Tesla will switch off a feature in its Full Self-Driving software, present in more than 50,000 vehicles in the US, that allowed the cars and SUVs to roll past stop signs at junctions without coming to a halt.

Aerial view of an all-way stop

According to recall documents on America's National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's website [PDF], Tesla has agreed to disable the feature via an over-the-air (OTA) software update. It is expected to begin deploying the update to affected vehicles in the next week or so.

It appears Tesla's Full Self-Driving (Beta) software included a feature that emulates driver behavior found to be common in some places in the US, but which is also against the law in most if not all states.

This is the practice of slowing to a crawl at a junction, and not actually coming to a complete halt. Instead, the driver is able to pick up speed again if the way is clear.

However, the NHTSA has taken the view that failing to halt for a stop sign at junctions could increase the risk of a crash, and sought meetings with Tesla to get it to change this feature. According to the documents, this covers the 2016-2022 Model S and Model X, 2017-2022 Model 3, and 2020-2022 Model Y vehicles.

The Associated Press reports that Selected Tesla drivers are effectively being allowed to beta test the Full Self-Driving software on public roads, as long as the owner enables the function.

Once enabled, the Tesla would be able to go through an all-way stop junction without coming to a complete halt. It would have to be traveling below 5.6 MPH (9 KPH) while approaching the junction, so long as no moving cars, pedestrians or bicyclists are detected nearby.

The incident is just the latest in the long-running saga of Tesla and its driver assistance software support. Last month, a Tesla driver was charged with vehicular manslaughter after a crash in Los Angeles in which the vehicle's Autopilot mode was engaged.

Last year, five police officers filed a lawsuit against Tesla after a Model X ploughed into two parked police cars in Texas, and Tesla was forced to pull the Full Self-Driving software from vehicles that were testing it after a number of issues were found.

Tesla has previously insisted that its vehicles are not capable of fully autonomous driving: "The currently enabled Autopilot and Full Self-Driving features require active driver supervision and do not make the vehicle autonomous."

The rest is here:
Tesla to disable 'self-driving' feature that allowed vehicles to roll past stop signs at junctions - The Register

On Friday the US House of Representatives passed a bill that will to equip America to boost semiconductor production and lift its economy to better compete better with China.

The law bill, called America Competes Act of 2022, includes $52bn in funding to help semiconductor companies build new factories, and to fund research and development.

The draft legislation also earmarks $45bn in funding to boost the supply chain and alleviate problems related to chip shortages, which have hit key sectors, such as consumer electronics and automotive.

The next step is reconciliation with the US Senate's version of the bill, the US Innovation and Competition Act, which passed in last June, before final passage.

In a statement on Friday, US President Joe Biden said, "I look forward to the House and Senate quickly coming together to find a path forward and putting a bill on my desk as soon as possible for my signature. America cant afford to wait."

Biden had been urging the House to pass the bill, last week saying that it will bring manufacturing jobs back the US, and ease semiconductor supply chain bottlenecks, and "create good-paying jobs for all Americans."

But the House passage of the America Competes Act was a one-sided affair with the vote split 222-210 along party lines, with support from Democrats, and Republicans opposing it.

Chip makers, especially Intel and Samsung, have been vocal about quick passage and reconciliation of the House and Senate bills. Both the companies are building new factories Intel is spending $20bn for fabs in Ohio, and Samsung $17bn in Texas and see the semiconductor funding as incentivizing their investments.

In a tweet on Friday, Intel CEO Pat Gelsinger lauded progression of the act. In an earnings call last week, Gelsinger said he had spoken at length on the topic with House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) ahead of the floor debate, adding, "I'd say everybody is now more optimistic on this coming across the line in the near future."

In a tweet on Friday, Pelosi said the act "helps to address supply chain disruptions while creating good-paying union jobs for American families with $52bn in investments in facilities and equipment to produce American-made semiconductor chips."

House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy (R-CA) earlier this week criticized the bill as not being tough enough on China, bringing up that the Middle Kingdom was where COVID-19 originated, and that throwing billions of dollars at the chip world would negatively impact the US economy and further raise prices of products.

But the semiconductor industry is happy.

We urge leaders in the House and Senate to work together promptly on a bipartisan, bicameral competitiveness bill ... that can be passed by both chambers and signed into law by the president. Getting this legislation across the finish line will help strengthen US chip production and innovation for many years to come, said John Neuffer, president and CEO of chip consortium Semiconductor Industry Association, in a statement.

The United States today has only a 12 per cent share of the global semiconductor manufacturing capacity, decreasing from 37 per cent in 1990, largely due to substantial government incentives, according to SIA. US investment in semiconductor research has been flat as a share of GDP, while other countries have boosted research initiatives to strengthen semiconductor capabilities.

The bill ensures access of grants for equipment and materials suppliers, which will strengthen the semiconductor supply chain in the US and attract new manufacturing facilities, said Ajit Manocha, president and CEO of SEMI, in a statement to The Register. SEMI represents semiconductor organizations worldwide.

"The bill will also bolster workforce development programs, helping to equip workers with the skills needed in todays semiconductor industry. We look forward to working with Congress and the Biden Administration to enact this funding into law, Manocha said.

See more here:
US House passes bill to boost chip manufacturing and R&D - The Register

The EARN IT Act, a legislative bill intended "to encourage the tech industry to take online child sexual exploitation seriously" has been revived in the US Senate after it died in committee back in 2020.

And advocacy groups have once again decried the bill for threatening free speech and access to encryption, and for imperiling the liability protection that allows online service providers to host third-party content. In other words, the bill's reception has been much the same as it was two years ago.

US Senators Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Richard Blumenthal (D-CT) on Tuesday reintroduced the bill [PDF] claiming that online service providers are disinterested in keeping child sexual abuse material (CSAM) off their platforms.

"Tech companies have long had ready access to low-cost, or even free tools to combat the scourge of child sexual abuse material but have failed to act," said Blumenthal in a statement. "Millions of these horrifying images go unidentified and unreported by the tech platforms that host them because there are so few consequences when these companies look the other way. That ends with the EARN IT Act."

The EARN IT ACT, which stands for Eliminating Abusive and Rampant Neglect of Interactive Technologies Act, removes the liability protection afforded to internet services under Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act in the context of CSAM.

Section 230 largely protects online service providers from being held responsible for what their users do; removing protection where CSAM is involved would open service providers to costly litigation and liability for failing to police their customers.

The bill also creates a government panel responsible for developing best practices for content policing, though these would not be legally binding obligations.

The bill's backers posit that big tech firms ignore CSAM, though that's clearly not the case. Google, for example, says it made 3.4 million reports to the National Center for Exploited and Missing Children (NCMEC) during the first half of 2021 and disabled more than 129,000 accounts during this period.

Meta (Facebook) says it took action on 20.9 million instances of CSAM in Q3 2021. Social media companies do actually have an incentive to prevent ad customer product pitches from appearing next to child abuse images or the like, and they spend money to do it.

Despite such evidence, the lawmakers supporting the bill contend that exposing companies to legal liability for allowing CSAM on their services will make them even more attentive, a claim critics of the bill dispute.

"The EARN IT Act assumes that Internet companies could do more to fight CSAM, but Section 230 reduces their motivation to do so," wrote Eric Goldman, law professor at Santa Clara University, in a blog post back in 2020. "Any such assumption is unquestionably false. Internet services have always treated CSAM as toxic content."

More likely, Goldman argued, what the bill will do, if it becomes law, is either encourage overbroad censorship to reduce the chance of being sued, spur efforts to encrypt everything to prevent awareness of unlawful content, or force companies to shut down to avoid the otherwise unsupportable legal risk.

However, the possibility that the bill will prompt internet providers to censor too broadly for their own protection bodes ill for free speech.

"The EARN IT Act is one of the most poorly conceived and dangerous pieces of Internet legislation I have seen in my entire career, and thats saying a lot," said Evan Greer, director of Fight the Future, in a statement.

"This bill will make children less safe, not more safe. And in the process, it will trample human rights and online free expression, particularly for trans and queer folks."

Greer expressed frustration that Congress has chosen to waste energy on a misguided proposal while failing to actually address the issues raised by large technology platforms, like the need for a federal data privacy law, for meaningful antitrust enforcement, and for curtailing algorithmic harms like biased AI systems.

The Center for Democracy and Technology argues that the bill, despite language that tries to create a safe harbor by ruling out liability solely on the basis of the use of encryption, would still punish encryption.

"Under the new version of the bill, offering users encrypted services can be considered evidence of an intermediarys liability for these claims, even if it cannot be considered an 'independent basis' for that liability," the rights group said in a blog post.

"By dramatically expanding the risk of lawsuits intermediaries will face over user-generated content and their use of end-to-end encryption, the bill will cause intermediaries to over-remove even lawful content and disincentivize them from offering encrypted services, to the detriment of all internet users."

The Chamber of Progress, a "center-left tech industry policy coalition," pointed to the 2018 FOSTA-SESTA legislation as an example of the undesirable consequences that have arisen from meddling with Section 230.

"The last time the Senate chipped away at Section 230, the results were disastrous, said Chamber of Progress CEO Adam Kovacevich, in an emailed statement.

"The EARN It Act goes even farther, giving platforms one of two options: quit moderating content altogether, or enforce invasive content moderation with outsized impacts on LGBTQ people and other marginalized communities. As Democrats, we need to think critically about the harm this legislation could do to groups that have a long history of being excluded and overlooked."

Read the rest here:
America's EARN IT Act attacking Section 230 is back and once again threatening the internet, critics say - The Register

Updated A whistleblower's allegations about spyware maker NSO Group should be investigated by American prosecutors, US House Rep Ted Lieu (D-CA) has said.

The informant claimed senior NSO executives offered "bags of cash" to California-based telecoms security and monitoring outfit Mobileum to assist in its surveillance work, according to the Washington Post on Tuesday.

Specifically, it's alleged NSO wanted to gain, with Mobileum's help, Signaling System 7-level access to US cellular networks, a position that can be abused to determine a cellphone's location, redirect and read its incoming text messages, snoop on calls, and more. SS7 is the glue between telecommunications providers, and subverting it opens up a wealth of opportunities for spies and miscreants.

Gerry Miller, who spent over six years at Mobileum and rose to veep of network security and client solutions, claimed that in August 2017, when asked how Mobileum would get paid, NSO co-founder Omri Lavie said: We drop bags of cash at your office.

No business was undertaken with Mobileum, NSO said in a statement. Mr Lavie has no recollection of using the phrase bags of cash, and believes he did not do so. However if those words were used, they will have been entirely in jest.

Also apparently on the call was Eran Gorev of private-equity biz Francisco Partners, which had a majority stake in NSO, before reportedly selling the biz back to the founders in 2019. Gorev offered a very similar statement.

If such a meeting actually took place, I would absolutely never make a comment like this," he said. "If someone else made that comment, it would clearly have been made in jest and a colloquial expression or cultural misunderstanding.

Both Mobileum and NSO Group denied they had any kind of business relationship.

Miller complained about NSO's intentions to the FBI's whistleblower tip line in 2017 and, after receiving no response, he filed a more detailed report to the Dept of Justice, copying in the FCC and SEC. He also shared his report with Congressman Lieu, a Democratic member of the US House of Representatives who has a computer science degree.

"The NSO Group, which sells phone hacking software, tried to gain access to cellular networks by offering 'bags of cash', according to a whistleblower," Lieu tweeted Tuesday, adding that he has asked US prosecutors to look into the claims.

"I made a criminal referral to the Justice Dept," he noted. Lieu also said "no one's phone is safe," due to the insecurities of the SS7 protocol.

It's certainly not a good time for NSO. In November, the US Department of Commerce put the Israeli software maker on Uncle Sam's Entity List, making it all but impossible for the outfit to legally do business with American companies, following revelations that its Pegasus spyware was being used to snoop on people. Legislators are calling for further sanctions against the surveillance company as well.

Meanwhile, weeks after the Dept of Commerce took action, Apple sued what it called the "amoral 21st century mercenaries" at NSO for infecting iPhones and breaking Cupertino's terms and conditions. A similar lawsuit from Meta over WhatsApp hacking is also going through the courts.

"Mobileum does not have - and has never had - any business relationship with NSO Group," a Mobileum spokesperson told The Register.

"Mobileum does not have any direct access to the customers network and is unable to provide any kind of access, including SS7 access, to any third party. Mobileums products work towards the benefit of the operator, and not to their or their subscribers detriment."

Read more:
Whistleblower claims NSO offered 'bags of cash' for access to US phone networks - The Register

Cisco has rolled out new technologies including Wi-Fi 6E access points and Private 5G services to help organisations adapt to hybrid work scenarios.

Businesses of all sizes have had to adjust to major transitions over the past two years, and these have reshaped IT plans and operations. Adopting a hybrid work strategy with staff working from home, at the office, or anywhere calls for ubiquitous wireless connectivity, Switchzilla says.

But what is hybrid work? In a blog post, Greg Dorai, VP for Cisco's secure-access product portfolio, said that every organisation has to define what it means for them.

"A big difference from before the pandemic is that the remote worker will no longer be a minority," he said. This means that organisations will need infrastructure to handle a greater level of rich video traffic, and need to consider what kind of a network will be required to deliver this and enable the best experience.

To address these requirements, Cisco has released a bunch of new solutions. These comprise a pair of Wi-Fi 6E access points, the Catalyst 9136 and Meraki MR57; a Private 5G managed service for enterprises; and new Catalyst 9000X switch models based on its Silicon One Q200 chip.

Cisco claims that its Private 5G service will be different from rival solutions in that it will integrate with a customer's Wi-Fi and IT operations environments. Rather than deploying a carrier-centric 5G solution, Cisco also states it will handle all the complexities of the mobile network stack, and provide a simple management portal that integrates with existing enterprise tools.

However, the managed service will also be delivered through service provider and technology partners, whose first task will be to perform a site survey to scope out the required networking and radio coverage, Cisco said. It will be delivered on a "pay-as-you-use" model that minimises upfront infrastructure costs, while the monthly subscription includes 24/7 support and upgrades.

Wi-Fi 6E adds support for frequencies in the 6GHz portion of the spectrum, providing gigabit speeds and greater throughput.

The Catalyst 9136 is an enterprise-class access point built for large-scale deployments. It supports features such as band steering, which automatically switches Wi-Fi 6E devices to the 6GHz band, freeing the 2.4 and 5GHz bands for other devices, and intelligent power management that will adjust to the number of wireless clients connected.

On the other hand, the Meraki MR57 is aimed more at environments with "a highly dynamic hybrid workforce," which appears to mean offices, schools, hospitals, retail shops, and hotels. Like other Meraki products, it is managed via a cloud-hosted dashboard that enables rapid deployment management of devices across highly distributed networks.

On the switch side, the new Catalyst 9000X models are based on the Cisco Silicon One chip architecture, originally deployed in kit for web scale and service provider networks, but now also powering enterprise switches. The new silicon provides the bandwidth capacity and scale needed to support 100G/400G network access for transitions to hybrid work in the campus, according to Cisco.

Link:
The future of work is hybrid, says Cisco, so here's Wi-Fi 6E access points and Private 5G - The Register