Tech Digest daily round up: Google still selling ‘unofficial’ ads for Government services
Google has failed to stop “shyster” websites advertising on its search engine, despite promising to fix the problem, the BBC has found. Adverts for unofficial services selling government documents such as travel permits and driving licences are against Google’s own rules. But the BBC found adverts for expensive third-party sellers every time it searched during a 12-month period. In a statement, Google said it had taken down billions of rule-breaking adverts. In the UK, changing the address on your driving licence is free – but Google consistently showed adverts for services charging £49.99. Applying for an Esta travel permit to visit the US should cost no more $14 (£10) – but Google repeatedly allowed adverts for websites charging more than $80. BBC
A Swiss quantum computing start-up has claimed a major breakthrough in encryption technology, beating British technologists to develop a system that can send theoretically unhackable messages around the world. Terra Quantum, a Swiss business developing ways to keep sensitive information safe from the ability of quantum computers to break traditional encryption, has found a new method of securely sending data on fibre optic cables for up to 40,000km (24,850 miles). The company’s new secure transmission method works using quantum key distribution, which is a way of sending data using quantum mechanics that many physicists say makes it impossible for hackers to intercept the data without alerting either side. Telegraph
AOL and Yahoo are being sold again, this time to a private equity firm. Wireless company Verizon will sell Verizon Media, which consists of the once-pioneering tech platforms, to Apollo Global Management in a $5 billion deal. Verizon said Monday that it will keep a 10% stake in the new company, which will be called Yahoo. Yahoo at the end of the last century was the face of the internet, preceding the behemoth tech platforms to follow, such as Google and Facebook. And AOL was the portal, bringing almost everyone who logged on during the internet’s earliest days. Verizon spent about $9 billion buying AOL and Yahoo over two years starting in 2015, hoping to jump-start a digital media business that would compete with Google and Facebook. It didn’t work — those brands were already fading even then — as Google and Facebook and, increasingly, Amazon dominate the U.S. digital ad market. AP News
There is currently no technology on Earth that could stop a massive asteroid from wiping out Europe, according to a simulations carried out by leading space agencies. The week-long exercise led by Nasa concluded that catastrophe would be unavoidable, even given six months to prepare. The hypothetical impact scenario, which took place during a planetary defence conference hosted by the United Nations, proved that governments are woefully unprepared for this kind of disaster. “If confronted with the scenario in real life, we would not be able to launch any spacecraft on such short notice with current capabilities,” the participants said. Independent
