Speaker 1: Welcome to tech Stuff, a production from I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: Hey there, and welcome to tech stuff. I'm your host
Speaker 1: job in Strickland. I'm an executive producer with I Heart Radio.
Speaker 1: And how the tech are you. It's time for the
Speaker 1: tech news for Tuesday, August two, two thousand twenty two. Now,
Speaker 1: if you haven't seen reports already, you are likely to
Speaker 1: come across a headline or a news snippet saying something
Speaker 1: along the lines of a solar storm is going to
Speaker 1: hit the Earth tomorrow. In case you're listening from the future,
Speaker 1: tomorrow would be Wednesday, August three, twenty two. And if
Speaker 1: you are from the future, how did it turn out?
Speaker 1: Are the zombies as bad as we heard? I'm kidding.
Speaker 1: So this news could sound a bit concerning, So I
Speaker 1: am here to tell you what this actually means. And
Speaker 1: right at the top, there is no need to worry.
Speaker 1: There's no cause for panic here. This is a mild
Speaker 1: solar storm, g one solar storm, and it's quite probable
Speaker 1: that tomorrow will come and go and most of you
Speaker 1: won't even notice anything unusual. However, solar storms do have
Speaker 1: the potential to cause some disruption here on Earth. So
Speaker 1: here's what's going on. The Earth has a strong magnetic field,
Speaker 1: and that's great because it helps protect us from being
Speaker 1: bombarded by stuff like solar debris, such as what is
Speaker 1: recently erupted from the Sun. These particles can carry a
Speaker 1: lot of energy. They could be harmful if they were
Speaker 1: to collide with us here on Earth. In fact, life
Speaker 1: would not really be possible if it weren't for the
Speaker 1: fact that we had this magnetic field that helps protect us.
Speaker 1: The magnetic field and the and the atmosphere together are
Speaker 1: like a force field for us here on Earth. Well,
Speaker 1: when the debris makes contact with Earth's magnetic field, that
Speaker 1: field ends up contracting a little bit. It gets you know, constricted,
Speaker 1: It absorbs energy, and the result is we get geo
Speaker 1: magnetic storms. Now, those can actually be gorgeous, They can
Speaker 1: be spectacular if they're strong enough. Fluctuations on Earth's magnetic
Speaker 1: field are sometimes visible. That's what the Aurora borealis is, right,
Speaker 1: the aurora at the polls. That's from these fluctuations of
Speaker 1: the magnetic fields, so the northern and southern lights. In
Speaker 1: other words, well, during a very powerful geomagnetic storm, those
Speaker 1: aurora can sometimes be visible much further away from the source.
Speaker 1: Than is typically possible. Like normally, for the Northern Lights,
Speaker 1: for example, you have to be pretty far north to
Speaker 1: see them, but in times of real geomagnetic storm activity,
Speaker 1: it might be possible to see them as far south
Speaker 1: as the Caribbean, which is unbelievable. So in places like Atlanta, Georgia,
Speaker 1: where I am, you know that's it's it's almost unheard
Speaker 1: of to be able to see the Northern Lights. Now,
Speaker 1: to be clear, that kind of activity is not going
Speaker 1: to happen tomorrow. Again, this is a mild solar storm.
Speaker 1: People in places like Michigan and Maine might be able
Speaker 1: to see the Northern Lights, but folks as far south
Speaker 1: as I am are not going to see it. These
Speaker 1: storms are electromagnetic in nature, so you get these electromagnetic
Speaker 1: surges and as a result, they can interfere with larger
Speaker 1: electronic systems and devices, um stuff like power grids. You
Speaker 1: can see surges and power grids because these are enormous systems, right,
Speaker 1: so you can almost think of them as a huge
Speaker 1: antenna for electro magnetic surges and that can then be
Speaker 1: detected within those systems. Generally speaking, the larger the system,
Speaker 1: the more prone it is to at least being affected
Speaker 1: a little bit by solar storms. Now, are really powerful
Speaker 1: electromagnetic surge is something from a massive solar eruption or
Speaker 1: maybe something you know, more terrestrial in in nature, like
Speaker 1: a blast from a nuclear warhead for example. That would
Speaker 1: be powerful enough to affect things like personal electronics. But again,
Speaker 1: that's not what's happening tomorrow. The solar storm will see
Speaker 1: tomorrow will be very mild in nature, so there might
Speaker 1: be some power surges here and there, but it's not
Speaker 1: going to be anything massive at least that's not what
Speaker 1: anyone's predicting. So, uh, chances are most people are going
Speaker 1: to go through the day tomorrow and not even notice
Speaker 1: that there was anything weird happening. We are entering into
Speaker 1: an era of increased solar activity. This is not unusual.
Speaker 1: This happens in cycles. The full cycle lasts eleven years,
Speaker 1: and we're coming back round to the part of the
Speaker 1: cycle where there's increased solar activity. Now, could this mean
Speaker 1: that in the future there is a solar flare coronal
Speaker 1: mass ejection that's large enough to have a noticeable effect
Speaker 1: on systems here on Earth. Yes, that is possible. Way
Speaker 1: back in the nineteenth century, I believe it was eighteen
Speaker 1: fifty nine there was a solar storm that was so
Speaker 1: powerful that it ended up causing surges in telegraph lines
Speaker 1: here on Earth and caused issues. Then that is not
Speaker 1: what we're gonna see tomorrow. Doesn't mean that we won't
Speaker 1: see it in the future. It's another reminder that we
Speaker 1: have to be very careful in how we prepare and
Speaker 1: design our systems so that they can handle these kinds
Speaker 1: of surges. As it stands, power grids on Earth typically
Speaker 1: aren't built to survive massive spikes like that. We would
Speaker 1: likely see outages in a in a truly large solar storm,
Speaker 1: So we can really think of this more as a warning,
Speaker 1: but not anything to be alarmed about for the time being. Okay,
Speaker 1: let's go for another Elon Musk Twitter update. So when
Speaker 1: last we met, Twitter had sued Musk for trying to
Speaker 1: back out of his acquisition deal for the company, and
Speaker 1: a judge has now schedule a day five day court
Speaker 1: case that's going to take place in October, and Twitter
Speaker 1: still has to hold a shareholder vote to get shareholder
Speaker 1: approval for Musk purchasing the company. That vote will happen
Speaker 1: later this year. Now, I suspect that the shareholders are
Speaker 1: going to approve of the acquisition because Musk agreed to
Speaker 1: buy Twitter at fifty four dollars and twenty since per share,
Speaker 1: and right now Twitter stock is currently trading, you know,
Speaker 1: somewhere around the forty one mark, so shareholders would stand
Speaker 1: to make a good amount of money if they sold
Speaker 1: their shares to Elon Musk. But the latest update is
Speaker 1: that last Friday, Musk filed a counter suit against Twitter,
Speaker 1: so he has countersued Twitter. Now we know that the
Speaker 1: filing is more than a hundred sixty pages long, but
Speaker 1: we don't know what's in it. It was privately filed.
Speaker 1: Only the court knows what's in it. Up to this point,
Speaker 1: the analysts whose work I've been reading about this haven't
Speaker 1: been terribly impressed with the arguments made by Musk's team
Speaker 1: of lawyers as to why he should be allowed to
Speaker 1: back out of the deal without any issue. But then
Speaker 1: it may be that the countersuit contains more compelling arguments.
Speaker 1: I just don't know. Now. We might get a redacted
Speaker 1: version of the countersuit before too long, and then we'll
Speaker 1: learn a bit more. I still don't know how this
Speaker 1: whole thing is gonna go. So my gut tells me
Speaker 1: the musk is kind of up the creek due to
Speaker 1: the nature of that initial agreement to acquire Twitter, But
Speaker 1: I am no legal expert, and anyway, sometimes court cases
Speaker 1: defy logic, or at least what I call logic. Fast
Speaker 1: Company has a report on how the tech sector continues
Speaker 1: to cut back on costs, which includes stuff like hiring
Speaker 1: freezes and layoffs. So the Fast Company says that Oracle
Speaker 1: reports are saying that thousands of employees will be laid
Speaker 1: off in the coming months in places like the United
Speaker 1: States and Canada, India, and Europe. Shopify laid off around
Speaker 1: ten percent of its work force last month. Lift has
Speaker 1: reorganized its business and in the process eliminated sixty jobs
Speaker 1: in its rental division. Netflix, which is a company that's
Speaker 1: been in and out of the news a lot this
Speaker 1: year due to issues with subscriber loss, has laid off
Speaker 1: around three hundred employees this year so far, and has
Speaker 1: also canceled a bunch of projects that I was personally
Speaker 1: looking forward to. So sad that the world is not
Speaker 1: going to get an animated movie version of Bone phenomenal
Speaker 1: uh comic book series. You can get the full collection
Speaker 1: and I highly recommend it, and it is sad that
Speaker 1: we're not going to get the animated version of it.
Speaker 1: Fast Company also notes that coin Base, which is a
Speaker 1: cryptocurrency exchange, is going to lay off nearly twenty percent
Speaker 1: of its workforce, and while it wasn't part of Fast
Speaker 1: Company's report, we've also heard about companies like Microsoft and
Speaker 1: Meta and Apple putting hiring freezes in place for certain departments.
Speaker 1: We've also heard Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg indicating that the
Speaker 1: company is going to reduce headcount and try to do
Speaker 1: more with less, saying things like they're probably people working
Speaker 1: here who shouldn't be working here. Fun times. Well, we've
Speaker 1: also got a few Apple related news I ams to
Speaker 1: talk about that I am eager to get to. We're
Speaker 1: gonna take a quick break when we come back. I'm
Speaker 1: going to talk about these Apple stories. We're back. So
Speaker 1: Apple story number one, it's that Apple has sent out
Speaker 1: an email to all employees saying that the company is
Speaker 1: lifting its mask mandate for employees at quote most locations
Speaker 1: end quote. In fact, I'm going to expand on that.
Speaker 1: Apple employees received an internal email that had one part
Speaker 1: of it saying quote in light of current circumstances, wearing
Speaker 1: a face mask will no longer be required in most locations.
Speaker 1: End quote. Now I'm curious what those current circumstances are
Speaker 1: because we're kind of in another COVID nineteen surge, and
Speaker 1: then there's an increased concern for other diseases, like you know,
Speaker 1: monkey pocks is a growing concern. And now I should
Speaker 1: still add that doctors are still working out to what
Speaker 1: extent monkey pocks could transmit from person to person through
Speaker 1: you know, respiratory excretions. Uh, there's there's not a full
Speaker 1: understanding of that. There's some evidence to suggest that it
Speaker 1: can happen, but we don't know to what extent. However,
Speaker 1: I would think that would be enough to raise concerns
Speaker 1: in certain areas like you know, California, for example, and
Speaker 1: suggest that maybe masks would be a good idea. So
Speaker 1: I don't I don't understand. In fact, over in San Francisco,
Speaker 1: which is not too far from where Apple headquarters is,
Speaker 1: I mean it's not like super close, but it's not
Speaker 1: super far either, BART, which is also known as the
Speaker 1: Bay Area Rapid Transit System, has reinstated it's mask mandate.
Speaker 1: So weird that Apple would remove its mask mandate just
Speaker 1: as you down the road, Bart is putting it back
Speaker 1: in place. I guess it just feels like odd timing
Speaker 1: to me. I am not sure what is going on
Speaker 1: here now. I will say that Apple's email reiterated that
Speaker 1: if employees feel more comfortable wearing a mask, they should
Speaker 1: do so. Uh, and that the company wants all employees
Speaker 1: to respect each other's decisions about whether or not to
Speaker 1: wear a mask. Um. Again, just odd timing. I don't
Speaker 1: know what prompted that, but there you go. Next up,
Speaker 1: Apple reported a decline and its profits last week. The
Speaker 1: company's profits were down by more than ten percent compared
Speaker 1: to the end of the second quarter of last year. Revenue, however,
Speaker 1: is up. The company is growing at a slower pace
Speaker 1: than it was last year, so it's still growing, just
Speaker 1: not growing as quickly. Uh. Insert rant from Jonathan here
Speaker 1: about how using growth as a prime metric for business
Speaker 1: is ultimately destructive. I'm sparing all of you all that
Speaker 1: this time. Just imagine that I'm ranting about it now. Anyway,
Speaker 1: Despite the fact that Q two of two thousand twenty
Speaker 1: two didn't perform as well as Q two of two
Speaker 1: thousand twenty one, Apple still beat expectations, and so it
Speaker 1: saw its stock price increase as a result. The company
Speaker 1: also reported that Apple's services division saw twelve growth. Now
Speaker 1: that's something that I would be a little bit concerned about,
Speaker 1: given what's going on with Apple in the world right now.
Speaker 1: So Tim Cook has been guiding Apple into becoming more
Speaker 1: of a services company for years. That's that's been the path,
Speaker 1: the trajectory that Apple has been on for quite some
Speaker 1: time now. But we're seeing more regulatory agencies around the
Speaker 1: world pushing back against Apple's processes. At the heart of
Speaker 1: the matter for most of these is whether or not
Speaker 1: Apple's approach is ultimately anti competitive, namely that the company
Speaker 1: requires all in app purchases to use Apple his own
Speaker 1: payment processing system, which automatically gives Apple a fifteen to
Speaker 1: cut of each in app transaction. Uh, it gets a
Speaker 1: little more tricky than that, but that's the general gist
Speaker 1: of it. So if we see Apple lose ground on
Speaker 1: that matter, that would have a potentially massive impact on
Speaker 1: an increasingly important revenue source for the company, and it
Speaker 1: could force Apple to have to pivot again. But it's
Speaker 1: early days and I expect we're gonna see Apple perform well,
Speaker 1: at least in the short term. It's just the question
Speaker 1: of when is the other shoe going to drop? And
Speaker 1: now for some weird Apple news, the company has requested
Speaker 1: emergency relief from a U S court over how it
Speaker 1: cannot sell five G iPhones and iPads in Colombia. And
Speaker 1: you might say, Colombia is not in the United States.
Speaker 1: That's a different country entirely. What is going on? All right,
Speaker 1: let's sort all this out. So Apple's five g iOS
Speaker 1: products rely on ed technology that's out from Ericsson. So
Speaker 1: Ericsson holds the patent on these technologies. Apple does not
Speaker 1: dispute this. This is something that all parties agree upon.
Speaker 1: And until recently, Apple was paying a licensing fee to
Speaker 1: Ericsson to make use of that technology. So far, so good.
Speaker 1: But then Apple decided, Yo, this is expensive and I'm
Speaker 1: not gonna pay it anymore, and so Apple stopped paying Ericson.
Speaker 1: So Ericsson started reaching out to various markets, with Columbia
Speaker 1: being a very earlier one, and and said, hey, Apple
Speaker 1: is illegally selling these products. They are violating our patents,
Speaker 1: so do not sell five G products in your stores. Really,
Speaker 1: Ericson said this to Colombian courts, and the courts in
Speaker 1: Columbia ordered stores there not to sell these five G
Speaker 1: Apple products. So then Apple goes in files an emergency
Speaker 1: motion in the Eastern District of Texas, arguing that Ericsson
Speaker 1: owes Apple damages for disrupting its operations and Colombia. Now
Speaker 1: the judges said, you're on your cotton picken minds. One, Apple,
Speaker 1: you're in the wrong here by refusing to sit down
Speaker 1: with Ericson and negotiate a licensing fee to Ericson is
Speaker 1: within its rights to defend its patents. Three, this is
Speaker 1: not an emergency situation. And if you do this again,
Speaker 1: I'm gonna make you go out there and get me
Speaker 1: a switch. I am paraphrasing, I should add anyway, Now
Speaker 1: Apple's filing another emergency motion, so it might be a
Speaker 1: switch time. Uh, And I'm sure that's gonna get a
Speaker 1: fun response from the courts. And the argument is that
Speaker 1: Apple's making is get this, It's human rights are being violated,
Speaker 1: as an Apple's human rights are being violated. So Apple,
Speaker 1: or maybe It's arguing its products have had human rights
Speaker 1: that have been violated by this action by Ericsson. Now
Speaker 1: you might be saying, but that none of those things
Speaker 1: that you talked about are actually human You are right now.
Speaker 1: You could potentially argue that corporations in the United States
Speaker 1: are granted a legal form of personhood, but that doesn't
Speaker 1: necessarily extend human rights to them. Plus, experts are arguing
Speaker 1: that even if it did, there are no human rights
Speaker 1: violations happening here anyway. So we'll have to see how
Speaker 1: this plays out. It might just be that Apples trying
Speaker 1: to wait out Ericson and hope that the loss of
Speaker 1: revenue will be enough to make Ericson go belly up
Speaker 1: and they won't have to pay anything anymore because no
Speaker 1: one will be around to own those I p um.
Speaker 1: I don't know. It's just bizarre. It's this is one
Speaker 1: of those stories where as I read it, I was thinking,
Speaker 1: am I awake or is this a fever dream? Uh?
Speaker 1: Turns out I was awake. Amazon released its sustainability report
Speaker 1: and the news isn't great. Now, the company did try
Speaker 1: to spin it into a positive direction. So here's the
Speaker 1: quote unquote good news. Amazon has managed to decrease the
Speaker 1: amount of emissions it generates on a more US per
Speaker 1: dollar level, so meaning the amount of emissions produced for
Speaker 1: every dollar of merchandise sold fell by just under two percent. Uh.
Speaker 1: They referred to this as carbon intensity, So from that perspective,
Speaker 1: things are moving in the right direction. Right Like per operation,
Speaker 1: Amazon's emissions are decreasing. But here's the big issue. Amazon
Speaker 1: also saw an enormous boom in business, and the volume
Speaker 1: of these operations increased dramatically. So while the carbon intensity
Speaker 1: of each individual operation dropped slightly, the total number of
Speaker 1: operations meant that carbon emissions ballooned by eighteen percent in
Speaker 1: twenty one. That means Amazon generated more than seventy one
Speaker 1: million metric tons of carbon dioxide last year. As The
Speaker 1: Verge points out, that's roughly equal to the amount of
Speaker 1: carbon dioxide that a hundred eighty gas fired power plants
Speaker 1: would generate over the course of a full year. The
Speaker 1: Verge also rightfully points out that companies like Amazon us
Speaker 1: stuff like carbon offsets to push toward being a net
Speaker 1: zero carbon company on paper. But here's the thing offsets. Really,
Speaker 1: what that means is that you're pouring money into projects
Speaker 1: that are at least intended to remove carbon from the
Speaker 1: atmosphere in some way, Like it might be a program
Speaker 1: where you're planting lots of trees for all, for certain
Speaker 1: amounts of carbon that you're emitting, and you get credits
Speaker 1: for that right because you're spending money, you get credits
Speaker 1: that allow you to emit that carbon. Here's the problem.
Speaker 1: You're dumping all that carbon now, and the solutions can
Speaker 1: take years to mature and start to make an impact.
Speaker 1: So in the in between that you've got this growing
Speaker 1: issue of of increasing amounts of carbon being emitted into
Speaker 1: the atmosphere with the quote unquote solution for the problem
Speaker 1: not really even making an impact until years later. You
Speaker 1: can't do that that there's a there's a recipe for disaster.
Speaker 1: It's heading toward collapse. But that is how a lot
Speaker 1: of these companies deal with trying to look like they're
Speaker 1: being carbon neutral. They're not actually carbon neutral. They're essentially
Speaker 1: buying the right to emit more carbon. And since these
Speaker 1: companies have enormous amounts of money, they can do that
Speaker 1: because in the end, the money they spend in order
Speaker 1: to appear carbon neutral on paper is way less than
Speaker 1: the money they would have to spend to actually overhaul
Speaker 1: operations so that it truly was carbon neutral. Dark times, y'all,
Speaker 1: it's it's tough, and this is something It's not just
Speaker 1: Amazon that does this, So I don't want to give
Speaker 1: that impression. It's not only Amazon that is guilty of
Speaker 1: kind of doing this sort of bait and switch or
Speaker 1: or juggling numbers around on a piece of paper to
Speaker 1: make it look better. This is something that's problemat throughout
Speaker 1: multiple industries, not just the tech industry. So it's something
Speaker 1: that we really do have to pay more attention to
Speaker 1: and make sure that we address in a responsible way. Alright,
Speaker 1: We've got a few more stories to cover before we
Speaker 1: conclude this episode, but first let's take another quick break.
Speaker 1: We're back. So, the chairman of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company,
Speaker 1: better known as t s MC, released a statement that
Speaker 1: I think kind of says the obvious, like it's something
Speaker 1: where everybody knows this, but I guess by saying it
Speaker 1: out loud, you make it more ominous. What he said
Speaker 1: was that if China were to invade Taiwan, that would
Speaker 1: cause huge economic turmoil in the entire region, it would
Speaker 1: change global economies, and it would render t s MCS
Speaker 1: semiconductor factory's nonoperable. Now, this has been something that's been
Speaker 1: a huge concern for a long time. So so let's
Speaker 1: do a very quick cliffs notes version of what's going
Speaker 1: on here. Taiwan is off the coast of mainland China.
Speaker 1: The two entities, China and Taiwan have had a long
Speaker 1: and complicated history. Way back in the nineteen forties, the
Speaker 1: Republic of China, which was the government that was in
Speaker 1: place of the entire nation at that time, was being
Speaker 1: pushed out by the People's Republic of China, a totally
Speaker 1: different group, and the Republic of China fled to Taiwan.
Speaker 1: The People's Republic of China assumed control of the Chinese mainland. Essentially,
Speaker 1: both governments more or less claim that they're the rightful
Speaker 1: power for all of China. So, uh, you have these
Speaker 1: two different entities that that essentially say, yeah, we're in
Speaker 1: charge of everything. Um well, effectively they operates separately. Although
Speaker 1: China and Taiwan have a lot of connections, obviously there
Speaker 1: are people who go back and forth. China has been
Speaker 1: accused of stealing talent from Taiwan for years now in
Speaker 1: order to bolster its own semi conductor industry in China,
Speaker 1: and there have been tensions there for ages. So this
Speaker 1: has been a huge reason why places other places around
Speaker 1: the world, like particularly here in the United States, we've
Speaker 1: seen a real push to create semiconductor fabrication facilities in
Speaker 1: order to reduce the dependence upon Taiwan. Right now, Taiwan
Speaker 1: produces nearly half of all semi conductors that are used
Speaker 1: in the world, and and more than half if you're
Speaker 1: looking at the really advanced semi conductors. That's because you know,
Speaker 1: Taiwan poured billions of dollars into developing this industry, and
Speaker 1: companies in other places like the United States, chose to
Speaker 1: outsource manufacturing to Taiwan because it made more economic sense.
Speaker 1: But now when you start looking at it and you
Speaker 1: look at the vulnerability of putting, you know, all of
Speaker 1: your semiconductor eggs in Taiwan's basket, you start to get
Speaker 1: a little nervous, especially when China seems to get a
Speaker 1: little more aggressive and it stands towards Taiwan. So an
Speaker 1: invasion would be a massive disruption to the entire tech
Speaker 1: sector and beyond. And I think the reason why this
Speaker 1: even came out in the news at all is because
Speaker 1: the United States Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, has
Speaker 1: announced a planned visit to Taiwan, which in turn prompted
Speaker 1: China to warrant that, you know, Western interference in Taiwan
Speaker 1: would raise tensions in the region. So there's this general
Speaker 1: worry that this is going to precipitate into a cascading
Speaker 1: event that will upend the entire semiconductor industry. My hope
Speaker 1: is that that doesn't happen, because obviously if it did,
Speaker 1: it's going to be incredibly disruptive across everything. Um it
Speaker 1: would be terrible for for millions of people uh directly
Speaker 1: affected by such a thing, and then indirectly billions more. So, obviously,
Speaker 1: here's hoping that we don't see, uh, this rhetoric grow
Speaker 1: into more drastic action. On the United States side, the
Speaker 1: government is placing more restrictions on what companies are able
Speaker 1: to export to China when it comes to chip making tools.
Speaker 1: So China has been investing billions in building more semiconductor
Speaker 1: facilities within China itself, and it has been importing some
Speaker 1: of the the advanced chip making tools from other countries
Speaker 1: like Japan and the United States. So you can kind
Speaker 1: of look at this as a political approach to trying
Speaker 1: to slow China's progress a little bit. The U s
Speaker 1: government is essentially saying to come needs within the US
Speaker 1: that you cannot sell current tools to China. You can
Speaker 1: sell much older tools, tools that are essentially obsolete when
Speaker 1: when you compare to the state of the art of
Speaker 1: what's what we're capable of making, But you can't sell
Speaker 1: China any tools that would allow China to stay up
Speaker 1: to date on manufacturing processes. So again it's another another
Speaker 1: case of trying to slow down China's march towards global domination,
Speaker 1: at least in the technology technology sector. Over in Spain,
Speaker 1: there's some concerning news about a pair of hackers who
Speaker 1: disrupted a significant number of radiation detection sensors that are
Speaker 1: part of a radioactivity alert system there. Moreover, these two
Speaker 1: hackers apparently previously served as contractors who were put in
Speaker 1: charge of maintaining that network. So the people who were
Speaker 1: meant to take care of the network, we're dismantling it.
Speaker 1: Here's what happened. So Spain has several nuclear power plants,
Speaker 1: so in a in an effort to assure safety, Spain
Speaker 1: also has this mesh network of around eight hundred gamma
Speaker 1: detection sensors. That network is meant to provide an early
Speaker 1: warning in case of something going wrong at one of
Speaker 1: these nuclear facilities, so that we don't have a catastrophic
Speaker 1: disaster on the order of Chernobyl. Also, it means if
Speaker 1: the Hulk goes out for Paea, will know about it
Speaker 1: right away. Anyway, apparently these two contractors were purposefully sabotaging
Speaker 1: those sensors. They were effectively severing the connection between the
Speaker 1: censor and the control center that monitors everything, and they
Speaker 1: did it to more than three hundred of the eight
Speaker 1: hundred censors. They also allegedly tried to delete a program
Speaker 1: that was designed to manage this network at the control center. Now,
Speaker 1: this was all happening last year between March and July,
Speaker 1: and investigators cut onto the fact that something was going
Speaker 1: on and they launched an investigation that lasted a full year. Now,
Speaker 1: the two unnamed individuals have been arrested. Uh no motive
Speaker 1: has been shared with the media, so there's no word
Speaker 1: if there was more to this plan or not. As
Speaker 1: it stands, the two hackers greatly reduced the detection capacity
Speaker 1: of the network, so if something had gone wrong with
Speaker 1: one of these nuclear facilities, it might have taken longer
Speaker 1: to detect it, which in turn could have been disastrous.
Speaker 1: But the question is, is this just part of a
Speaker 1: bigger plan. Maybe there was something far more destructive planned
Speaker 1: for the future. Maybe dismantling the warning system was step
Speaker 1: one to make sure that this more destructive plan would
Speaker 1: have a maximum effect. I don't I don't know if
Speaker 1: that's the case. Maybe I've just watched too many James
Speaker 1: Bond films. Finally, Logitech is working on a handheld gaming
Speaker 1: system with ten Cent games. It sounds like the games
Speaker 1: themselves will be mostly running in the cloud. Logitech announced
Speaker 1: that the device will support Xbox Cloud Gaming and G
Speaker 1: four Now, which is from Nvidia. There is an enormous
Speaker 1: lack of details about this. Logitech did not mention a
Speaker 1: release date. It did not mention what sort of price
Speaker 1: range this might be at, or whether there will be
Speaker 1: different models of the device. We actually didn't see any
Speaker 1: pictures or illustrations of the things, so we don't even
Speaker 1: know what it's going to look like. But there's definitely
Speaker 1: been a huge demand for handheld PC gaming systems. Valve
Speaker 1: came out with the Steam Deck and demand was so
Speaker 1: high that they could not meet it, like the supply
Speaker 1: was way too low, and in fact for a while
Speaker 1: there was concern about you know, people had put in
Speaker 1: reservations for one of these things, they didn't know if
Speaker 1: they were ever going to get one. Valve has said
Speaker 1: recently that people who had a current reservation as of
Speaker 1: four days ago would get their steam Deck by the
Speaker 1: end of twenty twenty two, and I think they're going
Speaker 1: in a first come, first serve basis, so in other words,
Speaker 1: the earlier you made your reservation, the earlier you will
Speaker 1: be able to get yours. I made a reservation for one,
Speaker 1: but I didn't get until relatively recently, so I expect
Speaker 1: if I do get one this year, it will be
Speaker 1: at the tail end of the year. But that's on
Speaker 1: me because I was slow to act on that. So
Speaker 1: Logitech getting into the space makes sense. Having competition in
Speaker 1: handheld PC gaming is great. It's going to drive innovation
Speaker 1: for all parties concerned. So I think this is a
Speaker 1: good thing, especially if you do like having portable gaming systems.
Speaker 1: I've heard great things about the Steam Deck, you know,
Speaker 1: people talking about certain titles that are just a joy
Speaker 1: to play on steam Deck, and I'm really hoping that
Speaker 1: I get a chance to try that out sometime towards
Speaker 1: the end of this year. So Logitech coming out with
Speaker 1: another model I think is nothing but good news and
Speaker 1: hopefully it means that we'll see other ones also join
Speaker 1: in the market, uh that are well designed so that
Speaker 1: ultimately the consumers benefit. And that's it for the news
Speaker 1: for Tuesday, August two, two thousand twenty two. If you
Speaker 1: have suggestions for topics I should cover in future episod
Speaker 1: is a tech Stuff, please reach out to me. There
Speaker 1: are a couple of ways to do that. One is
Speaker 1: you can download the I Heart Radio app. It's free
Speaker 1: to download. You can just navigate over to tech Stuff
Speaker 1: and there's this little microphone icon that if you click
Speaker 1: on you can leave a voice message up to thirty
Speaker 1: seconds in length and let me know what you would
Speaker 1: like me to cover. Or you can always reach out
Speaker 1: on Twitter. The handle I use on Twitter for the
Speaker 1: show is tech Stuff H s W and I'll talk
Speaker 1: to you again really soon. Y. Tech Stuff is an
Speaker 1: I Heart Radio production. For more podcasts from my Heart Radio,
Speaker 1: visit the i Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever
Speaker 1: you listen to your favorite shows.