Appeals Court Upholds U.S. Ban of TikTok

by  Jacob Gershman, Meghan Bobrowsky and Sarah E. Needleman

Panel rules Congress has the power to shut down Chinese-backed app in the U.S. because of national security concerns

A federal appeals court ruled Friday that TikTok can be banned in the U.S. over national security concerns, upholding a federal law requiring the popular social media app to shed its Chinese ownership to keep operating.

A three-judge panel in Washington, D.C., said Congress has the power to take action against TikTok to protect U.S. interests. The decision relied heavily on warnings from U.S. officials that the Chinese government can exert its will on the app's parent company, Beijing-based ByteDance, potentially giving it the ability to access U.S. users' data and manipulate what they see on the platform.

 Read full story at Wall Street Journal…

Ramaswamy Cites Legacy Tech and Fraud as Early DOGE Priorities

by  Natalie Alms

Department of Government Efficiency Co-Chair Vivek Ramaswamy called IT modernization “low-hanging fruit,” but reaping cost savings will take up-front investment — and time.

Vivek Ramaswamy wants to use the Department of Governmental Efficiency to update the government's antiquated technology and stop fraud in government programs, efforts he called “low-hanging fruit” for his work alongside billionaire Elon Musk.

The duo is leading the DOGE, which — despite the name &mdash is an advisory effort, not a government department. Big goals include slashing the government's headcount, paring back government regulations and cutting spending.

“Technology improvements across the federal government are not only going to be important, [but] I think it's necessary in order to actually get the job done,” Ramaswamy said Wednesday at the Aspen Security Forum.

The federal government spends over $100 billion on IT and cybersecurity every year, according to the Government Accountability Office.

 Read full story at NextGov/FCW…

Salesforce Launches New Top Secret Cloud Environment

by  Edward Graham

The software company said it is the first provider to deliver a true commercial cloud that has received Top Secret accreditation with platform — and software-as-a-service capabilities for the intelligence community.

Accurately predicting the future in emerging technology fields that are constantly evolving is not an easy thing. Too much changes too quickly, and rare breakthroughs can become mainstream almost overnight. When we write our yearly predictions for government and technology in Nextgov/FCW, we generally confine our forecasting to the following year, which allows for a little bit of hedging, although it's still pretty tough being consistently accurate.

Over at The National Institute of Standards and Technology, the scientists and researchers there are tasked with actually creating or defining many aspects of that future. On their main webpage, they feature several high-level topics, such as artificial intelligence, climate change, health and bioscience, cybersecurity, infrastructure and quantum computing, that are actively being researched. Asking the scientists working on those projects to predict the future of those fields would likely be pretty interesting, which is exactly what NIST officials recently did.

 Read full story at NextGov/FCW…

5 Simple Steps to Purge Digital Clutter

by  Jill Duffy

Cleaning up emails, documents, photos, and other digital junk can reduce stress and simplify your life. Here's how to streamline and declutter your devices.

A few times a year, I get an urge to purge. Whether it's spring cleaning or taking a moment to archive last year's emails, I find it incredibly gratifying to dump stuff I don't need. There's a whole lot of hippie rhetoric about how clutter-free environments lead to clarity of mind. I#39;m not necessarily saying this works for everyone or guaranteeing that it will improve your productivity, but I sure do feel less stressed and more able to focus when the junk is gone.

As kids, most of us learn to clean our rooms, tidy our desks, donate or throw out items that we don't need or want, and put away our physical stuff. As adults, however, many of us never learned to do the same thing with our digital material. It's no surprise we never learned. Who would have taught us? If yo'#39;re an adult now, you're part of the first wave of people to figure out how to do it and teach such skills to younger generations.

If you enjoy a good purge and have a messy digital life, here are five tasks to start with.

 Read full story at PCMagazine…

Booking.com Says Typos Giving Strangers Access to Private Trip Info Is Not a Bug

by  Ashley Belanger

Popular trip site confirmed it can't stop typos after user flagged privacy issue.

You may want to be extra careful if you're booking holiday travel for family and friends this year through Booking.com. A stunned user recently discovered that a typo in an email address could inadvertently share private trip info with strangers, who can then access sensitive information and potentially even take over bookings that Booking.com automatically adds to their accounts.

This issue came to light after a Booking.com user, Alfie, got an email confirming that he had booked a trip he did not.

At first, Alfie assumed it was a phishing attempt, so he avoided clicking any links in the email to prevent any malicious activity and instead went directly to his Booking.com account to verify that the trip info wasn't there. But rather than feeling the sweet relief that his account had not been compromised, he was shocked to find the trip had somehow been booked through his account.

 Read full story at arsTechnica…

Microsoft Now Allowing Windows 11 on Older, Incompatible PCs

by  Laura Pippig and Joel Lee

Despite years of warning, it's now officially possible to install Windows 11 on PCs that don't meet requirements.

Not even a week ago, Microsoft doubled down on its policy that requires PCs to have TPM 2.0-compatible hardware in order to install Windows 11. But now, in an unexpected and puzzling move, the company is issuing instructions for installing Windows 11 on incompatible PCs.

… With Windows 11, Microsof's chief requirement is the availability of a TPM 2.0 chip. We previously explained what a TPM is, and we also wrote about how you might not actually need to buy a TPM for Windows 11. But in most cases, you did need TPM 2.0 for Windows 11.

Until now. Users can now upgrade directly to Windows 11 even without the needed hardware. Microsoft doesn't explain the actual “upgrading to Windows 11 ” steps in the document, but we assume it's done via the Windows Update app and the PC Health Check app.

 Read full story at PCWorld…

Five-Year US Load Growth Forecast Surges 456%, to 128 GW: Grid Strategies

by  Robert Walton

U.S. electricity demand is forecast to increase 15.8% by 2029, according to a new report from Grid Strategies. Six regions of the country are driving the growth.

U.S. electricity demand could rise 128 GW over the next five years, driven by data centers and manufacturing growth primarily in six regions of the country, according to a report published Thursday by Grid Strategies. The “shocking” estimate represents a five-fold increase in load growth forecasts over the past two years, the firm said.

“We are now looking at the latter half of this decade showing 3% annual average load growth. ... We haven't seen that kind of load growth since the 1980s,” Grid Strategies Vice President John Wilson said … .

 Read full story at UtilityDive…

Huntsville Utilities, City Establish Energy Task Force to Create Energy Resource Plan

by  Paul Ciampoli

A rapidly changing energy environment prompted the City of Huntsville, Ala., and Huntsville Utilities, the city's public power utility, to establish a task force to develop a forward-looking approach to energy planning, the city said on Dec. 5.

Working with consulting engineering firm Black & Veatch, a 12-member Energy Task Force will create a Community Energy Resource Plan to guide the City's energy strategy into the future.

“As our community grows, we must proactively address our energy needs,” said Wes Kelly, CEO of Huntsville Utilities. “This task force will explore every option and approach to ensure a sustainable and resilient energy future for our customers and the City of Huntsville.”

The Energy Task Force will look at future power needs and increased demand, identify potential changes and opportunities and examine how Huntsville Utilities is structured and works within the TVA system.

 Read full story at Public Power Assoc.…

Meta to Build $10 Billion AI Data Center in Louisiana as Elon Musk Expands His Tennessee AI Facility

by Jack Brook & Adrian Sainz

Louisiana is among a growing number of states offering tax credits and other incentives to lure big tech firms seeking sites for energy-intensive data centers.

The largest artificial intelligence data center ever built by Facebook's parent company Meta is coming to northeast Louisiana, the company said Wednesday, bringing hopes that the $10 billion facility will transform an economically neglected corner of the state.

Republican Gov. Jeff Landry called it “game-changing” for his state's expanding tech sector, yet some environmental groups have raised concerns over the center's reliance on fossil fuels — and whether the plans for new natural gas power to support it could lead to higher energy bills in the future for Louisiana residents.

Meanwhile, Elon Musk's AI startup, xAI, is expanding its existing supercomputer project in Memphis, Tennessee, the city's chamber of commerce said Wednesday. The chamber also said that Nvidia, Dell, and Supermicro Computer will be “establishing operations in Memphis,” without offering further details.

 Read full story at Power Engineering…