Fra il ghiaccio e il freddo dell'inverno
In Nicollet Avenue
Una città in fiamme ha combattuto il fuoco e il ghiaccio
Vicino agli stivali di un occupante
L'esercito privato del DHS di re Trump
Pistole legate ai loro cappotti
Sono venuti a Minneapolis per far rispettare la legge
O almeno così racconta la loro storia

Contro fumo e proiettili di gomma
Nella prima luce dell'alba
I cittadini si sono schierati per la giustizia
Le loro voci risuonavano nella notte
E c'erano impronte insanguinate
Dove avrebbe dovuto stare la misericordia
E due morti, lasciati morire sulle strade piene di neve
Alex Pretti e Renee Good

Oh, nostra Minneapolis, sento la tua voce
Cantare attraverso la nebbia di sangue
Prenderemo posizione per questa terra
E lo straniero in mezzo a noi
Qui nella nostra casa, hanno ucciso e vagato
Nell'inverno del '26
Ricorderemo i nomi di coloro che sono morti
Per le strade di Minneapolis

I delinquenti federali di Trump colpiscono
Il suo viso e il suo petto
Poi abbiamo sentito gli spari
E Alex Pretti giaceva morto nella neve
La loro richiesta era di legittima difesa, signore
Non credere ai tuoi occhi
Ci sono il nostro sangue e le nostre ossa
E questi fischietti e i telefoni
Contro le sporche bugie di Miller e Noem

Oh, nostra Minneapolis, sento la tua voce
Piangere attraverso la nebbia di sangue
Ricorderemo i nomi di coloro che sono morti
Per le strade di Minneapolis

Dicono di essere qui per far rispettare la legge
Ma calpestano i nostri diritti
Se la tua pelle è nera o marrone, amico mio
Puoi essere interrogato o deportato a vista
Nei nostri canti di "ICE out now"
Il cuore e l'anima della nostra città persistono
Attraverso vetri rotti e lacrime di sangue
Per le strade di Minneapolis

Oh, nostra Minneapolis, sento la tua voce
Cantare attraverso la nebbia di sangue
Qui nella nostra casa, hanno ucciso e girovagato
Nell'inverno del '26
Ci schiereremo per questa terra
E lo straniero in mezzo a noi
Ricorderemo i nomi di coloro che sono morti
Per le strade di Minneapolis

youtube.com/watch?v=wWKSoxG1K7…

У Каспійському морі іранське судно Caspian Shiva отримало пробоїну «невідомого походження».

Судно, яке прямувало до порту Махачкала, сіло на мілину та почало затоплюватися.

An E-Ink Macropad For Improved Productivity

Why press many button when few button do trick? That was the thinking of [Bike Cook Robots] when it came time to revamp his desk. To that end, he whipped up a tidy macropad to make daily computing tasks easier.

The build is based around an Adafruit RP2040 Feather ThinkInk devboard, chosen because it plugs straight into a readily-available 4.2 inch e-ink. The display is tasked with showing icons that correspond to the macro assignments for the 3 x 4 array of mechanical keyboard switches. Everything is wrapped up in a 3D printed frame, with an bracket to mount it to the monitor arms on the desk. The macropad is set up to talk to a custom Python app that runs on the host machine, which handles triggering actions and can also talk back to the pad itself.

The combination of e-ink display and button pad is a great way to display the function of each key without excess complexity. We’ve seen some other great builds in this space before, too.

youtube.com/embed/PbdwmN28-So?…

hackaday.com/2026/01/29/an-e-i…

The Inner Workings of the Intel 8086’s Arithmetic Logic Unit

In the 1970s CPUs still had wildly different approaches to basic features, with the Intel 8086 being one of them. Whereas the 6502 used separate circuits for operations, and the Intel 8085 a clump of reconfigurable clump of gates, the 8086 uses microcode that configures the ALU along with two lookup tables. This complexity is one of the reasons why the Intel 8086 is so unique, with [Ken Shirriff] taking an in-depth look at its workings on a functional and die-level.

These lookup tables are used for the ALU configuration – as in the above schematic – making for a very flexible but also complex system, where the same microcode can be used by multiple instructions. This is effectively the very definition of a CISC-style processor, a legacy that the x86 ISA would carry with it even if the x86 CPUs today are internally more RISC-like. Decoding a single instruction and having it cascade into any of a variety of microcodes and control signals is very powerful, but comes with many trade-offs.

Of course, as semiconductor technology improved, along with design technologies, many of these trade-offs and disadvantages became less relevant. [Ken] also raises the interesting point that much of this ALU control technology is similar to that used in modern-day FPGAs, with their own reconfigurable logic using LUTs that allow for on-the-fly reconfiguration.

hackaday.com/2026/01/29/the-in…

Supply chain attack on eScan antivirus: detecting and remediating malicious updates

On January 20, a supply chain attack has occurred, with the infected software being the eScan antivirus developed by an Indian company MicroWorld Technologies. The previously unknown malware was distributed through the eScan update server. The same day, our security solutions detected and prevented cyberattacks involving this malware. On January 21, having been informed by Morphisec, the developers of eScan contained the security incident related to the attack.

Malicious software used in the attack

Users of the eScan security product received a malicious Reload.exe file, which initiated a multi-stage infection chain. According to colleagues at Morphisec who were the first to investigate the attack, Reload.exe prevented further antivirus product updates by modifying the HOSTS file, thereby blocking the ability of security solution developers to automatically fix the problem, which, among other things, led to the update service error.

The malware also ensured its persistence in the system, communicated with control servers, and downloaded additional malicious payloads. Persistence was achieved by creating scheduled tasks; one example of such a malicious task is named CorelDefrag. Additionally, the consctlx.exe malicious file was written to the disk during the infection.

How the attackers managed to pull off this attack

At the request of the BleepingComputer information portal, eScan developers explained that the attackers managed to gain access to one of the regional update servers and deploy a malicious file, which was automatically delivered to customers. They emphasize that this is not a vulnerability — the incident is classified as unauthorized access to infrastructure. The malicious file was distributed with a fake invalid digital signature.

According to the developers, the infrastructure affected by the incident was quickly isolated, and all access credentials were reset.

How to stay safe?

To detect infection, it is recommended to review scheduled tasks for traces of malware, check the %WinDir%\System32\drivers\etc\hosts file for blocked eScan domains, and review the eScan update logs for January 20.

The developers of eScan have created a utility for their users that removes the malware, rolls back the modifications it has made, and restores the normal functionality of the antivirus. The utility is sent to customers upon request to technical support.

Users of the solution are also advised to block known malware control server addresses.

Kaspersky’s security solutions, such as Kaspersky Next, successfully detect all malware used by attackers with its Behavior Detection component.

Indicators of compromise

Several malicious domain names and links were listed in the Morphisec blog:

• vhs.delrosal[.]net/i
• tumama.hns[.]to
• blackice.sol-domain[.]org
• https://codegiant[.]io/dd/dd/dd.git/download/main/middleware.ts

Our experts have discovered additional network IoCs related to this attack:

• airanks.hns[.]to
• csc.biologii[.]net/sooc

Right now we are analyzing the malware used in this incident, and will post more details as soon as possible.

securelist.com/escan-supply-ch…

Did We Overestimate the Potential Harm from Microplastics?

Over the past years there have appeared in the media increasingly more alarming reports about micro- and nanoplastics (MNPs) and the harm that they are causing not only in the environment, but also inside our bodies. If some of the published studies were to be believed, then MNPs are everywhere inside our bodies, from our blood and reproductive organs to having deeply embedded themselves inside our brains with potentially catastrophic health implications.

Early last year we covered what we thought we knew about the harm from MNPs in our bodies, but since then more and more scientists have pushed back against these studies, calling them ‘flawed’ and questioning the used methodology and conclusions. Despite claims of health damage in mice, institutions like the German federal risk assessment institute also do not acknowledge evidence of harm to human health from MNPs.

All of which raises the question whether flawed studies have pushed us into our own Chicken Little moment, and whether it’s now time to breathe a sigh of relief that the sky isn’t falling after all.

Measuring Many Tiny Things

One of the problems with making statements about the amount of MNPs in the body pertains to the way that this is measured. Rather than sliding samples under a microscope and doing manual counting, the typical method involves a method like pyrolysis-gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (Py-GC-MS). For biological samples you first want to remove the organic components before pyrolysis, lest the subsequent mass spectrometry step produces false positives rather than an objective polymer analysis.
A ThermoQuest Trace 200 gas chromatograph–mass spectrometer (GCMS) with open door. (credit: Polimerek, Wikimedia)
Py-GC-MS involves rapidly heating the sample in an inert atmosphere or vacuum. This cleaves large molecules into smaller fragments which can then be separated using a gas chromatography column and classified in combination with a mass spectrometer. With both results combined, the likely original materials in the sample can thus be deduced. This means that you are not literally counting MNP particles in the sample or measuring them, but quite literally vaporizing said sample and analyzing the debris cloud. Obviously this comes with some major asterisks.

A 2024 paper by Marthinus Brits et al. as published in Microplastics and Nanoplastics explored the use of Py-GC-MS for determining the amount of MNPs in human blood. Using whole blood samples they found mostly polyethylene (PE) polymer, with a mean of 268 ng/mL of MNPs across all 68 samples, with a call to investigate the health impact of this finding.

In response to this paper a correspondence by Bianca Wilhelmus et al. was submitted to the journal, in which one of the complaints was a lack of detail on the Py-GC-MS fingerprints using which the polymers were purportedly detected. It was also noted that with sub-micrometer MNP particles you’d need millions of them in a sample to really register, which is far above what had typically been found in human body fluids.

To this Brits et al. replied with among other things the admission that the quantitative analysis of MNPs using Py-GC-MS is still in early stages of development. To the issue of quantity it was noted that most of the MNPs are significantly larger than a micrometer, so they were still fairly confident of their findings.

It’s important to note more recent studies here, such as the 2025 study by Cassandra Rauert et al. in Environmental Science & Technology, in which also a study on using Py-GC-MS for detecting MNPs in blood was performed. Its conclusion was that this detection method has trouble detecting PE and PVC polymers, and the estimated exposure concentrations are testing the detection limits of this technique.

Contamination

One of the problems with trying to measure MNPs in a sample is that of environmental MNP contamination, as MNPs are being shed and distributed all around us, whether it’s from e.g. polyester clothing, plastic surfaces and tools, or carried in from outside. This makes it a real chore to make sure that in a laboratory setting such contamination does not ruin the findings, as with a recent study on MNPs in bottled water by Qian et al. in PNAS.

Rather than Py-GC-MS, this used stimulated Raman scattering, but also led to accusations of contamination due to improper procedures, with the finding that the ultra-pure filtered Milli-Q water that was used for a blank (i.e. control) contained as many MNPs as the bottled water. This and other issues were suggested as invalidating the findings. While Qian et al. acknowledged that using the Milli-Q water as a blank was resultingly improper, they disagreed with the premise that this invalidated the study’s findings.

Another type of contamination can come from the aforementioned biological tissue, such as in the early 2025 study on MNPs in the human brain and other organs by Nihart et al. as published in Nature Medicine. This analyzed tissue samples from human cadavers using, among other methods, Py-GC-MS, leading them to conclude that especially our brains are full of PE polymers, with major implications for Alzheimer’s and dementia research, for instance.

This assessment subsequently got challenged (full article) by Monikh et al. in a November 2025 published commentary, with the authors noting that Nihart et al.’s samples from the human liver, kidney and brain all have in common that they contain significant amounts of fatty tissue (lipids), which when subjected to pyrolysis produce fragments that are easily mistaken for PE polymer fragments.

When it comes to detecting polymers in such biological samples, it is absolutely essential to strip away the biological material, without affecting the sample that will ultimately be analyzed. In this case the processing method appears to have been flawed, leading to subsequent contamination. This was acknowledged by the team, in a reply by some of the study authors.

Empirical Correlation

Although it seems like we can at least conclude that our brains aren’t overflowing with PE polymer fragments, but that they are just filled with phospholipids in particular, this doesn’t necessarily take away all our concerns. After all, didn’t some studies find real, empirical evidence for MNPs causing actual damage? Especially since it seems harmful in mice, according to a 2025 study using starch-based plastics.

As highlighted by Baroni et al. in a September 2025 review paper on MNPs in the brain as published in Nanomaterials, the enduring problem that we are dealing with right now is one of a lack of information, a scarcity of standard detection methods and a total lack of longitudinal studies in humans.

Although we have health databases that span decades in countries with strong public healthcare systems, trying to figure out whether certain health trends are due to MNPs using their data is borderline lunacy, as you cannot realistically account for all confounding factors. Thus we are mostly stuck at this point trying to figure out how to actually effectively measure the presence of MNPs.

Methodology

The aforementioned Py-GC-MS and SRS methods are two tools available to us here, but clearly moving from measuring MNPs in water to measuring them in biological tissues is still a challenging topic. When we look at the established science of MNPs in water, we got a range of options, as illustrated by this application note by ThermoFisher Scientific:

In order to measure not just the relatively large microplastic particles, but also the much smaller nanoplastics which are more likely to interact with biological systems, you are pretty limited here already. With only Raman spectroscopes applicable for such fine analysis, it’s little wonder that Py-GC-MS is being applied to biological samples.

Maybe once we have figured out the right methodology for Py-GC-MS and potentially other approaches will we be able to tell with some certainty how many of these polymer fragments are in our bodies right now, and how much of it will simply pass through rather than take up permanent residence. On the bright side, there’s no clear epidemiological evidence of MNPs being actively harmful to us, yet.

Although the sky hasn’t been confirmed to be falling, it is still looking somewhat unsteady. For that reason alone it is probably in our own best interest to use the precautionary principle here, as it’s better to have begun today to find ways to reduce and prevent the spread of MNPs, rather than to regret not having done so tomorrow.

hackaday.com/2026/01/29/did-we…

L’estasi dell’ignoranza. La tradizione occidentale della non conoscenza

Perché un lettore crede a racconti palesemente falsi? Vuole evitare notizie scomode? Come fanno i fedeli religiosi a credere nella scienza e contemporaneamente affidarsi al mito? Si tratta di scelte razionali, strategie collettive oppure difesa privata e personale di un nucleo emotivo che altrimenti finirebbe in pezzi? Sono queste le domande che affiorano, con risposta annessa, nel libro del politologo Mark Lilla che per Luiss University Press ha pubblicato «L’estasi dell’ignoranza. La tradizione occidentale della non conoscenza».

A dispetto della moderna logica mediatica che obbliga tutti alla trasparenza, alla conoscenza, alla condivisione di informazioni e intimità sui social, Mark Lilla elabora una ricostruzione storica e filosofica del volto contrario di questa modernità, cioè dell’ignoranza intesa come volontà di non sapere. Strategia adattativa piuttosto che euristica vitale, l’ignoranza descritta da Lilla viene dissezionata nei miti antichi, come quello di Edipo, che non voleva sapere di essere giaciuto con la madre; passa per le Confessioni di Sant’Agostino che dubita della sua fede; arriva da Nietzsche il pazzo fino a Freud e alla sua teoria della rimozione, per ricostruire i tabù della verità, la delusione della curiosità quando si osa strappare il velo di Iside, fino alle cedevoli illusioni di innocenza personale, colte nelle loro forme quotidiane e talvolta penose.

La fuga dalla realtà è la chiave di questo viaggio intellettuale nella volontà di ignoranza. Certo, sull’ignoranza e sull’errore molto è stato detto, da Gianrico Carofiglio in Elogio dell’ignoranza e dell’errore, a Umberto Galimberti con Le contraddizioni della Verità e l’attitudine tutta binaria a pensare semplice senza troppo complicarsi la vita, come pure in L’età dell’ignoranza di Fabrizio Tonello, ma questo testo si misura sulla volontà di non conoscere quale strategia di sopravvivenza intima, nascosta e personale, per rendere la vita odierna più accettabile. Una scelta che è alla base di questioni tremendamente attuali, dagli effetti della disinformazione al cospirazionismo politico, dal pensiero magico alle semplificazioni scientifiche. In fondo, in fondo, il trionfo dell’ignorante è l’estasi del potere.

dicorinto.it/articoli/recensio…

Ask Hackaday: How Do You Digitize Your Documents?

Like many of you, I have a hard time getting rid of stuff. I’ve got boxes and boxes of weirdo bits and bobs, and piles of devices that I’ll eventually get around to stripping down into even more bits and bobs. Despite regular purges — I try to bring a car-load of crap treasure to local hackerspaces and meetups at least a couple times a year — the pile only continues to grow.