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Sulawesi art: Animal painting found in cave is 44,000 years old

A painting discovered on the wall of an Indonesian cave has been found to be 44,000 years old.
The art appears to show a buffalo being hunted by part-human, part-animal creatures holding spears and possibly ropes. Some researchers think the scene could be the world's oldest-recorded story. The findings were presented in the journal Nature by archaeologists from Griffith University in Brisbane, Australia. Adam Brumm - an archaeologist at Griffith - first saw the pictures two years ago, after a colleague in Indonesia shimmied up a fig tree to reach the cave passage. "These images appeared on my iPhone," said Mr Brumm. "I think I said the characteristic Australian four-letter word out very loud." The Indonesian drawing is not the oldest in the world. Last year, scientists said they found "humanity's oldest drawing" on a fragment of rock in South Africa, dated at 73,000 years old.

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T-Mobile 5G Secrets Revealed: Here's Where It Doesn't Work Well

T-Mobile's new "nationwide" 5G can double your 4G speeds...or not. We explain why and give you maps of where it works well.
For people in many major metro areas, T-Mobile's new low-band 5G and its OnePlus 7T Pro McLaren phone will offer little advantage over 4G—unless the T-Mobile/Sprint merger goes through. T-Mobile's low-band 5G launched last week. I've been testing it with the McLaren phone—first in Maui, where it performed very well, and then in New York City, where it hasn't performed as well. T-Mobile's low-band 5G is most likely to benefit people in smaller cities and rural areas. In those places people could see significant speed increases. In 16 of the nation's top metro areas, T-Mobile's 5G will currently bring no benefit. It will bring relatively little benefit in 22 other major metros.

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Gmail Can Now Send Emails as Attachments

Yes, you read that right, Gmail users can now email emails.
Google decided to make it easier to send emails to other people using Gmail, so it's now possible to add one or more emails as an attachment. Typically, if you want to share an email you've received with someone else the easiest way to do so is to forward the email. However, that's not always suitable, especially when there's multiple email threads to send. Until now, you'd have to download the emails first from Gmail and then add them as an attachment, but not anymore.

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Climate change: Major emitters accused of blocking progress at UN talks

Delegates from developing countries have reacted angrily to what they see as attempts to block progress at the COP25 meeting in Madrid.
One negotiator told the BBC that the talks had failed to find agreement on a range of issues because of the blocking actions of some large emitters. Carlos Fuller from Belize said that Brazil, Saudi Arabia, India and China were "part of the problem". Other observers said there was a serious risk of failure at the talks. Ministers from all over the world have arrived in Madrid for the high-end negotiations that will determine the final outcome of this conference. Despite a huge climate demonstration on the streets of the Spanish capital last Friday, hopes of an ambitious declaration at COP25 have smacked straight into the realities of politics and entrenched positions.

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New Zealand volcano eruption leaves survivors with extensive burns

Almost all patients who were injured in the deadly New Zealand volcanic eruption have suffered extensive burns to their bodies and lungs, as questions mount over the circumstances surrounding the tragedy that has left at least six people dead.
Every burns unit in the country is at full capacity as medical staff do all they can to treat those with severe injuries from the volcanic ash and gas, Ministry of Health spokesman Pete Watson said Tuesday. Out of the 31 people still in hospital, 27 had burns to at least 30% of their bodies and many have inhalation burns that require airway support.Given the extent of survivors' injuries, the death toll could continue to rise. "It's possible that not all patients will survive," Watson said. Authorities are now working to gather information on the dead, injured, and missing, and provide emergency services to those affected, after the eruption on White Island, also known as Whakaari, left at least six people dead. The injured were aged between 13 and 72. Police confirmed the death of a sixth victim in a statement on Tuesday. The unnamed person was earlier being treated at Middlemore Hospital in Auckland.

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Phishing, pyramid schemes and more: 4 scams to avoid this holiday shopping season

Pyramid schemes disguised as gift exchanges, virtual card skimmers and other digital traps are set and waiting for you when you shop online.
Between Thanksgiving and the New Year, consumers are estimated to spend a staggering $143 billion, according to Adobe Analytics. All that money changing hands means that, now more than ever, cybercriminals will be targeting both you and the online retailers you trust. Some hackers, like those who struck Macy's in October, infect merchants' websites directly with identity-stealing malware. Far more scams, however, try to lure you away from legitimate sellers to malicious sites or apps that often spoof familiar retailers like Amazon, Best Buy or Walmart. Recent research from RiskIQ lists nearly 1,000 apps using holiday-related terms that the security company deemed malicious, as well as over 6,000 apps infringing on copyrighted names and slogans from popular retailers to fool you into giving up your credit card number. RiskIQ also identified 65 fraudulent websites posing as popular retailers.

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Amazon: Trump used “improper pressure” to block AWS from DOD cloud contract

Trump said "screw Amazon" and used contract as political weapon against Bezos, suit claims.
In a redacted filing released today by the US Federal Court of Claims, attorneys for Amazon asserted that Amazon Web Service's loss of the Department of Defense Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI) cloud computing contract to Microsoft's Azure was the result of "improper pressure from President Donald J. Trump, who launched repeated public and behind-the-scenes attacks to steer the JEDI Contract away from AWS to harm his perceived political enemy—Jeffrey P. Bezos, founder and CEO of AWS' parent company, Amazon.com, Inc. ("Amazon"), and owner of the Washington Post."

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'We’re sorry for Thomas Cook refund delay'

The body repaying money owed to Thomas Cook customers after the tour firm collapsed has apologised to thousands of customers facing refund delays.
Paul Smith, director at the Civil Aviation Authority, said "we are very sorry" and promised the CAA is "working tirelessly" to process payments. Despite £160m having already been refunded, he told the BBC well over 50,000 customers were still owed money. Incomplete claim forms and attempted fraud were adding to delays, he said. Thomas Cook collapsed on 23 September, after failing to obtain rescue funds from its banks. Some 150,000 travellers had to be repatriated back to the UK during a two-week operation run by the CAA. A refund process was opened on 7 October for customers covered by Atol-protected insurance.

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5G on the horizon: here’s what it is and what’s coming

5G is many things—but the most interesting part is what it will eventually become.
The long-touted fifth generation of wireless communications is not magic. We’re sorry if unending hype over the world-changing possibilities of 5G has led you to expect otherwise. But the next generation in mobile broadband will still have to obey the current generation of the laws of physics that govern how far a signal can travel when sent in particular wavelengths of the radio spectrum and how much data it can carry. For some of us, the results will yield the billions of bits per second in throughput that figure in many 5G sales pitches, going back to early specifications for this standard. For everybody else, 5G will more likely deliver a pleasant and appreciated upgrade rather than a bandwidth renaissance.

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Huawei launches new legal challenge against US ban

Chinese telecoms giant Huawei has launched a legal challenge to a decision by US regulators to classify it as a national security threat.
It comes after the US Federal Communications Commission put curbs on rural mobile providers using a $8.5bn (£6.5bn) government fund to buy Huawei equipment. The firm said evidence that it was a threat to security "does not exist". The move is the latest in a series of challenges between Huawei and the US. The company has asked the US Court of Appeal to overturn the decision. Speaking at a news conference at Huawei's headquarters in Shenzhen, the company's chief legal officer, Song Liuping, said: "The US government has never presented real evidence to show that Huawei is a national security threat. That's because this evidence does not exist."