a slate of online challengers, all while narrating the tide of the battle to tens of thousands of fans watching him stream live on Twitch, the Amazon-owned site where people usually broadcast themselves playing video games like Fortnite and Call of Duty. The coronavirus pandemic and stay-at-home orders have crowned a host of unlikely winners catering to bored audiences. But watching livestreams of chess games? Could one of the world's oldest and most cerebral games really rebrand itself as a lively enough pastime to capture the interest of the masses on Twitch? Turns out, it already has. Since the pandemic began, viewership of live chess games has soared. From March through August, people watched 41.2 million hours of chess on Twitch, four times as many hours as in the previous six months, according to the analytics website SullyGnome. In June, an amateur chess tournament called PogChamps was briefly the top-viewed stream on Twitch, with 63,000 people watching at once, SullyGnome said. And popular Twitch gamers like Felix Lengyel (better known to his 3.3 million followers as "xQcOW") have also recently started streaming chess.

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As countries race to develop a Covid-19 vaccine, just determining who's infected remains a major challenge. From a report: Large-scale testing is a crucial element in containing the virus, experts say, because many who contract it exhibit little to no symptoms. Without widespread testing, it's a daunting task to identify contagious individuals and isolate them. To help meet that challenge, the XPRIZE Foundation, which aims to spur technological and industry advancements, is offering a $5 million prize to develop a new Covid-19 rapid test. Competitors can enter until midnight Tuesday. Since July, 659 teams from 68 countries have registered. Currently, test results for the novel coronavirus can take up to two weeks, creating headaches for medical professionals, public-health experts and elected officials. Without the ability to test people often and with speedy results, many cases may go undetected, which can lead to new clusters of infections. "We have, like everyone else around the globe, seen the impact this has had on mental health, physical health, bringing the wheels off of the economy," said Anousheh Ansari, chief executive officer of the XPRIZE Foundation. "We always look at innovation to solve grand challenges." Ansari and her family poured millions into funding the first XPRIZE in 2004 that launched the commercial space race. That $10 million prize brought in about $100 million of investment to the teams that competed, helping fuel what is now a more than $100 billion industry. Ansari's hope is that the Covid prize will seed a similar investment boom to fight a virus that has infected more than 27.3 million people and killed more than 892,000 worldwide.

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You'd be amazed how many people have 10-year-old TVs. There's been so much progress. I was one of those people until last year, bought a big Sony for a few thou in 2010. Replaced it with a much better, much larger, higher def screen for 1/5th the price in 2019. Just looked at prices, makes my 2019 screen look like chopped liver.