Free Republic

Central Bank Digital Currencies are the future of currency, and when they arrive, they'll enslave the world. To understand why, you first need to understand what they are, how they serve the vision of those in power, and why they're inevitable. What Are Central Bank Digital Currencies? Central bank digital currencies (CBDCs) have yet to be launched on a large scale, but advocates envision a government-controlled cryptocurrency that replaces national currencies. CBDCs will use digital tokens on a computer network to represent a national currency. They'll rely on blockchain, the same technology behind Bitcoin, Etherium, and other popular cryptocurrencies. As...

Late last week, a curious alert appeared in the Federal Aviation Administration’s database of Notices to Airman, or NOTAMs, which, among other things, alerts aviators to chunks of airspace that are temporarily off-limits. The details strongly point to the comings or goings of a high-flying aircraft between either Area 51, also known as Groom Lake, or the Tonopah Test Range Airport, two of the U.S. military’s most closely-guarded flight test facilities, and the Pacific Ocean to the southwest of San Francisco, California. The NOTAM, which was first pointed out by users of the Dreamlandresort.com message board, was issued on March...

• In the sequel to our Wintel Wars article, we offer the ultimate deep dive into the tectonic shifts happening in the tech industry, giving unparalleled context to Karp's cryptic musings. • We lay out how Google and Facebook gradually created privatized versions of secretive DARPA programs, and why Palantir and Apple are leading a push for privacy as industry tensions ignite. • We discuss how Palantir threatens the current paradigm with software for a decentralized alternative. Europe's GAIA-X offers significant upside potential as Palantir seeks a new European hub in Switzerland. • While the last decade focused on the...

Build a dual-band low-noise amplifier for 2 meters and 70 centimeters" by kim kocsis WA9PYH is on page 48 https://amatortelsiz.com.tr/wp-content/uploads/2021/02/CQFeb2021Fiby2C5.pdf

China’s unabashed ambitions to win the international race to bring 5G networks to the world poses a significant threat to U.S. national and economic security. The Chinese, through their semi-governmental companies and other entities, want to stampede the world into complete dependence on their equipment and services for 5G connectivity, with all the national security problems that would provoke. Sadly, some companies on the free side of the line who should be cooperating to counter this threat are fighting each other. I am referring to the ongoing dispute between Ericsson and Samsung over patent infringement claims at the U.S. International...

I wanted a bit more “oomph” from my 1W 1.2 GHz HT, so I purchased a PC board Yagi to get another 6 dB. I have a Yaesu FT-911 1.2 GHz HT. It is a 1990’s rig gifted me by the wife of a Silent Key at my work. It is a sweet handheld, but with limited power.

The security holes...leave the door open to industrial-scale cyber espionage, allowing malicious actors to steal emails virtually at will from vulnerable servers. Tens of thousands of organizations have already been compromised,...the sluggish pace of many customers’ updates...means the field remains at least partially open to hackers of all stripes...Intriguingly, several of the groups appeared to know about the vulnerability before it was announced by Microsoft on March 2.

After appearing for decades in science fiction, then moving into an actual theory, a new patent for an updated warp drive was published last year to no fanfare. Like many other false starts in cutting-edge research, the patent may represent the next step in the expanding theory, or it could mean the practical, real-world design of a functioning warp drive is on the horizon. BACKGROUND: HOW TO BEND SPACE-TIME WITH A WARP DRIVE After first publishing his groundbreaking 1994 warp drive concept in the journal Classical and Quantum Gravity, Mexican Mathematician and Physicist Miguel Alcubierre received significant positive and negative...

Genealogy company MyHeritage is putting deepfake technology to a creatively unsettling use with a new feature called Deep Nostalgia. The system animates photographs of long-deceased loved ones, turning old still portraits into uncanny blinking and smiling videos. Deepfake technology has been rapidly evolving over the past few years and generally stoking conversations over how close we are to completely losing faith in the veracity of the images we encounter. So far, the technology is still in its infancy but MyHeritage is presenting a novel use of deepfakes, bringing to life still photographs of dead relatives. Called Deep Nostalgia, the technology...

Meanwhile, both IGEA and John Deere believe existing protections under existing consumer law work just fine. "As more products are computerised, and the information and power imbalances between manufacturers and consumers grow, the incentives for premature planned obsolescence that harms consumers is likely to increase. It is important that regulators are equipped with an appropriate legislative framework to investigate new emerging practices that may harm consumers," the ACCC said. In September 2018, the Equipment Dealers Association signed an agreement with John Deere in which the company would begin voluntarily making repair tools, software guides, and diagnostic equipment available for ordinary...

As COVID cases began to rise a year ago, a Chinese company contacted several U.S. states and offered to set up testing labs. As a byproduct, the Chinese firm, Beijing Genomics Institute, would likely gain access to the DNA of those tested. The offer was tempting for states struggling to set up their own testing facilities for a new virus on short notice. But U.S. national security officials urged the states to reject the offer, citing concerns about how China might use personal data collected on Americans. "We certainly reached out to our partners and the community to make sure...

The Federal Reserve’s systems for electronic money transfers between banks suffered a widespread disruption Wednesday. The Fedwire Funds Service, Fedwire Securities Service, and National Settlement Service have resumed processing and are operating normally. The Federal Reserve Banks have taken steps to help ensure the resilience of the Fedwire and NSS applications, including recovery to the point of failure. Nevertheless, it is critical that you reconcile the messages you believe you had sent or received through the services after waiting several minutes for the backlog of messages to finish processing before you submit additional messages to the Fedwire Funds Service and...

A report commissioned in mid-1999 by Rep. Curt Weldon (R) looks into possible Chinese front companies in the US seeking technology for the Chinese military. Dr. Eileen Preisser and Michael Maloof are commissioned to make the report. Dr. Preisser, who runs the Information Dominance Center at the US Army's Land Information Warfare Activity (LIWA) and will later become closely tied to Able Danger, uses LIWA's data mining capabilities to search unclassified information. According to Maloof, their results show Chinese front companies in the US posing as US corporations that acquire technology from US defense contractors. When the study is completed...

In China’s bid to acquire advanced technology from the United States, officials from the north-central city of Baoding tried to meet with Silicon Valley executives and discuss deals for companies to set up offices there, according to internal government documents that The Epoch Times obtained recently. Citing the Chinese regime’s key strategy of “bringing technologies in, exporting our products out,” the Baoding government detailed a successful example: it attracted AXT Inc., a U.S.-based designer and manufacturer of semiconductor substrates, to set up a factory in Dingxing county, Baoding. The semiconductor substrates are components for making electronic chips, which power nearly...

The gist of the Congressional inquiry into the role NSA may have played in manipulating the U.S. civilian government technical standards development and approval process is not the first time the legislative branch of government has smelled a rat when it comes to NSA inserting “Trojan horses” into standards developed for civilian government and commercial use. In the case of Dual_EC_DRBG, NSA’s zeal in providing itself with a hidden back door to spy on targeted computers and networks relying on the NIST standard may have boomeranged. Back doors of any nature in information technology products is a hack waiting to...

UK Microwave Group (UKuG) member Kent Britain WA5VJB talks about 'Care and Feeding of Yagi’ Antennas' - including some interesting ways to doing Yagi’s and myths of Yagi Stacking. - Recorded from the online UKuG talk on Wednesday 10 February 2021

Recent court documents have indicated that the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) possesses a tool allowing them to access encrypted messages on the Signal app. Signal has rapidly gained in popularity as Silicon Valley monopolists have grown more openly hostile to free speech, but the platform may be vulnerable to backdoors that undermine the privacy protections provided through the encrypted messaging service. According to documents filed by the Department of Justice and first obtained by Forbes, Signal’s encrypted messages can be intercepted from iPhone devices when those Apple devices are in a mode called “partial AFU,” which means “after first...

Those of us who are either in-house or independent EMC consultants can benefit greatly by assembling our own EMI troubleshooting kit. I’ve depended on my own kit for several years and it has proven not only valuable, but depicts a sense of professionalism in dealing with your own product development engineers, their managers, or your clients, as the case may be. Mine is designed around a Pelican 1514 roller case (http://www.pelican.com) that includes a padded divider, so it is easy to transport to the area needed. You’ll also want to order the optional lid organizer, model 1519, for carrying extra...

Plus: Check if your Flickr photos are in facial recognition engines and and the list of NSFW words for AICanada’s privacy watchdog has found Clearview AI in “clear violation” of the country’s privacy laws, and has told the facial-recognition startup to stop scraping images of Canadians and delete all existing photos it has on those citizens. The Office of the Privacy Commissioner of Canada launched an official investigation into the upstart’s practices, and as a result Clearview stopped selling its software to Canadian police. “Clearview's massive collection of millions of images without the consent or knowledge of individuals for the...

Waste fibers from hemp crops out-perform graphene for a thousandth of the cost, according to new researchIs there anything hemp can’t do? A year after hemp became legal to grow in the United States, we’ve seen its power to make better clothing, better buildings and better medicine. Now, there’s something else hemp appears to be better at – making batteries. Most auto batteries today are made from lithium-ion, an expensive, quickly disappearing material. A team of American and Canadian researchers have developed a battery that could be used in cars and power tools using hemp bast fiber – the inner...