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Let's Encrypt "will shorten the default validity period of its TLS certificates from 90 days to 64 days, starting February 10, 2027," reports the blog Linuxiac: All certificates issued or renewed from that date will have a 64-day lifespan unless users explicitly select one of the shorter options already available: 45 or six days. Existing certificates will remain valid until their expiration dates. Let's Encrypt expects the final 90-day certificate to expire on May 11, 2027. The organization al…

"Video game console sales in the U.S. have cratered," reports Tom's Hardware, with sales through August far below where they'd been in 2025: Mat Piscatella, the video game industry advisor at research firm Circana, shared the numbers on his Bluesky account — PlayStation 5 sales have dropped by 25%, putting it at its lowest point since 2013, when gamers held off buying PlayStation consoles in anticipation of the arrival of the PS4, while Xbox's retail figures have cratered by 33% YTD, putting it…

CNBC reports: As Anthropic barrels toward a potential $2 trillion market cap on the Nasdaq, one research firm is valuing the artificial intelligence company at a mere $150 billion and says Wall Street is about to face an "unprecedented test of investor gullibility." In a report on Tuesday, independent financial research provider New Constructs called Anthropic's upcoming offering the "most ridiculous IPO of 2026." To reach its desired valuation, the firm estimates Anthropic would need to record…

"Gas cars are now a minority of the world's new car sales," reports Electrek. Gasoline-only vehicles made up 49% of global new-vehicle sales in the first half of 2026, down from 73% in 2021, according to Mobility Global data first reported by Nikkei. It's the first time on record that they've been under half. But there's a catch: most of the cars taking their place still have a gas tank... [The share of gas-only vehicles] fell three points in a single year, from 52% to 49%. Battery-electric veh…

Why didn't The Social Reckoning enjoy the box office success of 2010's The Social Network, asks IndieWire/A>: [T]here wasn't the same urgency in the story being told. The Social Reckoning focuses less on Zuckerberg, and more on data engineer Frances Haugen's decision to blow the whistle on how Facebook's algorithms were promoting political content that radicalized users, as well as the company's awareness of how its products were contributing to a rise in bullying and teen suicide... [B]ut The …

There was some Blade Runner news at New York Comic-Con this weekend — and also some news about Godzilla. Ars Technica reports: We got our first look at Prime Video's new sci-fi series Blade Runner 2099 in July at San Diego Comic-Con. With the show's premiere roughly six weeks away, the streamer unveiled the full trailer this weekend at New York Comic-Con... Prime Video will drop all eight episodes of Blade Runner 2099 on November 25, 2026. [It's already earned 2.1 million views in the last 17 h…

The Chicago Sun-Times reports: When Elgin Community College hired Flock Safety to install six surveillance cameras in April 2025, President Peggy Heinrich thought they would "enhance the safety and security of students...." They were supposed to help locate stolen cars and missing people. But Heinrich started to wonder if the cameras were actually making students less safe after seeing news reports that data captured by Flock cameras in Illinois had been shared with U.S. Customs and Border Prot…

Long-time Slashdot reader badger.foo writes: As some of you may remember, in 2001 RFC1149 (TCP/IP over carrier pigeon) was implemented. Now one of the packets preserved from that event is up for auction at Christies. Direct link to the auction (current bid: USD 2600) is here. This is a unique chance to own a piece of Internet history! Read more of this story at Slashdot.

America's National Highway Traffic Safety Administration "said on Tuesday that it will rewrite its vehicle lighting standards," reports Reuters, "to address concerns about headlight glare and allow for the latest safety-improving lighting technologies." NHTSA said it plans to improve rules for LEDs, dusk sensors, automatic high beams and replaceable light sources. The agency will also evaluate headlamp height and aim and how they impact driver visibility and address headlight glare and make app…

"What did four astronauts see, notice, and document as they traveled around the Moon during NASA's Artemis II mission?" asks a new NASA web page, offering some fascinating pictures and video: Through photographs, spoken observations, drawings, and annotations, the Artemis II crew created a unique scientific record — one that is now available to the science community and the public for further study... As part of the mission science plan, lunar scientists asked the Artemis II crew to watch for t…

CNN reports: The FBI arrested a Canadian cybersecurity executive and ransomware expert as part of the investigation of a damaging hack that exposed the sensitive data of current and former FBI employees, according to court documents and people familiar the investigation. Edward Dubrovsky was arrested in the Philadelphia area in recent days... Dubrovsky is facing charges related to extortion and making threats. He has been transferred to Texas's Eastern District for a scheduled detention hearing…

On Thursday those trying to access the Ubuntu website, ISO downloads, and similar Ubuntu resources on Thursday found the site "inoperable," reports Phoronix, with the disruption confirmed as a distributed denial of service attack. "Our team is working diligently to resolve the incident," according to a Thursday post on Ubuntu Discourse — followed by a later announcement. "At this time our team continues to work on restoring affected services, most of them are now available. We appreciate your p…

The Telegraph reports that the nutritional value of fruit and vegetables has fallen by up to 50% since the Sixties, according a new study from researchers at startup studio Deep Science Ventures. The study "found that humans needed to consume twice the number of vegetables to get the same level of minerals such as potassium, magnesium or copper as would have been present in their food 60 years ago." The study found that many crops had lost 20% to 50% of several key nutrients... The decrease in …

Top executives at Anthropic, OpenAI and other AI companies "are privately gaming out scenarios for a public and political revolt after a catastrophic AI event," reports Axios, one that turns "an already wary public further against the technology and its leaders..." These AI company executives "anticipate a large-scale event, most likely a cyberattack, that shuts down access to financial services, internet connectivity, or even power and water..." the article points out. "Many top AI researchers…

"Nicolas Cage is speaking out against Amazon," reports Variety. Amazon developed the series Spider-Noir for Prime Video, but then allegedly asked Cage to sign an AI waiver: "Amazon is a very AI-friendly company, to the tune of $50 billion invested in OpenAI," Cage said Saturday during a panel on the Empire Stage at New York Comic Con. "I am not an AI-friendly actor, so it's like, connect those dots! I'm not a member of their club. I didn't sign the waiver to let him use AI on 'Spider-Noir.' I'm…