Tech Digest daily roundup: Boeing and Airbus call for 5G delay
Bosses from the world’s two biggest plane makers have called on the US government to delay the rollout of new 5G phone services. In a letter, top executives at Boeing and Airbus warned that the technology could have “an enormous negative impact on the aviation industry.” Concerns have previously been raised that C-Band spectrum 5G wireless could interfere with aircraft electronics. US telecoms giants AT&T and Verizon are due to deploy 5G services on 5 January. “5G interference could adversely affect the ability of aircraft to safely operate,” said the bosses of Boeing and Airbus Americas, Dave Calhoun and Jeffrey Knittel, in a joint letter to US Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg. BBC
Jack Dorsey has predicted that Bitcoin will replace the US dollar in the boldest statement yet from one of the cryptocurrency’s biggest backers. The Twitter founder, who recently resigned as the social network’s chief executive, made the prediction in a series of controversial exchanges online, in which he dismissed much of the hype surrounding cryptocurrency and blockchain technology. However, responding to a question from the rapper Cardi B about whether cryptocurrencies will replace the dollar, Mr Dorsey tweeted:
The mobile phone of a UN-backed investigator who was examining possible war crimes in Yemen was targeted with spyware made by Israel’s NSO Group, a new forensic analysis of the device has revealed. Kamel Jendoubi, a Tunisian who served as the chairman of the now defunct Group of Eminent Experts in Yemen (GEE)– a panel mandated by the UN to investigate possible war crimes – was targeted in August 2019, according to an analysis of his mobile phone by experts at Amnesty International and the Citizen Lab at the University of Toronto. The targeting is claimed to have occurred just weeks before Jendoubi and his panel of experts released a damning report which concluded that the Saudi-led coalition in the Yemen war had committed “serious violations of international humanitarian law” that could lead to “criminal responsibility for war crimes”. Guardian
Human muscle cells will be launched into space in an experiment that could help people live longer, healthier lives. The study, called MicroAge, will be launched on a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from the Kennedy Space Centre in Florida to the International Space Station on Tuesday. Space will be used to understand what happens to human muscles as people age and why. Human muscle cells, the size of a grain of rice, were grown in labs and put into small 3D-printed holders which are the size of a pencil sharpener. Once in space, they will be electrically stimulated to induce contraction in tissue. Sky News
Nasa has published the sounds of Jupiter’s flyby mission past the planet’s icy moon, Ganymede, one of the planet’s 79 known moons. The 50-second audio clip was created using data captured by the Juno craft as it was passing by the moon on 7 June – travelling only 645 miles (1,038 kilometers) from the moon’s surface at a speed of 41,600 mph (67,000 kph). Juno has been orbiting the planet for five years so far. The recording was conducted using the craft’s Waves instrument that captures electric and magnetic waves produced in the planet’s magnetosphere. Nasa then shifted the frequency of the sounds so that they could be heard by humans. Independent
