Andrew Forrest
Climate Tech

Elon Musk bet on batteries, fellow billionaire Twiggy Forrest on green hydrogen – but we’ll need both to power the future

- October 11, 2022 3 MIN READ

The battle of the billionaires has become the stuff of headlines. The world’s richest man, Elon Musk, has gone head-to-head with Australia’s richest man, billionaire Andrew “Twiggy” Forrest. Musk, founding investor in battery-powered car giant Tesla, has famously mocked hydrogen fuel-cell vehicles as “mind-bogglingly stupid”. Forrest has just placed a very large bet on green… Read more »

Optus
Cyber security

The government is making regulatory changes in response to the Optus data breach, but legislative reform still needed

- October 7, 2022 2 MIN READ

In response to Australia’s biggest ever data breach, the federal government will temporarily suspend regulations that stop telcos sharing customer information with third parties. It’s a necessary step to deal with the threat of identify theft faced by 10 million current and former Optus customers. It will allow Optus to work with banks and government… Read more »

Other tech

Tesla’s Optimus robot is pretty meh, but Elon Musk’s knack for publicity does advance the promise of bigger and better things

- October 4, 2022 3 MIN READ

In August 2021, Tesla CEO Elon Musk announced the electric car manufacturer was planning to get into the robot business. In a presentation accompanied by a human dressed as a robot, Musk said work was beginning on a “friendly” humanoid robot to “navigate through a world built for humans and eliminate dangerous, repetitive and boring… Read more »

Cyber security

Programmers self-sabotaging their own code with ‘protestware’. Here’s what you need to know

- September 30, 2022 3 MIN READ

In March 2022, the author of node-ipc, a software library with over a million weekly downloads, deliberately broke their code. If the code discovers it is running within Russia or Belarus, it attempts to replace the contents of every file on the user’s computer with a heart emoji. A software library is a collection of… Read more »

Cyber security

The Optus hacker says they deleted the stolen data, but here’s what experts want you to know

- September 29, 2022 4 MIN READ

Shortly after Australian telecommunications company Optus announced the identity data of millions of customers had been stolen, a person claiming to be the hacker announced they would delete the data for US$1 million. When Optus didn’t pay, the purported hacker published 10,000 stolen records and threatened to release ten thousand more every day until the… Read more »

Optus
Cyber security

Everything that’s wrong with how Optus announced its massive data breach

- September 26, 2022 2 MIN READ

Optus fears data on up to 9.8 million of its customers has been accessed in a sophisticated cyberattack – including, for some customers, passport and drivers licence details, as well as phone numbers, dates of birth and email addresses. It made the announcement through the media, in the middle of Thursday’s national day of mourning… Read more »

Employment, interview, job
Workplace

A major analysis of LinkedIn’s ‘People You May Know’ algorithm has uncovered the best connections for when you’re job hunting

- September 16, 2022 3 MIN READ

Say you are looking for a new job. You head to LinkedIn to spruce up your profile and look around your social network. But who should you reach out to for an introduction to a potential new employer? A new study of more than 20 million people, published in Science, shows that your close friends… Read more »

On phone in bed
Life hacks

Science says doomscrolling is bad for your health, so here are 4 tips to help you stop it

- September 9, 2022 3 MIN READ

Doomscrolling can be a normal reaction to living through uncertain times. It’s natural to want to understand dramatic events unfolding around you and to seek out information when you’re afraid. But becoming absorbed in bad news for too long can be detrimental. A newly published study has found that people with high levels of problematic… Read more »

Bored Ape
Cryptocurrency

Why Ethereum’s switch to ‘proof of stake’ is great news for the environment and energy use

- September 6, 2022 4 MIN READ

Amid the continuous noise about cryptocurrencies, it’s often hard to pick out what really matters. However this month, if all goes to plan, the energy-hungry digital sector will undergo its biggest shake-up in years. Ethereum, the world’s second largest cryptocurrency, is tomorrow expected to start a technology changeover which, once complete, should cause its carbon… Read more »

Social Media

5 expert tips for avoiding social media scandal from oversharing

- September 2, 2022 4 MIN READ

Social media are increasingly blurring the lines between our personal and professional lives, leaving us at risk of posting sensitive information that could have ramifications far beyond our “friends” list. Finnish Prime Minister Sanna Marin recently found this out the hard way after a video of her dancing and drinking with friends, first posted to… Read more »

milk, dairy
Ag tech

Unlike the udders: cow-free synthetic milk is nearly here

- August 30, 2022 3 MIN READ

The global dairy industry is changing. Among the disruptions is competition from food alternatives not produced using animals – including potential challenges posed by synthetic milk. Synthetic milk does not require cows or other animals. It can have the same biochemical make up as animal milk, but is grown using an emerging biotechnology technique know… Read more »

Global tech

AI weapons, robot subs & silent drones: the military tech startup created by the Oculus founder lands in Australia

- August 23, 2022 4 MIN READ

Earlier this month, posters started going up around Sydney advertising an event called “In the Ops Room, with Palmer Luckey”. Rather than an album launch or standup gig, this turned out to be a free talk given last week by the chief executive of a high-tech US defence company called Anduril. The company has set… Read more »