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Welcome to the February 14, 2025 edition of ACM TechNews, providing timely information for computer professionals three times a week.

Please note: In observance of the U.S. Presidents' Day holiday, TechNews will not be published on Monday, Feb. 17. Publication will resume Wednesday, Feb. 19.
ACM has named 56 new Distinguished Members for their impact in the computing field, including researchers from organizations in Australia, Bangladesh, Canada, China, Cyprus, Denmark, Germany, Ireland, India, Switzerland, Turkey, the U.K, and the U.S. The 2024 Distinguished Members made contributions in autonomous vehicles, AI, cybersecurity, mobile networks, software, and other technology areas. “Each year we look forward to selecting a new class of ACM Distinguished Members from among our worldwide association of 110,000 colleagues,” said ACM President Yannis Ioannidis. "The Distinguished Members Program not only celebrates innovation but also underscores the value of being part of a vibrant technical community."
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ACM Media Center (February 12, 2025)

Treasury Dept The Electronic Privacy Information Center is suing the Trump administration’s Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) and other federal agencies over what it calls “the largest and most consequential data breach in U.S. history.” The suit also targets the U.S. Office of Personnel Management and Treasury Department and their leadership, alleging they administered systems containing “vast quantities” of sensitive personal information while failing to comply with the Federal Information Security Modernization Act, and that they violated the Privacy Act by disclosing that data.
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Bloomberg Law; Sam Skolnik (February 11, 2025)

President Emmanuel Macron France said it would provide a gigawatt of nuclear power for a new AI computing project. AI cloud platform FluidStack plans to start construction on the project in the third quarter of this year, with the first tranche of 250 megawatts of power expected to be connected to AI computing chips by the end of 2026. FluidStack said the facility could expand to 10 gigawatts by 2030.
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The Wall Street Journal; Sam Schechner; Asa Fitch (February 10, 2025)

The TikTok app logo is shown on an iPhone TikTok has returned to Apple and Google's app stores. The firms pulled TikTok from app stores on Jan. 19, the date a law passed by the U.S. Congress took effect that prevented businesses from supporting TikTok as long as it is controlled by China's ByteDance. On Thursday, Apple and Google received a letter from U.S. Attorney General Pam Bondi informing the companies they will not be prosecuted for supporting TikTok.
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NPR; Bobby Allyn (February 13, 2025)

European Union flags flutter The European Commission on Wednesday said it has scrapped draft rules regulating technology patents, AI, and consumer privacy on messaging apps, saying it did not expect approval from EU lawmakers and countries. One of the rules, the AI Liability Directive proposed in 2022, would have allowed consumers to sue for compensation for harm due to the fault or omission of a provider, developer, or user of AI technology.
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Reuters; Foo Yun Chee (February 12, 2025)

FERC approves PJM’s fast-track power plant interconnection plan PJM Interconnection LLC, which manages a 13-state power-grid network, won federal approval to fast-track the review of dozens of new power-plant projects to shore up supplies amid a proliferation of AI datacenters. PJM will review up to 50 new projects specifically to boost grid reliability starting in April, to help avoid potential shortages toward the end of this decade, the U.S. Federal Energy Regulatory Commission said in an order issued Tuesday.
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Bloomberg; Naureen S. Malik (February 12, 2025)

Iridium German white hat hackers demonstrated how to intercept text messages sent via U.S. satellite communication system Iridium and locate users with an accuracy of about 4 kilometers. During a presentation at the Chaos Communication Congress in late December, the hackers highlighted the vulnerabilities, which they said can be exploited using a commercially available Iridium antenna, a software-defined radio receiver, and a basic computer such as the Raspberry Pi.
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IEEE Spectrum; Tereza Pultarova (February 12, 2025)
X has agreed to pay about $10 million to settle a lawsuit that U.S. President Trump brought against it. The agreement makes X the second social-media company to settle litigation that Trump filed when the companies removed him from their platforms for his role in the Jan. 6, 2021, riot at the U.S. Capitol. Last month, Meta settled a similar lawsuit over its suspension of Trump’s Facebook account for $25 million. Trump’s attorneys are also expected to pursue a settlement with Google, which banned Trump from YouTube after the riot.
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The Wall Street Journal; Annie Linskey; Rebecca Ballhaus (February 12, 2025)

Google hub in Poland to develop AI use in energy and cybersecurity sectors Google and Poland on Thursday signed an agreement to develop the use of AI in the country’s energy, cybersecurity, and other sectors. Google is also dedicating $5 million over the next five years in Poland to expand training programs and increase digital skills among the young. Earlier in the week, Prime Minister Donald Tusk said Google and Microsoft will be among the international businesses planning to invest about 650 billion zlotys ($160 billion) in Poland this year.
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Associated Press (February 13, 2025)
A security method developed by researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology improves the effectiveness of address space layout randomization against hardware attacks. The "Oreo" method removes random bits of addresses that lead to program instructions and inserts a "masked address space" between virtual and physical memory to re-map code from random virtual addresses to fixed locations before the hardware executes the code.
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MIT News; Alex Shipps (February 11, 2025)

funky-data In a survey of more than 2,000 developers by Java support service provider Azul, close to 70% of respondents said more than half of their organization's applications run on Java. In addition, about half of respondents said they are using Java to build AI applications.
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CIO Dive; Matt Ashare (February 7, 2025)

An AI vehicle charging robot Data from China's State Administration for Market Regulation show 451,700 companies registered in the intelligent robotics sector as of the end of last year, up 19.39% from the end of 2023 and 206.73% from the end of 2020. Scientific research and technical services; IT, software, and IT services; and wholesale and retail businesses accounted for 80% of those companies.
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China Daily; Sun Chi (February 10, 2025)
Apple issued emergency security updates to fix a zero-day vulnerability that allowed attackers to bypass USB Restricted Mode, which prevents accessories from making a data connection with iPhones and iPads that are locked for more than an hour. The feature is designed to block forensic software from extracting data from locked iOS devices. The vulnerability was an authorization issue now addressed in iOS 18.3.1, iPadOS 18.3.1, and iPadOS 17.7.5 with improved state management.
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BleepingComputer; Sergiu Gatlan (February 10, 2025)
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