Day: December 22, 2024

What Is Your Browser Homepage?  MUO – MakeUseOf
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Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.
At least five people have been killed, and 200 injured, after a car plowed into a busy outdoor Christmas market in the eastern German city of Magdeburg on Friday in what authorities called a deliberate attack.
MAGDEBURG, Germany (AP) — Four women and a 9-year-old boy were killed and 200 people were injured when a man drove into a Christmas market teeming with holiday shoppers in the German city of Magdeburg — an attack that has left Germans mourning the victims and with a shaken sense of security.
At first, Thi Linh Chi Nguyen thought the loud bangs were fireworks. The 34-year-old manicurist from Vietnam, whose salon is near the Christmas market, was on the phone during a break when she heard the noise just after 7 p.m. on Friday. Then she saw a car drive through the market at high speed. People screamed and a child was thrown into the air by the car.
The Christmas market, where a car drove into a crowd on Friday evening, in Magdeburg, Germany, is empty on Saturday evening , Dec. 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Michael Probst)
The Christmas market, where a car drove into a crowd on Friday evening, in Magdeburg, Germany, is empty on Saturday evening , Dec. 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Michael Probst)
The woman recalled seeing the car bursting out of the market and turning right onto Ernst-Reuter-Allee street and then coming to a standstill at a tram stop where the suspect was arrested.
The Christmas market was surrounded by concrete barriers designed to prevent attacks, but there was a gap left for emergency access, wide enough for a car to speed through.
The market stood empty and cordoned off by police tape on Sunday, with armed officers deployed around it. Nearby, people stopped to light candles or leave flowers at a growing makeshift memorial.
The Christmas market, where a car drove into a crowd on Friday evening, in Magdeburg, Germany, is empty on Saturday evening , Dec. 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Michael Probst)
The Christmas market, where a car drove into a crowd on Friday evening, in Magdeburg, Germany, is empty on Saturday evening , Dec. 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Michael Probst)
Police say the dead are four women, aged 45, 52, 67 and 75, and a boy, aged 9. Authorities said 200 people were injured, including 41 in serious condition. They were being treated in multiple hospitals in Magdeburg, which is about 130 kilometers (80 miles) west of Berlin, and beyond.

Prosecutors said the suspect, a 50-year-old Saudi doctor, is under investigation on suspicion of murder, attempted murder and bodily harm. In a closed-door hearing on Saturday evening, a judge ordered that he be kept in custody pending a possible indictment.
Several German media outlets identified the suspect as Taleb A., withholding his last name in line with privacy laws, and reported that he was a specialist in psychiatry and psychotherapy. He has lived in Germany since 2006, practicing medicine in Bernburg, about 40 kilometers (25 miles) south of Magdeburg.
The suspect’s X account describes him as a former Muslim. It is filled with tweets and retweets focusing on anti-Islam themes and criticism of the religion, while sharing congratulatory notes to Muslims who left the faith. He was critical of German authorities, saying they had failed to do enough to combat the “Islamification of Europe.” He has also voiced support for the far-right and anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany (AfD) party.
People have lit candles at the Christmas Market in Magdeburg, Germany on Saturday evening , Dec. 21, 2024, where a car drove into a crowd on Friday evening, . (AP Photo/Michael Probst)
People have lit candles at the Christmas Market in Magdeburg, Germany on Saturday evening , Dec. 21, 2024, where a car drove into a crowd on Friday evening, . (AP Photo/Michael Probst)
Some described Taleb as an activist who helped Saudi women flee their homeland. Recently, he seemed focused on his theory that German authorities have been targeting Saudi asylum-seekers.
Investigators are analyzing the suspect’s computers, mobile devices and other evidence, trying to understand what motivated him to drive his black BMW into a crowd in the eastern German city. Prosecutors said the motive may have been “dissatisfaction with the treatment of Saudi refugees in Germany.”
There are unanswered questions about what the authorities knew about the suspect. The head of the Federal Criminal Police Office, Holger Münch, said the agency — Germany’s equivalent of the FBI — received a warning from Saudi Arabia in November 2023, but that the information was unspecific.
People lay flowers and light candles on concrete blocks that protect the Christmas market in Magdeburg, Germany, Saturday, Dec. 21, 2024, where a car drove into a crowd on Friday evening. (AP Photo/Michael Probst)
People lay flowers and light candles on concrete blocks that protect the Christmas market in Magdeburg, Germany, Saturday, Dec. 21, 2024, where a car drove into a crowd on Friday evening. (AP Photo/Michael Probst)
Münch said the suspect “published a huge number of posts on the internet,” was in contact with various authorities and “made insults and even threats” — but was not known to be violent.
Germany’s Federal Office for Migration and Refugees also acknowledged it had received a warning about the suspect last year.
German Chancellor Olaf Scholz is facing criticism about security lapses that allowed the attack to happen, and was heckled by some bystanders during a visit to Magdeburg on Saturday.
The violence shocked all of Germany, prompting several other German towns to cancel their weekend Christmas markets as a precaution, and out of solidarity with Magdeburg’s loss. Berlin kept its markets open but increased the police presence.
Germany has suffered several extremist attacks in recent years, including a knife attack that killed three people and wounded eight at a festival in the western city of Solingen in August. Friday’s attack came eight years after an Islamic extremist drove a truck into a crowded Christmas market in Berlin, killing 13 people and injuring many others.
Those attacks have led cities to beef up security at Christmas markets and other events.
The horror triggered by yet another act of mass violence in Germany make it likely that migration will remain a key issue as German heads toward an early election on Feb. 23.
It is the latest in a string of incidents around the world in which vehicles have been used as weapons by jihadi attackers, far-right extremists and others whose motives were unclear.
Copyright 2024 The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved.

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Disclaimer: The opinions expressed by our writers are their own and do not represent the views of U.Today. The financial and market information provided on U.Today is intended for informational purposes only. U.Today is not liable for any financial losses incurred while trading cryptocurrencies. Conduct your own research by contacting financial experts before making any investment decisions. We believe that all content is accurate as of the date of publication, but certain offers mentioned may no longer be available.
Bulls could not hold the gained initiative until the end of the week, according to CoinMarketCap.
The rate of Bitcoin (BTC) has declined by 0.54% since yesterday. Over the last week, the price has fallen by 5.84%.
On the hourly chart, the price of BTC is near the local resistance level of $97,248. If a breakout happens, the growth may continue to the $98,000 area tomorrow.
On the bigger time frame, neither side is dominating. The rate of the main crypto is far from the key levels, which means any sharp moves are unlikely to happen shortly.
From the midterm point of view, one should pay attention to the weekly bar closure in terms of the $97,092 level. 

Related

Sat, 12/21/2024 – 12:52

Ethereum (ETH) Price Prediction for December 21

Denys Serhiichuk

If the candle closes far from it, traders may witness a local bounce back to the $100,000 area. Such a scenario is relevant until the end of the month.
Bitcoin is trading at $96,396 at press time.
With more than 5 years of trading, Denys has a deep knowledge of both technical and fundamental market analysis. Mainly, he has started his blog on TradingView where publishes all relevant information and makes predictions about top coins.
Thus, his experience is backed up by working in top blockchain related companies such as W12, Platinum Listing, ATB Coin, and others, can be contacted at denys.serhiichuk@u.today.
Disclaimer: The opinions expressed here are not investment advice; they are provided for informational purposes only. The opinions expressed by our writers are their own and do not represent the views of U.Today. Every investment and all trading involves risk, so you should always perform your own research prior to making decisions. U.Today is not liable for any financial losses incurred while trading cryptocurrencies. We do not recommend investing money you cannot afford to lose.

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Israeli official confirms: Hamas has provided ‘signs of life’ for several hostages  The Times of Israel
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The 10 Funniest Christmas Movies of All Time, Ranked  Just Jared
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Guest column | How to see the good in families and connections in the holiday season  The Washington Post
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The Internet Archive has finally recovered from a devastating series of cyberattacks last month with all its main sites and services back up and running. Only a few ancillary features are still down, but those should be coming back soon.
Also: Apple will pay you up to $1 million if you can hack into Apple Intelligence servers
In Monday's update to the blog post, Chris Freeland, Director of Library Services at Internet Archive, reported that the key archive page is up, along with its Wayback Machine, Open Library, Archive-It service, Vault, and the scholarly archive site. On the archive page, most of the key services seem to be available once again, including publicly available texts, TV news search and borrowing, audio files, moving images, institutional uploads, institutional web archiving, and access via the API.
"More services and features coming online soon," Freeland said in the blog post. "Services may be interrupted for ongoing maintenance. Thank you for your patience and ongoing support."
Though the Internet Archive may appear on the surface as just one service, it actually provides a variety of resources. The main archive page offers free access to digital artifacts of the past, including software, music, movies, TV shows, and books. The Open Library is stocked with a huge catalog of electronic books you can read and borrow. Archive-It is a subscription-based service that helps organizations build large collections of videos, social media posts, and other digital content. The Vault is a digital repository and preservation service for libraries and other organizations.
Also: Microsoft's Windows 11 24H2 bug patch fixes some problems – and creates new ones
While all of those sites and services were affected last month by a series of cyberattacks, the chain of events started in September when two attacks hit the Internet Archive.
One was a data breach that compromised 31 million user accounts. Cyber attackers stole site users' usernames, email addresses, and encrypted passwords. Exploiting a JavaScript library to deface the archive, the attackers displayed the following message to visitors: "Have you ever felt like the Internet Archive runs on sticks and is constantly on the verge of suffering a catastrophic security breach? It just happened."
Also: Why you should power off your phone at least once a week – according to the NSA
Another incident occurred around the same time — a pro-Palestinian group named SN_BlackMeta launched a DDoS (Distributed Denial of Service) attack against the archive. Here, the hackers said they hit the site "because the archive belongs to the USA, and as we all know, this horrendous and hypocritical government supports the genocide that is being carried out by the terrorist state of 'Israel'."
The irony with the DDoS attack is that the archive is a non-profit and non-government organization with no ties to or affiliation with the US government.
Also: 7 essential password rules to follow in 2024, according to security experts
The third incident saw the theft of GitLab authentication tokens, as described by Bleeping Computer, giving the attackers access to the site's email support platform. Several people who had previously sent support emails to the archive received the following response from the attackers as shown in a Reddit forum:
It's dispiriting to see that even after being made aware of the breach weeks ago, IA has still not done the due diligence of rotating many of the API keys that were exposed in their GitLab secrets. As demonstrated by this message, this includes a Zendesk token with perms to access 800K+ support tickets sent to info@archive.org since 2018. Whether you were trying to ask a general question, or requesting the removal of your site from the Wayback Machine your data is now in the hands of some random guy. If not me, it'd be someone else.
Some people who chimed in on Reddit blamed the Internet Archive for not changing its API keys in the wake of the initial attacks, and others sympathized with the site. As a non-profit organization devoted to sharing valuable historical information, the Internet Archive has a limited budget. That means cybersecurity may get short shrift in the overall running of things.
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"In a third attack on the Internet Archive this month, hackers are exploiting access tokens to the organization's Zendesk implementation," said Ev Kontsevoy, CEO of Teleport. "This means they now have access to more than 800 support tickets. While many have been critical of Internet Archive for not rotating API keys, it can be challenging in the aftermath of a breach for organizations to pick through the blast radius of an attack to prevent further exploitation."
As a result of the attacks, the archive was forced to go offline and has slowly come back one service at a time.
"Along with a DDOS attack and exposure of patron email addresses and encrypted passwords, the Internet Archive's website javascript was defaced, leading us to bring the site down to access and improve our security," Kahle said in a blog post on October 18. "The stored data of the Internet Archive is safe and we are working on resuming services safely. This new reality requires heightened attention to cyber security and we are responding. We apologize for the impact of these library services being unavailable."

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ChildofHope.png  Arizona Daily Sun
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By Jason Hall
December 22, 2024
Monday’s (December 23) Powerball jackpot will be worth an estimated $103 million after zero players matched all six numbers during the $92 million drawing Saturday (December 21) night.
Results from Saturday’s Powerball game are listed below:
NUMBERS: 1-12-17-21-58
POWERBALL: 1
POWER PLAY: 3x
The odds of winning the Powerball jackpot are reported to be 1 in 292.2 million, according to Powerball.com. The Powerball jackpot previously reset after one player in New York won the $256 million drawing on December 7. The Powerball jackpot reset after one player in California won the $44 million drawing on August 19.
One player in Pennsylvania won the $214 million Powerball drawing on August 12, exactly one week prior to another jackpot. The Powerball jackpot had previously reset after one player won the $139 million Powerball drawing on July 3.
One player in California matched all six numbers to win the $2.04 billion ($997.6 million) jackpot on November 7, 2022, the largest jackpot offered in U.S. lottery history, according to the official Powerball website. Powerball has had jackpots exceeding $1 billion five times.
Mega Millions games have also exceeded $1 billion six times, which includes its largest offering, a $1.603 billion jackpot that was one by a player in Florida on August 8. Both jackpots increase during each following game until there’s a jackpot winning ticket matching all six numbers drawn, which includes the additional Mega Millions Gold Ball or Powerball in each respective game.
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