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Polkit, formerly known as PolicyKit, is a systemd SUID-root program. It’s installed by default in every major Linux distribution. How dangerous is it? Very. This vulnerability is easy to exploit. And, with it, any ordinary user can gain full root privileges on a vulnerable computer by exploiting this vulnerability in its default configuration. As Qualys wrote in its brief description of the problem: “This vulnerability is an attacker’s dream come true....

Also: The two smart devices I will never install in my house Currently, these devices aren’t readily compatible with each other. Some tinkerers set up a bridge, like HomeBridge, or an automation via IFTTT to get incompatible devices like these to work with each other. But this requires work, time, and sometimes basic programming knowledge. Eve was one of the participants to make big announcements for the smart home world....

One of these firms was Medcast, which launched two online learning programs to upskill registered nurses on critical care nursing and high dependence nursing. In the first two weeks of launch, the organisation saw enrolment from registered nurses based in metro, rural, and regional Australia hit 20,000. These courses were delivered between April to August 2020. Medcast director Stephen Barnett attributed the organisation’s ability to launch and deliver these courses in such a short period of time to the tech overhaul the company completed five years ago....

StellarFi offers three different membership tiers for users: a $4.99 monthly membership, a $9.99 membership, and a $19.99 membership. The mid tier lets consumers add an unlimited amount of bills for StellarFi to pay on their behalf. There are no other fees for user’s to worry about, the company said. There is no credit check required to make an account, just a valid bank account and a Social Security number to verify your identity....

“The speech of politicians are already very highly scrutinised,” Meta Australia policy head Josh Machin told reporters at a press briefing “It’s scrutinised by [journalists], but also by academics, experts, and their political opponents who are pretty well-positioned to push back or indicate they don’t believe something’s right if they think they’re being mischaracterised.” Misinformation that is political in nature and comes from people who are not politicians will be eligible to be fact-checked, however....

SDCs are data errors that do not leave any record or trace in system logs. Sources of SDCs include datapath dependencies, temperature variance, and age, among other silicon factors. Since these data errors are silent, they can stay undetected within workloads and propagate across several services. The data error can affect memory, storage, networking, as well as computer CPUs and cause data loss and corruption. Meta engineers started testing three years ago as they had a difficult time detecting SDCs once components had already gone into one of its production data centre fleets....

Also: Apple’s VR/AR headset is coming. Here’s everything we know so far Details on Project Chronos, which is still very much a work in progress, were limited, so ZDNET caught up with Sanjeev Menon, vice president and general manager of the Desktop Business Segment at Lenovo, via email after the show to find out more. Why do you think similar motion-control technologies have failed to gain widespread traction? Natural motion-capture technologies are either marker-based using body-tracking sensors or markerless-based using cameras....

Also: How to use the new Bing (and how it’s different from ChatGPT) Confirming the beta release in a tweet posted on Wednesday, Pedram Rezaei, Microsoft Chief Technology Officer for the Mobile and Commerce Division, asked: “Did we just add major AI functionality to @SwiftKey?” and then followed up by saying: “Slowly rolling out. Get yourself onto the Beta channel to taste the future.” By selecting the new SwiftKey beta as the keyboard on your Android device, you can search for information via Bing, ask the AI to rewrite certain text, and chat with it to generate specific content....

In January 2021, Microsoft took the wraps off the Microsoft Cloud for Retail; the second announced Microsoft industry cloud bundle. Cloud for Retail is meant to provide an “end-to-end shopper journey.” Like the Microsoft Cloud for Healthcare, it combines services and features from Azure, Microsoft 365, Dynamics 365, Power Platform and adds Microsoft Advertising specifically for retail customers. Like the healthcare cloud offering, Cloud for Retail is meant to bring together disparate data sources via a common data model....

Microsoft has several other Kubernetes-themed sessions slated for Build, including a how-to for Azure Arc-enabled Kubernetes and another session about “seamless and secure Kubernetes experience and observability” thanks to “distroless” .NET containers, the Azure Kubernetes Service and ARC-enabled Kubernetes. Azure Arc is Microsoft’s solution for customers who want to run and manage their services, including Kubernetes, across Microsoft and non-Microsoft clouds and on-premises servers. Microsoft shared publicly hundreds of the planned Build 2022 sessions this week....

Windows will now remember if users turn on Bluetooth or Wi-Fi when in airplane mode so that next time users select airplane mode, their preferences will be carried over. Windows Sandbox now supports reboots inside virtualized environments. Three high-priority notifications will now be shown as stacked and shown at the same time for apps that send notifications for calls, reminders or alarms using Windows notifications. This capability is also being rolled out staggered, so all testers won’t see it immediately....

Microsoft has decided to wind back a new-ish security restriction in Office that was heralded a “game changer” for the cybersecurity industry because it would block a favorite – and effective – technique used by crooks to distribute phishing and malware threats in email. Since April, Microsoft has blocked by default VBA macros obtained from the internet in Office apps on devices running Windows. The in-scope apps included Excel, PowerPoint, Visio, and Word....

Microsoft’s latest Windows 11 Beta Channel builds have included two releases: a higher build number with features rolling out, and a lower build number with features off by default. In this case, build 22622.450 and 22621.450 don’t appear to be very different as both builds received fixes and other improvements. “We enhanced Microsoft Defender for Endpoint’s ability to identify and intercept ransomware and advanced attacks,” Microsoft’s Insider Program managers explained....

In spite of these desires for more flexibility by employees, 50% of leaders say they have plans for a full in-person return to the office this year. Employees who were surveyed said they want a reason why they should come into the office, yet only 28% of companies have established team agreements about who should work from where. And 53% of those surveyed say they are more likely to prioritize their health and wellbeing over work....

In an update on Friday, Microsoft said it found “information-stealing malware” on the machine of one of its support agents that had access to “basic account information for a small number of our customers”. “The actor used this information in some cases to launch highly-targeted attacks as part of their broader campaign. We responded quickly, removed the access and secured the device,” the company said. “The investigation is ongoing, but we can confirm that our support agents are configured with the minimal set of permissions required as part of our Zero Trust ’least privileged access’ approach to customer information....

With an Intel i7 processor, 16 GB of RAM, and a 256 GB SSD, this computer can complete any task in incredible time. Did I mention that this Surface Pro 8 has Windows 11 as well? With a battery life exceeding 15 hours of usage, you can use this Microsoft Surface Pro 8 all day. But, when the battery level gets low, the Fast Charging ports get you back to maximum battery life in a jiffy....

So, it might seem a bit too good to be true when Monoprice comes along with Bluetooth headphones that claim to provide ANC for just $60. While that skepticism turned out to be well-founded during my testing, I still found that the Monoprice SYNC-ANC Bluetooth headphones had a lot going for them, especially with their shaky ANC disabled. I won’t bury the lede. The ANC on these headphones is just not good....

Every time I’d fly through London’s Heathrow Airport, I’d stock up on fine British chocolate and scurrilous political magazines at an airport store. Then the hell would begin. I’d have to go through self-checkout as there was only one human checkout – and that, only sometimes. I was reasonably adept at scanning the items. It’s not hard to find the barcode. But then the machine would demand I scan my boarding pass....

The sensors are connected via low Earth orbit nanosatellites, and have been estimated to save the council around AU$20,000 each year. The council partnered with Optus Enterprise and Myriota on the deployment, with Optus parent company Singtel having a stake in Myriota. “As a council we have made great strides in implementing smart technologies, from our AI road scanning system on garbage trucks to pathway defect detection e-bikes, just to name a few,” Mayor Peter Flannery said....