Daily Tech News 2 April 2022

• It's the weekend again - somehow - and that means it's Question and Answer time. Take one of the bottles from the basket, put your question inside, and cast it into the waters. It will probably just wash straight back up on the beach, but if it does make it here to PixyLab I will attempt to answer.
  
  
  
• No news on house #3 yet. The one that was previously #4 on my shortlist has actually sold, but I wasn't actively pursuing that one because while the renovated interiors were first rate, the location (between an iron foundry and an artillery range) was less than ideal.
  
  
  
• 123qweQWE!@#0. (Bleeping Computer)
  
  GitLab had a default test password configured for accounts registered via external authentication providers. They say no accounts have been compromised, but the bug affects not only the cloud service, but the paid on-premises version and the free open source edition, so if you run your own it's time to update.
  
  Also, put it behind a firewall. At my day job your VPN account has to be configured to grant access the the GitLab server before you can do anything at all.
  
  
  

• Sabrent's 8TB PCIe 4 M.2 SSD is now available at a mere $1499. (Tom's Hardware)
  
  Which is about what I paid for three 4TB drives, but if you absolutely have to fit a ton of storage inside a laptop - maybe if your job involves video editing on the go with a film crew - then it's either that or $2200 for the 8TB option on a MacBook Pro.
  
  
  
• Proposed EU regulations would require all blockchain transactions - all of them - to be registered with a verified account - on both ends - and the details made available to member governments at any time for any reason. (Bleeping Computer)
  
  And transactions valued at more than 1000 Euros would be automatically reported to the government.
  
  Note the both ends requirement. If you want to transfer your crypto to someone - anyone - they also must register with the EU.
  
  Oh, and these registers, if implemented, are going to get hacked. Count on it.
  
  
  
• Posting the full name and medical history of a patient in a reply to a Yelp review is a HIPAA violation. (The Verge)
  
  Who knew?
  
  
  
• A Scottish Twitter user has been sentenced to 150 hours of community service for being a Twitter user. (The Verge)

  Sheriff Adrian Cottam told Kelly he passed the "custody threshold" but there is a presumption against prison if there is an alternative.

  Which means that this haggis-humping bumblefuck was actually considering jail time for the crime of being a pretty normal Twitter user, which is to say, a loathsome mindless hate-filled tankie who would likely be shot by his own zampolit if their unit ever faced action.
  
  Hang on...
  
  Right, this is not Twitter, nor am I Scottish. Just needed to check.
  
  
  
• Russia has banned purchases of foreign software for critical infrastructure. (The Register)
  
  But at the same time has legalised theft of foreign software, so that's okay.

• Some of you expressed interest in the cover home of The Concise Dictionary of Regrettable Architecture (4th ed, Stodder & Houghton, 3716pp) as mentioned in yesterday's Pixy Goes House Hunting item.
  
  Well, here's one of the bathrooms:
  
  
  
  After looking at several late 19th to early 20th century homes that have been lovingly restored (and one that is a complete dump but is heritage listed and so frozen in time as a complete dump) this place comes across like a big bowl of curried corn flakes.
  
  Every single pixel asks the question why?
  
  And that's the bathroom they they selected to show off the property. If this was a modest three-bedroom place passed down in the family for 65 years and now on the market for the first time, sure. Buy it, replace the kitchen, bathroom, and carpet, strip off the wallpaper and paint everything left white, and you'd have yourself a little gem.
  
  For this one, the owner would have to be someone prepared to drop an additional half a mil to gut it and rebuild from the inside out.
  
  In other words, not me.

posted by Pixy Misa at 05:00 AM

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