schwit1 quotes Norm Matloff, a CS professor at the University of California at Davis, on H-1B visa programs: The Trump administration has drafted a new executive order that could actually mean higher wages for both foreign workers and Americans working…

Magic Leap CEO Defends His AR Company After Leaked Photo
Saturday Business Insider claimed that augmented reality company Magic Leap was “scrambling to finish a working prototype before an important board meeting next week,” publishing a photo described by their source as an early January prototype. An anonymous reader quotes…

Excessive Radiation Inside Fukushima Fries Clean-Up Robot
“A remotely-controlled robot sent to inspect and clean a damaged reactor at Japan’s Fukushima nuclear plant had to be pulled early when its onboard camera went dark, the result of excess radiation,” reports Gizmodo. “The abbreviated mission suggests that radiation…

First Gene Drive In Mammals Could Aid Vast New Zealand Eradication Plan
wisebabo writes: Say goodbye to our little whiskered friends! There is an effort to wipe out not just any species, (there’s been discussions to wipe out the mosquitos that carry Malaria), but a mammal. Specifically the house mouse which, along…

Nanorods Emit and Detect Light, Could Lead To Displays That Communicate Via Li-Fi
schwit1 quotes a report from IEEE Spectrum: Ever since 2015 Consumer Electronics Show, quantum dots have been in a market struggle to displace light-emitting diodes (LEDs) as a backlight source for liquid crystal displays (LCDs). Now an advance by a…

Valve Is Shutting Down Steam's Greenlight Community Voting System
Valve’s crowdsourced Greenlight submission program, which let the gaming community select which games get chosen for distribution via Steam, is shutting down after nearly five years. It will be replaced with a new system called Steam Direct that will charge…

Senators Push Trump Administration For Clarity On Privacy Act Exclusions
Trailrunner7 quotes a report from On the Wire: A group of influential lawmakers, including Sen. Ed Markey and Sen. Ron Wyden, are pressing the Trump administration for answers about how an executive order that includes changes to the Privacy Act…

Google’s neural networks turn pixelated faces back into real ones
While there are interesting potential real-world applications for the technology, for now the Google team is focused on the theoretical advances

If you’re attending BSidesSF, expect to see a lot of Mr Robot
If you’re going to be in San Francisco, here are some of the cool things to look out for at BSidesSF

News in brief: Yahoo faced with suit; dev hits back at support scammers; Note 7 batteries flare up
Your daily round-up of some of the other stories in the news