world news

Why Hollywood animation powerhouses are resisting the cloud

Despite new performance bottlenecks, the digital animation and visual effects industry is very reluctant to move their productions to the cloud, according to Sydney's Animal Logic.




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MyGov to feel the audit blowtorch

Human Service to face National Audit Office scrutiny. Again.




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Apple v FBI: what the fight is about and why you should care

Apple is in the middle of a legal fight with the FBI over creating a 'back door' to unlock a terrorist's iPhone.




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Government acknowledges poor internet in Canberra's south but sticks to NBN plan

Minister for Communications acknowledges some areas of Canberra's southern suburbs have poor internet access.




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Branching out after death: where next for the 'Internet of Things'?

It turns out that even death needs the internet.




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Slack's secret sauce: how it became the fastest growing business app ever

Slack has launched its Asia-Pacific headquarters in Melbourne. We caught up with Ali Rayl, head of customer experience.




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Recruitment drive for cyber security specialists will bring challenges for government

Fear government's cyber security recruitment drive will lead to job cuts.




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Malcolm Turnbull promises $50 million reboot for troubled myGov

Takeover of troubled portal by Digital Transformation Office confirmed




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Government agencies name cybercrime as their top fraud risk: PwC

The 'typical' corrupt bureaucrat is a male, university-educated middle manager, aged 41 to 50.




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Governments should hack less, deliver better online services: Harvard IT expert

Western governments have established the international norm of online hacking and should not be surprised when foreign governments do the same.




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Digital public service means ditching control and embracing 'we'

Collaborating with the public is the key for a more engaging government experience.




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Call for a cyber security reserve corps to help fight major attacks

Experienced volunteers would help fight major online threats to governments, private industry and civil institutions.




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Centrelink apologises for new privacy breach

Rookie email error shares hundred of email addresses – twice.




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Is the Australian government agile and innovative? Not to those in the start-ups world

Public service departments "too nervous" to innovate, say start-ups.




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ATO fumes after cyber criminals attack myGov portal during last days of Tax Time 2016

Tensions emerge between Tax Office and Human Services after hackers take down myGov




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Digital Transformation Agency boss Paul Shetler resigns

Agile government takes a stumble as digital pioneer logs off after just six weeks.




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Digital government could become just more cost cutting, warns Internet Australia

Revolving door at digital agency must stop, says Labor.




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Can the government really protect your privacy when it 'de-identifies' public data?

We don't really know to how to use big data and protect personal information at the same time.




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$212,000 per public service IT contractor, and we're hiring more of them

Contractors cost 80 grand more than public servants, Finance Departments says, and the public service hires more of them.




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Brisbane City Council IT contract faces potential $60 million blow-out

A $122 million Brisbane City Council IT contract will be renegotiated after a systems replacement program was delayed by 18 months, with a potential cost blow-out of up to $60 million.




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Centrelink debt debacle shows government is unprepared for digital revolution

The public service needs to embrace partnerships if it's to harvest big data's massive yields.




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Tax time in danger from ATO's tech wreck

IT projects thrown overboard as ATO orders all hands to keep tax time afloat.




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ACT scientist teaches computers to police the border

A Canberra-based scientist is teaching computers to pick up suspicious activity at the border.




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Auditor-general exposes weaknesses in ACT government's IT systems

Electronic sexual health records and the births, deaths and marriages registry have been left exposed.




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How federal government departments are protecting Australians' data against cyber hack

Cyber Security Minister Dan Tehan says the government can't rule out vulnerabilities to cyber threats.




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Australia's Cyber Security Strategy: weaknesses, yes, but we're improving

The online world changes so fast it was always going to be tough to design a four-year strategy.




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Latest ATO online system failure hits at peak tax time

Outages have hit the Tax Office's IT system on Wednesday.




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Medicare details available on dark web is just tip of data breach iceberg

The next wave of government reform will have to focus on data management.




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Brisbane City Council terminates $122 million IT contract

Brisbane CIty Council has terminated a $122 million IT contract that had been plagued with cost blow outs and lengthy delays.




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Robot to greet visitors to Queensland government office

Visitors to two Queensland government offices in 1 William Street will be greeted by a robot, as part of a new trial.




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Quirk's integrity questioned over failure to release "secret" IT report

Opposition councillors have called Brisbane's Lord Mayor Graham Quirk secretive and accused him of putting his integrity at stake over the failure to release an external review into the now terminated $122 million IT contact with Technology One.




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Labor to push for Senate inquiry into $10b government IT spend and tech wrecks

The probe would investigate a trail of blunders that have shredded the government's reputation.




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Tax time IT problems strike again at Australian Taxation Office

Slow internet is causing headaches during a busy time at the Tax Office.




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Construction of mega new IT data storage centre under way in Fyshwick

Fyshwick is set to get another massive IT data storage facility from 2018.




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Faster NBN connections should go to all Canberra homes: Labor's Gai Brodtmann

Canberra Labor MP calls for fibre-to-the-curb and fibre-to-the-premises for whole of Canberra.




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Cyber security threat: Is Australia's power grid safe from hackers?

Cyber attacks have labelled the number one threat to power and utility companies worldwide, a new EY report has found.




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FIFA 18 and Harry Potter play rescued from bots by Queensland start-up

The FIFA soccer game and Harry Potter and the Cursed Child have been protected from bots thanks to a Queensland start-up.




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Public service bosses to be schooled in digital following IT problems

Public service bosses will take lessons aiming to improve their leadership in all things digital.




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ACT human rights commission 'concerned' about new app for ACT police

Canberrans' privacy rights could be threatened by the new app.




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ACT police emailing speeding tickets could be 'ripe for scammers'

Nigel Phair said experts had spent years warning Australians about dodgy email scams.




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Privacy Commissioner’s small budget to make policing new data breach laws difficult, experts say

New laws that mandate companies notify individuals about data breaches add to Privacy Commissioner's already-stacked caseload, but do not come with new funding.




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Medical records exposed by flaw in Telstra Health's Argus software

Default static password allowed medical practitioners' computers and servers to be accessed remotely by hackers.




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Microsoft cloud targets critical government business in Canberra

Two new regions of Microsoft's Azure cloud will open in Canberra on Tuesday.




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Face scanning falls flat as part of digital credentials push

State government's facial recognition ID check is now required for those seeking solar rebates, but it failed 40 per cent of the time during the first two weeks.




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Smart Energy Council calls for state to abandon facial recognition

Some users have been brought to tears by 'broken' facial recognition software now required to approve solar rebate applications.




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WITHDRAWN: Structural and mechanistic studies of hydroperoxide conversions catalyzed by a CYP74 clan epoxy alcohol synthase from amphioxus (Branchiostoma floridae) [Research Articles]

This manuscript has been withdrawn by the Author.




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WITHDRAWN: The Fundamental And Pathological Importance Of Oxysterol Binding Protein And Its Related Proteins [Thematic Reviews]

This article has been withdrawn by the authors as part of this review overlapped with the contents of Pietrangelo A and Ridgway ND. 2018. Cellular and Molecular Life Sciences. 75; 3079-98.




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Fatty acid oxidation and photoreceptor metabolic needs [Thematic Reviews]

Photoreceptors have high energy-demands and a high density of mitochondria that produce adenosine triphosphate (ATP) through oxidative phosphorylation (OXPHOS) of fuel substrates. Although glucose is the major fuel for central nervous system (CNS) brain neurons, in photoreceptors (also CNS), most glucose is not metabolized through OXPHOS but is instead metabolized into lactate by aerobic glycolysis. The major fuel sources for photoreceptor mitochondria remained unclear for almost six decades. Similar to other tissues (like heart and skeletal muscle) with high metabolic rates, photoreceptors were recently found to metabolize fatty acids (palmitate) through OXPHOS. Disruption of lipid entry into photoreceptors leads to extracellular lipid accumulation, suppressed glucose transporter expression, and a duel lipid/glucose fuel shortage. Modulation of lipid metabolism helps restore photoreceptor function. However, further elucidation of the types of lipids used as retinal energy sources, the metabolic interaction with other fuel pathways, as well as the crosstalk among retinal cells to provide energy to photoreceptors is not yet known. In this review, we will focus on the current understanding of photoreceptor energy demand and sources, and potential future investigations of photoreceptor metabolism.




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Metabolic phospholipid labeling of intact bacteria enables a fluorescence assay that detects compromised outer membranes [Research Articles]

Gram-negative bacteria possess an asymmetric outer membrane (OM) composed primarily of lipopolysaccharides (LPS) on the outer leaflet and phospholipids (PLs) on the inner leaflet. Loss of this asymmetry due to mutations in the lipopolysaccharide (LPS) biosynthesis or transport pathways causes externalization of PLs to the outer leaflet of the OM and leads to OM permeability defects. Here, we employed metabolic labeling to detect a compromised OM in intact bacteria. Phosphatidylcholine synthase (Pcs) expression in Escherichia coli allowed for incorporation of exogenous propargylcholine (PCho) into phosphatidyl(propargyl)choline (PPC) and for incorporation of exogenous 1-azidoethyl-choline (AECho) into phosphatidyl(azidoethyl)choline (AEPC) as confirmed by LC-MS analyses. A fluorescent copper-free click reagent poorly labeled AEPC in intact wild-type cells, but readily labeled AEPC from lysed cells. Fluorescence microscopy and flow cytometry analyses confirmed the absence of significant AEPC labeling from intact wild-type E. coli strains, and revealed significant AEPC labeling in an E. coli LPS transport mutant (lptD4213) and an LPS biosynthesis mutant (E. coli lpxC101). Our results suggest that metabolic PL labeling with AECho is a promising tool to detect a compromised bacterial OM, reveal aberrant PL externalization, and identify or characterize novel cell-active inhibitors of LPS biosynthesis or transport.