1

Geek Speak / Re: Victim of an Adult Site Blackmail Email Hoax?

« on: 14/08/2018 08:27:40 »

They're back again today:

Hi, victim.
This is my last warning.
I writе yоu bеcаusе I рut a malware оn the web раgе with porn which you havе visited.
My virus grаbbеd аll your personаl infо аnd turned on your саmerа which саpturеd the process of yоur onаnism. Just aftеr thаt thе sоft saved your contаct list.
I will deletе thе соmpromising vidеo аnd infо if you раy mе 600 USD in bitсoin. This is address fоr рaymеnt : 1ML4nLW4tyVwa3dqhbwYRsHw4Tuiqy92W3
 
I givе you 30 hours аfter you ореn my mеssаgе for making thе transаctiоn.
As sооn as you reаd thе mеssagе I'll sеe it right awаy.
It is nоt neсessаry tо tell mе thаt you have sеnt money to me. This аddress is connесted to yоu, my systеm will delеtе everything automatically аfter transfеr соnfirmаtion.
If you nееd 48 h just reрly оn this letter with +.
Yоu cаn visit the роliсe stаtion but nоbоdy can hеlp you.
If you try to decеive mе , I'll see it right аway !
I dоnt livе in yоur сountry. Sо thеy саn nоt trасk my lосatiоn evеn for 9 mоnths.
Goоdbyе. Dоnt forgеt about thе shаmе and tо ignоre, Your life саn be ruined.

This one is from "e" - "admin@warheads2foreheadsproductions.com"

You'll note that the price is now even lower - we're down at US$600 now, so this appears to be bargain bucket porn guilt revenge. Clearly it's worth keeping the spammers waiting - the longer they wait the lower the price. At this rate they will be paying me!

More seriously, this message is almost certainly not written by the same group; it uses shoddy English, contains none of the plausibility of the first wave (that contained passwords for added authenticity) and has a totally different tone.

Amazingly, the "soft" also waited for the (presumably hard) viewer to have an "oanaism" before it saved their contact list. Clever - computer software that can remotely recognise the moment of an "oanism". Shame it still can't implement spellcheck really.

The most likely explanation is that this is a bunch of people piggy-backing off the idea of the first lot, who actually made themselves a reasonable amount of money out of frightened people who paid up.

Please don't fall for this scam. But also watch out for the websites you visit - many are now incorporating all kinds of nefarious code with consequences like cryptojacking...

2

Physiology & Medicine / Re: Can someone develop PTSD after stopping antipsychotic medications?

« on: 09/08/2018 14:08:27 »

I would argue that, in medicine, anything can happen. But in this case, cessation of antipsychotics after long-term use is likely to provoke side effects and other symptoms, at least transiently, and especially if the drugs are not weaned off carefully. These side effects can include anxiety symptoms and mood destabilisation, which might be what you are referring to.

3

Geek Speak / Re: Do you know mobile app for photo editing, if possible, similiar to GIMP?

« on: 04/08/2018 23:20:42 »

There's pixelr, which I've used a few times and seems pretty user friendly.

4

Geek Speak / Re: Why is my Buffalo external HDD creating files that don't exist?

« on: 03/08/2018 23:40:35 »

Sounds like the file allocation table is corrupted. Do you actually need the data on the disk? Otherwise, deletion of the partition data and a reformat would be a good idea, followed by a disk surface scan / SMART test to see what the problem is...

5

Geek Speak / Re: Victim of an Adult Site Blackmail Email Hoax?

« on: 26/07/2018 12:31:30 »

These people have been writing to us for about 2 weeks, each time giving us 24h to pay up before they mail all our contacts with compromising videos of us; in the same breath they counsel that it can take several days to lay your hands on the bitcoins.

No saucy videos sent to our contacts...yet. Do let us know if you receive a video of a naked scientist doing something really naughty, like opening an email, or making a radio programme...

Please don't fall for this anyone.

6

General Science / Re: Why does the inside of my spectacles lenses always get dirtier than the outside?

« on: 23/07/2018 15:20:32 »

Great question!

I think there are several factors - or perhaps (lens) facets, you might say(!) - some of which have been alluded to above.

My own experience of wearing glasses mirrors that of @Mark Grifter with the inside surface of my glasses collecting a healthy coating of debris requiring regular cleaning.

I think that part of this is because volatiles, including sweat and skin oils, get deposited onto the inside of the lens surface from your nearby face. This is splattered into place by eye movements, blinks and other facial contortions.

This splattering of sticky gunk, I speculate, acts as a wallpaper paste to glue dust and other debris in place.

7

Physics, Astronomy & Cosmology / What is the neutrino discovery announced today?

« on: 12/07/2018 22:40:35 »

This is the leader from an article published today by Discover magazine:

Four billion years ago, an immense galaxy with a black hole at its heart spewed forth a jet of particles at nearly the speed of light. One of those particles, a neutrino that is just a fraction of the size of a regular atom, traversed across the universe on a collision course for Earth, finally striking the ice sheet of Antarctica last September. As it hit, a neutrino detector planted by scientists within the ice recorded the neutrino’s charged interaction, causing a blue flash of light that lasted just a moment. The results are published today in the journal Science.

I would appreciate the insights of the learned members of the forum to help me to understand more about this.

1) How do they know where it came from?

2) How do they know how old it is?

3) Why is this important?

8

Just Chat! / Re: Latest Forum Updates and Upgrades

« on: 10/07/2018 11:55:21 »

JULY 2018 UPDATE

  Hello campers! Hi-de-Hi! 

Sorry, forgive the lame 1980s comedic opening. (Some people may remember the TV series I am referencing here)...

A couple of changes to update you about.

1) ANTI-SPAM
Our friends from Korea believe that we need more advertising for their online casinos and other mechanisms to separate your from your money. Unfortunately they've become so over-excited about their ventures that they are accidentally getting carried away and posting hundreds of duplicate threads linking to their nefarious ventures. How nice of them.

Because this sad abuse jeopardises the user experience for everyone else, and the moderators are sick and tired of deleting their pathetic attempts to promote gambling scams, we've adjusted our anti-spam system to employ a re-captcha system instead.

Some users will see this now appearing beneath the reply / posting box. Trusted, senior members will not be troubled, and once a member achieves sufficient seniority or good standing on the forum, this privilege will be awarded so the captcha challenge goes away.

This shouldn't be burdensome for you, and we apologise to newcomers for subjecting them to this additional tick-box, but we hope it will help to keep down our workload so that we have more time to devote to contributing to posts and answering questions rather than deleting rubbish.

If anyone notices that it is causing problems or affecting your user experience, please report this here, preferably accompanied by a screenshot so we can see - and investigate - the problem.


2) GDPR / Data protection / Privacy
In May 2018 the EU rolled out a new set of rules concerning personal data. This is called the GDPR and probably generated the world's largest tide of spam as operators everywhere fired off increasingly desperate email salvos assuring the people they have been spamming for over a decade that their data is safe.

Here are the Naked Scientists we have always been very careful about this sort of thing, and we were largely ahead of the rule changes anyway; nevertheless, we have made some minor alterations to the systems here to ensure that we are compliant with the requirements of the GDPR.

The alerations include:

a) - A clearly-published privacy policy, which you can review here:
https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?action=gpdr;sa=privacypolic

This is in addition to the more general information we provide about privacy and copyright:
https://www.thenakedscientists.com/privacy-and-copyright-policies

...and in addition to the Acceptable User Policy (AUP) that forms part of the registration process and to which everyone signs up to in order to post here:
https://www.thenakedscientists.com/forum/index.php?topic=8535.0

b) - The ability for users to review the data held by the forum about you

c) - The ability to export your data from the forum.

To do either of b or c above, click on the MEMBERS link in the menu at the screen top, and select PROFILE from the drop-down menu

PROFILE.PNG (25.84 kB . 901x370 - viewed 653 times)

Under the MODIFY PROFILE section, you'll see there's an option to "EXPORT YOUR DATA"

PROFILE-DATA-EXPORT.PNG (20.97 kB . 1178x406 - viewed 648 times)

This actually provides you with two options: one is to "Export User Data Information" - which you do by clicking the link; the other is to "Export Posts".

d) - Deletion of your user has also been changed slightly.

Previously, a deleted username would remain visible against posts made by that user, although the personal data associated with that user were removed. Now, if you elect to delete your account, as well as the removal of all personally-identifiable data, the username against the posts that you have made will revert to an anonymous "guest" user. This step is irreversible: if you delete your account, we cannot re-associate your earlier posts with a new user that you may create subsequently, so please think carefully before choosing this course.

Thanks, everyone, for making this forum such a splendid place to hang out, and a special thanks to the moderators who work so hard to keep the place looking tidy!!

9

General Science / Re: Can H2O molecules cause an allergic response by binding to immune cells?

« on: 09/07/2018 21:52:10 »

Thanks for that, I was going to include links but when I did I couldn't post.

You need to achieve more seniority before it will permit posting links...

10

Physiology & Medicine / Re: Does grapefruit juice affect beta blockers?

« on: 05/07/2018 14:53:09 »

For clarity, amlodipine is a calcium channel blocker, rather than a beta-blocker...

11

Geek Speak / Re: How do I purchase bitcoin?

« on: 01/07/2018 16:25:49 »

You might already unknowlingly be mining for bitcoins...

https://www.thenakedscientists.com/articles/interviews/what-cryptojacking

12

Just Chat! / Praise for Evan_au

« on: 28/06/2018 11:16:09 »

@evan_au  just received on the Naked Scientists Twitter:

Project STREET WISE
@wise_project 50m50 minutes ago

I really enjoy reading evan_au comments on the @nakedscientists forum! 🤖 #isotoperesearch

13

Just Chat! / Re: what is "money"?

« on: 23/06/2018 10:28:41 »

Can someone translate the above into a language I can understand?

14

General Science / Re: What are the leading technological and social challenges that need addressing?

« on: 22/06/2018 14:54:08 »

Maybe your innovation could be a system to help people to remember to follow the forum rules and please phrase post titles as questions...?

15

Physiology & Medicine / Re: Can you become vitamin D deficient during summer?

« on: 17/06/2018 12:30:28 »

Can you become vitamin D deficient during summer?

Yes, if you don't go out in the sunshine and you don't eat a diet with either natural or supplemental vitamin D. Believe it or not, there are plenty of people in the situation in many countries right now, especially the UK.

In fact, most people in high northern latitudes (UK, especially Scotland) become very low in vitamin D by the end of winter, meaning that the begin the summer with a functional vitamin D deficiency. If they don't catch up and "make hay while the sun shines", or rather make vitamin D, then they will enter the next winter in an already low vitamin D state, meaning that they become even more deficient. Over time this results in bone problems like osteomalacia, which is prevalent in dark skinned people and especially those also wont to cover every square centimetre of skin for "cultural reasons"...

16

Physiology & Medicine / Re: How are transcatheter aortic valve replacement - TAVR - procedures carried out?

« on: 11/06/2018 07:59:21 »

When you feel better and able, do please tell us about the procedure, what happened and what it was like. It would be really interesting to hear about it and how they do the procedure.

17

Just Chat! / Re: Newbie here!!

« on: 04/06/2018 23:20:57 »

Ah, @Zer0 - good to see you; I wondered what had become of you!

18

Physics, Astronomy & Cosmology / Re: Do you become an owner of a star or a planet if you get there first?

« on: 03/06/2018 09:18:10 »

You are basing this proposal on an equivalent principle: stellar nullis (pardon my Latin).

You missed out an "i" in "nullius"! It would also be "stella nullius", @evan_au, or "sidus nullius", sidus being the other word for star. [My Latin's not that great either, but I did enough to get me a GCSE and I think it made me better at English in the long run, so I don't regret doing it!]

There are 200 billions stars in our galaxy. More then enough for everybody.

That seems like a lot, doesn't it? But when you think that there are 7.5 billion on Earth now, scheduled to reach 9-10 billion by mid-Century, that's not very many years of stars, in the grand scheme of things, before we've run out of stars to give to new humans.

19

General Science / Re: The sounds of science...

« on: 02/06/2018 10:33:25 »

Great idea for a thread - well done for starting it!

20

Geology, Palaeontology & Archaeology / Re: Is this fools gold or real gold?

« on: 19/05/2018 21:12:20 »

I'll bet my mortgage that that's pyrites (fool's gold)...