Governments use pandemic to crack down on online dissent: watchdog

A human rights watchdog says in a report that China is leading global efforts to suppress dissent with new technologies, often using the pandemic as justification for increased surveillance

Governments around the world are using the pandemic as a justification to expand surveillance and crack down on dissent online, resulting in a 10th consecutive annual decline in internet freedom, a human rights watchdog report said Wednesday.


The report by Washington-based Freedom House said authorities in dozens of countries have cited the Covid-19 outbreak "to justify expanded surveillance powers and the deployment of new technologies that were once seen as too intrusive."

This is leading to increasing censorship of dissent and the expansion of technological systems for social control, according to the report.

"The pandemic is accelerating society's reliance on digital technologies at a time when the internet is becoming less and less free," said Michael Abramowitz, president of the nonprofit group.

"Without adequate safeguards for privacy and the rule of law, these technologies can be easily repurposed for political repression."

Freedom House's index of internet based on a score assigned on a 100-point scale to 65 countries shows a drop in internet freedom for a 10th straight year.

The scale is based on 21 indicators pertaining to obstacles to access, limits on content and violations of user rights.

China was the worst-ranked country for the sixth consecutive year, according to the report.

It said Chinese authorities "combined low- and high-tech tools not only to manage the outbreak of the coronavirus, but also to deter internet users from sharing information from independent sources and challenging the official narrative."

The report said these trends are showing a growing trend toward Chinese-style "digital authoritarianism" globally and a "splintering" of the internet as each government imposes its own regulations.

Freedom House said that of the estimated 3.8 billion people using the internet, just 20 percent live in countries with a free internet, 32 percent in countries "partly free," while 35 percent were in places where online activities are not free. The remainder live in countries that weren't among the 65 assessed.

The report cited notable declines in countries where authorities have imposed internet shutdowns including Myanmar, Kyrgyzstan and India, and in Rwanda for its use of "sophisticated spyware to monitor and intimidate exiled dissidents."

The United States remained among those counties ranked free but saw its score decline in light of increased surveillance used by law enforcement against protest movements, executive orders on social media regulations, disinformation propagated by President Donald Trump and moves to ban Chinese-owned apps TikTok and WeChat.

The app bans were described as "an arbitrary and disproportionate response to the genuine risks" from those services.


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Social media disinformation, surveillance growing: watchdog

© 2020 AFP

Cyber warriors sound warning 

on working from home

by Polina Kalantar

'Large scale use of remote work has attracted spies, thieves and thugs,' says Jaak Tarien, head of NATO's Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence

Cyber warriors on NATO's eastern edge are warning that the growing number of people working from home globally due to the pandemic is increasing vulnerability to cyber attacks.


The Baltic state of Estonia hosts two cyber facilities for the Western military alliance—set up following a series of cyber attacks from neighbour Russia more than a decade ago.

"Large scale use of remote work has attracted spies, thieves and thugs," Jaak Tarien, head of NATO's Cooperative Cyber Defence Centre of Excellence (CCDCOE), told AFP in an interview.

The increased amount of information travelling between institutional servers and home networks is creating new challenges for employers.

"Tackling these new challenges is complicated and requires a lot of resources as well as a different kind of approach," Tarien said.

"We are likely only scratching the surface in assessing the magnitude of malicious activities taking place in the COVID-era busy cyberspace."

An EU-wide survey in September found that around a third of employees were working from home.

Boom in online courses

The concerns are echoed at NATO's Cyber Range—a heavily-guarded facility protected by barbed wire in the centre of the capital Tallinn run by Estonian defence forces.

The NATO Cyber Range CR14 centre was set up after a series of cyber attacks on Estonian websites in 2007

The server rooms inside serve as a platform for NATO cyber security exercises and training.

"Specialists have set up the work infrastructure, but they cannot control the way people use their home internet or how secure it is," said Mihkel Tikk, head of the Estonian defence ministry's cyber policy department.

Tikk said the latest cyberattacks have targeted Estonia's health sector and Mobile-ID—the mobile phone based digital ID.

The coronavirus pandemic has also affected operations at the cyber facilities themselves, forcing the cancellation of offline exercises.

But the NATO Cyber Defence Centre said the silver lining is the growing popularity of the cyber security courses it is putting online.

The online courses include "Fighting a Botnet Attack", "Operational Cyber Threat Intelligence" and "IT Systems Attack and Defence".

There were 6,411 students by September 1 and the centre is aiming for 10,000 by the end of 2020.


'A massive mistake'

The Cyber Defence Centre was set up following a series of cyberattacks of unprecedented sophistication on Estonian websites in 2007.

The unit's base in Tallinn, Estonia, is heavily guarded

The Russian pro-Kremlin youth organisation Nashi later claimed responsibility.

These days, Estonia faces a "continuous flow of attacks" and repelling them requires constant work, Defence Minister Juri Luik told AFP.

But he said the country was in "a pretty good situation" since it has had time to learn from past experience.

"We have worked diligently to guarantee that the computer networks are difficult to break in and the communication is encrypted –- both military but also civilian communication.

"So I think it is relatively more difficult to harm Estonia than many other countries who perhaps are not so used to working via cyberspace and haven't given too much attention to cyber defence," he said.

The minister underlined that all this work would be for nothing without basic cyber hygiene, including password protection.

"This is extremely important and should be remembered—especially now that many people work from home via computer.

"At home you might let your guard down and that's of course a massive mistake."


Explore further  Estonia hosts NATO cyberdrill with focus on infected tablets

© 2020 AFP

Alphabet's X lab announces "Mineral" project to increase sustainable food production

by Bob Yirka , Tech Xplore

Credit: X lab

Alphabet's X lab, formerly a Google division, has announced via blog post that it has formally named its newest "moonshot" project Mineral. The project will be geared toward using new and novel methods to increase sustainable food production. Alphabet X has also set up a web page outlining the goals of the project.


As noted on the team's blog post, to feed the billions of people expected to be populating the Earth in the coming years, changes are required in food production. The team at Mineral suggests that such changes should involve the use of new approaches, techniques and tools. Such tools and techniques, they say, should involve the development of new kinds of hardware, software and the way they are built and used in agricultural efforts.

One example is a robotic buggy that the team has deployed in several locations. Each of the robots drives over cropland along the same paths used by tractors so as to not disturb the plants, autonomously collecting data. Each plant is photographed and sensors collect data about the plant and the soil in which it is growing. The data from the robots is then analyzed and used to make changes to farming practices that will result in greater yields.

The team at Mineral readily acknowledges that the work is still in an experimental stage—the focus for now remains on coming up with new ideas. For that to happen, the team is adding members from a wide variety of fields: farming, robotics, agriculture, artificial intelligence and computer and software engineering. Initial work will involve taking a close look at how plants grow in ways that have not been done before. The team wants to learn as much as possible about the process, from soil preparation, to planting and harvesting. They then plan to make changes by asking questions about the way things are done now, such as, what if farmers begin growing plants that are both consumable and nutritious but have never been considered a food crop? The team hopes to find the answers to such questions and to use that information to feed the people of the future.


Explore furtherLongevity gene discovered in plants
More information: Mineral: x.company/projects/mineral/

© 2020 Science X Network

Solar-powered system extracts drinkable water from 'dry' air

by Massachusetts Institute of Technology
A prototype of the new two-stage water harvesting system (center right), was tested on an MIT rooftop. The device, which was connected to a laptop for data collection and was mounted at an angle to face the sun, has a black solar collecting plate at the top, and the water it produced flowed into two tubes at bottom.Credit: Alina LaPotin

Researchers at MIT and elsewhere have significantly boosted the output from a system that can extract drinkable water directly from the air even in dry regions, using heat from the sun or another source.


The system, which builds on a design initially developed three years ago at MIT by members of the same team, brings the process closer to something that could become a practical water source for remote regions with limited access to water and electricity. The findings are described today in the journal Joule, in a paper by Professor Evelyn Wang, who is head of MIT's Department of Mechanical Engineering; graduate student Alina LaPotin; and six others at MIT and in Korea and Utah.

The earlier device demonstrated by Wang and her co-workers provided a proof of concept for the system, which harnesses a temperature difference within the device to allow an adsorbent material—which collects liquid on its surface—to draw in moisture from the air at night and release it the next day. When the material is heated by sunlight, the difference in temperature between the heated top and the shaded underside makes the water release back out of the adsorbent material. The water then gets condensed on a collection plate.

But that device required the use of specialized materials called metal organic frameworks, or MOFs, which are expensive and limited in supply, and the system's water output was not sufficient for a practical system. Now, by incorporating a second stage of desorption and condensation, and by using a readily available adsorbent material, the device's output has been significantly increased, and its scalability as a potentially widespread product is greatly improved, the researchers say.

Wang says the team felt that "It's great to have a small prototype, but how can we get it into a more scalable form?" The new advances in design and materials have now led to progress in that direction.

Instead of the MOFs, the new design uses an adsorbent material called a zeolite, which in this case is composed of a microporous iron aluminophosphate. The material is widely available, stable, and has the right adsorbent properties to provide an efficient water production system based just on typical day-night temperature fluctuations and heating with sunlight.

The two-stage design developed by LaPotin makes clever use of the heat that is generated whenever water changes phase. The sun's heat is collected by a solar absorber plate at the top of the box-like system and warms the zeolite, releasing the moisture the material has captured overnight. That vapor condenses on a collector plate—a process that releases heat as well. The collector plate is a copper sheet directly above and in contact with the second zeolite layer, where the heat of condensation is used to release the vapor from that subsequent layer. Droplets of water collected from each of the two layers can be funneled together into a collecting tank.


In the process, the overall productivity of the system, in terms of its potential liters per day per square meter of solar collecting area (LMD), is approximately doubled compared to the earlier version, though exact rates depend on local temperature variations, solar flux, and humidity levels. In the initial prototype of the new system, tested on a rooftop at MIT before the pandemic restrictions, the device produced water at a rate "orders of magnitude" greater that the earlier version, Wang says.

While similar two-stage systems have been used for other applications such as desalination, Wang says, "I think no one has really pursued this avenue" of using such a system for atmospheric water harvesting (AWH), as such technologies are known.

Existing AWH approaches include fog harvesting and dew harvesting, but both have significant limitations. Fog harvesting only works with 100 percent relative humidity, and is currently used only in a few coastal deserts, while dew harvesting requires energy-intensive refrigeration to provide cold surfaces for moisture to condense on—and still requires humidity of at least 50 percent, depending on the ambient temperature.

By contrast, the new system can work at humidity levels as low as 20 percent and requires no energy input other than sunlight or any other available source of low-grade heat.

LaPotin says that the key is this two-stage architecture; now that its effectiveness has been shown, people can search for even better adsorbent materials that could further drive up the production rates. The present production rate of about 0.8 liters of water per square meter per day may be adequate for some applications, but if this rate can be improved with some further fine-tuning and materials choices, this could become practical on a large scale, she says. Already, materials are in development that have an adsorption about five times greater than this particular zeolite and could lead to a corresponding increase in water output, according to Wang.

The team continues work on refining the materials and design of the device and adapting it to specific applications, such as a portable version for military field operations. The two-stage system could also be adapted to other kinds of water harvesting approaches that use multiple thermal cycles per day, fed by a different heat source rather than sunlight, and thus could produce higher daily outputs.


Explore further

Drinking water sucked from the dusty desert air
More information: Alina LaPotin et al. Dual-Stage Atmospheric Water Harvesting Device for Scalable Solar-Driven Water Production, Joule (2020). 

DOI: 10.1016/j.joule.2020.09.008
Journal information: Joule


Provided by Massachusetts Institute of Technology

Study shows whole-fruit vitamin C boosts feelings of vitality

by Mark Hathaway, University of Otago
Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain

A University of Otago study has shown adults low in dietary vitamin C can improve their feelings of vitality by eating two kiwifruit a day for two weeks.


The study highlights the advantages of ingesting vitamin C through whole fruits such as kiwifruit. Observed effects were more marked than in a matched population taking vitamin C predominantly through a supplement tablet.

Researchers from Otago's Department of Psychology (Dunedin) and the Center for Free Radical Research in Christchurch ran a placebo-controlled intervention to test whether increasing vitamin C through whole fruit or tablets can improve feelings of vitality or zest for life.

They recruited 167 participants between 18 to 35 years-old who had low baseline levels of vitamin C and randomly divided them into three groups; a kiwifruit group, an equivalent vitamin C tablet group (250 mg), or a placebo-tablet group. Each day for four weeks, participants were asked to eat two Sungold kiwifruit (a fruit known to be exceptionally high in vitamin C) or consume their tablet. Blood vitamin C levels and questionnaire measures of mood, fatigue, and well-being were measured fortnightly throughout the study.

Results showed vitamin C levels in both the kiwifruit group and vitamin C tablet group increased to normal within two weeks. There was no placebo effect. A key finding however was the extra benefits to vitality reported by the group taking kiwifruit.

"Whole fruit had a broader range of benefits; lessening fatigue and improving mood and well-being across a wider number of people than we saw in the supplement group. The vitamin C tablet did decrease fatigue and improve well-being to some extent for individuals with consistently low vitamin C levels leading up to the intervention. Interestingly, the benefits from consuming kiwifruit emerged in just 2 weeks," lead author Associate Professor Tamlin Conner says.

Vitamin C has many functions in the body and brain, and increases the production of numerous hormones and neurotransmitters. These include adrenalin, serotonin, and oxytocin that control stress levels, regulate mood, and promote feelings of well-being. Co-investigator Professor Margreet Vissers says while links between vitamin C and physical functioning are well-documented, this study establishes a role for vitamin C in mental functioning. The study also suggests that whole fruit intake promotes added benefits to mental function.

Dr. Conner says by raising vitamin C levels through whole foods like kiwifruit, people can get other active ingredients that will benefit more systems in the body and brain.

"For example, kiwifruit has numerous additional vitamins and minerals that support health and are also high in dietary fiber, which is beneficial to the gut. There are important links between the gut and the regulation of mood. This could account for why kiwifruit benefited mood more than vitamin C tablets."

The study, "KiwiC for Vitality: Results of a Randomized Placebo-Controlled Trial Testing the Effects of Kiwifruit or Vitamin C Tablets on Vitality in Adults with Low Vitamin C Levels," has been published in the open access journal Nutrients.


Explore further

What's the relationship between low levels of vitamin B-12 and depression?
More information: Tamlin S. Conner et al. KiwiC for Vitality: Results of a Randomized Placebo-Controlled Trial Testing the Effects of Kiwifruit or Vitamin C Tablets on Vitality in Adults with Low Vitamin C Levels, Nutrients (2020).

DOI: 10.3390/nu12092898
Provided by University of Otago

Mental accounting is impacting sustainable behavior

by University of Geneva

Credit: CC0 Public Domain

Mental accounting is a concept that describes the mental processes we employ to organize our resource use. Human beings tend to create separate mental budget compartments where specific acts of consumption and payments are linked. This mechanism can be counter-productive when it comes to energy consumption and can have a negative impact on attempts to reduce carbon emissions. Psychologists from the University of Geneva (UNIGE), working in collaboration with the University of Applied Sciences and Arts in Western Switzerland (HES-SO Valais), have published a perspective in the highly influential journal Nature Energy. The article links theories and research on mental accounting to energy and sustainability behavior, proposing concrete strategies to improve the impact of climate-control measures.

Mental accounting, a concept known by psychology researchers since the 1980s, describes how the human mind functions when performing acts of consumption. For instance, someone who has bought a cinema ticket in advance but who cannot find it on entering the cinema will typically not buy a second ticket: their film budget has already been spent! This example illustrates our tendency to mentally segment our budgets and link them to specific acts of consumption. "These basic cognitive mechanisms can help us better understand unsustainable behavior. If they are taken into account, they could be used to fine-tune the way policy instruments are designed to fight climate change, improve prevention and promote sustainable behavior," begins Tobias Brosch, professor in psychology of sustainable development at UNIGE's Faculty of Psychology and Educational Sciences and the Swiss Centre for Affective Sciences. "For this article, we used the currently ongoing discussions around the carbon tax to illustrate the impact of three mechanisms of mental accounting on behavior and to propose ways to circumvent this impact."

Justifications, rebounds and labels

The spillover effect refers to the fact that we tend to justify one behavior by another of our behaviors. "Someone who makes the effort to cycle to work every day will use this argument to justify, to himself or others, buying a plane ticket to go on holiday to the Seychelles. A possible intervention strategy to prevent this is to encourage people to create differentiated mental accounts using targeted messages," states the psychologist.

The rebound effect explains how actions can induce a negative energy balance when people fail to adapt their budgets to a new situation. For example, people who buy an energy-efficient car may feel inclined to use it more often, canceling out potential energy savings. To tackle this phenomenon, the psychologists suggest informing people about the real energy costs of their new car so they can update their consumption budget.

Our minds create mental accounts with precise labels. The mental account that is opened when we receive a sum of money in a specific context determines what the money will be spent on. "A monetary gift received for a birthday will be labeled 'pleasure," and will most likely be spent on pleasurable experiences," says Professor Brosch by means of illustration. This can be problematic in the context of sustainable decision-making. For instance, the financial returns on solar panels installed at home appear only indirectly in the electricity bill and are not explicitly labeled as "energy saving." Accordingly, people will not necessarily think about reinvesting this money in new sustainable measures. "Clear labels are needed. In Switzerland, part of the carbon levy is returned to citizens via a reduction in health insurance costs. It would be better to label such an income "Climate action revenue,'" argues Tobias Brosch.


Take the right measures but don't forget your values

The analysis carried out by the psychologists proposes concrete measures aimed at the political sphere so that pro-climate initiatives can be improved by factoring in human behavior. "We need to clearly show the price of energy, make the message salient, and demonstrate the impact of consumption on CO2-emissions through concrete feedback," says Ulf Hahnel, senior researcher at UNIGE and first author of the study.

The approaches developed in the perspective help conceptualize spending and diversify mental accounts so that individuals can better adapt their behaviors. But Hahnel warns: "Be careful to consider your values and not to fall into purely marketing-based initiatives. You cannot put sustainability labels on just any tax credit." "Bounded rationality, including mental accounting, can help introducing innovative policies for climate change mitigation in addition to price-oriented ones," adds Valentino Piana, senior economist at HES-SO, who contributed to the study.

Professor Brosch says, "Our work helps to understand behavior, how humans make choices and take decisions. Our goal isn't to abolish free will, but to provide a behavioral toolbox. Policymakers can use this knowledge to develop strategies based not just on scientific evidence, but also on ethical considerations."


Explore further

APA reaffirms psychologists' role in combating climate change
More information: Ulf J. J. Hahnel et al. Mental accounting mechanisms in energy decision-making and behaviour, Nature Energy (2020). DOI: 10.1038/s41560-020-00704-6

Journal information: Nature Energy


Provided by University of Geneva

What we've learned from COVID-19 outbreaks

 in meat-processing plants

by Shelley Marshall, The Conversation

Credit: Shutterstock

From the United States to Brazil, Britain, Germany and Australia, meat-processing plants have played a peculiar role in spreading COVID-19.

In Brazil, union officials allege one-fifth of the industry's employees—about 100,000 meat plant workers—have been infected. In the US, meat-processing facilities have been linked to more than 38,500 cases and at least 180 deaths. Meat works made up almost half of US COVID-19 hotspots in May. They were also the major initial source of infections in Australia's June "second wave" outbreak in the state of Victoria.

One reason for these transmissions is that meat processing takes place in confined refrigerated spaces. But the fact the industry has not been linked with large viral outbreaks in all countries and regions suggests other, controllable factors have also been instrumental.

The fundamental lesson from these outbreaks is that unhealthy working conditions and precarious work need to be addressed to stop the meat industry acting as an incubator of COVID-19.

Unhealthy work conditions

Past studies have shown influenza and other coronaviruses (SARS and MERS) are more stable and therefore spread more easily in lower temperatures. Though lower temperatures have not yet been conclusively proven to increase COVID-19 transmissions, Australian researchers have identified an association with lower humidity.

This alone increases the risk to meat-processing workers, who perform strenuous manual labor on a production line in relatively close proximity to others. But that risk is compounded by other factors—particularly poor air quality contributing to respiratory illness, which makes any COVID-19 infection more severe.


As noted by the US Occupational Safety and Health Administration, among the "many serious safety and health hazards" long associated with meat-processing work are "biological hazards associated with handling live animals or exposures to feces and blood which can increase their risk for many diseases".

A 2017 study found respiratory disorders such as coughing, breathlessness and wheezing three to four times more prevalent among slaughterhouse workers than office workers. Among poultry workers, a 2013 study found more than 40% had asthmatic symptoms (compared with about 10% of all adults). This was attributed to "poultry dust", a biologically active combination of chicken residue, feathers and molds.

Insufficient ventilation makes the spread of the coronavirus 20 times more likely, according to a report published by the European Federation of Food, Agriculture and Tourism Trade Unions in June.

That report lists other factors too, such as inadequate social distancing and a dearth of appropriate personal protective equipment. But ultimately, poor air-quality is symptomatic of the lack of a healthy and safe workplace for many meat-processing workers.

It is also pertinent to the rest of us. The American Society for Heating, Refrigeration, and Air‐Conditioning Engineers, for example, has recommended ventilation air intake in all buildings should now be three air changes an hour. That's three to five times higher than the minimum standard for offices.

What this all comes down to is a critical need to improve health and safety standards in abattoirs and meat processing facilities across the board.

Credit: Shutterstock

Increase job security and sick leave entitlements

The other main lesson to be drawn from the meat-processing industry is the risk posed by "precarious work", where workers lack the rights and protections of being an employee.

It is no coincidence, as the European Federation Union report argues, that the vast majority of meat workers testing positive in Europe have been migrant workers, hired through subcontractors, with few employment rights and often living in overcrowded accommodation.

An estimated 80% of meat workers in the Netherlands, for example, are from central and eastern Europe, employed through temporary agencies.

Workers are typically employed as casuals, or "daily hires" (meaning their jobs technically terminate at the end of every shift) or through subcontracting arrangements that deem them "self-employed". As the report notes: "Employment conditions for many meat workers are extremely precarious. Moreover, the level of sick pay allowances can be very low. This may have determined the fact that in case of experiencing COVID-19 symptoms some workers have not reported the status of their health conditions for fear of losing their job or for not being able to afford a decent living with sick pay allowances."

These things can be fixed

Evidence from a number of countries shows these things can be fixed.

Denmark is the poster-child for the automation of meat processing and decent pay, allowing for social distancing within factories and thus low COVID-19 outbreaks.

In Spain, a collective agreement that guarantees subcontracted workers the same conditions as other employees has been credited with controlling COVID-19 transmissions.

In Germany, transmissions linked to meat processing slowed after abattoirs were banned from hiring temporary workers in May.

In Victoria, Australia, ensuring all workers have access to paid pandemic leave (along with other measures including the government mandating strict physical distancing and safety protocols in plants) appears to have proven successful.

But many of these responses are only temporary emergency responses. The global pandemic has brought global attention to the longer-term need for systemic reform to eliminate the dangers of unhealthy workplaces and disempowered workers, and ensure that workers can afford to stay home when they are sick.

In a sense we are all complicit in a system that has seen working conditions worsen over the last decade. We've accepted the rise of complex subcontracting and fake "phoenix" companies designed to strip workers of employee status, and supermarket and fast-food chains pushing cost pressures down supply chains, simply because we like cheap meat.

There are moves in Europe to address this lack of accountability through extending legal liability throughout the whole subcontracting chain. Other countries would do well to learn from these examples.

One way or the other, our love of cheap prices shouldn't see workers getting treated like meat.


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COVID-19 outbreaks at meat processing plants are hitting minorities hard

Provided by The Conversation

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

How worried should I be about news the coronavirus survives on surfaces for up to 28 days?

by Lara Herrero and Eugene Madzokere, The Conversation

Credit: Shutterstock

During a typical day, we touch the surfaces of many different objects, often without noticing: money, phones, door handles, elevator buttons, cups, desks, keyboards, petrol pumps and shopping trolleys.


Objects with surfaces that carry pathogens (such as bacteria or viruses) can pass on infections when we touch them. So it makes sense contact with these contaminated surfaces (often called "fomites") might increase our infection risk.

Now a study published by CSIRO researchers suggests SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, can survive up to 28 days on common surfaces.

So, is this cause for panic? The answer is, not necessarily.

What did the study find?

The researchers applied SARS-CoV-2 to Australian plastic banknotes, paper banknotes, stainless steel, glass, vinyl and cotton cloth.

They exposed the objects to three different temperatures—20 degrees C, 30 degrees C and 40 degrees C—all in the dark and with 50% humidity. They then measured the amount of surviving live virus over time.

At 20 degrees C, the virus survived longer (up to 28 days) on smooth surfaces, such as glass and banknotes (both plastic and paper), than on porous surfaces such as cotton.

At 30 degrees C, the virus was not detected beyond day seven on any surface except paper banknotes, where it survived up to day 21.

At 40 degrees C, the virus was rapidly inactivated, meaning it couldn't cause infection.

What does this mean for our daily routine?

The study was designed to mimic the spread of the virus indoors on surfaces under dark conditions only. In Australia, 28 days of darkness would not be considered normal.

However, this is the first study to show long-term survival (28 days) of the virus on non-porous surfaces such as glass, steel and banknotes.

Previous studies indicated the virus survives for much shorter periods. This is from a few hours to less than seven days, inside, at temperatures under 25 degrees C, and in lit environments with varying humidity.


Although the CSIRO findings are scientifically significant, their relevance to the everyday transmission of the virus remains uncertain.

Where does this leave us?

Many of the object surfaces we touch certainly deserve consideration as sources of SARS-CoV-2 transmission. However, how long the virus survives on them depends on several environmental and other factors, not all of which researchers have sufficiently studied.

Light

Could exposing the object surfaces to light have affected the results? At this stage, we just don't know.

Other researchers have looked at the ability of a form of ultraviolet light (known as UVC) to inactivate the virus.

However, this form is not abundant in sunlight. So we cannot simply leave objects (possible fomites) in the sun hoping to deactivate any potential viruses hitching an unwelcome ride.

This and other research means we still don't fully understand the impact of sunlight or other sources of light on the viability of the virus on common objects under everyday conditions. This could be in the home, workplaces or shopping centers, or in enclosed spaces such as in cars or on public transport.

Most of the research so far on using light to inactivate the virus has focused on hospitals or other controlled settings, and using artificial light.

Humidity

Humidity is also likely to play a role in the survival of SARS-CoV-2, but there is no certainty on what the role is.

Most studies analyzing humidity have been observational, meaning researchers are observing the spread of virus in a population under certain weather conditions.

So far observations are that increasing humidity may be worse for virus survival.

This has also been demonstrated in a laboratory, with increasing humidity decreasing the virus' survival on fomites. However we're not certain whether this is relevant to everyday life.

Type of secretion

We know the virus is mainly transmitted through the air, by inhaling respiratory secretions containing the virus.

While there is ongoing debate about whether the virus is spread via droplets or is airborne, this is merely a debate on how small a particle can be while still successfully transferring the virus and causing infection.

Research to conclusively prove SARS-CoV-2 can be transmitted via micro particles (5 micrometers or less, the definition of airborne transmission) is still ongoing.

For now, if a SARS-CoV-2 infected person coughs, sneezes or wipes respiratory secretions onto an object, this object may become a fomite.

In a nutshell

The CSIRO study furthers our understanding of SARS-CoV-2. However, it does not suggest fomites are a significantly greater source of infection than what we are currently managing with existing COVID-19 hygiene practices.

We need to continue frequently washing and sanitizing our hands and surfaces, wearing personal protective equipment such as masks if in high-risk situations or when mandated, and physically distancing.


Explore furtherNew research on SARS-CoV-2 virus 'survivability'
Provided by The Conversation

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

A consensus document on the state of the science of combating misinformation

by University of Bristol

Credit: CC0 Public Domain

With the current flood of misinformation and "fake news" undermining democracies around the world, a consensus document that summarizes the science of debunking has been published by a team of 22 prominent researchers of misinformation and its debunking.


Well-informed political deliberation cannot occur when citizens and politicians are entangled in the dissemination of misinformation. Misinformation has particularly insidious psychological consequences because it often 'sticks' in people's memories even after it has been debunked, and even when people believe and acknowledge a correction.

The Debunking Handbook 2020 has been made freely available to the public, policy makers, journalists, and other practitioners and is a consensus document that reflects experts' understanding of the science of debunking.

Professor Stephan Lewandowsky, Chair in Cognitive Science in the School of Psychological Science at the University of Bristol and lead author, explained: "Society is drenched in misinformation, which can range from inadvertent inaccurate reporting to deliberate dissemination of outlandish conspiracy theories for political ends.

"Social media has created a world in which traditional gate-keepers are largely absent, which allows misinformation to spread farther and faster online than ever before, and it is becoming increasingly difficult for the public to sift information that is accurate from false or misleading information.


"This handbook helps explain how best to combat misinformation, namely through intensive debunking or inoculating people against misleading information before it is encountered.

"The handbook is a consensus document that was created by an innovative process that involved a series of predefined steps, all of which were followed and documented and are publicly available. The authors were invited based on their scientific status in the field, and they all agreed on all points made in the handbook. We therefore believe that this is a consensus document that reflects the scientific consensus about how to combat misinformation."


Explore further

Why COVID-19 misinformation spread faster than pandemic in early March
More information: Lewandowsky, S., et al. The Debunking Handbook 2020.

DOI: 10.17910/b7.1182 www.climatechangecommunication … nking-handbook-2020/
Provided by University of Bristol

Fake COVID-19 news makes you want to treat yourself on the cheap

by Andrew Sorensen, University of Colorado at Boulder
Credit: CC0 Public Domain

People exposed to fake news during the already uncertain COVID-19 era are simultaneously compelled to treat themselves and to try to save money, according to new research from CU Boulder and the University of New Hampshire.


The findings are published in an upcoming edition of the Journal of the Association for Consumer Research.

Participants exposed to fake news said they felt more uncertainty about their lives. The researchers found this effect was compounded by the pandemic. It even occurred when researchers reminded participants that fake news exists.

The researchers then asked participants a series of questions about making hypothetical choices between premium or cost-effective food and grocery products.

"The finding that surprised us is that this uncertainty can cause people to feel a joint desire to save their money for a murky future and also to spend a little bit to make themselves feel better about the state of the world right now," said Nick Light, a marketing Ph.D. candidate at CU Boulder's Leeds School of Business and co-author on the paper.

Essentially, people who have splurged for little treats over the course of the pandemic should take solace that they are not alone, according to the researchers.

"COVID-19 did not occur in a vacuum. The pandemic came in on the heels of this other societal issue of misinformation that the world is still figuring out," said Justin Pomerance, an assistant professor of marketing at the University of New Hampshire and study co-author.

Fake news' sway over consumers' spending habits under COVID-19 did not depend on political party and occurred whenever participants felt they had been exposed to misinformation, whether or not it was actually misinformation.

"Regardless of what we feel about it, or if we can identify it, the presence of fake news changes the information environment," said Lawrence Williams, co-author and associate professor of marketing at the Leeds School of Business. "It's having an effect on the world and the way that all of us are exposed to information."

The uncertainty fake news created did play out somewhat differently for people of different income levels. While higher-income earners wanted to balance out treat purchases with value buys, people making less money leaned towards purchasing one or the other.

Higher-income earners may weather the COVID-19 economic downturn with fewer issues, but Williams said there could be a way for lower-income earners to avoid feeling pressure to spend money on non-essentials.

"They could limit time on social media or engaging with other possible sources of misinformation," Williams said.

While the research yields insights into how fake news is impacting people's psyches during the pandemic, the work actually began in 2019.

"We started this research looking at marketing questions around products implicated in fake news stories," Williams said. "We saw a clear need to pivot in March as global response to the pandemic became influenced by misinformation."

The paper still holds long-lasting lessons for the business community, according to the researchers.

"Companies can do well during uncertain times by convincing consumers that what they offer is more of a treat," said Light. "They could also argue their product is a more responsible purchase compared to some other purchase the customer might be considering."

Beyond selling products, the researchers advised companies to pay extra attention to the relationships they have with customers.

"Use your platform to be more authentic. Be especially honest and a champion for the truth," said Williams.

He said that approach could help people reduce customers' feelings of uncertainty, or even anxiety and depression.

Companies can take a major step by simply making themselves aware of the misinformation problem and the uncertainty it creates, the researchers said.

Policymakers should also take note of the group's findings on fake news' impact on uncertainty, Pomerance said.

"Taking action to limit fake news could tamp down the uncertainty that leads to overspending or antisocial behaviors like hoarding," said Pomerance.


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Warnings about COVID-19 misinformation are being ignored, new study suggests
More information: Justin Pomerance et al. In these uncertain times: Fake news amplifies the desires to save and spend in response to COVID-19, Journal of the Association for Consumer Research (2020). DOI: 10.1086/711836
Provided by University of Colorado at Boulder