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Kimsuky hackers deploy new Linux backdoor in attacks on South Korea  BleepingComputer

Kimsuky hackers deploy new Linux backdoor in attacks on South Korea  BleepingComputer

Kimsuky hackers deploy new Linux backdoor via trojanized installers  BleepingComputer

An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Verge: Airbus Helicopters showcased an experimental half-plane, half-helicopter on Wednesday in a quest for speed as competition heats up to define the rotorcraft of the future. The $217 million Racer is a one-off demonstrator model combining traditional overhead rotors with two forward-facing propellors in a bid to combine stability and speed, shortening response times for critical missions like search-and-rescue. "There are missions where the quickest possible access to the zone is vital. We often talk about the 'golden hour'," Airbus Helicopters CEO Bruno Even told Reuters, referring to the window considered most critical for providing medical attention. Such designs could also be offered for military developments as NATO conducts a major study into next-generation helicraft, though much depends on how its planners define future needs. [...] Racer's public debut came months after Italy's Leonardo and U.S. manufacturer Bell agreed to co-operate on the next generation of tilt-rotor technology, which replaces a helicopter's trademark overhead blades altogether. Leonardo is also leading a separate project to develop the next generation of tilt-rotors for civil use. Its AW609 is the sole existing civil design, but has yet to be certified. Proponents of the tilt-rotor, which relies on swiveling side-mounted rotors 90 degrees to go up and then forwards, say it permits higher speed and range that are suited to military missions. Critics say the tilt mechanism reaches higher speeds only at the expense of higher complexity and maintenance costs. Airbus said the Racer will fly at 220 knots (400 km/hour) compared with traditional helicopter speeds closer to 140 knots. Bell says its V-280 Valor tilt-rotor design, recently picked by the Pentagon, will reach a cruise speed of 280 knots. Watch: Racer - Inside the high speed demonstrator (YouTube)

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Intel Habana Labs & Xe Linux Driver Maintainer Steps Down  Phoronix

Intel IPU6 Driver Being Upstreamed In Linux 6.10  Phoronix

Michael Kan reports via PCMag: AT&T has struck a deal to bring satellite internet connectivity to phones through AST SpaceMobile, a potential rival to SpaceX's Starlink. AT&T says the commercial agreement will last until 2030. The goal is "to provide a space-based broadband network to everyday cell phones," a spokesperson tells PCMag, meaning customers can receive a cellular signal in remote areas where traditional cell towers are few and far between. All they'll need to do is ensure their phone has a clear view of the sky. AT&T has been working with Texas-based AST SpaceMobile since 2018 on the technology, which involves using satellites in space as orbiting cell towers. In January, AT&T was one of several companies (including Google) to invest $110 million in AST. In addition, the carrier created a commercial starring actor Ben Stiller to showcase AST's technology. In today's announcement, AT&T notes that "previously, the companies were working together under a Memorandum of Understanding," which is usually nonbinding. Hence, the new commercial deal suggests AT&T is confident AST can deliver fast and reliable satellite internet service to consumer smartphones -- even though it hasn't launched a production satellite. AST has only launched one prototype satellite; in tests last year, it delivered download rates at 14Mbps and powered a 5G voice call. Following a supply chain-related delay, the company is now preparing to launch its first batch of "BlueBird" production satellites later this year, possibly in Q3. In Wednesday's announcement, AT&T adds: "This summer, AST SpaceMobile plans to deliver its first commercial satellites to Cape Canaveral for launch into low Earth orbit. These initial five satellites will help enable commercial service that was previously demonstrated with several key milestones." Still, AST needs to launch 45 to 60 BlueBird satellites before it can offer continuous coverage in the U.S., although in an earnings call, the company said it'll still be able to offer "non-continuous coverage" across 5,600 cells in the country.

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PipeWire 1.2 Release Candidate Adds Explicit Sync and Snap Support  9to5Linux

Morningstar has published their 2024 Diversification Landscape Update (direct link to PDF), another useful whitepaper for DIY investors that looks closer at the correlations between different asset classes. In their Key Takeaways, they note the quick turnaround from “The Classic 60/40 Portfolio is Dead” articles at the end of 2022 to “The Classic 60/40 Portfolio is Back!” at the end of 2023.

After a dismal year in 2022, the plain-vanilla version of a 60/40 portfolio (made up of US stocks and US investment-grade bonds) gained about 18% in 2023. Diversifying into other asset classes generally led to lower returns.

This marks a reversal from 2022 when portfolio diversification was a net positive. However, the basic 60/40 portfolio, composed of US stocks and high-quality bonds, has been tough to beat over longer periods. A 60/40 portfolio improved risk-adjusted returns versus an all-stock benchmark in more than 87% of the rolling three-year periods starting in 1976.

A potential benefit from owning multiple asset classes is that the lower the correlation between asset classes (the less they move in the same direction), the greater the reduction in volatility you get by combining assets. As long as you combine asset classes with correlations below 1 (perfectly correlated), you get some degree of volatility reduction. (See top graphic.) You can also see that the volatility reduction benefit mostly occurs within the first few asset classes; you don’t need 10 of them.

As you can see from the 60/40 Key Takeaway, the catch here is that correlations aren’t always stable. We have to look for longer historical trends with evidence that it will continue. Here are a few selected charts from the research paper.

T-Bill and Chill. Over long periods, US Treasury bonds have a lower average correlation to US stocks than a Total Bond index that includes investment-grade corporate bonds. But T-Bills (cash) get rid of the interest rate risk within T-Bonds as well, which often results in T-Bills being the most reliable shelter from the storm. You might not get a handy negative correlation boost during a stock crash, but the correlation will be reliably close to zero and your principal will be ready and waiting to deploy.

International stocks offer a small diversification benefit, but are usually strongly correlated with US stocks. (Though a little less so recently.) In the end, you must have faith that international stock returns will at times exceed US stock returns for periods of time to invest in this asset class. That faith has been tested recently, but I still would rather own them than not.

Commodities and Gold. Commodities go through boom and bust cycles as part of their nature, and the correlations with US stocks can also stay high or low for years at a time. I find it all very unreliable and unpredictable. Now, Gold has shown a consistently low correlation with US stocks, which is definitely an attractive quality. I’m more concerned about the long-term returns. Again, you need to have faith that long-term average gold returns will be well above inflation.

Long-term average correlations between asset classes. At the bottom of the whitepaper, don’t miss the charts which include correlation matrixes between major asset classes over the last 1, 3, 5, 10, 15, and 20 years.

“The editorial content here is not provided by any of the companies mentioned, and has not been reviewed, approved or otherwise endorsed by any of these entities. Opinions expressed here are the author's alone. This email may contain links through which we are compensated when you click on or are approved for offers.”

Morningstar Asset Class Correlation Charts 2024: 20-Year Historical Matrix from My Money Blog.

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Announcing the new €15M Google.org Impact Challenge

Explore the Growing Role of Linux in Quantum Computing  ITPro Today

ESET Reports: Ebury Botnet Growing, Hitting 400k Linux Servers  SMEStreet

Microsoft's ambitious goal to be carbon negative by 2030 is threatened by its expanding AI operations, which have increased its carbon footprint by 30% since 2020. To meet its targets, Microsoft must quickly adopt green technologies and improve efficiency in its data centers, which are critical for AI but heavily reliant on carbon-intensive resources. Bloomberg reports: Now to meet its goals, the software giant will have to make serious progress very quickly in gaining access to green steel and concrete and less carbon-intensive chips, said Brad Smith, president of Microsoft, in an exclusive interview with Bloomberg Green. "In 2020, we unveiled what we called our carbon moonshot. That was before the explosion in artificial intelligence," he said. "So in many ways the moon is five times as far away as it was in 2020, if you just think of our own forecast for the expansion of AI and its electrical needs." [...] Despite AI's ravenous energy consumption, this actually contributes little to Microsoft's hike in emissions -- at least on paper. That's because the company says in its sustainability report that it's 100% powered by renewables. Companies use a range of mechanisms to make such claims, which vary widely in terms of credibility. Some firms enter into long-term power purchase agreements (PPAs) with renewable developers, where they shoulder some of a new energy plant's risk and help get new solar and wind farms online. In other cases, companies buy renewable energy credits (RECs) to claim they're using green power, but these inexpensive credits do little to spur new demand for green energy, researchers have consistently found. Microsoft uses a mix of both approaches. On one hand, it's one of the biggest corporate participants in power purchase agreements, according to BloombergNEF, which tracks these deals. But it's also a huge purchaser of RECs, using these instruments to claim about half of its energy use is clean, according to its environmental filings in 2022. By using a large quantity of RECs, Microsoft is essentially masking an even larger growth in emissions. "It is Microsoft's plan to phase out the use of unbundled RECs in future years," a spokesperson for the company said. "We are focused on PPAs as a primary strategy." So what else can be done? Smith, along with Microsoft's Chief Sustainability Officer Melanie Nakagawa, has laid out clear steps in the sustainability report. High among them is to increase efficiency, which is to use the same amount of energy or computing to do more work. That could help reduce the need for data centers, which will reduce emissions and electricity use. On most things, "our climate goals require that we spend money," said Smith. "But efficiency gains will actually enable us to save money." Microsoft has also been at the forefront of buying sustainable aviation fuels that has helped reduce some of its emissions from business travel. The company also wants to partner with those who will "accelerate breakthroughs" to make greener steel, concrete and fuels. Those technologies are starting to work at a small scale, but remain far from being available in commercial quantities even if expensive. Cheap renewable power has helped make Microsoft's climate journey easier. But the tech giant's electricity consumption last year rivaled that of a small European country -- beating Slovenia easily. Smith said that one of the biggest bottlenecks for it to keep getting access to green power is the lack of transmission lines from where the power is generated to the data centers. That's why Microsoft says it's going to increase lobbying efforts to get governments to speed up building the grid. If Microsoft's emissions remain high going into 2030, Smith said the company may consider bulk purchases of carbon removal credits, even though it's not "the desired course." "You've got to be willing to invest and pay for it," said Smith. Climate change is "a problem that humanity created and that humanity can solve."

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Fedora Linux 38 users told to upgrade now or risk exposure to exploits  Neowin

Fedora Linux 38 users told to upgrade now or risk exposure to exploits  Neowin

Fedora Linux 38 users told to upgrade now or risk exposure to exploits  Neowin

Installing ONLYOFFICE on Ubuntu Linux (And Remove it Later)  It's FOSS

The recent surge in bitcoin prices has the phones at crypto wallet recovery firms ringing off the hook, as retail investors locked out of their digital vaults make frantic calls to regain access to their accounts. From a report: Cryptocurrencies exist on a decentralized digital ledger known as blockchain and investors may opt to access their holdings either through a locally stored software wallet or a hardware wallet, to avoid risks related to owning crypto with an exchange, as in the case of the former FTX. Losing access to a crypto wallet is a well-known problem. Investors forgetting their intricate passwords is a primary reason, but loss of access to two-factor authentication devices, unexpected shutdowns of cryptocurrency exchanges and cyberattacks are also common. Wallet passwords are usually alphanumeric and the wallet provider also offers a set of randomized words, known as "seed phrases," for additional security - both these are known only to the user. If investors lose the passwords and phrases, access to their wallets is cut off. With bitcoin prices regaining traction since last October and hitting a record high of $73,803.25 in March, investors seem to be suffering from a classic case of FOMO, or the fear of missing out. Reuters spoke to nearly a dozen retail investors who had lost access to their crypto wallets. Six of them contacted a recovery services firm and managed to regain access to their holdings.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

FOSS Weekly #24.20: Linux Kernel 6.9, SnowflakeOS, Nvidia GPU Handling and More  It's FOSS

Ebury botnet compromises 400,000+ Linux servers  Help Net Security