Peter's Quasi-Daily Blah-g

Zoox takes a significant step toward mass production

Tesla is days away from its June 22 robotaxi launch in Austin, Texas, but autonomous rideshare company Zoox, backed by Amazon, has bigger news. Zoox has opened its first large-scale robotaxi production facility in Hayward, California—a 220,000-square-foot site equivalent to 3 ½ American football fields capable of assembling more than 10,000 vehicles per year at full capacity. While Waymo is the undisputed leader in self-driving rideshare service, Zoox is considered its top competitor. The company is currently testing in multiple U.S. cities with more than 20 vehicles and plans to launch commercial operations later this year in Las Vegas and San Francisco. Zoox also expects to begin onboarding public riders soon for its testing in San Francisco’s South of Market neighborhood.

Zoox self-driving vehicle in San Francisco

Zoox

The Amazon-backed rideshare service’s autonomous fleet uses purpose-built, box-like vehicles designed purely for riders without a steering wheel or pedals. In perfect timing, the NHTSA just announced that it is streamlining reviews of self-driving car manufacturers’ requests for exemptions from safety rules requiring steering wheels or pedals. The application, which previously took years if companies received an answer at all, is now expected to take months.

Zoox will use its new Hayward, California, manufacturing facility for robotaxi engineering and software/hardware integration, robotaxi assembly, storage of robotaxi components, shipping and receiving, and end-of-line testing preceding deployment. Vehicles undergoing manufacturing at Zoox have robots perform specific tasks like applying precision-based adhesive for glass installation and moving cars down the line while humans complete remaining duties. Zoox expects its new facility’s scaling to provide hundreds of jobs for the San Francisco Bay Area.

Tesla’s newest production announcement raises questions about demand

Tesla also had a production announcement this week, but it received mixed feedback, causing the company’s stock to decline almost 4% from Tuesday’s market closing to the end of Wednesday’s trading. The electric automaker is halting Model Y and Cybertruck production for a week at its Texas Gigafactory plant for the second time in two months, starting June 30. Tesla states the temporary shutdown is for factory line maintenance and other improvements aimed at boosting production, but a recent report from Electrek highlighted how there is an increasing number of Tesla vehicles parked in lots not linked to the company’s retail, delivery, or service locations, indicating excess inventory.

The now-shutdown Chesterfield Mall in Westchester, Missouri, is currently holding hundreds of unsold Teslas in its parking lot located about three miles from one of the automaker’s dealerships. Tim Lowe, senior vice president of leasing and development for The Staenberg Group, told Fox 2: “Tesla has a short-term lease to park Tesla cars at Chesterfield Mall. We relocated them to the Dillard’s parcel when we started mall demolition.” Lowe added that Tesla is six months into its 16-month lease for the lot, which has held anywhere from 200-400 cars at a time. Tesla will launch its robotaxi service in Austin using its Model Y SUV, with the company’s Cybercab purpose-built for autonomous ridesharing scheduled to launch full-scale production next year.

Final thoughts

Zoox’s latest production announcement for its purpose-built robotaxi places it well ahead of Tesla’s Cybercab manufacturing, increasing its likelihood of being Waymo’s most significant competitor. The Amazon-backed autonomous rideshare company’s other assembly facility in Fremont, California, is a site for its retrofitted test fleet and sensor pod configuration. Instead of specifying initial production targets, Zoox said in a release that it plans to grow its robotaxi production to match commercial demand.

via Autoblog https://ift.tt/nchFvNQ

June 23, 2025 at 08:24AM

June 21, 2025

‘Godfather’ Malware Is Now Hijacking Banking Apps on Android

https://lifehacker.com/tech/godfather-malware-banking-apps-android

As malware evolves to be more sophisticated, seeing should not always equal believing. A new iteration of the "Godfather" malware found on Android is hijacking legitimate banking apps, making it increasingly difficult for users (and on-device protections) to detect.

An early version of Godfather utilized screen overlay attacks, which placed fraudulent HTML login screens on top of legitimate banking and crypto exchange apps, tricking users into entering credentials for their financial accounts. It was first detected on Android in 2021 and was estimated to target several hundred apps across more than a dozen countries.

The new threat, uncovered by security firm Zimperium, is Godfather’s virtualization, which allows the malware to create a complete virtual environment on your device rather than simply spoofing a login screen. It does so by installing a malicious "host" application, which scans for targeted financial apps and then downloads copies that can run in its virtual sandbox.

If you open one of those targeted apps, Godfather redirects you to the virtual version. You’ll see the real banking interface, but everything that happens within it can be intercepted and manipulated in real time. As Bleeping Computer notes, this includes harvesting account credentials, passwords, PINs, and capture responses from the bank’s back end. Further, the malware can control your device remotely, including initiating transfers and payments inside the banking or crypto app, even when you’re not using it.

This threat is severe not only because it is difficult for users to detect visually, but also because it can evade on-device security checks like root detection. Android protections see only the host app’s activity while the malware’s remains hidden.

How to protect your device from Godfather

According to Zimperium, while the current campaign affects nearly 500 apps, it has primarily focused on banks in Turkey. That said, it could easily spread to other countries, as the previous version did.

To protect against Godfather and any other malware targeting your Android device, download and install apps only from trusted sources, like the Google Play Store. You can change permission settings for unknown sources under Settings > Apps > Special app access > Install unknown apps. You should ensure Google Play Protect, which scans apps for malware, is enabled, and that your device and apps are kept up to date. Now would also be a good time to audit the apps you have on your device and delete any you don’t use or don’t need.

Since Godfather’s attack mechanism is so sophisticated, you should also follow other basic best practices for avoiding malware in the first place. Never open attachments or click links in emails, texts, or social media posts, and avoid clicking ads, which are used to spread malware.

via Lifehacker https://ift.tt/gcdebTZ

June 20, 2025 at 03:14PM

June 17, 2025

Scientists Discover the Key to Axolotls’ Ability to Regenerate Limbs

https://www.wired.com/story/scientists-discover-the-key-to-axolotls-ability-to-regenerate-limbs/

The axolotl seems like something out of science fiction. This perpetually youthful-looking Mexican salamander possesses a superpower that defies biology as we know it: the ability to regenerate entire limbs, parts of its heart, and even its spinal cord. But how does an amputated limb know whether to regenerate an entire arm from the shoulder down or just a hand from the wrist? This mystery of “positional identity” has fascinated scientists for decades.

via Wired Top Stories https://www.wired.com

June 17, 2025 at 04:04AM

June 17, 2025

Unexplainable Radio Waves Under Antarctica’s Ice Defy the Laws of Particle Physics

https://www.discovermagazine.com/the-sciences/unexplainable-radio-waves-under-antarcticas-ice-defy-the-laws-of-particle

Strange pulses that don’t seem to abide by the laws of particle physics have been detected in Antarctica. These radio waves, emanating from below the ice, could be evidence of dark matter and have been puzzling scientists since their discovery.

The new study, published in Physical Review Letters, provides details about these strange signals. In Antarctica, radio waves are often detected after being reflected off the ice. These recent waves, however, appear to be coming from beneath the ice, a location that can’t be explained by physics and may suggest a new, previously unseen type of particle.

“The radio waves that we detected were at really steep angles, like 30 degrees below the surface of the ice,” said Stephanie Wissel, associate professor of physics, astronomy, and astrophysics at Penn State, in a press release. “It’s an interesting problem because we still don’t actually have an explanation for what these anomalies are, but what we do know is that they’re most likely not representing neutrinos.”

Detecting Strange Signals in Antarctica

The strange signals were detected by the Antarctic Impulsive Transient Antenna (ANITA) experiment. ANITA is a collection of scientific instruments flown high above the Antarctic on balloons. These instruments are designed to detect radio waves that occur as a result of cosmic rays hitting the atmosphere.

Normally, the radio waves hoping to be detected by ANITA are made up of neutrinos. Neutrinos are very common and incredibly small, being the subatomic particle with the smallest mass. Due to them being so small, they are also famously hard to find and require sophisticated detection instruments like ANITA.

“You have a billion neutrinos passing through your thumbnail at any moment, but neutrinos don’t really interact. So, this is the double-edged sword problem. If we detect them, it means they have traveled all this way without interacting with anything else. We could be detecting a neutrino coming from the edge of the observable universe,” said Wissel in the press release.

Although difficult to detect, the payoff is big. Even the tiniest signal from a neutrino contains tons of important information. Once a signal has been detected, you can follow it back to its source, and it can tell scientists more about the cosmos than even the most high-powered telescopes.

Neutrinos Vs. Anomalies

When it comes to the physics of it all, neutrino signals are easy to trace back to their origin because they work similarly to a bouncing ball — no matter what angle a ball is thrown, we can always predict that it will bounce back at that same angle.

The newly detected signal does not behave in this predictable way, as its strange angle is much sharper than anything observed before. This led the ANITA team to declare that these signals were not neutrinos and are instead what is known as anomalous.

Anomalous signals, like the ones picked up in Antarctica, do not behave in a way predictable or understandable through current models of particle physics. Although scientists have yet to figure out what these signals are or where they came from, there are some theories, including the idea that these signals could be hinting at the presence of dark matter.

The research team is currently working on the design process for an even bigger and better detector than ANITA. Their hope is that, once built, the new detector will be able to provide more information on the strange, anomalous signal from deep below the Antarctic ice.

“I’m excited that when we fly [the new detector], we’ll have better sensitivity. In principle, we should pick up more anomalies, and maybe we’ll actually understand what they are. We also might detect neutrinos, which would in some ways be a lot more exciting,” said Wissel in the press release.

Article Sources

Our writers at Discovermagazine.com use peer-reviewed studies and high-quality sources for our articles, and our editors review for scientific accuracy and editorial standards. Review the sources used below for this article:

As the marketing coordinator at Discover Magazine, Stephanie Edwards interacts with readers across Discover’s social media channels and writes digital content. Offline, she is a contract lecturer in English & Cultural Studies at Lakehead University, teaching courses on everything from professional communication to Taylor Swift, and received her graduate degrees in the same department from McMaster University. You can find more of her science writing in Lab Manager and her short fiction in anthologies and literary magazine across the horror genre.

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June 16, 2025 at 05:00PM

June 16, 2025

Tesla blows past stopped school bus and hits kid-sized dummies in Full Self-Driving tests

https://www.engadget.com/transportation/tesla-blows-past-stopped-school-bus-and-hits-kid-sized-dummies-in-full-self-driving-tests-183756251.html?src=rss

A revealing demonstration with Tesla’s Full Self-Driving mode is raising concerns about whether fully autonomous cars are ready to hit the streets. Tesla has reportedly pushed back the rollout of its upcoming all-electric, fully autonomous car called the Cybercab, while a recent demonstration in Austin, Texas showed a Tesla Model Y running through a school bus’ flashing lights and stop signs, and hitting child-size mannequins. The tests were conducted by The Dawn Project, along with Tesla Takedown and ResistAustin, and showed Tesla’s Full Self-Driving software repeating the same mistake eight times.

It’s worth noting that Tesla’s autonomous driving feature is formally known as Full Self-Driving (Supervised) and "requires a fully attentive driver and will display a series of escalating warnings requiring driver response." Tesla even has a warning that says, "failure to follow these instructions could cause damage, serious injury or death." However, it’s not the first time that Tesla’s FSD software has found itself in hot water. The Dawn Project, whose founder Dan O’Dowd is the CEO of a company that offers competing automated driving system software, previously took out ads warning about the dangers of Tesla’s Full Self-Driving and how it would fail to yield around school buses. In April 2024, a Model S using Full Self-Driving was involved in a crash in Washington, where a motorcyclist died.

With anticipation building up for an eventual Cybercab rollout on June 22, the company’s CEO posted some additional details on X. According to Elon Musk, Tesla is "being super paranoid about safety, so the date could shift." Beyond that, Musk also posted that the "first Tesla that drives itself from factory end of line all the way to a customer house is June 28."

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://ift.tt/W8wsFJV

via Engadget http://www.engadget.com

June 15, 2025 at 01:45PM

June 11, 2025

The Viral Storm Streamers Predicting Deadly Tornadoes—Sometimes Faster Than the Government

https://www.wired.com/story/the-viral-storm-streamers-predicting-deadly-tornadoes-sometimes-faster-than-the-government/

Storm streamers are using radars and AI robots to predict extreme weather for millions of YouTube subscribers, in some cases faster than the National Weather Service, which has been gutted by DOGE.

via Wired Top Stories https://www.wired.com

June 11, 2025 at 06:37AM

June 7, 2025

These Hyundai Robots Park Cars Like Ballerinas, But With More Lifting Power!

https://www.geeksaresexy.net/2025/06/07/these-hyundai-robots-park-cars-like-ballerinas-but-with-more-lifting-power/

Robots Park Car

Hyundai’s parking robots may not be new, but they’re still stealing the show like it’s opening night of Fast & the Fabulous. In this video from their smart office building in Seoul, these little machines prance around the parking lot like they just graduated from robot ballet school with honors, parking cars better than most humans can. Check it out!

Click This Link for the Full Post > These Hyundai Robots Park Cars Like Ballerinas, But With More Lifting Power!

via [Geeks Are Sexy] Technology News https://ift.tt/UG6vMc2

June 7, 2025 at 05:18AM