Category: All

The Federal Aviation Administration said Monday it will bar drone flights over seven major U.S. nuclear sites, including Los Alamos National Laboratory in New Mexico. The move is the latest in a series of growing restrictions on unmanned aerial vehicles over U.S. sites that have national security implications. The new restrictions begin Dec. 29 and include the Hanford Site in Washington State, Idaho National Laboratory, Savannah River National Laboratory in South Carolina, Pantex Site in Texas, and the Y-12 National Security Site and Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee. The FAA said it is considering additional requests from other federal security agencies to bar drones. Earlier this year, the FAA banned drone flights over 133 U.S. military facilities. The Pentagon said in August that U.S. military bases could shoot down…

It's all fun and games until a family gets behind the wheel. That's the whole idea behind Volvo's Drive Me project. Automated vehicles are now being test driven by families as part of a multi-stage experiment that's taking place in Norway. VOA's Steve Redisch reports. ...

A boom in production of Apple iPhones is helping lift the economy of Taiwan, an industrial center that still relies on high-tech manufacturing contracts despite increasing competition from offshore. Apple’s phone sales in the third quarter this year grew 5.7 percent over the same period of 2016, ahead of a cross-brand increase of 3 percent to 383 million units, market research firm Gartner says. Orders for older iPhones as well as the iPhone X, which is seen taking off next year, have solidified orders for parts supplied by tech firms in Taiwan, analysts say. Tech specialists say the Silicon Valley icon is looking this year to Taiwanese firms for chip production, camera modules, displays and final assembly. Taiwanese-owned Foxconn Technology often assembles Apple gear at sprawling factories in China, for…

With people coming from around the world to work in Silicon Valley, some struggle with the best ways to care for their aging parents. Increasingly, the solution is an “affinity” retirement community, where older people from places like India and China can live near — but not with — their adult children. These communities break from traditional custom that parents and children live together. “The children are so busy these days, they are all the time working, taking care of their kids, so we do not want to interfere in their lives,” said Asha RaoRane, an Indian national who wanted to move to the U.S. to be near her three daughters who had immigrated to San Francisco. Her daughters started exploring the idea of a traditional senior retirement community, but…

Young people come from around the world to work in Silicon Valley, California. As these workers build a life away from home, many struggle with how to bring their aging parents to their new community. But what happens to foreign parents entering their later years in a new country? VOA's Deana Mitchell visits a unique community in Silicon Valley that caters to retirees from India. ...

With nearly 2 billion users, Facebook's survival depends on people continuing to use its service.  That's why observers were surprised by an unusual company blog post Friday that highlighted some of the potential harm of using the social media service.  Titled Hard Questions: Is Spending Time on Social Media Bad for Us?, the company cited studies that suggested some of the possible downsides of using social media.  In one study, people who passively read about others' lives reported feeling worse about themselves. One possibility is "negative social comparison" when reading about others online, the company said, because "people's posts are often more curated and flattering" than how they are in their real, offline lives.  But there's a potential solution, according to Facebook, which reported $10 billion in revenue — its highest…

U.S. attorneys in Utah prosecuting a multimillion-dollar opioid drug-ring are moving quickly to sell seized bitcoin that’s exploded in value to about $8.5 million since the alleged ringleader’s arrest a year ago. The U.S. Attorney’s Office for Utah cites the digital currency’s volatility in court documents pressing for the sale. The bitcoin cache was worth less than $500,000 when Aaron Shamo was arrested on drug charges, but the value of the digital currency has skyrocketed since then. Bitcoin was created as a digital alternative to the traditional banking system, and is prone to swings in value based on what people believe its worth. For federal prosecutors in Utah, sales of seized assets like cars are routine, but bitcoin is new territory, spokeswoman Melodie Rydalch said Thursday. Shamo is accused of…

The German government says it backs an "open and free internet" following the U.S. decision to repeal net neutrality rules. A spokeswoman for the Economy Ministry said Friday that Germany had "taken note" of the U.S. move but declined to comment directly on it. However, spokeswoman Beate Baron said the German government supports rules introduced across the European Union last year forbidding discriminatory access to the internet. Baron told reporters in Berlin that "an open and free internet is indispensable for the successful development of a digital society that everyone wants to take part in." The Republican-controlled U.S. Federal Communications Commission on Thursday repealed Obama-era rules requiring all web traffic to be treated equally. ...

Charged particles from the sun are responsible for the brilliant auroras at the earth's poles. But there can be cases of too much of a good thing. When huge solar storms push massive waves of energized particles into Earth's path, they can wreak havoc on our satellites and electric grid. That is why researchers are trying to figure out what causes solar storms. VOA's Kevin Enochs reports. ...

U.S. President Donald Trump has touted progress on slashing federal regulations, which he says cost America trillions with no benefit. Speaking Thursday from the White House, the president said his administration had exceeded its goal of removing two federal regulations for every new one, by removing 22 for every new one. Opponents have criticized some of the deregulation, especially dismantling of the net neutrality rules that guarantee equal access to the internet. VOA's Zlatica Hoke reports. ...

"Net neutrality'' regulations, designed to prevent internet service providers like Verizon, AT&T, Comcast and Charter from favoring some sites and apps over others, have been repealed. On Thursday, the Federal Communications Commission voted to dismantle Obama-era rules that have been in place since 2015, but will forbid states to put anything similar in place. Here's a look at what the developments mean for consumers and companies. What is net neutrality? Net neutrality is the principle that internet providers treat all web traffic equally, and it's pretty much how the internet has worked since its creation. But regulators, consumer advocates and internet companies were concerned about what broadband companies could do with their power as the pathway to the internet — blocking or slowing down apps that rival their own services,…

The U.S. on Thursday dismantled two-year-old "net neutrality" rules that guaranteed equal access to the internet in favor of policies that would reduce regulation of major internet service providers and hand them sweeping powers to decide what web content consumers can access. The Federal Communications Commission voted 3-2 to adopt a plan advanced by chairman Ajit Pai, appointed to his position by President Donald Trump, for a "light touch" on regulating major telecommunication companies and end what he says is the federal government's "micromanaging" of the internet. The meeting was briefly interrupted for security reasons before the vote took place. A video feed of the meeting showed law enforcement officers enter the room with dogs. No reason was immediately given for the disruption. WATCH: What is 'net neutrality'? Pai's controversial…

As the federal government prepares to unravel sweeping net-neutrality rules that guaranteed equal access to the internet, advocates of the regulations are bracing for a long fight. The Thursday vote scheduled at the Federal Communications Commission could usher in big changes in how Americans use the internet, a radical departure from more than a decade of federal oversight. The proposal would not only roll back restrictions that keep broadband providers like Comcast, Verizon and AT&T from blocking or collecting tolls from services they don't like, it would bar states from imposing their own rules. The broadband industry promises that the internet experience isn't going to change, but its companies have lobbied hard to overturn these rules. Protests have erupted online and in the streets as everyday Americans worry that cable…

There is a new word in the English language that all internet users should learn, because it may define the next stage in global financial transactions. It may not be translatable to many other languages so it may become an international term, much like "computer" or "internet," used and understood around the world. The word is "blockchain," and VOA's George Putic explains its meaning. ...

Microsoft on Wednesday rolled out new features on its Bing search engine powered by artificial intelligence, including one that summarizes the two opposing sides of contentious questions, and another that measures how many reputable sources are behind a given answer. Tired of delivering misleading information when their algorithms are gamed by trolls and purveyors of fake news, Microsoft and its tech-company rivals have been going out of their way to show they can be purveyors of good information — either by using better algorithms or hiring more human moderators.   Second-place search engine  Microsoft is also trying to distinguish its 2nd-place search engine from long-dominant Google and position itself as an innovator in finding real-world applications for the latest advances in artificial intelligence. “As a search engine we have a…

The White House said Wednesday the U.S. government needs a major overhaul of information technology systems and should take steps to better protect data and accelerate efforts to use cloud-based technology. "Difficulties in agency prioritization of resources in support of IT modernization, ability to procure services quickly, and technical issues have resulted in an unwieldy and out-of-date federal IT infrastructure," the White House said in a report. The report outlined a timeline over the next year for IT reforms and a detailed implementation plan. The report said one unnamed cloud-based email provider has agreed to assist in keeping track of government spending on cloud-based email migration. President Donald Trump in April signed an executive order creating a new technology council to overhaul the U.S. government's information technology systems. The report…