FaunaDB, a serverless database combining relational and document features, will shut down by the end of May due to unsustainable capital demands. The company plans to open source its core technology, including its FQL query language, in hopes of continuing its legacy within the developer community. The Register reports: The startup pocketed $27 million in VC funding in 2020 and boasted that 25,000 developers worldwide were using its serverless database. However, last week, FaunaDB announced that it would sunset its database services. FaunaDB said it plans to release an open-source version of its core database technology. The system stores data in JSON documents but retains relational features like consistency, support for joins and foreign keys, and full schema enforcement. Fauna’s query language, FQL, will also be made available to the open-source community. “Driving broad based adoption of a new operational database that runs as a service globally is very capital intensive. In the current market environment, our board and investors have determined that it is not possible to raise the capital needed to achieve that goal independently,” the leadership team said.

“While we will no longer be accepting new customers, existing Fauna customers will experience no immediate change. We will gradually transition customers off Fauna and are committed to ensuring a smooth process over the next several months,” it added.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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A good VPN works like a bouncer for your internet traffic, keeping snoops out while letting you move freely. AdGuard VPN is one of those solid, no-nonsense choices that does exactly what it promises. Right now, StackSocial is offering a five-year AdGuard VPN subscription for just $39.97, a steep drop from its regular price. That’s five years of private browsing, streaming, and secure connections across most major platforms, including Windows, macOS, iOS, and Android, and up to 10 simultaneous connections (making it great for multi-device users without juggling logins). If you like the idea of browsing without trackers and being able to access geo-restricted content without hassle, this deal makes sense. Just a heads-up, though—this offer is only for new users, and you’ll need to redeem it within 30 days of buying.

Performance-wise, AdGuard VPN uses AES-256 and its proprietary protocol, which is supposed to be faster and harder to detect than the usual VPN options. That means fewer annoying speed drops, which is a win if you stream a lot or hate buffering. It also offers over 60 server locations, covering key regions without overwhelming you with choices, so finding a decent connection shouldn’t be an issue. More importantly, AdGuard sticks to a strict no-logs policy, meaning it won’t track your browsing or sell your data to advertisers, unlike some other VPNs.

AdGuard VPN is best suited for anyone looking for a low-maintenance, long-term privacy solution without monthly bills. It’s easy to set up, has a clean interface, and works well for everyday browsing and security. Five years of coverage for under forty bucks is hard to beat, and if you don’t like it, at least you won’t be locked into another high-priced subscription.

It is an immutable law of nature that when you receive a corporate email with a subject line like “Changes coming to your Pixel 4a,” the changes won’t be the sort you like. Indeed, a more honest subject line would usually be: “You’re about to get hosed.”

So I wasn’t surprised, as I read further into this January missive from Google, that an “upcoming software update for your Pixel 4a” would “affect the overall performance and stability of its battery.”

How would my battery be affected? Negatively, of course. “This update will reduce your battery’s runtime and charging performance,” the email said. “To address this, we’re providing some options to consider. “

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from 404 Media: 23andMe filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy Sunday, leaving the fate of millions of people’s genetic information up in the air as the company deals with the legal and financial fallout of not properly protecting that genetic information in the first place. The filing shows how dangerous it is to provide your DNA directly to a large, for-profit commercial genetic database; 23andMe is now looking for a buyer to pull it out of bankruptcy. 23andMe said in court documents viewed by 404 Media that since hackers obtained personal data about seven million of its customers in October 2023, including, in some cases “health-related information based upon the user’s genetics,” it has faced “over 50 class action and state court lawsuits,” and that “approximately 35,000 claimants have initiated, filed, or threatened to commence arbitration claims against the company.” It is seeking bankruptcy protection in part to simplify the fallout of these legal cases, and because it believes it may not have money to pay for the potential damages associated with these cases.

CEO and cofounder Anne Wojcicki announced she is leaving the company as part of this process. The company has the genetic data of more than 15 million customers. According to its Chapter 11 filing, 23andMe owes money to a host of pharmaceutical companies, pharmacies, artificial intelligence companies (including a company called Aganitha AI and Coreweave), as well as health insurance companies and marketing companies. Shortly before the filing, California Attorney General Rob Bonta issued an “urgent” alert to 23andMe customers: “Given 23andMe’s reported financial distress, I remind Californians to consider invoking their rights and directing 23andMe to delete their data and destroy any samples of genetic material held by the company.”

In a letter to customers Sunday, 23andMe said: “Your data remains protected. The Chapter 11 filing does not change how we store, manage, or protect customer data. Our users’ privacy and data are important considerations in any transaction, and we remain committed to our users’ privacy and to being transparent with our customers about how their data is managed.” It added that any buyer will have to “comply with applicable law with respect to the treatment of customer data.”

404 Media’s Jason Koebler notes that “there’s no way of knowing who is going to buy it, why they will be interested, and what will become of its millions of customers’ DNA sequences. 23andMe has claimed over the years that it strongly resists law enforcement requests for information and that it takes customer security seriously. But the company has in recent years changed its terms of service, partnered with big pharmaceutical companies, and, of course, was hacked.”

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

A prominent journalist knew the US military would start bombing Houthi targets in Yemen two hours before it happened on March 15 because top Trump administration officials accidentally included the reporter on a Signal text chain in which they discussed the war plan.

Jeffrey Goldberg, editor-in-chief of The Atlantic magazine, described the surprising leak of sensitive military information in an article today. The National Security Council confirmed that the messages were real and said it is investigating how Goldberg was added to a thread in which the war information was discussed.

“The world found out shortly before 2 p.m. eastern time on March 15 that the United States was bombing Houthi targets across Yemen,” Goldberg wrote. “I, however, knew two hours before the first bombs exploded that the attack might be coming. The reason I knew this is that Pete Hegseth, the secretary of defense, had texted me the war plan at 11:44 a.m. The plan included precise information about weapons packages, targets, and timing.”

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There are about 85 million single-family homes in the United States, which is a lot of houses. If you own one of them, then you already know what you don’t know—from real estate terms to the actual cost of owning the place. Buying and maintaining a house is a life-long learning process.

But no matter how long you’ve owned your home, there are probably aspects of it that you have no clue about. This can be a problem because you’re relying on this structure to protect you and your family from the elements, to be a valuable asset in your financial portfolio, and to be an attractive place you can be proud to show off to friends and family. In order for that to happen, you need to know some fundamental details about your house. If you don’t know these things, find them out ASAP.

Shutoffs

Your house runs on a few basic resources—water, electricity, and possibly natural gas. Unless you’re totally off the grid with solar power and localized supplies like propane tanks, these resources are piped into your home from outside under consistent pressure. If something goes wrong (e.g., a water pipe bursts, or a pilot light goes out and gas leaks) you need to know how to shut things off—which means you need to know the location of the following:

• The water shutoff: The main valve that controls the flow of water into your house. It will usually be located outside, but if it’s inside (mine is), it’ll be near the perimeter, and possibly in your basement. Know where it is and how to turn it off.

• Localized valves. Your sinks, outdoor spigots, and toilets will also have shutoff valves. Knowing where your toilet shutoff is located can be a real lifesaver when it starts to overflow.

• The gas shut off. Similarly, if you have natural gas piped into your home, know where the shutoff valve is. If you ever smell gas and can’t figure out its source, this could literally save your house—and your life.

• Appliance shutoffs. Your gas-powered appliances like an oven or a dryer will also have specific shutoffs, usually located in the rear where the hookups are. Know how to access them in case you need to turn them off.

• Electric panel. Know where your home’s electric panel is located, and familiarize yourself with the circuits and the main in case you need to cut the power to an area of the home—or the whole house.

If you smell gas, you should exit your home and call the authorities even if you turn off the main supply. And never touch an electrical panel that’s sparking or smoking.

Circuits

Speaking of your electrical panel, you should know more than just it’s location. Map out which circuits control what in your house by turning them off one by one and checking to see what they’re connected to. Don’t just trust any labeling that’s already in there—these are often not updated properly after renovations and repairs. Having each breaker labeled clearly will save you time and trouble if you need to kill the juice to something that’s malfunctioning.

Location of meters

You should know where your water, gas, and electric meters are—and how to read them. If you still have in-person meter readers from your utility company, it’s helpful to know how to guide them to the meters, and being able to read and interpret them will let you audit your utility bills. Doing this once a year will spot any discrepancies that could indicate a billing error, utility theft, or a slow leak.

An evacuation route

If something terrible were to happen unexpectedly, how would you get out of the house? If the front door was blocked somehow, is there an alternate route out? If you’re trapped on an upper floor, how would you escape? Those kinds of emergencies don’t happen often, thank goodness, but now is the time to plan for them. Think about what you would do in a variety of scenarios, so you have a way out even if the obvious exits are blocked.

Dryer type

If your home had a washer and dryer when you moved in, find out what kind of dryer you have. This might sound obvious, but many people don’t realize that there are gas- and electric-powered dryers. If your gas-powered dryer dies and you order an electric one to replace it, you’ve got a huge headache instead of a solution.

Type of insulation

A good question to ask the builder, previous owners, or home inspector is the type of insulation in the walls and attic space. In older homes that haven’t been significantly renovated, this could be asbestos-based insulation, which isn’t a problem unless you try to remove it. But even if your insulation is more modern, knowing the kind and how long it’s been in there is a good thing. First, it might not be the best insulation in the world, so you might want to upgrade it. And second, insulation doesn’t last forever, so knowing how old it is will be helpful as you plan future maintenance and budgets.

Property lines

You (probably) didn’t just buy a structure, you bought property. That probably includes some outdoor space around your home—your lot. The problem with property lots is that they look very clear and obvious on a map, but aren’t so easy to figure out when you’re literally standing on them. This can lead to incursions from neighbors when their fencing strays onto your property, or assumptions about who owns what or whether your neighbors have an easement or a right of access that includes your property. Finding out your exact property lines is, in other words, a very good idea.

Water quality

Clean, potable water being piped into our homes is an incredible luxury by historical standards—but not all local water supplies are the same. Your local water utility probably has testing results available, but it’s not a bad idea to test your tap water yourself to see what you’re dealing with—and whether you’re comfortable drinking it, or if you need to look into filters.

It’s also useful to find out if you have hard water—water with a high mineral content—as it can be damaging to your appliances and other aspects of your house (and isn’t the best water for showering and cleaning, either). You can soften your hard water pretty effectively—but only if you know about it in the first place.

Lead pipes

If your house was built some time before 1988, it might still have lead water pipes—which means lead might be leeching into your drinking water, potentially making you sick. You should check to see if your pipes are lead, and if you get a positive result, you should contact your local government and water utility to arrange a replacement.

Underneath

Do you know what’s under your house? If you have a full basement, the answer is probably yes. Crawl spaces—especially very shallow ones—can be overlooked, however. They usually contain a lot of vital stuff like water lines, gas lines, and electrical wiring, and can be a source of pest infiltration, air pollution, and bad vibes in general.

It’s not unheard of for homeowners to eliminate crawl space access panels in their homes, or for crawl spaces to simply have no convenient access point—but it’s vital that you be able to access your crawl space for a variety of reasons. You will someday need to access those pipes and wires, after all, and you need to be able to monitor the foundation, humidity levels (and potential mold growth), rodent and pest populations, and potential water issues. When it comes to what’s under your house, ignorance is definitely not bliss.

Sewer or septic

When you flush your toilet or wash your dishes, where does that grey and black water go? The answer will inform your maintenance decisions, as plumbing that hooks into a municipal sewer line needs different maintenance than pipes that lead to a septic tank on your property. If you’re on a sewer line, having it inspected for clogs or infiltrating roots every year can save you a lot of trouble, while septic tanks need to be pumped out regularly, and chemical drain cleaners need to be avoided.

Your filter schedules

A lot of things in your house have filters (including, possibly, the house itself). These filters all need to be replaced periodically, but each appliance or piece of infrastructure will have its own schedule and specific type of filter. Make sure you know what filters you need and how often it’s recommended they be replaced. Just because something appears to be running just fine doesn’t mean the filter doesn’t need replacing.

Materials

Do you know what kind of flooring you’re walking on? What kind of countertop you’re cooking on? Different materials have different maintenance and cleaning needs. Using the wrong cleaning products—like bleach when you’re cleaning natural stone—can do real damage to the materials, and leave you with ruined stuff and a looming renovation bill. It can be challenging for non-experts to tell the difference between stuff like laminate and hardwood flooring, after all, so you can’t just assume you know what you’re dealing with. If at all possible, it’s best to find out exactly what’s there and what the manufacturer recommends in terms of maintenance, cleaning, and repair.

Access

You own the house—all of it. You should be able to access every bit of it. You might not want to go into the crawl space or up onto the roof, but you should be able to get into those places. If there is any place you can’t get to, it might also be a place a contractor can’t get to, which could be disastrous in case of an emergency repair. And you should be able to inspect your house regularly as a proactive practice to anticipate problems before they become emergencies. Taking some time to make sure you at least know how you can access each part of your home is an essential piece of maintenance planning for what’s probably the largest asset you own.

CERN faces a pivotal decision about its future as the Large Hadron Collider approaches the end of its usefulness by the early 2040s. Management proposes building the Future Circular Collider (FCC), a machine with a 90-kilometer circumference that would smash particles at eight times the energy of the LHC. This hugely consequential plan faces significant challenges. Much of the required technology doesn’t exist yet, including superconducting magnets strong enough to bend high-energy particle beams.

The project also lacks the clear rationale that the LHC had in finding the Higgs boson. The proposal has divided physicists. Critics worry about the decades-long timeline, potential cost overruns, and the risk of sacrificing other valuable CERN activities. Germany, which provides 20% of the lab’s budget, has already indicated it won’t increase contributions. A council-appointed group is now gathering input from the physics community before making recommendations in December.

Nature’s editorial board adds: Unless some nations step up with a major infusion of cash, the FCC faces an uncertain prospect of being funded. But waiting too long could mean that there will be a large gap between the new facility opening and the closure of the LHC, and precious expertise could end up being lost.

Although physicists might disagree on what CERN should do, they nearly unanimously care about the lab’s future. They and their leaders must now make the case for why European taxpayers, who fund most of the lab’s yearly budget should care, too. The stakes are beyond science, and even beyond Europe.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

23andMe has capped off a challenging few years by filing for Chapter 11 bankruptcy today. Given the uncertainty around the future of the DNA testing company and what will happen to all of the genetic data it has collected, now is a critical time for customers to protect their privacy. California Attorney General Rob Bonta has recommended that past customers of the genetic testing business delete their information as a precautionary measure. Here are the steps to deleting your records with 23andMe.

1. Log into your 23andMe account.

2. Go to the “Settings” tab of your profile.

3. Click View on the section called “23andMe Data.”

4. If you want to retain a copy for your own records, download your data now.

5. Go to the “Delete Data” section

6. Click “Permanently Delete Data.”

7. You will receive an email from 23andMe confirming the action. Click the link in that email to complete the process.

While the majority of an individual’s personal information will be deleted, 23andMe does keep some information for legal compliance. The details are in the company’s privacy policy.

There are a few other privacy-minded actions customers can take. First, anyone who opted to have 23andMe store their saliva and DNA can request that the sample be destroyed. That choice can be made from the Preferences tab of the account settings menu. Second, you can review whether you granted permission for your genetic data and sample to be used in scientific research. The allowance can also be checked, and revoked if you wish, from the account settings page; it’s listed under Research and Product Consents.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/science/how-to-delete-your-23andme-data-201451382.html?src=rss

This is a sitcom-long video from Hacksmith Industries of the crew attempting to set the world record for fasted speed on a snow sled. Not a snowmobile, but a previously unpowered sled trike that’s been modded with two jet engines and manages to hit 107MPH (beating the previous record of 42MPH, although the record for an unpowered downhill sled is a very respectable/incredibly deadly 83MPH). Damn! There’s no doubt in my mind that if roadrunners lived in Canada, Wyle E. Coyote would have been all over ordering one of these from ACME and crashing it into a maple tree.

Google Maps’ Timeline feature is a great way to look back on your past travels—if you have the data to look back on.

Timeline users over the past couple of weeks have noticed that their data is missing, with no warning or explanation. Redditor srj737 posted on the r/GooglePixel subreddit earlier this month, reporting they lost over a decade of Timeline data, seemingly out of nowhere. Before, they could browse each location they visited with Google Maps over the past ten years; now, they had to start from scratch.

What makes the situation especially confusing is the fact that Google had previously warned users they might lose Timeline data. The company announced late last year that it would be transferring Timeline functionality away from the web, and onto individual mobile devices. If you didn’t move your Timeline data in time, Google warned you could lose it forever.

However, that deadline appears to be June of this year, not March, so it wouldn’t have made much sense for that to be the reason behind this deletion.

Google did accidentally delete the data

Google has since responded to these concerns, however. The company confirmed to The Verge that they had accidentally erased Timeline data for some users:

We briefly experienced a technical issue that caused the deletion of Timeline data for some people. Nearly everyone with encrypted Timeline backups will be able to restore their data; unfortunately those who did not have backups enabled will not be able to recover lost data.

Google appears to be actively reaching out to affected users, so keep an eye out for an email from the company with instructions on retrieving your data—if you can.

Redditor srj737 was able to retrieve their data, once Google acknowledged the situation. They had tried restoring from their backup before to no avail, but following Google’s email, the backup worked. It’s possible Google made some changes on their end to fix the feature in general, which includes both saved data as well as backup restoring, but that can’t be confirmed at this time.

It’s a crummy situation, but it’s a good reminder of the trust we put in tech companies to manage our data. Google is so huge, it makes it seem like anything you share with them will be preserved forever. However, all it takes is a technical issue on the company’s end to lose your data forever. Today, it’s Timeline data; tomorrow, it could be your photos. It’s tricky with dedicated cloud-based features, but whenever you have the option, backing up to a source other than the cloud is the most secure way to preserve your data.

How to recover your lost Timeline data

Unfortunately, the only way to restore this deleted Timeline data is if you had previously made a backup of that data through Google Maps. If so, Google’s instructions say to update to the latest version of Google Maps, open your Timeline, then tap the cloud icon that appears at the top of the screen. From here, you should be able to select a backup to restore your Timeline data from.

If you don’t see a backup option here, it likely means you never made a Timeline backup, and, sadly, your data is lost forever.

How to export your Google Maps Timeline data

If you do still have your Timeline data, or you start building it back up again, and you want to make a more secure backup than relying on Google’s services, you can manually export your data, as shared by Redditor saharaci.

To do so on Pixel, then go to Settings > Location > Location Services > Timeline > Export timeline data. On iPhone, go through the Google Maps app. Tap your profile, head to Your timeline, then tap the three dots in the top right. Here, tap Location & privacy settings, choose Export Timeline data, then pick a destination for your data.