Washington, July 30 (Reuters): NASA's next-generation Mars rover Perseverance is set for liftoff from Florida's Cape Canaveral on Thursday on a mission to search for traces of potential past life on Earth's planetary neighbor. The U.S. space agency's $2.4 billion mission is scheduled for launch at 7:50 a.m. ET (1150 GMT) and is expected to reach Mars next February. The car-sized six-wheeled robotic rover, which will launch atop an Atlas 5 rocket from the Boeing-Lo

WASHINGTON, July 28 (Reuters): Scientists have succeeded in reviving microbes retrieved from sediment deep under the seafloor in the heart of the South Pacific that had survived in a dormant state for 101.5 million years in research illustrating the resiliency of life on Earth. The microbes, spanning 10 major and numerous minor groups of bacteria, may be the planet's oldest-known organisms. The scientists said on Tuesday the microbes were present in clay samples drilled fro

New Delhi, July 27 (IANS) Hackers have created a specialised economy around email account takeover via methods like brand impersonation, social engineering and spear-phishing, retaining the data for long period of time to make more money by reselling it to another set of cybercriminals on the Dark Web, a new report revealed on Monday. More than one-third of the hijacked accounts analysed by researchers at Barracuda, a leading provider of cloud-enabled security and data protection so

New Delhi, July 26 (IANS) If you think that Facebook posts which are most liked are also most viewed by the users on the platform, you are mistaken. According to a top company executive, posts that get the most engagement are actually seen by a small percentage of users. According to Facebook's Head of News Feed John Hegeman, real data on actual reach is available only with the social network and it is exploring ways to incorporate it into its publicly available tools. "

San Francisco, July 26 (IANS) A bug in Facebook-owned Instagram has left some users bemused as they found a camera on indicator for iOS 14 Beta even when they were not taking either selfies or photos. The vulnerability showed a green "camera on" indicator for iOS 14 Beta devices even when users were just scrolling through their feeds on Instagram. An Instagram spokesperson told The Verge the bug caused this behaviour which was being fixed. The app's Create Mode i

New Delhi, July 25 (IANS) Science fiction writers predicted in the 1950s that social networks like Facebook, Instagram and Twitter will trap billions of people one day, in such a way that they will struggle to break-free, thus becoming perfect examples of modern-day robotic prosumption. Products where producer and consumer are blurred are called the "prosumer" so consumers also play a part in a product's creation, as with social media and Augmented Reality (AR) games.

San Francisco, July 23 (IANS) Facebook has introduced new privacy features like App Lock in Messenger that will help users prevent others from accessing their private messages. App Lock adds another layer of security to private messages. The optional feature gives users "confidence to know that if a friend or family member needs to borrow your phone, they won't be able to access your chats". "Privacy is at the heart of Messenger - where you can be yourself with

Chennai, July 23 (IANS) Indian Institute of Technology Madras (IIT-M) on Thursday said its researchers have developed enhanced image processing techniques to mitigate the impact of haze on images captured by surveillance cameras. This can prove crucial in helping law enforcement agencies solve crimes and help the common public as many communities are now installing CCTVs to safeguard themselves. This research can also be applied to self-driving and autonomous vehicles as they als

San Francisco, July 21 (IANS) US-based Video meet app Zoom app has broken Chinese short video making app TikTok's record of most downloaded app on Apple App Store. From April through June-end, Zoom was downloaded from App Store 94 million times '40 per cent more than TikTok's previous record of 67 million downloads, reveals data from analytics firm Sensor Tower. YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, Google Meet, Messenger, WhatsApp, Netflix and Microsoft Teams rounded out the

New Delhi, July 21 (IANS) A most notorious hacker attacked at least 135 companies in 44 countries, some even Fortune 500 ones, and made over $1.5 million by selling backdoor access of corporate networks on the Dark Web. Cybersecurity firm Group-IB that works out from Singapore and Moscow, tracked the hacker for over three years and has now revealed his identity in a report titled "The invisible God of networks" who sold backdoor access to corporate networks on underground

WASHINGTON, July 21 (Reuters): Scientists have identified 37 volcanic structures on Venus that appear to be recently active - and probably still are today - painting the picture of a geologically dynamic planet and not a dormant world as long thought.   The research focused on ring-like structures called coronae, caused by an upwelling of hot rock from deep within the planet's interior, and provided compelling evidence of widespread recent tectonic and magma activit

Mumbai, July 20 (IANS) The Indian Performing Rights Society Ltd on Monday announced a pact to license its music repertoire for video and other social experiences across Facebook and Instagram.   People will now be able to choose music from the IPRS repertoire with hundreds and thousands of songs, to add in their own videos they share on Facebook and Instagram, as well as other social features like Music Stickers on Stories.   "Music plays an important role in

New Delhi, July 19 (IANS) Admitting that it does not have all the answers when it comes to ensuring data privacy, Facebook has said there are many opportunities for businesses and regulators to embrace modern design methods and collaborate to find innovative ways to hold organisations, including itself, accountable.   In a white paper released last week, Facebook said it recognises the responsibility "we have to make sure that people are informed about the data that we

Sydney, July 18 (IANS) Australian researchers have been able to detect positive Covid-19 cases using blood samples in about 20 minutes and identify whether someone has contracted the virus.   The research team developed a simple agglutination assay - an analysis to determine the presence and amount of a substance in the blood - to detect the presence of antibodies raised in response to the SARS-CoV-2 infection.   The researchers at Monash University in Australia w

Bengaluru, July 16 (IANS) Increase in attacks targeting and leveraging routers will continue as cybercriminals are able to easily monetise these infections in secondary attacks, warns a new report by global cybersecurity company Trend Micro.   The research revealed an increase from October 2019 onwards in brute force log-in attempts against routers, in which attackers use automated software to try common password combinations.   The number of attempts increased ne

New Delhi, July 15 (IANS) To create an affordable yet powerful smartphone ecosystem for the masses in the country, Reliance Jio Platforms and Google on Wednesday announced to launch an entry-level Android smartphone soon.   Jio Platforms and Google have entered into a commercial agreement to jointly develop the entry-level affordable smartphone with optimisations to the Android operating system and the Play Store.   "I am excited that our joint collaboration

Mumbai, July 15 (IANS) Heralding a new era for the Indian tech ecosystem, Reliance Jio on Wednesday announced a slew of upcoming homegrown innovations like a 5G solution, interactive Jio TV+, a Mixed Reality (MR) eye-wearable JioGlass and key updates on JioFiber and video meet app JioMeet.   Speaking at the annual general meeting (AGM), Mukesh Ambani, Chairman and Managing Director of Reliance Industries, said that Jiofiber, the optical-fiber based, Gigabit-speed home broadb

New Delhi, July 14 (IANS) Researchers studying the SARS-2 (Covid-19) virus have discovered potential target points on its genome, which may contribute to future treatments for the disease.   "Our work will contribute to a better understanding of how the virus escapes the host immune response and contribute to the development of attenuated viral vaccines," said study researcher Alex McLellan from the University of Otago in New Zealand.   The research team

New York, July 13 (IANS) In a big breaking discovery, the researchers may have found the beginnings of a path toward increasing human lifespan.   The study, published in the Journal of Gerontology: Biological Sciences, shows the drug mifepristone can extend the lives of two very different species used in laboratory studies, suggesting the findings may apply to other species, including human beings.   Mifepristone, also known as RU-486, is used by clinicians to end

Seoul, July 12 (IANS) Google's video-sharing platform YouTube will cooperate with South Korea to closely monitor and prevent the spread of fake news and illegal content.   Google's Senior Vice President Neal Mohan made the comments during a videoconference with Han Sang-hyuk, chairman of the Korea Communications Commission (KCC).   The remarks came after Han requested such cooperation, considering fake news surrounding Covid-19 and a recent high-profile di