Technology

The widely versatile Worx Aerocart is down to just $160 at Best Buy right now.

If like me you were hoping we might see a Samsung Galaxy Z Fold FE – i.e. an affordable alternative to Samsung’s pricey foldable phones – then I have some bad news. According to Samsung itself, there’s no plans to launch a cheaper foldable for the time being.

Samsung has just launched a new foldable; specifically it’s a new Galaxy Z Fold 6 Special Edition with some exclusive upgrades such as wider displays, a 200MP main wide camera, and a thinner and lighter body than the base Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6. These upgrades come at price, however, with the device costing 2,789,600 won (or roughly $2,000 / £1,550 / AU$3,000).

It’s also exclusive to South Korea – with the rumored China launch remaining unconfirmed.

As for a cheaper alternative, Samsung appears to have no plans to make a cheaper foldable, with an official saying to Korean outlet Sisa Journal (translated for Korean), “As of now, we have no plans to release a separate product with a lower price.”

It doesn’t really get any clearer than that.

The wrong move?

The Galaxy Z Fold 6 was already a step up in price (Image credit: Lance Ulanoff / Future)

Admittedly there’s still a non-zero chance Samsung is working on some kind of Galaxy Z Fold FE – to match other cheap Fan Edition Samsung handsets – as the statement is a little non-committal. The sort of non-promise either way that Samsung might mike if it has nothing to announce at this time (and teasing a cheap phone right before launching a mega pricey one likely isn’t a good business move).

And I seriously hope it has something less pricey up its sleeve, as the last thing foldables need to be is more expensive.

Yes the technology is awesome, I had an absolute blast using the regular Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6 when it launched, but it’s tough to justify $1,899.99 / £1,799 / AU$2,749 for a smartphone when a $799 / £799 / AU$1,399 Galaxy S24 does a lot of the same stuff. It’s especially a tough pill to swallow when you consider the non dustproof Galaxy Z Fold 6 design makes it less durable, meaning you could end up ruining your expensive gadget with one trip to the beach.

At, say $1,200-ish – £1,200 / AU$1,800 – or around two-thirds the price a Galaxy Fold would be a heck of a lot more appealing, even if that does mean Samsung has to make some sacrifices on the hardware side of things.

We’ll have to wait and see if Samsung changes course, but for now it looks like the best we can do is start hoping for some amazing deals in this year’s Black Friday sales if you want a cheap foldable.

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Cybersecurity experts have revealed a specific phishing tactic which has become increasingly popular - including malicious QR codes in .PDF files.

Researchers from Barracuda said that in the three months between June and September 2024, they observed (and later analyzed) more than half a million of phishing emails employing this tactic.

By sharing QR codes in .PDF files, threat actors are doing a number of things: first - they are evading detection from email security solutions, who can now scan the contents of images in the email’s body, but not in the .PDF files attached; and second - they are tricking users into accessing malicious content via their mobile devices, which are generally less defended compared to their desktop counterparts.

Shift in tactics

The overall theme of these attacks remains the same - the hackers would impersonate a major brand, and send out an email that warranted a swift reaction. That email could be a pending invoice, a payment notification, information about a bounced parcel, or something similar. The victims were urged to respond immediately, with further information being provided in the .PDF file attached.

Since .PDF files are not as dangerous as .EXE or .LNK files, they rarely raise any suspicion with the victims. Opening the file up does nothing, but it also shows nothing except the QR code, which the victim is enticed to scan with their mobile phone.

From there, the threat actors have an easier time navigating the victims to malicious landing pages, fake login sites, or places where malware can be downloaded.

Barracuda also says that certain industries such as finance, healthcare, or education, are being increasingly targeted these days, due to the sensitive data they handle. The researchers also said small-and-medium businesses (SMBs) were particularly vulnerable given the lack of advanced security tools needed to defend against such sophisticated attacks.

“The shift in tactics from embedding QR codes in the body of an email to attaching them in PDF documents makes it harder for traditional defenses to identify and block these attacks before they reach employees,” the researchers concluded.

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Russia, Iran, and China are targeting the US election with an evolving array of influence operations in the last days of campaign season.

Windows 11 users, I have some good news (for a change) about the new feature update for 2024, version 24H2. Thanks to major improvements to how the Windows Update app works, 24H2 will be installed faster than previous major updates.

Microsoft published a blog post explaining how it’s been working on changes behind the scenes that speed up how updates are installed, and the process will draw significantly less system resources as well, contributing to the speeding up of the installation process.

Thanks to 24H2’s servicing stack, a crucial software component that is responsible for installing updates in the operating system, installation is 45.6% faster and restart time is 39.7% faster than we saw with Windows 11 version 22H2 (and 23H2, as both versions have the same servicing stack) when installing cumulative updates for devices that were up to date and regularly maintained.

Systems that were running older versions of Windows 11 also saw big improvements, according to tests carried out by Microsoft. On a computer that hadn’t been updated for a year a half, Microsoft claims improvements of installation being 43.6% faster and taking 33.5% less time to restart. Good news all around.

As described by Microsoft, this was done using a couple of methods. First, Microsoft implemented parallel processing, allowing Windows PC devices to handle multiple parts of the update simultaneously. Second, it used smart caching, meaning that when Windows 11 processes part of an update, it stores (or ‘caches’) that information so it doesn’t redo the same parts of the process twice.

This helps speed things along when the same parts of the update show up repeatedly. Finally, updates will now make better use of RAM (your computer’s temporary memory storage), by checking if your PC is low on RAM and adjusting the update process accordingly to avoid slowing things down.

(Image credit: Microsoft) Faster, more efficient updates all around for Windows 11

Faster cumulative security updates aren’t the only improvement, with larger feature updates (that bring new tools and features) being made more efficient as well. This will include Edge, Microsoft’s default browser for Windows 11, saving about 200MB of space during bigger feature updates. You can read more in to the technical details of all of these processes in Microsoft’s blog post.

If Microsoft has its numbers right, you should feel that updates install significantly faster. The time it takes to download and install updates is one of the biggest complaints you hear from Windows 11 users and this will mean less down time and less frustration due to having to wait for your device to update or restart. Using fewer system resources during the update process means that you should be able to use your computer for various tasks while updates are installed, allowing you to get on with your activities.

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While Virgin River season 6 fans have already saved the date for Mel Monroe and Jack Sheridan's wedding, there's more good news as the hit romantic drama has been renewed for season 7 ahead of the season 6 premiere on December 19.

Netflix officially confirmed the news, posting a video on social media with the cast announcing that Virgin River has been renewed (see below). This won't come as a huge surprise to the Virgin River fandom since the series has been known to constantly top the best streaming service’s weekly top 10 most-watched shows list.

What's On Netflix first reported that it had seen several numerous members of the show's production team tease a season 7 and the rumor has since become a reality.

Good news, VIRGIN RIVER is confirmed to come back for Season 7! More love, drama, and small-town charm coming your way. You're very welcome ❤️ pic.twitter.com/WcJYNko3HTOctober 23, 2024

Netflix's greatest love story will be getting another chapter

According to What's On Netflix, after season 6 had wrapped some of the production team teased on social media that they'd be returning for another installment of the best Netflix show and a writer's room for season 7 had been active for a while now.

Patrick Sean Smith became the new showrunner for season 5 and is apparently expected to resume his duties for season 7. Meanwhile, there's been no official announcements regarding production dates, but it probably won't be until early 2025 when they begin filming in British Columbia. Now that Virgin River has been renewed for season 7, it will join the likes of Orange is the New Black and Grace & Frankie in becoming one of Netflix's longest-running English language scripted shows.

Despite Virgin River "showing some signs of declining viewership season over season, it still remains a bankable show" and there was a boost in watchers when the season 5 Christmas episodes aired.

While Virgin River's renewal has now been confirmed, there's plenty to look forward to when Virgin River season 6 comes out, with two new characters set to join the titular sleepy town. Jessica Rothe (Happy Death Day) and Callum Kerr (One Piece) will play a young version of Mel's parents, Sarah and Everett Reid who appear in flashbacks as they meet and fall in love in the 1970s.

The Virgin River universe is also set to expand with a rumored prequel series focused on Mel's parents that's currently in early development and will tell the love story of Sarah and Everett.

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A database believed to belong to the United Nations Trust Fund to End Violence against Women has been discovered unsecured online, containing financial reports, bank account information, staff details, victim testimonies and more.

The database, containing a total 228 GB of information, was discovered by cybersecurity researcher Jeremiah Fowler and reported to vpnMentor.

It lacked any password protection, with the 115,141 files displayed unencrypted and accessible to anyone with an internet connection.

Victim and worker information exposed

While currently unconfirmed, the database contained information linked it to the UN Women and UN Trust Fund to End Violence against Women, including letters and documents addressed to the UN and stamped with UN logos, with specific reference to UN Women.

Amongst the information within the database, Fowler identified scanned passport documents and ID cards, alongside detailed information on staff roles including names, job roles, salary information and tax data.

“There were also documents labeled as “victim success stories” or testimonies,” Fowler wrote in his report for vpnMentor. “Some of these contained the names and email addresses of those helped by the programs, as well as details of their personal experiences. For instance, one of the letters purported to be from a Chibok schoolgirl who was one of the 276 individuals kidnapped by Boko Haram in 2014.”

A collection of documents and certificates from the UN Women database. (Image credit: vpnMentor / Jeremiah Fowler)

It is not known how long the database has been exposed for, whether the database is managed by the UN Women organization or a third party, or whether the database has been accessed by anyone outside of the organization.

Fowler explains several hypothetical situations in which the data could be misused, such as convincing spear phishing attacks against exposed email addresses using manipulated documents. Theoretically, a threat actor could also use the documents to gain a high-level understanding of the organization’s organizational and financial layout.

The UN Women organization has a scam alert posted on its website which is undated, but the page dates back to at least July 2022, with an update occurring in July 2024 adding a guide to using the Quantum procurement verification portal. Fowler alerted the UN Information Security team to the unprotected database, and received a response stating, “The reported vulnerability does not pertain to us (the United Nations Secretariat) and is for UN Women. Please report the vulnerability to UN WOMEN.”

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The 42nd Golden Joystick Awards will be streamed live next month, and it's set to be hosted by voice actor Ben Starr.

Starr, known for voicing Final Fantasy 16 protagonist Clive Rosfield and Prometheus in Hades 2, is set to be joined by a host of guest presenters. These include Neil Newbon (Astarion in Baldur's Gate 3), Patricia Summersett (Princess Zelda in The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom), Alex McKenna (Sadie Adler in Red Dead Redemption 2), and Abubakar Salim (Bayek in Assassin's Creed Origins and director of Tales of Kenzera: Zau).

On the upcoming awards ceremony, taking place on November 21, Starr had this to say: "I’m thrilled to announce that I’ll be your guide to this year’s Golden Joystick Awards. We’ll be celebrating the greatest games of the past 12 months - but more importantly, the talented teams of people who made them possible. 

"Tune in for an evening of fashionable festivities, where you can expect special guests, showmanship, and plenty of silly jokes. See you soon, and if you haven’t already, get your votes in now!"

This year's Golden Joystick Awards will feature 19 separate categories including Best Storytelling, Best Indie Game, Best Soundtrack, Best Lead Performer, and Best Gaming Hardware. Final Fantasy 7 Rebirth and Astro Bot are leading the charge with five nominations apiece, whereas Helldivers 2 and Balatro put on a strong showing with four and three nominations respectively.

You'll be able to watch the 42nd Golden Joystick Awards live on November 21 via YouTube, Twitch, Facebook, X / Twitter, and Steam. TechRadar Gaming as well as GamesRadar and PC Gamer will also be livestreaming the event.

Be sure to get your own votes in over at GamesRadar's dedicated Golden Joystick Awards page, too! You can vote right now and voting closes on Friday, November 1 at 4pm PDT / 7pm EDT / 11pm GMT.

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AMD’s Ryzen 7 9800X3D has some impressive potential to be fine-tuned for eye-opening performance levels, or that’s the latest rumor (among many) around the soon-to-be-unleashed Zen 5 processor.

Wccftech spotted that on the Anandtech forums, Igor Kavinski leaked some benchmark scores for the Ryzen 9800X3D. These come complete with CPU-Z details of clock speeds, and notes on the processor configuration used to achieve the eye-opening boost clock shown – namely just over 5.6GHz across all eight cores.

The Ryzen 9800X3D (likely a prerelease engineering sample chip) was turbocharged to those levels by using Precision Boost Overdrive (PBO) and Curve Optimizer (CO) plus a raft of other manual fine-tuning of the CPU by Kavinski. We can guess the cooler used was a high-end effort, too, which all goes to explain hitting 5.6GHz, which is quite remarkable across all the processor’s cores.

To put it in perspective, the rumored all-core boost of the 9800X3D is 5.2GHz out of the box (with no tuning), although that’s still a good deal faster than the 7800X3D (at 4.8GHz).

Turning to the benchmarks shown, one is from Cinebench R23 and the Ryzen 9800X3D comes out well here too, with a score of 2,261 in single-core and 25,258 in multi-core. As Wccftech points out, for the latter, the Ryzen 7800X3D typically falls between 18,000 to 19,000, so this appears to indicate that this (heavily amped up) 9800X3D could be a good 30% faster when it comes to non-gaming performance.

As for gaming, a Final Fantasy XIV: Dawntrail benchmark is aired here, showing a score of 62,360 (but the GPU that the 9800X3D was paired with isn’t shared). We don’t have comparisons for the 7800X3D there, but the general reaction to the result is that it’s again impressive – as you’d expect from the juicing up that’s gone on here.

(Image credit: Future) Analysis: Trying to guess the real generational uplift

Clearly, we need to bear firmly in mind that not every Ryzen 9800X3D buyer will go to lengths that Kavinski has done here – many won’t – and there are unknowns like the cooling setup and how fancy it was. So, the benchmark leaks need to be interpreted with a healthy dose of skepticism, but just seeing that all-core boost pushed this high is promising.

Looking at the gains here, we can anticipate (read: guess) that out of the box – with standard cooling and no CPU tuning – we could see the 9800X3D be about 10%, or possibly up to 15%, faster than the 7800X3D for gaming. And a good deal more than that for everyday use away from PC games – as this is not the only leak which has suggested that the all-round performance of X3D has been seriously pepped up with Zen 5. Mainly because AMD seems to have solved the problem of the clock speeds being held back by that 3D V-Cache with the 9800X3D (and by extension the other X3D chips for Zen 5 when they arrive later on).

We can certainly be broadly optimistic about a decent performance uplift, in both gaming and overall terms, given that we are (supposedly) getting quite a boost for clock speeds, plus the generational gains for Zen 5 X3D on top. (Despite some other leaks having outlined a bleaker situation – spillage you need to take with a heap of salt in our opinion).

Whatever the ultimate generational performance increase ends up being, the other vital part of the equation will be pricing – will the 9800X3D retail at $449 (in the US, and proportionate to that elsewhere) as its predecessor did? Or will AMD charge a bit less than this? The latter is probably tilting too far with the optimism, but the point remains that whatever performance boost we get with the 9800X3D will need to be viewed through the lens of the MSRP, naturally.

AMD has confirmed that Ryzen 9000X3D will arrive on November 7, 2024 – all rumors point to this just being the Ryzen 9800X3D CPU, with a possible reveal in just a couple of days. The 9800X3D is, of course, very much anticipated as the successor to the rightly popular 7800X3D (which has now all but vanished from the shelves), with the hope that it’ll wash away some of the bad taste that the Ryzen 9000 launch has left (in the mouths of PC gamers, anyway).

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As a CTO, it’s my job to make sure tech is an integral part of our company’s success. This can come down to the tools we use and the products we build. But while there’s a lot of talk about the ability of tech to save time or cancel out inefficiencies, what about its ability to drive diversity?

In recent years, diversity has been the subject of budget cuts, slipping down the priority list of leaders. After all, what’s in it for them? Aside from a more fair, diverse and creative workplace that thrives off self-esteem, empowerment and innovation, that is.

Well, if that wasn’t enough, the new dawn of ESG reporting will mean that companies will finally be held accountable for their diversity targets. Plus in tech we need to recognize that we are designing products and services for an increasingly diverse consumer base. What will drive this point home even more is the EU Accessibility Act which will aim to make everyday products accessible for people with disabilities.

Consumers are no longer homogenous; they are brilliantly diverse and different. So how come we can’t say the same for the teams building the products and services for them?

The scale of the challenge

The most rewarding part of my job is harnessing the brilliance of a bunch of engineers and making it translate into something for the business. To do this, I don’t prescribe what an engineer should look like. Speaking for myself, I’m non-binary, neurodiverse and disabled, looking far different from what people stereotypically imagine a technical leader looks like.

Too often, employees, especially leadership, are expected to adhere to a cookie cutter definition of an infallible superhuman. But there’s nothing wrong with being human. Whether you have an exciting perspective from a different culture, a fluctuating gender identity, get sick like the rest of us or exist on the spectrum. You are human and should be celebrated for being such.

But most European businesses are still struggling to build diverse workplaces. According to a DEI Index compiled by EY, the average score for European companies is just 5.69 out of 10. With only Swiss companies achieving an average score of 6.0. While only 34% of managers surveyed belong to underrepresented groups, with trans representation in the tech sector only 0.17% – down on the national sector average of 0.5%.

This is not a numbers game though. Research shows that diversity – whether neurodiversity, gender diversity, ethnocultural diversity or otherwise – is one of the most important drivers of innovation, performance and employee engagement. And high engagement drives high performance. McKinsey estimates that hiring ethnocultural minority employees (EMEs) could contribute an additional €120 billion to EU-27 GDP a year. Similarly, neurodiverse teams are 30% more productive than others, while those organizations that respect pronoun use are seeing greater levels of validation, while avoiding psychological distress, depression, low self-esteem and even suicidal ideation.

Businesses are well and truly out of arguments for failing when it comes to diversity. So how can they begin to make progress? And should technology play a central role?

Can tech really improve diversity?

Using technology to help improve DE&I might not be the leap we think it is. In the same way we use work management tools or GenAI, technology can act as a sparring partner and help compensate for our own DE&I knowledge gaps.

For instance, when it comes to hiring, there are good gender decoders that can remove the gender bias from job ads that we might not even be aware was there to begin with. This can help address the difference in gender response to job applications and level the playing field for applicants.

Similarly, we’re also starting to see AI sifting CVs. However, we must be cautious around how much responsibility we are giving to AI. It is traditionally trained on what “success” looks like, and there’s a risk that AI can reinforce human biases. For instance, there have been examples of AI approval systems refusing loans for marginalized communities.

It is important to remember that while technology can bring advantages to improving diversity, it is not about to replace humans. For example, it should not be determining who we hire off the back of an info dump from CVs. Plus anyone reviewing a CV still needs to understand that by default they are biased and that they need to fight against this through unconscious bias training and active resistance.

There is a trend right now to dive headfirst into implementing time-saving technologies. But we should start small. Instead of using technology to write policies or manage affinity groups, we should use it to empower our teams to respect pronouns or access resources to improve their understanding. As much as 55% of people are worried about saying the wrong thing when it comes to workplace diversity, so let’s use technology to help them ask questions and empower curiosity.

This approach meets a critical prerequisite for diversity: it removes barriers, fear and judgement, and normalizes something normal.

The human role remains

It’s exciting to think about the role technology can play in driving diversity. But we can’t neglect the continued need for a human in the loop.

Businesses keen to improve the diversity of their teams should use technology to assist them, not take shortcuts. And this is true of commitment too. Because even with the most powerful AI in the world, without leadership buy-in and an active determination to not just hire, but maintain a diverse workplace, we’ll fall short.

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This article was produced as part of TechRadarPro's Expert Insights channel where we feature the best and brightest minds in the technology industry today. The views expressed here are those of the author and are not necessarily those of TechRadarPro or Future plc. If you are interested in contributing find out more here: https://www.techradar.com/news/submit-your-story-to-techradar-pro

The procurement function hasn’t traditionally been seen as leading the way in technological advancement. Most often it is sales and marketing that experiments and adopts emerging tech such as Generative AI. Many even expected Gen AI to pass the department by without much impact.

But, as Gen AI continues to influence business performance in all industries, procurement has taken notice and teams are embracing its adoption. Research found that almost a quarter (24%) of UK businesses have deployed Gen AI in procurement and supplier management in the last 12 months, with 55% planning on implementing Gen AI.

So what’s different this time? Gen AI is providing enormous efficiency gains. Organizations that have adopted Gen AI tools have seen a 44% reduction in manual processes across the procurement and supply chain function.

As early adopters reap its benefits, organizations that can’t implement Gen AI and use it effectively risk being at a competitive disadvantage.

But organizations can’t run before they can walk. Instead, they need to ensure they have the right foundations in place by digitizing their procurement processes.

The road to gen AI is paved with poor digitization

When it comes to Gen AI use, a clear innovation gap is appearing – and digital laggards have a long way to go to close the gap. Digital transformation has stalled in the last five years: UK organizations now say they have digitized just 48% of their procurement processes in the past year on average, compared to 45% in 2019.

Procurement and supply chain functions with poor digitization are still subjecting employees to onerous manual tasks, stunting efficiency and limiting the organization's ability to make quick, informed decisions regarding their suppliers and spend.

Crucially, the lack of digitized processes in the procurement function leads to subpar data quality, limiting the accuracy and consistency of the data, and muddying the waters of clear decision-making in supplier risk or performance management, for instance. This is critical for firms looking to adopt Gen AI – as a lack of quality data can be a limiting factor that can substantially impact the effectiveness of Gen AI insights in procurement and supplier management.

The smart use of data

Organizations looking to capitalize on the productivity gains Gen AI offers must put in the hard yards. This means taking a smarter approach to procurement, digitizing their processes from source to pay. This includes building a solid foundation of data from the unification of multiple systems across an enterprise.

Data is the lifeblood of AI, and without quality data, organizations won’t see valuable outputs from Gen AI. Using a single source-to-pay platform that unifies and cleanses your data and combines it with information generated from various sources will be critical for the success of businesses. Organizations that can ensure data is accessible, high quality, and accurate are spending less time on tactical issues (e.g., building reports, syncing data, etc) and more time on building intelligent processes. Access is critical as if data is dispersed, systems will struggle to access it and match relevant information, which can exacerbate data accuracy problems.

With more accurate information at its disposal, Gen AI can allow procurement leaders to bridge the technological and data gaps that they previously risked succumbing to.

The AI end-game in procurement

With digitization across the source-to-pay process, organizations have the foundations in place to establish a single source of truth for supplier and spend data. This allows Gen AI to have an immediate impact on organizations' efficiency and their decision making capabilities.

As organizations fully digitize their processes, Gen AI can produce instant contract analysis and summarization in multiple languages, supplier and category research assistance, and supplier performance SWOT, RFX generation and more. With Gen AI built on fully digitized processes, organizations can also speed up risk assessments and mitigation plans and allow employees to effectively “chat with your data”, allowing users to instantly find information about suppliers, spending, contracts and transactions.

Think of Gen AI as having numerous assistants in various parts of the source-to-pay process. Traditionally, a member of the procurement team would have to take time to summarize a contract, research a category, write a report, draft an improvement plan and create a questionnaire on a new regulation. All of these manual steps can be removed with Gen AI, ultimately giving teams back time to focus on high value, strategic activities.

In fact, of the 44% of organizations that have adopted Gen AI tools, 69% of efficiency savings have been seen in task automation, 67% in internet research, 59% in document analysis and 48% in content creation. When processes are digitized and Gen AI has good quality data to pull from, procurement teams can create first drafts of RFPs quicker, or collate more comprehensive and accurate market intelligence reports.

The path to procurement transformation

Slow digitization poses an existential roadblock to businesses seeking to leverage Gen AI for productivity gains and resource unlock. Organizations must have the right data foundation in place and the buy-in of user trust to ensure Gen AI solutions are embedded seamlessly within existing procurement technologies.

Gen AI is already proving to be a catalyst for procurement transformation, but a technological and data gap needs to be bridged before organizations can make full use of Gen AI.

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Researchers from Cybernews have reported finding a huge database containing sensitive customer information from the Mexican healthcare sector left unprotected online

The team discovered a misconfigured Kibana instance with a “tremendous volume” of information, later attributed to eCaresoft, a software company behind two cloud-based Hospital Information Systems - Cirrus and Anytime. These platforms are used by more than 65 hospitals, 110 outpatient care centers, and more than 30,000 doctors, to help manage different aspects of work, such as inventory management, medicine management, appointment booking, and more.

According to Cybernews, the database contained sensitive information on more than five million people, leaking things like names, ethnicity, nationality, religion, blood type, birth dates, gender, phone number, email address, CURP (Mexican personal identification number), expenses, hospitals visited, and payment request descriptions.

Shift in tactics

Kibana is an open source data visualization and exploration tool. It is used for analyzing and visualizing log data stored in Elasticsearch, a distributed, open-source search and analytics engine, commonly used for indexing and querying large volumes of data in real time.

Unprotected and poorly managed databases remain one of the key causes of data leaks, and this instance contained more than enough information to help threat actors mount identity theft, phishing, and possibly even wire fraud.

Luckily, health records or payment data were not exposed, however Cybernews stressed the CURP numbers are “a particular cause of concern”, since they are the Mexican counterpart to the US Social Security Number.

The database has subsequently been locked down, but it's not known for how long it remained open, or if someone found it before the researchers. We also don’t know if the victims have already been notified about the breach or not.

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Novo Nordisk has asked the FDA to block production of compounded copies of Ozempic, arguing that it’s too difficult to do safely. It’s the latest escalation in a brewing war between pharmaceutical companies and compounders.

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Some LinkedIn users have reported losing hundreds or even thousands of followers, likely due to a bug which has since been fixed, but the glitch has already fuelled widespread concern about the Microsoft-owned job site’s integrity.

Given the ongoing battle regarding bots and other illegitimate accounts on social media, many have wondered whether the change was a deliberate clean-up effort by LinkedIn to eliminate such accounts.

Other users expressed concerns they may have unknowingly violated policies leading to the loss in their follower count, but this now looks not to have been the case.

LinkedIn users are losing followers

Following the circulation of rumors around the internet and hours of radio silence, LinkedIn finally confirmed that it had identified a problem and resolved it, failing to add any further details about what caused the drop in follower counts.

The platform confirmed on its LinkedIn Help X account: “We heard some members may have seen a change in their connection and follower count. Our team quickly looked into this. We're happy to report this has now been resolved.”

LinkedIn’s status page reported it became aware of the issue and started investigating at 03:00 PDT on October 22. Four hours later, it was still investigating the issue. At 10:00, seven hours after the first post, the platform confirmed, “issues with [user] follower and connection count on LinkedIn” had been resolved.

Although account functionality remained unaffected, the sudden loss of followers on a professional networking platform such as LinkedIn could have serious implications for users who rely on their profiles for business development and personal branding.

Moreover, the company has been criticized for failing to notify users of the issue on its own LinkedIn page, adding to the dissatisfaction with the service.

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Prime Video has already seen huge success with their adaptation of Fallout, and now a TV adaptation of God of War is coming to the streaming service. It seems the beloved video game series is in good hands too, with Ronald D. Moore attached as showrunner.

You might know Moore from his work on For All Mankind, which is considered to be one of the best Apple TV shows. He's no stranger to the sci-fi genre, having worked on Star Trek: The Next Generation, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, and Battlestar Galactica, so it will be interesting to see how he approaches God of War.

What do we know about Prime Video's God of War TV show?

So far, we don't have much to go off when it comes to the planned God of War TV series. It's been in the works for a while, though, with Prime Video first announcing it back in December 2022. During that time, we were teased what the plot might entail.

The streaming service reported that the show would follow Kratos' "dangerous journey with his estranged son" to fulfil his wife's final wish to "spread [her] ashes from the highest peak". "Kratos soon realises the journey is an epic quest in disguise" and one which "will test the bonds between father and son, and force Kratos to battle new gods and monsters for the fate of the world".

However, there have been some changes to the team and it is unknown if the plot will change now that Moore is on board as showrunner. He takes over from predecessor Rafe Judkins, so there could well be some changes heading our way.

Now that the show is back on track, it'll be interesting to see if it joins our best Prime Video shows line-up, which is already packed with some great entries. In a world where videogame adaptations are, thankfully, getting better, I do have high hopes for this one.

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The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA), the government agency that regulates civil aviation in the United States, has published its final regulations that will facilitate the certification of ‘powered lift’ aircraft.

In a press release sent out by the FAA, it claims that the powered lift category is “the first completely new category of civil aircraft since helicopters were introduced in the 1940s”, paving the way for air taxis and futuristic cargo delivery solutions.

The final rule, which was issued earlier this week, forms a framework for the qualifications and training that instructors and pilots must have to fly this new-fangled type of aircraft, but it will also help speed up the certification of new models.

In essence, the powered lift category describes the numerous electric vertical take-off and landing (eVTOL) craft that have been hogging the news agenda over recent years, with the likes of Hyundai-owned Supernal and Joby Aviation all seemingly ready to unleash the air taxi of the future.

(Image credit: Toyota/Joby Aviation)

The concept craft, which are often powered by battery packs and electric motors, feature tilting rotors that allow it to take-off and land on a vertical plane, then titling to allow forward or backward propulsion.

Many of those burgeoning start-ups dabbling in eVTOL concepts have been frustrated at the FAA’s proposal to create an all-new category of aircraft, claiming that it would slow down progress. But the FAA has continued to claim it wanted to “to prioritize the safety of our system”, rather than rush into things.

This new certification, which combines existing regulations and updates others, effectively allows air taxis to be used commercially. The FAA has even gone so far as to produce a blueprint for how Urban Air Mobility vehicles will operate in the near future. It is heavy-going, but fascinating nonetheless.

Analysis: the future of air travel is here

(Image credit: Hyundai/Supernal)

Some industry analysts are predicting that the air taxi market is predicted to grow to $80.3bn from the $4.9bn that it was worth last year, while research suggests that there are currently 1,044 vertiports (sites where air taxis will operate from) planned for development between now and 2028.

Even notorious stickler-for-the-rules, the UK, has planning permission for its first vertiport in Bicester, Oxfordshire, while Dubai has apparently gone all in on the technology, claiming it will have an air taxi in operation by the end of next year.

Those in the Advanced Air Mobility (AAM) game say that the eVTOL craft has the ability to reduce congestion and allow those in a rush to speed across cities in comfort. Hyundai’s Supernal SA-2 electric aircraft, for example, will cruise at speeds of up to 120mph at an altitude of around 1,500ft, much lower than commercial helicopters and aircraft.

During conversations with Supernal’s CEO and ex-NASA man Jaiwon Shin, it has been suggested that its offering could operate like a ride-hailing business, effectively taking some of Uber’s most premium offerings to the skies.

More recently, Joby Aviation received a further $500 million cash injection from Toyota in a bid to speed up the certification process and nail down a method of mass producing these large aircraft.

By announcing its final regulations in the US, the FAA has not only made it easier for companies to achieve the certification required to put eVTOL craft into service, but it will also drastically speed up the training of pilots.

The FAA has adapted the rules so it can apply helicopter operating requirements to some phases of flight, effectively negating the need for further training, as well as allowing pilots to train in powered-lift with a single set of flight controls – legacy rules require two flight controls – one for the student and one for the instructor.

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