January 6 Safe Tech International News and Notes
The Brain and Cell Phones, New Telecom Leadership, NTIA AND LEO, Tinnitus, Vandenberg EIA for MORE launches, Nukes for Data
Thank you for support, referrals and news items that others are sending to be shared! Lots of mainstream industry and political news today…and the winds keep shifting…many advise to stay calm and centered.
Note the NTIA decision to include LEO satellites for broadband coverage, admitting that many comments favored fiber….and DOD getting involved in the environmental impact study of MORE Vandenburg launches for SpaceX, (not the question of if, but how many more) with the discussion of addressing sonic booms. using more tech to solve issues caused by tech, like more drugs to treat drug side effects-
Also the impending decision of Nukes for data centers is expected in February.
It reminds me of Taylor Swift Red: “loving him was like driving a new Maserati down a dead-end street.” (It would be such a wonderful anthem for breaking up with a device addiction.) We are on so many dead-end streets and going in the wrong direction. and it’s going to take every ounce of humility, grace, patience and compassion to move through the very necessary course corrections.
FEATURED: KEITH CUTTER: A Healthy EMF Environment
Keith Cutter EMF Remedy: New Year’s Resolution: Achieve a Healthy EMF Environment in Your Home “Well begun is half done” – Aristotle A Perfect Design, Distorted by “Progress” The Earth’s natural electromagnetic environment is a marvel of design, seamlessly supporting life in its infinite complexity. From the tiniest microbe to the most intricate human systems, all life depends on the delicate balance of this life-giving force. Electricity and electromagnetic forces are not merely companions to life—they are fundamental to its very existence. Yet, humanity disrupted this balance with the introduction of synthetic electromagnetic fields, beginning with the telegraph in the mid-19th century. This shift marked the slow erosion of our natural electromagnetic environment, a process that has only accelerated since. Early on, strange new ailments like neurasthenia emerged—symptoms that puzzled doctors and were later dismissed by Freud’s rebranding efforts. Today, we are nearing the total replacement of the Earth’s natural electromagnetic environment with an artificial one. While the consequences remain invisible to many, they are profoundly harmful to life. If you sense that something about our modern electromagnetic landscape feels wrong, consider that awareness a gift. It is your invitation to act.
FEATURED: THE POWER COUPLE: FEEDBACK
Can we get your advice on something? Feedback on our approach | Personal challenges
FEATURED: The EMF diet for tinnitus
The EMF diet for tinnitus Toxic Superfoods | Oxalate crystals Here’s what we’ll learn in this article: 1. Why is tinnitus an electrical illness? 2. How does pasteurized dairy affect our microbiome ? 3. How are oxalates created? 4. How does our body get rid of oxalates? 5. How do EMFs impact our calcium levels? 6. What causes tinnitus? 7. How does light generate sound in our ears? 8. What studies show that EMF could cause tinnitus? 9. Why are vegetarians more prone to tinnitus? 10. Our interview with Sally Norton, author of Toxic Superfoods 11. What colors of the rainbow are best to reduce EMF damage? 12. How are Bohdanna and I embracing a low-oxalate diet?
NEWS AND NOTES
AI: Gary Marcus Could 2025 see the largest cyberattack in history? In a just-published series of very brief essays called “The Incredible, World-Altering ‘Black Swan’ Events That Could Upend Life in 2025”, Politico asked “15 futurists, foreign policy analysts and other prognosticators”, including me, “to provide some explosive potential scenarios for the new year”. My essay was about the small but very real possibility that 2025 could see the worst cyberattack in history, perhaps catalyzed in some fashion by generative AI (which was #24 in my list of 25 AI predictions for 2025).
AI: Gary Marcus AI still lacks “common” sense, 70 years later What’s obvious to people still isn’t always obvious to machines
AI GARY MARCUS: Sam Altman thinks that AGI is basically a solved problem. I don’t. Here’s why.
AI: AI’s next leap requires intimate access to your digital life SAN FRANCISCO — Tech companies are racing to upgrade chatbots like ChatGPT not only to offer answers, but also to take control of a computer to take action on a person’s behalf. Experts in artificial intelligence and cybersecurity warn the technology will require people to expose much more of their digital lives to corporations, potentially bringing new privacy and security problems.
AI DATA CENTERS NUCLEAR, BEYOND NUCLEAR: A double-edged sword of Damocles SCOTUS to rule on waste The US Supreme Court could soon decide whether or not to uphold a Fifth Circuit decision that the NRC does not have the legal power to license a private off-site nuclear waste storage dump. Depending on which way the court rules, the decision could dampen the appetites of voracious AI companies eager to expand nuclear power to feed their energy-guzzling operations. []An overlooked Supreme Court case could decide the future of nuclear power, writes Miles Mogulescu
Although barely mentioned in the mainstream media, in granting cert to Interim Storage Partners, LLC v. Texas, a case about the storage of spent radioactive fuel from nuclear power plants, the U.S. Supreme Court may have taken on potentially the most consequential case of its new term. SCOTUS will decide whether or not to uphold a Fifth Circuit decision that the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC) does not have the legal power to license a private corporation to construct an off-site storage facility to hold deadly radioactive waste from nuclear power plants. Depending on the legal rationale for SCOTUS’ decision, it could further enhance the power of courts to overturn decisions of regulatory agencies. The case could determine whether artificial intelligence companies like Microsoft and Google can build a new generation of nuclear power plants to service the voracious hunger of artificial intelligence for electricity. Depending on its rationale, it could also impact the ability of regulatory agencies to function efficiently without being second guessed by courts. The issues in the case have brought together an unlikely coalition of environmentalists, Texas Republicans, New Mexico Democrats, and the oil and gas industry against an equally unlikely grouping of the Biden administration, the nuclear power industry, and AI tech companies like Microsoft and Google.
AI: Gregg Braden AI book - Pure Human - https://www.awesomebooks.com/book/9781401949365/pure-human
In an age where technologies such as AI threaten to supplant human intelligence, an award-winning scientist offers a radical new view of our innate human technology and what we're truly capable of. There are rare moments in time when we make choices that irreversibly change the world, and our lives, forever. Today is one of those moments.
Scientists, engineers and philosophers alike warn us that without a radical shift in our thinking, we are on track to be the last generation of pure humans that the world will know. Within a single generation we will devolve into a hybrid species of synthetic bodies, Artificial Intelligence (AI), and computer chips that limit our ability to think, to love, and to adapt to the conditions of the emerging world in a healthy way. In doing so we will also lose our capacity for emotion, empathy, intimacy, and forgiveness—the very qualities that we value and cherish in our humanness. The question that we face is simple: Do we love ourselves enough to preserve the gift of our humanness? Our answer is based upon the way we’ve been taught to think of ourselves.
This book is a compelling journey of self-discovery that will catapult you beyond conventional thinking when it comes to your origins, your limits and, most importantly, the abilities that have been hidden from you for centuries, and the extraordinary potential that awaits as you embrace them.
AI: Vitalik Buterin proposes a "global soft pause button" to cut AI computing power by 90-99% for 1-2 years — giving ample time to prepare for potential existential doom
Aside from privacy and security concerns around AI, most users have expressed their reservations about the technology as it could potentially lead to existential doom. According to an AI safety researcher and director of the Cyber Security Laboratory at the University of Louisville, Roman Yampolskiy, there's a 99.999999% probability AI will end humanity. The researcher claimed the only way to avoid the outcome is not to build AI in the first place. While there's a critical need for guardrails and regulations to prevent AI from veering off the rails and spiraling out of control, Vitalik Buterin, Ethereum co-founder, proposes a "global soft pause button" on global hardware to prevent the tech from taking over humanity. According to Buterin: "The goal would be to have the capability to reduce worldwide available compute by ~90-99% for 1-2 years at a critical period, to buy more time for humanity to prepare. The value of 1-2 years should not be overstated: a year of "wartime mode" can easily be worth a hundred years of work under conditions of complacency. Ways to implement a "pause" have been explored, including concrete proposals like requiring registration and verifying location of hardware." The Canadian computer programmer says a clever cryptographic trickery would serve as an advanced approach to address AI risks. He proposes that industrial-scale AI hardware should be fitted with a trusted chip that would only continue running if it gets up to three signatures every week from major international bodies, including one non-military party. "The signatures would be device-independent (if desired, we could even require a zero-knowledge proof that they were published on a blockchain), so it would be all-or-nothing: there would be no practical way to authorize one device to keep running without authorizing all other devices," Buterin added. He indicated that the constant need to get online every week for a signature would help discourage extending the scheme to consumer hardware. OpenAI CEO Sam Altman claimed AI will be smart enough to solve the consequences of rapid advances in the landscape, including the destruction of humanity. Interestingly, he claimed the safety concerns expressed won't manifest at the coveted AGI moment as it will whoosh by with "surprisingly little" societal impact. However, the executive says AI should be regulated like an airplane by an international agency to ensure the safety testing of these advances. Buterin touts the approach for several reasons, including its capability to slow down the transition if it shows early signs of catastrophic damage and negligible impact on developers.
AI: LG and Samsung have put AI everywhere in their 2025 TVs –and Copilot's coming too:
AUTOMOBILES OT: IIHS study reveals big cars make slow speed limits useless
In a new study published this week by the IIHS, researchers found that Americans' love for bigger, much heavier vehicles like pickup trucks and big family SUVs is making safe speed limits inadequate in today's kind of traffic. In their research, the safety organization found that higher speeds contribute to more serious injuries to pedestrians in the event they collide, and the height of the offending vehicle makes the difference. Essentially, taller vehicles make the risk of higher crash speeds much more serious than those in smaller cars like sedans or hatchbacks.
BANKING: Wall Street On Parade’s Ongoing Series on the Federal Reserve’s 2019-2024 Bailouts of Wall Street
BROADBAND BREAKFAST: Tech, Broadband Bills Dropped by Congress in New Funding Bill Omits measures on NTIA coordination, deepfakes, and FCC transparency. [] WASHINGTON, Jan. 2, 2025 – Despite including telecommunications and technology proposals in earlier drafts, Congress passed a government funding bill on Dec. 21 that stripped many of those provisions from the final version.
BROADBAND SPACE NTIA BEAD RE: LEO SATELLITES Final Guidance for BEAD Funding of Alternative Broadband Technology January 2, 2025
Today, NTIA released guidance to clarify how states can use broadband funding to deploy technologies like Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite and unlicensed fixed wireless. The final Alternative Broadband Technology Policy Notice provides states and territories with additional guidance on issuing subgrants to these “alternative technology” providers. This notice gives states and territories additional flexibility and simplified processes for determining where Alternative Technologies can be funded, all while ensuring that states and territories may select the most robust technology for each BEAD funded location, including those locations in the most remote and difficult to reach areas.
NTIA has also taken steps to significantly reduce barriers to participation by LEO satellite providers. The Policy Notice gives states the flexibility to reimburse LEO providers based upon either subscriber milestones or the number of locations in a project area. Letter of Credit obligations, Federal interest requirements, and consumer premises equipment obligations have all been addressed in a manner that will better facilitate participation by LEO providers while preserving taxpayer and consumer protections across the BEAD program.
On August 26, 2024, NTIA released draft guidance on the use of Alternative Broadband Technology under BEAD. In response, NTIA received 138 comments from state broadband offices, network providers, industry associations, manufacturers, and consumers. Many commenters supported adoption of the draft guidance as written, and others proposed modifications and clarifications to the draft language.
Many commenters urged NTIA to continue its focus on fiber to the home deployments. NTIA reiterates through this Public Notice the importance of these Priority Broadband Projects, which the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law required NTIA to define. NTIA has long recognized, however, that the cost of deployment for some locations may require the use of Alternative Technologies. This Public Notice will help ensure that BEAD funding is directed to those areas that most need it and ensure that states and territories may select the best available technology to deploy to be deployed to each location.
Through the release of this Public Notice, states are now further equipped to implement their award processes and ensure that every person in America has access to affordable, reliable high-speed Internet, regardless of where they live.
The final guidance and copies of the 138 comments received by NTIA can be found at this link.
Final BEAD Alternative Broadband Technology Policy Notice | National Telecommunications and Information Administration AND INDUSTRY ARTICLE: NTIA Finalizes Guidance on LEO Satellites for BEAD NTIA said it has significantly reduced barriers to participation by LEO satellite providers.
BROADBAND: Amazon aims to branch into UK internet market with satellite broadband plan Proposed space launches within next two years could ultimately deliver mobile phone signal even to most remote areas
CELLPHONES/INSPIRATION; My smartphone made me feel like I had self-inflicted Alzheimer’s (published in the UK Telegraph) A couple of years ago, on my way to a meeting in Manchester, I got off the train and found my phone had died. My brain began to buffer. My body froze. I knew the name of the venue but had no idea where it was or what to do. I was stuck. How had it come to this? How had I come to rely on my phone so completely? []that was what made me think, “Phone, you are smart but you’re robbing me of my sense of direction and removing me from the path of these little joyful human interactions. Goodbye.” []So I replaced my smartphone with a Nokia. It can make calls and send texts but it can’t book my tickets, give me directions, or count my steps. It wasn’t an easy goodbye. My smartphone and I had had some very happy times together. We’d played all sorts of games, from Angry Birds to Chess. Learnt languages. Shared memes. Booked tickets. Checked facts. The train app had saved me from rail replacement buses. []Honestly I’m not trying to convert you. Though now that I’m not a smartphone user myself, there are certain things that I really notice. If someone’s phone rings mid conversation and they say they have to take it, there’s almost always a delay between hanging up and returning to the conversation. They’ll almost always check a feed or their WhatsApp or whatever. It’s as if the incoming call is a pretext for peering back into the digital world. In debates about how to limit children’s screen time, we’re now told not to use the word “addicted” because phones are not chemically addictive. We can teach responsible use of the phone, apparently. Can we really? []Not having a smartphone has helped me recover some of the abilities I think I’ve lost. A sense of direction, the pleasure of chatting to strangers, boredom. Most of all a kind of creative patience: the ability to let a thought grow for a while before sharing it.But our children were born into the digital world. What if we are creating a situation where our children, born into the brilliant, distracting digital world, are being denied the chance to develop those abilities in the first place?
CELLPHONES DAILY MAIL (COMPROMISED REPORTING): Cellphone radiation warning as researchers reveal new risk factor for 5G networks Anyone uploading videos of their scenic hike in a rural area with 5G is exposed to nearly twice the radiation of someone in a city, according to a new study. Researchers believe the extra radiation stems not from 5G cell towers, but from users' own mobile devices which work overtime to get out a signal in rural areas. A team at the Swiss Tropical And Public Health Institute (Swiss TPH), tracked 5G cell phone users' exposure to radiofrequency electromagnetic fields (RF-EMF) across two cities and three rural communities. [] While European nations deem such levels as 29 mW/sq-m high, they are well below America's own more lax threshold limits. The Federal Communications Commission (FCC) has set the maximum permitted exposure level to 10,000 mW/sq-m. The rollout of 5G has sparked conspiracy theories that the new form of wireless technology somehow causes Covid-19 or might be even a secret and high-tech new form of mind control. While the new research out of Switzerland does not weigh-in on the health risks, it does provide new detailed information on what people are being exposed to out in real world scenarios.
CELL PHONES BRAIN BREAKTHROUGHS Is Your Smartphone Compromising Your Brain? Key Takeaways
Excessive smartphone use can alter white matter, impairing communication between brain regions and affecting cognitive and emotional regulation.
Smartphone use increases GABA and decreases Glx, potentially leading to anxiety, impulsivity, and learning difficulties.
Overuse is associated with poorer sleep, weight gain, memory decline, and even increased cancer risks due to disrupted melatonin production.
Your Brain’s White Matter Matters One of the chief concerns highlighted by new studies of how smartphones affect the brain centers is their influence on cognition and memory through white matter changes. White matter in your brain forms an informational highway that lets neurons in different parts of the brain communicate. This tissue, deep within the brain, contains nerve fibers and axons that facilitate the conduction of electrical signals. And the changes that using a smartphone makes to the brain’s white matter, say Asian researchers, may have a “sustained negative impact on thinking, remembering, attention and emotion regulation.”1 The researchers found that disruptions in the brain’s white matter linked to smartphone use may also cause diminished proprioception (the perception of where your body is) and lead to what is called “sensorimotor deficits.” These deficits can result in some loss of coordinated muscle control. Neurotransmitter Changes Result in Anxiety, Fatigue Another study in Asia shows that hours spent on your phone can change the balance of neurotransmitters in your brain in ways that can make you more anxious and fatigued. Staring at that little screen too much, the study found can result in increases in a brain chemical called gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA). One of GABA’s functions is to moderate neuronal signals in the brain and regulate muscle movement and vision. At the same time as smartphone use is linked to an increase in GABA, researchers found an apparent simultaneous drop in a neurochemical called Glx (glutamate-glutamine).2 This could be problematic because other research has found that low levels of Glx may be linked to gambling problems and increases in impulsive behavior.3 This begs the question, with so many children hooked on smartphones, some starting as young as seven years old, how much of the recently reported increase in impulsive behaviors and lack of attention and focus is related to their smartphone use?[}
Interrupted Sleep, Weight Gain and Cancer
Other problems linked to smartphone use include:
Weight gain: Research at the University of Copenhagen in Denmark showed that phone use at night results in significantly less sleep and a greater chance of being overweight.4
Poor Sleep: And yet another study in Asia – folks on that continent are as hooked on their phones as we are – found that the more you use your phone, the worse you sleep.5
Increased risk of cancer: Research at the University of Houston shows that in the evening, the blue light from your phone can shrink your body’s nocturnal melatonin secretion by almost 60 percent. Aside from helping you sleep, this hormone helps the body fight off cancer.6 And the brain cancer risk due to smartphone emissions of EMFs is now established as far as I’m concerned.
Decrease in memory and intellectual performance: A study in Switzerland found that radiation from phones, when you hold them near your head, is linked to poorer memory in young adults. More at link
CHILDREN: Katherine Martinko | The Analog Family Phones Don't Prepare Kids for the Future Human skills do.
Image Courtesy Flo Freshman
CHILDREN: JOHN HAIDT Parents, It’s OK To Do Less Why parenting less might be the best thing we can do for our children [] The “do less” message is gaining traction, thanks in part to advocates like Lenore Skenazy at Let Grow. Her non-profit promotes greater childhood independence, encouraging parents to let their kids do things on their own that they’ve never done before. Let Grow even offers a printable “free-range kid license” to reassure concerned strangers that the child has permission to explore.
CHILDREN SURVEILLANCE: Samsung TV will let parents spy on their children Parents will soon be able to spy on their children through their television after Samsung unveiled new technology that will allow families to keep “a watchful eye on loved ones”. Using artificial intelligence (AI), Samsung said its new television range will detect “unusual behaviour in both pets and family members” by linking to smart home devices such as robot vacuum cleaners and even fridges. At the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, Samsung said its new “Neo” televisions will act as “intelligent companions” that intend to “simplify and enrich everyday living”. The company said: “It enhances comfort by automatically adjusting room settings, like dimming the lights when a child falls asleep, while providing real-time updates and recorded events through TVs.” The televisions will also link up to Samsung’s “Family Care” service, currently available on its smartphones in the US, which provide users with alerts about older relatives. The service can be used to check if a vulnerable family member has got up that morning or gone to a planned doctor’s appointment. When a family member comes home, it will provide a summary of visitors to the house on the TV while nobody was in. Its televisions will also have the capability to alert homeowners to suspicious activity by intruders through a connection to security cameras including video doorbells.
CONSUMER PRODUCTS: What to expect at CES 2025 Expect plenty of laptops, TVs, and smart home gadgets — and a lot of new places to stuff AI.
EMF/RF 2016: Inaccurate official assessment of radiofrequency safety by the Advisory Group on Non-ionising Radiation Sarah J. Starkey From the journal Reviews on Environmental Health https://doi.org/10.1515/reveh-2016-0060 Abstract The Advisory Group on Non-ionising Radiation (AGNIR) 2012 report forms the basis of official advice on the safety of radiofrequency (RF) electromagnetic fields in the United Kingdom and has been relied upon by health protection agencies around the world. This review describes incorrect and misleading statements from within the report, omissions and conflict of interest, which make it unsuitable for health risk assessment. The executive summary and overall conclusions did not accurately reflect the scientific evidence available. Independence is needed from the International Commission on Non-Ionizing Radiation Protection (ICNIRP), the group that set the exposure guidelines being assessed. This conflict of interest critically needs to be addressed for the forthcoming World Health Organisation (WHO) Environmental Health Criteria Monograph on Radiofrequency Fields. Decision makers, organisations and individuals require accurate information about the safety of RF electromagnetic signals if they are to be able to fulfil their safeguarding responsibilities and protect those for whom they have legal responsibility.
ENERGY OT: ‘Not Incredibly Popular’: Blue State Primed To Clear Cut Hundreds Of Acres Of Forest To Make Way For Solar Panels (Michigan)
The state will soon start competitive bidding on approximately 420 acres of forested land near Gaylord, Michigan, to clear space for a solar farm while generating revenue and advancing the state’s long-term green energy targets, according to MLive. There is some evidence suggesting that such a move would actually increase emissions, and Michigan is one of the least-sunny states in the country, according to analysis conducted by The Washington Post. “Not incredibly popular with everyone,” Scott Whitcomb, the director of the Michigan Department of Natural Resources’ (DNR) public lands office, told MLive. “I will be frank about that.”
ENVIRONMENT/SUSTAINABILITY/MINING/METALS: Fight to Repair: Right To Repair News From The Front Lines The Dirty Truth About Electronics Producing electric cars, phones, and renewable energy comes with some serious setbacks we aren't always told. In this week’s podcast, journalist and author Vince Beiser joins Jack to discuss his new book, Power Metal: The Race for the Resources That Will Shape the Future. Vince delves into the environmental and social challenges tied to mining critical minerals like cobalt and copper—essential for the energy transition—and paints a picture of what a sustainable future …8 1/2 MINUTES VIDEO
FCC/POLITICS: Tech, Broadband Bills Dropped by Congress in New Funding Bill Omits measures on NTIA coordination, deepfakes, and FCC transparency. AND Loper Bright, A Court Ruling That Changes How D.C. Operates Loper Bright sets the stage for a Republican-led overhaul of broadband and telecom policy in 2025. A Supreme Court decision this year redefined the balance of power between federal agencies and the courts – curbing the power of regulators like the Federal Communications Commission and the National Telecommunications and Information Administration to interpret ambiguous statutes. AND FCC Moving to Seek Rip and Replace Cash from U.S. Treasury A defense bill providing funding for the program was signed into law
5G; New protocol measures 5G radiation from phones and base stations A team of researchers from Project GOLIAT has developed and applied a new protocol to measure exposure to mobile phone radiation, in particular from 5G. The researchers measured radiofrequency electromagnetic field (RF-EMF) levels during three different scenarios: when the mobile device is in flight mode (non-user), when the mobile phone is used intensively by either downloading or uploading data. []The study demonstrates that exposure to RF-EMF from mobile phone base station increases with increasing population density. However, mobile phones transmit most strongly in areas with poor network quality. More information: Adriana Fernandes Veludo et al, Exploring RF-EMF levels in Swiss microenvironments: An evaluation of environmental and auto-induced downlink and uplink exposure in the era of 5G, Environmental Research (2024). DOI: 10.1016/j.envres.2024.120550
HAVANA: WASHINGTON TIMES Ex-CIA officer says agency covered up Havana syndrome attacks - Washington Times
HEALTH: Study identifies five different ways of aging thanks to data from 50,000 brain scans Researchers analyzed 50,000 brain scans that revealed five different forms of cerebral atrophy associated with aging and the appearance of neurodegenerative illnesses. Although the human eye is unable to detect the subtle variations between the five patterns, scientists were able to identify them using machine learning technology. The study’s authors trained an algorithm by showing it scans from 1,150 healthy individuals between the ages of 20 and 50, and of nearly 9,000 people total in that age range, both with and without cognitive decline. []A team from Johns Hopkins University evaluated cognitive decline in more than 12,000 people over the course of 20 years and compared it to a calculation of their levels of inflammation, which can be measured by blood analysis. They found that individuals whose inflammation levels were in the highest 25% experienced 8% more cognitive decline than those who were in the lowest 25% for inflammation. This effect of aging on the brain, which has a greater impact beginning in the 40s, can be combated with exercise, which has anti-inflammatory effects, and other neuroprotective treatments customized to a specific pattern of brain aging.
HEALTH/DISABILITY: 9,243,999 people As of December 2021, there were 9,243,999 people receiving Social Security disability benefits as disabled workers, disabled widow (er)s, or disabled adult children. The majority (85.2 percent) were disabled workers, 12.4 percent were disabled adult children, and 2.4 percent were disabled widow (er)s1.
HEALTH OT: Pesticide Banned in Europe But Widely Used in U.S. Makes Brain Cells Age Faster Exposure to atrazine can make nerve cells age faster and harm the hypothalamus, an essential part of the brain, increasing the risk of neurodegenerative disease, according to a recently released study in mice.
HEALTH OT FLUORIDE: Breaking: New Study Linking Fluoride to Lower IQ in Children Sparks Renewed Calls to End Water Fluoridation A meta-analysis examining the link between children’s IQ and fluoride exposure found that the more fluoride pregnant women and young children are exposed to, the greater the decrease in a child’s IQ.
INSPIRATION: School of the Unconformed It's not me, it's you - on breaking up with the internet Yes, even as someone who does not own a cell-phone and does not spend any time on social media apart from Substack, I noticed that my mental space no longer felt as unfettered as it used to.When I decided to designate several “don’t touch the computer days” over the Christmas holiday, I was struck by the changes I noticed in myself. I also realized that many of the challenges I had begun to face over the last few months, such as feeling inexplicably irritated, pressed for time, hurried, or overly busy, evaporated. It was not me who was the problem, nor was it my children or the demands of life, it was the time spent on the internet dimension that sent me into a bit of a scramble.
INSPIRATION/ENVIRONMENTALISM, EVENT ZOOM: Friends of Merrymeeting Bay, Getting to Know Rachel Carson Best-Selling Author, Scientist, Conservationist & Advocate When January 8th at 7:00 pm Where FOMB Event Page & Zoom Link
INSPIRATION ECOLOGY: RadFemBiophilia’s Newsletter Seeing overshoot (mostly images and graphs) Seeing overshoot - by Elisabeth Robson Katie Singer NOTE 2d Thanks, Beth, for compiling this. The next step, for me, is to ask Everyone, What do YOU do to reduce your ecological impacts? I.e., re-use plastic grocery bags as much as possible. Don't buy bottled water. Grow 2% of my food. Walk whenever possible. Rarely buy anything new. Keep what I have in good working order. Prefer wired tech to wireless. Prefer voice-only to video. Encourage children to move toward living by local energy, water and ores as much as possible...
INTERNET: Courts Kill Net Neutrality
MEDIA AXIOS: The hot new publishing platform is a legal filing
Filing a legal complaint is rapidly becoming the self-publishing option of choice for individuals looking to make explosive public allegations — regardless of whether they actually care about a judge finding in their favor. Why it matters: In an era of steadily declining trust in media, the dry formalities of a legal template provide not only an imprimatur of institutional credibility, but also the freedom to go into extreme amounts of detail without seeming petty, tedious or self-indulgent. Driving the news: Actress Blake Lively is in a war of legal filings with her co-star Justin Baldoni. [] Where it stands: The internet has given the power of the printing press to everyone — but for that very reason, self-published posts on X or Medium or a personal blog are often treated with a healthy degree of skepticism, and serious journalists often avoid reporting on them. By framing allegations in the form of a legal complaint, accusers give themselves an institutional imprimatur, much as Émile Zola did when he published "J'Accuse" on the front page of the newspaper L'Aurore. The bottom line: Lawsuits are often used just as a way of inflicting expensive litigation on others. Now they're also being used to try to bring about outcomes no jurist can hand down in judgment.
POLITICS: POLITICO ‘Dark Money’ Is Tainting Washington Think Tanks. A New Report Shows It’s Worse Than You Think. Foreign governments are throwing millions at D.C. think tanks.
POLITICS: New Leadership for House Commerce Committee in the 119th Congress
New Chair for Subcommittee on Communications and Technology On December 20, Chairman Guthrie named Rep. Richard Hudson (R-NC-09) to be Chairman of the Subcommittee on Communications and Technology for the 119th Congress, saying, "Under Congressman Hudson's leadership, the Communications and Technology Subcommittee will close the digital divide for rural America, affirm U.S. leadership in next-generation telecommunication networks, and protect our critical communications infrastructure from adversarial attacks." Chairman Hudson said, "I look forward to working with President Donald Trump, Chairman-Elect Brett Guthrie, and members of the committee to advance strong, commonsense policies that promote innovation, streamline federal regulations, and bridge the digital divide." Rep. Hudson has served in Congress since 2013. In the 118th Congress, Hudson was elected by his colleagues to House Republican leadership as the Chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee (NRCC). Originally formed in 1866, NRCC supports:
the election of Republicans to the House through direct financial contributions to candidates and Republican Party organizations;
technical and research assistance to Republican candidates and Party organizations;
voter registration, education and turnout programs; and
other party-building activities.
In 2021, Rep. Hudson introduced the Federal Broadband Deployment Tracking Act, a bill to streamline the burdensome process of deploying broadband on federal lands. The legislation would have required the NTIA to submit a plan to Congress within 180 days of enactment describing how it would track the acceptance, processing, and disposal of requests for communications use authorizations on Federal real property, how they would implement that plan, any barriers to that plan, and how to increase transparency to requesting parties seeking a communications use authorization on Federal real property. In 2023, the legislation was reintroduced—by Reps. August Pfluger (R-TX-11) and Darren Soto (D-FL-9), not Hudson—and the bipartisan legislation unanimously passed through the committee and the full House before Congress adjourned in December 2024. Also in 2021, Rep Hudson introduced the 21st Century Broadband Deployment Act which would have established two grant programs at the NTIA and award up to $20 billion and $3 billion each over 5 years. These grant programs would have required the NTIA to use maps created by the FCC to ensure that federal broadband reaches unserved and rural areas. The programs would have promoted public-private partnerships that have streamlined permitting processes so that federal support paid for broadband expansion, not red tape. In July 2022, Rep. Hudson led an official effort by House Republicans to obtain communications between President Joe Biden, Vice President Kamala Harris, NTIA, the FCC, and the U. S. Department of Agriculture concerning recently created broadband programs including:
the Connecting Minority Communities Pilot Program established under the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021,
the Tribal Broadband Connectivity Program established under the Consolidated Appropriations Act, 2021 and amended by the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act,
the State Digital Equity Capacity Grant Program established under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act,
the Digital Equity Competitive Grant Program established under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act,
the Enabling Middle Mile Broadband Infrastructure Program established under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, and, in the greatest detail,
the Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) Program established under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act. For the BEAD Program, Rep Hudson specifically sought communication relating to:
the definition of reliable broadband service;
rate regulation;
the definition of unserved areas that may be served by fixed wireless using unlicensed spectrum; and
use of the Federal Communications Commission's National Broadband map.
The House Commerce Committee rejected Hudson's resolution.
A New Vice Chair for the Subcommittee on Communications and Technology
"As a proud Member of the House Energy and Commerce Committee, I am in a unique position to play a pivotal role in crafting legislation that lifts regulatory barriers and cuts through the bureaucratic red tape that has worsened the digital divide millions of Americans currently face."—Rep Allen
Chairman Hudson will be joined by new Subcommittee Vice Chair Rick Allen (R-GA-12). "Congressman Allen's deep expertise of our nation's telecommunications system will help propel our country into the next generation economy. I look forward to working with Rick to close the digital divide for rural America, affirm U.S. leadership in next-generation telecommunication networks, and protect our critical communications infrastructure from adversarial attacks," said Chairman Guthrie when announcing the appointment.
Rep. Allen said: We have much work to do over the next two years, including promoting the great work that is sure to come from the Trump Administration. I look forward to leading efforts, alongside Subcommittee Chair Richard Hudson, to reauthorize the FCC’s spectrum auction authority, enact broadband permitting reform, reform Section 230, combat robocalls, and protect our communications infrastructure. Additionally, as many communities in Georgia continue to face significant challenges with connectivity and reliable broadband access, we will prioritize efforts to bridge the digital divide in rural America.
In May 2023, Rep. Allen introduced the BEAD FEE Act. The legislation would have restricted recipients of BEAD Program grants from charging fees related to the deployment of broadband infrastructure. Generally, the bill would have prohibited grant recipients from charging fees for considering requests for deploying broadband infrastructure or using or accessing land, or existing infrastructure on land, that is owned or managed by a state, territory, or locality (i.e., a right-of-way) to deploy broadband infrastructure. However, the bill would have permitted recipients to charge fees if they are nondiscriminatory, publicly disclosed, and based on actual and direct costs. Additionally, BEAD recipients would have to describe the fees in a manner that distinguishes between (1) recurring and nonrecurring fees, and (2) using a right-of-way with and without existing infrastructure.
Around the same time, the Washington Times published an op-ed by Rep. Allen outlining his proposed reforms to accelerate the build-out of high-speed connections. He pointed to the Precision Agriculture Satellite Connectivity Act (H.R. 1339), a bill that would require the FCC to review its current satellite rules to determine if changes can be made to promote precision agriculture. He also argued for the need for streamlining permitting to help make BEAD network deployments more efficient. Finally, Rep. Allen is a big proponent of Georgia's broadband mapping and has urged the FCC to incorporate the state's data into the National Broadband Map.
SECURITY/NOT SECURE: Violent Hackers Are Using U-Haul To Dox Targets Specifically, Pontifex said the U-Haul phishing page is a clone of the official point-of-sale (POS) login page, which is used by U-Haul workers. Once inside, hackers can “look up customer info from an email and it gives back their name, address, phone number and last 4 billing,” Pontifex said. This information can be used to then socially engineer access to major ISP emails such as Comcast, Pontifex added. “There is a ton of stuff you can actually do from the POS panel,” they said
SECURITY/NOT SECURE: Mindlessly ‘Deregulating’ U.S. Telecom Contributed to The Worst Hack In U.S. History
For the better part of thirty years telecom giants (and the consultants, think tanks, and lobbyists paid to defend them) have fought against every effort at coherent federal oversight. It didn’t matter whether it was modest privacy standards or basic pricing transparency, the argument that was if you stripped away coherent state and federal government oversight of telecom, free market magic would happen. Not only is U.S. broadband uncompetitive, patchy, expensive, with bad customer service as a result, lax oversight and privacy/security standards has resulted in a steady parade of hacks and leaks, culminating recently in the worst hacking intrusions the U.S. has ever seen. Chinese hackers deeply infiltrated nine major U.S. ISPs to spy on high profile targets, and the government and U.S. telecoms are still trying to assess the damage months later. (Why, it’s almost as if corruption is a national security risk.) Because the “Salt Typhoon” hackers were very careful about wiping logs it’s been difficult to assess the full scale of the intrusion or whether intruders are still in sensitive systems. Officials believe intruders could still be rooting around the networks of the nine compromised ISPs. They also state the hack was because telecoms “failed to implement rudimentary cybersecurity measures across their IT infrastructure.”[] The FCC is poised to hold meetings next month to address whether it should shore up its cybersecurity oversight of telecoms. But at the helm of those conversations will be new Trump FCC boss Brendan Carr, who has never stood up to major telecoms on any issue of importance, ever. And the looming Trump-court-backed defeat of net neutrality also curtails the FCC’s authority on cybersecurity. Again, the U.S. Congress has repeatedly proven too corrupt to pass meaningful telecom reform. Regulators are routinely stocked with revolving door careerists too worried about their next career move to stand up to telecoms. And the corrupt U.S. Supreme Court just neutered what’s left of regulatory independence, ceding most reforms to a Congress too corrupt to act. The Salt Typhoon hack comes after years and years of officials freaking out about the security risks of Chinese-made Huawei telecom hardware. Though when the worst hack in U.S. history finally arrived it was courtesy of lax domestic oversight, domestic deregulation, domestic corruption, domestic laziness, and outdated administrative passwords.
SMART METERS BILLING IMPACTS OHIO: Duke Energy Bill Study: An Interview With Vince Welage
SPACE: SPACENEWS Study to examine environmental impacts of increased SpaceX launches from Vandenberg The EIS would also allow SpaceX to conduct up to 100 launches annually between SLC-6 and its existing launch pad at Vandenberg, SLC-4. That includes booster landings at both launch sites as well as droneships downrange. “The Proposed Action is needed to meet current and near-term U.S. government space launch requirements from the DoD space launch range that supports launches centered at VSFB (Western Range), specifically for medium and heavy-lift to polar, geostationary, and other orbits less reliably available elsewhere without compromising current launch capabilities,” the Department of the Air Force stated in a public notice about the planned EIS on a dedicated website. “The Proposed Action is also needed to expand launch capacity by returning heavy-lift launch capability to the Western Range.” The Department of the Air Force is planning three in-person public meetings Jan. 14 through 16 in Ventura, Santa Barbara and Lompoc, California, as well as an online public meeting Jan. 23 to discuss the planned EIS and receive comments on what should be included in the scope of the study. Those comments can also be submitted through Jan. 27.
SPACE: Starlink Satellites Spewing Radiation https://zero5g.com/2025/research-study-starlink-satellites-spewing-radiation/ Findings published in a study by the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics on second generation V2-mini Starlink satellites found 32 times more radiation than the first generation. []5 January 2025 | Zero5G.com |Current regulatory guidelines for satellite radiation (and ground based infrastructure) are not intended to protect Life on Earth, but rather to protect radiofrequency radiation transmissions from interference. Bassa, C. G., et al.: A&A, 689, L10 (2024) “…we find that the second-generation satellites emit UEMR that is up to a factor of 32 stronger compared to the first generation. The calculated electric field strengths of the detected UEMR exceed typical electromagnetic compatibility standards used for commercial electronic devices as well as recommended emission thresholds from the Radiocommunication Sector of the International Telecommunications Union (ITU-R) aimed at protecting the 150.05–153 MHz frequency range allocated to radio astronomy.”
VT Digger commentary by Mark Alexander: Starlink is the wrong path to broadband - VTDigger: Digger Editor’s note: This commentary is by Mark Alexander, of Rochester, a retired software engineer who worked in Silicon Valley for 39 years.
In a recent commentary, Jock Gill writes that SpaceX Starlink, Elon Musk’s network of thousands of satellites, is superior to fiber to home for broadband. His commentary ignores the many disadvantages of wireless internet systems.
Gill estimates that the cost to Vermont for fiber to the home is $4,500 per location, but does not back up that claim with a link. Gill says “Let’s do the math,” but doesn’t show us where he got his figures.
Starlink is similar to 5G that it transmits microwaves in highly directional beams in the 20 GHz region. This means that we (and all living things) are going to be irradiated with even more powerful microwaves than we were with 4G and previous wireless systems, all without our consent.
Many scientists are deeply concerned about the effects of this ever-increasing dose of radiation on living things, and there are already many people who are highly sensitive to the weaker radiation emitted by Wi-Fi and 4G antennas. It’s time to use the precautionary principle and call a halt to these new sources of radiation, which have not been studied for health effects, before more damage is done.
By contrast, users of fiber internet service can turn off the Wi-Fi transmitter in their home routers and connect via ethernet cables if they choose to have a microwave-free home. Hard-wired ethernet cable systems also provide much better quality, especially when cameras are in use for Zoom, Gotomeeting and other commonly used online platforms, because cameras require much more bandwidth.
Compared with fiber to the home, Starlink (and 5G in general) is hugely inefficient. It requires the launching of hundreds of polluting, kerosene-powered rockets. The satellites themselves have a limited lifespan of approximately five to seven years, after which time they must be sent back to earth as flaming space junk. Even the earliest crop of Starlink satellites are already obsolete. The ground stations and home terminals themselves are also power-hungry devices, since they must be able to transmit microwaves to satellites that are over 300 miles away. Is this the kind of technology we want to use if we’re truly interested in reducing our energy consumption?
Speaking of planned obsolescence, history tells us that wireless technology is constantly being upgraded, requiring both providers and users to discard their old devices and buy new ones. We’ve seen this in the progression of cellular technology, from analog to 2G, to 3G, to 4G, and now to 5G. There’s no reason to believe that Starlink is any different. By contrast, fiber to the home is far more future proof. To take one example, ECFiber doubled the speed of their lowest cost service without any price increases or forced equipment upgrades.
The cost to the user is likely to be higher with Starlink than it is with fiber to the home. Starlink hasn’t announced their fees, but it is estimated to be around $80 per month, and the installation cost could be around $300. By contrast, ECFiber’s lowest cost service from ECFiber is $72 per month, and that is for service that is 25 MBs for both uploads and downloads; the installation cost for most users is $99.
Wireless internet systems are inherently less secure and less reliable than wired systems (such as fiber to the home). We’ve already seen examples of this in the use of cell tower-mimicking devices by police departments. Wireless systems are also subject to disruption by weather and obstacles of all sorts, including walls and trees.
Vermont needs to avoid the use of short term wireless solutions to the broadband gap. Fiber to the home and other wired internet systems are efficient, safe, secure, cost-effective, high quality and future-proof.
SPACE:
WARFARE/MILITARY: The Intercept U.S. Military Service Is the Strongest Predictor of Carrying Out Extremist Violence The mass murder in New Orleans and Cybertruck explosion in Las Vegas fit a troubling pattern among U.S. vets, research says
Missing Axios link from Jan 5: Teen alcohol and drug use keeps declining (commentary: if you don’t count dopamine drip via tech)
In case you missed it: Pig-Pen vs. Wiping Up the World: 2025's Evolutionary Challenge for Tech, Health, and Humankind More Dirt, More Compassion; Less Hand Sanitizers and No Smart Meters with Flo’s artwork. Health care and protection of nature is lagging decades behind tech innovation. We have not included human health and the environment into the equations for telecommunications regulation, by law, since 1996, because applying precaution was and is still viewed as an obstacle to innovation, economic growth, and militarized objectives. [] Until the FCC addresses the court remand regarding RF exposure levels, all new wireless infrastructure projects should be halted. The FCC guidelines, which are not standards and have never been tested (biologically), are not science.