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'The program is in a death spiral,' former domestic policy adviser to former President Trump says In a move critics say is designed to shield the Biden-Harris administration from election fallout, the administration has leveraged taxpayer funds to mask upcoming increases in Medicare premiums. Under the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), which was intended to cap out-of-pocket drug costs for Medicare beneficiaries, insurers are poised to significantly hike monthly premiums, with average bids for Part D plans expected to triple by 2025. In response to potential voter backlash, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) rolled out a three-year "demonstration...

First, there was 5-Hour Energy BBQ sauce. Now, there's another caffeinated meal on the block: Caffeinated Noodles. In late July, Nippon launched Boost Noodles, a ramen created by a young developer who wanted to solve the age-old problem of how you can eat ramen while also simultaneously participating in an online gaming battle all night. Each serving of the ramen contains 35mg of caffeine, roughly a third of a cup of coffee, so while it might keep you going, it's not likely to keep you up past bedtime (unless you're having a few packets at once). It will, however, give...

“I can has cheezburger?” became one of the first internet memes... But research has now found that the vast majority of data stored in the cloud is “dark data”, meaning it is used once then never visited again. That means that all the memes and jokes and films that we love to share with friends and family – from “All your base are belong to us” ... are out there somewhere, sitting in a datacentre, using up energy. By 2030, the National Grid anticipates that datacentres will account for just under 6% of the UK’s total electricity consumption, so tackling...

Good afternoon Freepers. This is a post to ask what I hope is a simple question. What do you all recommend for use as a web browser? The reason I ask this question is because today I was trying to update my Mozilla-ish browser called Palemoon. It's actually a Goanna fork of Mozilla so it's not really based on their programming code anymore, that I'm aware of. In the process of my task, I noticed that it wasn't playing well with a few secure websites, like ID.me, myPay, etc. I use Brave as my primary browser, and I also have...

I'm a Mac. I'm a PC. You're both annoying meOn Call The Register knows that tech support is a vocation that induces frustration, which is why each Friday we offer a new edition of On Call – the reader-contributed column that details real-life support stories so you can at least enjoy misery in company. This week, meet a reader we'll Regomize as "Brad" who told us about his first tech support job, for a grocery retailer based in a major US city. Brad spent most of his time at the company's biggest store, but a few times a week was...

Revealense recognizes indicators from video clips that help client companies know if a customer is being truthful or not.I was surprisingly anxious in the moments before my “truth test.” I was about to answer a dozen questions that would score my honesty and integrity. It isn’t a written questionnaire, with right and wrong answers. It’s AI watching, listening and assessing me based on indicators over which I have no control – such as changes in my skin pigmentation, blood flow, pulse, voice, eye blinking, facial expressions, and signs of brain activity. I have to answer each question aloud, and mark...

COSMIC! This name has become increasingly popular in the open-source community over the past year, raising high expectations. Now, more than two years after System76 unexpectedly announced its bold plan to create a new desktop environment written in Rust programming language from scratch, users can finally try it out. And let me tell you, the wait was worth it.We recently tested the alpha version of COSMIC, and our initial thoughts can be summed up most briefly with this: it’s a game-changer! Above all, it is incredibly fast. And when I say fast, I don’t just mean fast – it’s fast...

Microsoft's Outlook email is changing in September. You can no longer set your email program's Authentication Method to Normal Password. You must set it to OAuth2. I'm having difficulty doing this. My Thunderbird, fully up to date, allows me to set the Server Settings to OAuth2, but my Outgoing Server (SMPT) setting has no OAuth2 option. Also, when I log into MS online, it wants to verify me. MS has my phone number, and my non-Outlook email (which forwards to my Outlook address). But though MS claims to have texted and emailed verification codes to me, I never receive them....

We Windows users are sometimes the butt of the joke when it comes to cybersecurity issues. Or at least, we often used to be. Still, if I receive one more lecture on why Linux or Mac systems are more secure, I'll at least have this article to point to. Not always, I shall say. Not always.Oligo Security's research team has discovered a “0.0.0.0 Day” vulnerability that affects Google Chrome/Chromium, Mozilla Firefox and Apple Safari browsers, enabling websites to communicate with software running on MacOS and Linux systems (via The Hacker News).The vulnerability means public websites using .com domains are able...

How much over-provisioning of an older SSD is best? The drive in question is a 120 GB Samsung 840, Model MZ-7TD120. Obviously this is not the latest and greatest, but is does have Win XP on it and should speed up one of my old XP Machines in my lab. The drive health as reported by Samsung Magician is "Good", with 17TB having been written to it. That's good news, as the TLC NAND is not the most durable in world. (It looks like the existing files on the drive go back as far as 2012, but I'm not to...

Iran is ramping up online activity that appears intended to influence the upcoming US election, in one case targeting a presidential campaign with an email phishing attack, Microsoft said Friday. Iranian actors also have spent recent months creating fake news sites and impersonating activists, laying the groundwork to stoke division and potentially sway American voters this fall, especially in swing states, the technology giant found. The findings in Microsoft’s newest threat intelligence report show how Iran, which has been active in recent US campaign cycles, is evolving its tactics for another election that’s likely to have global implications. The report...

Good afternoon Freepers. I got an IT question I'm hoping you all can help me with. I have been experimenting with using a "dark mode" for my browsers. I know that browsers like Brave have a built in dark mode that can be found in chrome://flags, and I've experimented with a few plugin extensions, like Super Dark Mode. The problem is none of them "quite" do the job. For instance, Super Dark Mode can be a good one. The extension has options built in where you can white list a website that doesn't do well in dark mode, and it...

This at home mother posted doorbell video of the Amazon driver, mother is complaining that >>> Amazon driver blatantly ignores our "sleeping baby" and "excitable barking dog" sign. She wants driver to phone or text this housewife. Lots of choice Twitter comments here. The general consensus is that Amazon drivers don't have the time to cater to you.

If you spend any time looking at diet and lifestyle content on social media, you may well have encountered a variety of weight loss "hacks". One of the more recent trends is a home-made drink called ricezempic, made by soaking uncooked rice and then straining it to drink the leftover starchy water. Sounds delicious, right? Its proponents claim it leads to weight loss by making you feel fuller for longer and suppressing your appetite, working in a similar way to the sought-after drug Ozempic – hence the name. So does this drink actually mimic the weight loss effects of Ozempic?...

I have detected a serious YouTube security threat that needs exposure. All IT and security experts welcome to please check into my findings and chime in. Here is what I found so far. Years ago this was a problem. Just going to youtube or Google mail at all even on another tab without logging in would load strong spyware in your browser and even in your machine permanently which required reinstalling your OS to remove. It tracked logins on other tabs and was gaining access to keyboards, microphones, and cameras even if you just landed on their site by accident....

A pilot was preparing to take off from a Texas airport when he was suddenly arrested on a disturbing charge -- forcing a cancellation. A Frontier Airlines pilot was taken into custody by Houston police on board a plane at George Bush Intercontinental Airport on Saturday night. The airman, later identified as 45-year-old Seymour Walker, was removed from Flight 3195 before takeoff due to an outstanding warrant for assault-family violence. Law enforcement timed the arrest for when Flight 3195 reached its assigned gate at George Bush Intercontinental Airport around 4 p.m. Officers boarded the empty plane and took the pilot...

Well, ladies and gentlemen: the chips are down — literally and figuratively. Two years ago, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris touted their “Chips Act” to bring the semiconductor industry back home from Taiwan, China and Singapore. The price tag on the bill: a cool $280 billion of corporate handouts. It was arguably the largest corporate welfare bill in American history. Intel, Micron, Global Foundries, Polar Semiconductor, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company, Samsung, BAE Systems, and Microchip Technology have been the direct beneficiaries of the law. This was supposed to be one of the “Crown Jewels” of the Biden-Harris admin. A massive...

The Thomas More Society is defending a pro-life Florida woman who is suing Google for deplatforming her without explanation and keeping her data. The attorney group is representing 76-year-old Trudy Perez-Poveda in her lawsuit against Google in a trial court in Jacksonville, Florida. Perez-Poveda argues that without explanation, Google deplatformed her an hour after she emailed members of her pro-life group in September to join her for a peaceful Catholic Mass and prayer gathering in front of A Woman’s Choice, an abortion business in Jacksonville. Google then refused to allow her access to more than 11 years of her stored...

Hey folks. My current computer, while relatively new at about 18 months, has been problematic since purchase. Since it was only a lateral move in performance, I'd like to upgrade to a new machine, a problem-free one. These are the specifications I am looking for: Not Intel-based. I hear Intel is having major problems with their chips lately, and that the chips are simply frying outright. Maybe that is only for a certain set of chips, so I could be convinced to return to Intel, but I'm leaning towards AMD or other mainstream chipsets. I'd like it optimized for gaming...

Olympic bosses dramatically doubled down on their decision to allow two boxers who failed a gender test to compete in Paris - after the opponent of one withdrew from their bout in tears after just 46 seconds. Amid deeply disturbing scenes on the outskirts of Paris, Italy's distraught Angela Carini quit her contest with Algeria's Imane Khelif, who was disqualified from last year's World Championships after being deemed biologically male. The defeated welterweight was hit twice, suffered a suspected broken nose and barely threw a punch before telling her corner: 'It's not fair.' She then sank to her knees, beat...