Ransomware: Sharp rise in attacks against universities as learning goes online

Danny Palmer 

© Getty Images/iStockphoto
Young student watching lesson online and studying from home. Young woman taking notes while looking at computer screen following professor doing math on video call. Latin girl student studying from home and watching teacher explaining math formula on video chat.
© Provided by ZDNet

The number of ransomware attacks targeting universities has doubled over the past year and the cost of ransomware demands is going up as information security teams struggle to fight off cyberattacks.

Analysis of ransomware campaigns against higher education found that attacks against universities during 2020 were up 100 percent compared to 2019, and that the average ransom demand now stands at $447,000.

The sharp rise in the number of ransomware attacks, combined with the six-figure sums ransomware gangs demand in exchange for the decryption key means ransomware represents the number one cybersecurity threat for universities, according to the research by tech company BlueVoyant.

Ransomware is a problem across all sectors, but for higher education it currently represents a particular problem because the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic means that students are receiving their teaching online while many academics are also working from home.

Overstretched IT departments might not have the ability to fully address security, providing cyber criminals with an opening to exploit.

"Operating in the middle of the pandemic provides even greater opportunity for the adversary," Austin Berglas, global head of professional services at BlueVoyant told ZDNet.

Berglas said IT staff are already busy ensuring students and staff have the necessary tools to conduct remote learning, from device configurations and the installation of new software and cameras to assisting end users that are having problems with the new technology. "These schools may not have the resources to properly secure the network," he said.

That means that universities could be considered an easy target for cyber attackers – and the lack of IT resources, combined with students and staff being reliant on the network being available, means that many victims of ransomware attacks in higher education will consider paying a ransom demand of hundreds of thousands of dollars in Bitcoin in order to restore the network as quickly as possible.

Researchers suggest that in many cases, cyber criminals are specifically targeting universities because they perceive them to be a soft target, and one from which it is easier to extract a ransom payment than businesses in other areas, which might potentially provide more lucrative targets, but that require more effort from attackers.

According to the report, more than three-quarters of the universities studied had open remote desktop ports, and over 60% had open database ports – both of which provider cyber attackers with an entry point into networks and a means to eventually deliver and execute ransomware attacks.
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While cyberattacks and ransomware continue to pose a threat to universities – and will continue to do so even after in-person teaching resumes – there are things that can be done in order to improve cybersecurity and reduce the chances of falling victim to malicious hackers.

This includes applying multi-factor authentication across all email accounts, so if cyber criminals can breach login credentials, it's much more difficult to exploit them for access around the network.

"Ensure multi-factor authentication using a single sign-on solution. Multi-factor authentication will prevent the majority of phishing attacks, which is one of the top ways ransomware is being deployed," said Berglas.

It's also recommended that universities monitor networks for abnormal behaviour, such as fast logins or logins to multiple accounts from the same location, as that could indicate suspicious activity.

SEE: Phishing: These are the most common techniques used to attack your PC

SEE: Network security policy (TechRepublic )

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Ransomware: Attacks could be about to get even more dangerous and disruptive

The robot revolution is here: How it's changing jobs and businesses in Canada

Joshua A. Marshall, Associate Professor of Mechatronics and Robotics Engineering, Queen's University, Ontario

In 2017, I returned to Canada from Sweden, where I had spent a year working on automation in mining. Shortly after my return, the New York Times published a piece called, “The Robots Are Coming, and Sweden Is Fine,” about Sweden’s embrace of automation while limiting human costs.

© (Shutterstock) 

The future of automated labour may not spell the end of human employment.

Although Swedes are apparently optimistic about their future alongside robots, other countries aren’t as hopeful. One widely cited study estimates that 47 per cent of jobs in the United States are at risk of being replaced by robots and artificial intelligence.

Whether we like it or not, the robot era is already upon us. The question is: Is the Canadian economy poised to flourish or flounder in a world where robots take over the tasks we don’t want to do ourselves? The answer may surprise you.
Robots are everywhere

Modern-day robots are how artificial intelligence (AI) physically interacts with us, and the world around us. Although some robots resemble humans, most do not and are instead specifically designed to autonomously carry out complex tasks.



Over the last few decades, robots have rapidly grown from specialized devices developed for select industry applications to household items. You can buy a robot to vacuum your floors, cut your grass and keep your home secure. Kids play with educational robots at school, where they learn to code, and compete in robot design teams that culminate in exciting international competitions.

Robots are also appearing in our hospitals, promising to help us fight the COVID-19 pandemic and performing other health-care tasks in safer and more efficient ways.

The media is abuzz with stories about the latest technical claims, rumours and speculations about the secret developments of major international corporations, including Waymo, Tesla, Apple, Volvo and GM.

And NASA just landed the Perseverance rover on Mars, with an autonomous helicopter called Ingenuity attached to its belly.

Oh, and there are the dancing robots too, of course.
Robots behind the scenes

I have been working on robotics and autonomous vehicles technology in mining since the late 1990s. As such, I have been part of an industry that is undergoing a sea change, with fully autonomous machines steadily replacing workers in dark, dirty and dangerous scenarios.

© (Joshua Marshall) A fully autonomous underground load-haul-dump vehicle developed for Swedish mining equipment manufacturer Epiroc AB and in partnership with Canadian robotics firm MacDonald, Dettwiler and Associates.

This robot revolution is happening behind the scenes in other industries too. Robots fill Amazon orders, manufacture stuff in factories, plant and pick crops, assist on construction sites, and the list goes on.

In fact, robots even build other robots. Will we soon run out of jobs for people?
Robots in Canada

There are many who paint a bleak picture of the future, where robots and AI take away all the “good jobs.” Although I fully acknowledge that we must be mindful of possible inequalities and unintended outcomes that might arise as a result of new technologies, I contend that Canadians have the potential to thrive.

But to make it happen, my colleagues and I agree that our country needs a “robotics strategy.”

In 2017, Canada launched the world’s first national AI strategy. Called the Pan-Canadian Artificial Intelligence Strategy and costing $125 million, the strategy aims to strengthen Canada’s leadership in AI by funding institutes, universities and hospitals to meet key objectives.

In its 2020 list of future jobs, the World Economic Forum listed “robotics engineers” as No. 10, in close company with “AI and machine learning specialists.” In Canada, I see huge potential for our robotics industry, with companies such as Clearpath Robotics, OTTO Motors, Kinova, Robotiq and Titan Medical already world leaders in the design and manufacture of robots for purposes ranging from materials handling to surgery.

Beyond building robots, Canada’s most significant opportunities may lie in the increased adoption of robots into economically important industry sectors, including mining, agriculture, manufacturing and transportation.

And yet, Canada may be the only G7 country without a robotics strategy.
The robot revelation

As it turns out, there is hope. According to a November 2020 report from Statistics Canada, Canadian firms that employed robots have also hired more human workers, contrary to what you may instinctively believe. In fact, they hired 15 per cent more workers!

However, this does not mean that we can all sit back and relax. Along with the increased economic activity that robots bring to businesses comes a shift in the workforce from “workers spending less time performing routine, manual tasks, in favour of non-routine, cognitive tasks.”

© (Heshan Fernando) Mobile robotics researchers from the Ingenuity Labs Research Institute at Queen’s University.

The roles of education and research and development — such as new programs to train the next generation of robot-savvy Canadians and collaborative research clusters — are paramount. And they need to be combined with a national robotics strategy and a progressive socioeconomic system that supports a transitioning workforce to ensure the success, well-being and happiness of Canadians, alongside our robot friends.

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

Joshua A. Marshall receives funding from the Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council of Canada (NSERC) under Discovery grant RGPIN-2015-04025. He also receives funding from the NSERC Canadian Robotics Network (NCRN) and its industry partners, including Clearpath Robotics, under grant NETGP 508451-17, from the NSERC Collaborative R&D program, General Dynamics Land Systems (Canada), and Defence R&D Canada (DRDC) under grant DNDPJ 533392-18, from the National Research Council of Canada (NRC) under grant agreement SC-AI4L-118-1, as well as from the NSERC CREATE for Building Trust in Connected Autonomous Vehicles under grant 542999-2020.

RACIST REPUBLICANS
Fracking and Deb Haaland: 

How to view the Senate debate

Q&A by Zachary B. Wolf and Drew Kann, CNN 


President Joe Biden nominated the most diverse Cabinet in history, but the Senate, which gets to offer "advice and consent," is suddenly full of members -- mostly Republicans -- who are critical of partisan tweets and are carefully scrutinizing nominees' job qualifications

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© Joshua Roberts/Getty Images Nominee for Secretary of Interior, Congresswoman Deb Haaland, speaks after President-elect Joe Biden announced his climate and energy appointments at the Queen theater on December 19, 2020 in Wilmington, Delaware. Haaland is the first Native American nominated to serve on the presidential cabinet.

The attention has chiefly fallen on three domestic policy roles:

Office of Management and Budget nominee Neera Tanden has written a lot of mean tweets about conservatives and progressives and clashed with Bernie Sanders' future presidential campaign manager. She'd be the first woman of color in charge of the executive budget.

Department of Health and Human Services nominee Xavier Becerra played important roles defending the Affordable Care Act from the Trump administration's efforts to get it declared unconstitutional and in California's pandemic response. He'd be the first Latino to run HHS.

Interior Secretary nominee Deb Haaland has supported the Green New Deal and wants to end fracking on public land. She'd be the first Native American Cabinet secretary.

The difficulty faced by Haaland is particularly interesting since it's not just political -- opposition or support for a fossil fuel economy -- but also scientific. One party wants to actively address climate change and the other does not.

What Matters went to CNN's Drew Kann, who covers climate change for the network, to find out more about how energy policy intersects with climate science and where Haaland fits into that equation.


What is fracking and why is it controversial?

WHAT MATTERS: One criticism of Haaland is that as a lawmaker, and unlike President Biden, she supports a ban on fracking on federal land. That's pretty much the opposite of the Trump administration, which worked hard to expand fracking on public land. Why are fracking in general and fracking on public land in particular such key issues? Is it a scientific or political dispute?

KANN: Through a purely scientific lens, the link between fracking and climate change is fairly simple. Fracking -- short for hydraulic fracturing -- is a process of extracting oil and gas by blasting liquids deep underground into rock formations to unlock fossil fuel reserves hidden inside.

When we burn that oil and gas in our cars and trucks and power plants, it releases carbon dioxide into the atmosphere. And the more carbon dioxide (CO2) that we put in the atmosphere, the thicker the blanket of greenhouse gases around the globe gets, and the hotter the planet gets as well.

Fracking doesn't just add more CO2 to the equation. Oil and gas drilling also releases huge amounts of methane -- another greenhouse gas that isn't as abundant in the atmosphere as CO2, but has the potential to trap more than 25 times more heat and is already causing around 25% of the warming we feel today.

While burning fossil fuels isn't the only reason that Earth is heating up, it is the biggest cause of global warming. And nearly all scientists agree that to stop the worst effects of global warming, we need to stop burning oil and gas -- and fast.

But figuring out how -- or whether -- we stop burning oil and gas is where this gets political.


What is the public lands piece of this?

WHAT MATTERS: Where does most fracking occur and why is it so important to some lawmakers?

KANN: While most drilling in the US occurs on private and state lands, about 9% of both the oil and gas produced onshore is extracted from federal lands. In 2019, land leasing to oil and gas companies through the Department of the Interior brought in $4.2 billion in revenue for the federal government.

That's a nice chunk of revenue, but what's even more important to some politicians are the jobs that those fracking leases are connected to. There is little debate that a shift away from fossil fuels and towards renewables will come at the expense of fossil fuel extraction jobs. But the Biden administration has argued that moving the US towards a net-zero emissions economy will ultimately create more better-paying jobs than the ones that are lost along the way.

This jobs argument is at the center of the Biden administration's climate pitch. And it is also central to the Republican opposition to Haaland's nomination, and explains why fracking has become such a political football.


Undoing Trump's policy

WHAT MATTERS: A large portion of the Biden energy policy is undoing President Donald Trump's energy policy, which was to expand drilling and increase oil and gas production and exports. Is this back-and-forth just going to continue with administrations in the future?

KANN: US climate policy over the last few years has certainly been whiplash-inducing. President Trump spent most of his four years in office gutting Obama-era climate change regulations, and now President Biden's task will be to roll back the rollbacks.

President Biden has already issued a number of executive orders aimed at reversing Trump's policies. He rejoined the Paris Climate Agreement on his first day in office and soon after temporarily halted new oil and gas leases on public lands.

But experts say crafting climate policy that can last long after Biden is out of the White House will be one of his biggest challenges. One of the problems with executive actions and even agency rule-making through the Environmental Protection Agency and the Department of the Interior is that many of those rules can be challenged and eventually undone by future administrations.

And with a razor-thin Democratic Senate majority, Biden will face a tall task to pass climate legislation that can endure after he is out of office.

WHAT MATTERS: If confirmed, how large a role exactly could Haaland play in furthering Biden's climate agenda?

KANN: Michael Regan, Biden's nominee to lead the EPA, will be at the tip of the spear when it comes to rebuilding the climate and environmental guardrails that were dismantled under Trump. But the Department of the Interior will also play a huge role in the Biden administration's all-of-government approach to tackling climate change.

Interior manages more than 413 million acres of federal lands, as well as millions more acres held in trust for Native American tribes. What happens on that land -- whether it is leased out for fossil fuel exploration or protected -- will have a huge impact on the lives of Americans today, as well as future generations.

Haaland's confirmation would also be historic because of her heritage -- she is a citizen of the Laguna Pueblo, one of the 574 Native American tribes recognized by the US government. And given the federal government's long history of mistreatment and injustice toward Native Americans, having Haaland in charge of all federal lands as the country's first Native American cabinet member would be rich in symbolism

THE PHILIPPINES MAIN EXPORT
Coronavirus vaccines: Philippines offers to let nurses work in Britain and Germany in exchange for shots

"We are disgusted on how nurses and health care workers are being treated by the government as commodities or export products," says union.

The Philippines will let thousands of its health care workers, mostly nurses, take up jobs in Britain and Germany if the two countries agree to donate coronavirus vaccines, a senior official said on Tuesday.

© Ezra Acayan/Getty Images Medical personnel work inside a makeshift nurse station at a parking lot converted into a Covid-19 isolation facility at the National Kidney and Transplant Institute Hospital in Quezon city, Metro Manila, Philippines, on May 1, 2020.

Britain's health ministry said it was not interested in such a deal and its priority was to use shots domestically, but added it would share surplus vaccine internationally in the future.

The Philippines, which has among Asia's highest number of coronavirus cases, has relaxed a ban on deploying its health care workers overseas, but still limits the number of medical professionals leaving the country to 5,000 a year.

Alice Visperas, director of the labor ministry's international affairs bureau, said the Philippines was open to lifting the cap in exchange for vaccines from Britain and Germany, which it would use to inoculate outbound workers and hundreds of thousands of Filipino repatriates.

Nurses are among the millions of Filipinos who work overseas, providing in excess of $30 billion a year in remittances vital to the country's economy.

"We are considering the request to lift the deployment cap, subject to agreement," Visperas told Reuters.

Britain has the world's fifth-highest coronavirus death toll, while Germany has the 10th most infections globally.

Britain said there were 11,000 more nurses working in the National Health Service (NHS) than last year. It said that while it was grateful to the 30,000 Filipinos working for the NHS, Britain did not need to trade vaccines for more.

"We have no plans for the UK to agree a vaccine deal with the Philippines linked to further recruitment of nurses," a health ministry spokeswoman said, citing Prime Minister Boris Johnson's pledge to share spare shots later in the year.

"We have confirmed that we will share any surplus vaccines in the future -- for example through the COVAX international procurement pool."

The Philippines wants to secure 148 million doses of vaccines altogether, while Britain has ordered more than 400 million doses, six times its population.

While Britain and Germany have inoculated a combined 23 million people, the Philippines has yet to start its campaign to immunize 70 million adults, or two-thirds of its 108 million people. It expects its first vaccines this week, donated by China.

Calls to Germany's mission in Manila went unanswered.

In 2019, almost 17,000 Filipino nurses signed overseas work contracts, government data showed.

While Filipino nurses have fought to lift the deployment ban to escape poor working conditions and low pay at home, the workers-for-vaccine plan has not gone down well with some medical workers.

"We are disgusted on how nurses and health care workers are being treated by the government as commodities or export products," Jocelyn Andamo, secretary general of the Filipino Nurses United, told Reuters.

#ALCHEMY

Scents of time: Belgrade's last craft #perfumery

From a cobblestoned street in downtown Belgrade, the Sava perfumery has seen more than half a century sweep past without ceasing in its mission to keep the city's citizens smelling flowery and fresh

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© Andrej ISAKOVIC 

Nenad Jovanov (right) and his son Nemanja in their perfume shop in Belgrade

The artisanal shop -- which mixes its perfumes in-house -- is the last of its kind in the Serbian capital, thanks to the Jovanov family who are committed to keeping the craft alive.

While the city has gone through many changes, the store remains a snapshot in time, with glass bottles, mixing vials and other tools passed down through three generations.

The work is a labour of love for the Jovanovs, whose other sources of income enable them to continue with the perfumery.

"We have remained because of tradition, love, affection and willingness to do a job which at certain times doesn't earn you enough money to subsist," the shop's jovial owner Nenad Jovanov, 71, told AFP as he mixed a custom eau de toilette in the shop's laboratory-like back room, measuring out ingredients with beakers and pipettes. 

© Andrej ISAKOVIC 

Nenad Jovanov's shop perfumery dates back to the 1940s

The perfumery dates back to the 1940s but opened under its current name a decade later, when communist authorities in then-Yugoslavia reversed a decision to ban private business, allowing the family to take back ownership.

In the 1950s and 60s, such perfumeries enjoyed a "golden age" in Belgrade, said Nenad, recalling more than 20 other family-run shops.

But as Yugoslavia started opening up to imports, mass-produced fragrances poured in, pushing local mixers out of business.

Crippling sanctions in the 1990s, when Serbia and other ex-Yugoslav republics broke apart in a series of wars, dealt another blow to the industry.

"One by one they started shutting down. And in the end, we were the only ones to remain," said Nenad.

- No labels -

When customers enter the tiny store, Nenad or his son Nemanja, who also works in the film industry, help them navigate the wooden shelves of label-less glass bottles.

"We don't have brand names. We don't have brand bottles. We don't have brand boxes. We simplified our packaging and our interior as much as we could so we can allow customers the experience of discovering what they like," explained Nemanja.

After enquiring about preferences -- floral, citrus, sweet or musky -- they use an old-fashioned pump to test different fragrances on the client's arms.

Shoppers are then encouraged to take a walk and return later to choose which perfume they like best, as the scent evolves over time after its first contact with the skin.

Most of their ingredients come from France.

"Men, at least those in this region, would be terrified if they knew that many masculine fragrances -- wonderful and popular fragrances -- have floral components," Nenad said with a laugh.

The store stays afloat thanks to a loyal clientele, plus a growing interest from tourists interested in what Nemanja calls its "living museum".

At a time when Covid-19 has taken away many people's sense of smell, an appreciation of its power has also deepened.

"The sense of smell is one of the most important," mused Nenad, who works in a white lab coat.

"It can transport us to another place, another time."

COMMENTARY: Dispute over beach carving is one of many miseries at Royal BC Museum

Mike Smyth  GLOBAL NEWS

Things were looking up for Victoria's Royal BC Museum last summer when a local man taking an early morning stroll on the beach made a remarkable discovery.

© THE CANADIAN PRESS/Chad Hipolito

 Former Royal BC CEO Jack Lohman

It was a 100-kilogram stone pillar, exposed at low tide with a light covering of seaweed, carved into a mysterious human face with bulging eyes and lips.

Bernhard Spalteholz took some pictures of his find and then notified the museum, which declared it an important discovery.

“This is a remarkable find with a remarkable story,” Jack Lohman, then the CEO of the museum, wrote in a now-deleted blog post that triggered excitement in the archeological community.

The museum said the stone pillar was likely a spiritual totem used by the local Songhees and Esquimalt First Nations, possibly displayed on the beach to attract migrating salmon.

Read more: Outgoing Royal BC Museum Indigenous collection curator calls it a ‘wicked’ place

The discovery brought some badly needed happiness to a museum struggling through a COVID-19 pandemic that decimated attendance numbers at one of the B.C. capital's top tourist destinations.

But the excitement waned after Victoria artist Ray Boudreau spotted a picture of the carving in the local newspaper — and immediately recognized it as his own work.

"I knew right away that it was my carving," Boudreau told me, saying he carved the rock on the beach in 2017 over a period of three days.

He said he returned to the beach to continue the sculpture on the fourth day, but the rock was gone.

"I figured someone had taken it," said Boudreau, who had made earlier rock carvings on local beaches.

Video: Departing Royal BC Museum curator calls it a ‘wicked’ place

He showed me a cellphone photo of the original carving — date-stamped Jan. 23, 2017 — and it looks identical to the carving "discovered" on the beach more than three years later, minus the seaweed.

"You can still see the fresh chisel marks on it," he said, noting that he meant for the sculpture to be a symbol of unity.

I asked him what went through his mind when he heard the museum had declared the sculpture to be a historic archeological discovery.

"At first I thought, 'Well, maybe I won't say anything and just let this have a life of its own.' But then my friend said to me, 'You have to tell them! This is your work!'"

Read more: First Nations leaders condemn widespread reports of racism at Royal BC Museum

He decided to alert the museum, which has now launched an investigation.

"The review into the provenance of the stone pillar is ongoing," the museum said in a brief statement.

Things went from bad to worse when Lohman — the CEO who announced and then un-announced the pillar's discovery — was forced to resign over accusations of institutional racism at the museum.

The resignation came after an outside consultant declared the institution a "dysfunctional and toxic workplace characterized by a culture of fear and distrust."

The consultant had been brought in after the museum's head of Indigenous collections and repatriation had resigned, citing institutional racism and discrimination. The museum's Indigenous collections curator also resigned.

Read more: Ex-finance minister Carole James named to Royal BC Museum board amid racism controversy

Now the B.C. government has stepped in, appointing former provincial finance minister Carole James — who is of Metis heritage — to the museum's board of directors.

"The museum has challenges," James said. "I'm looking forward to contributing to the board and being able to resolve those issues."

She would appear to have a lot of work to do to repair the museum's shattered internal structure and damaged reputation.

A small start might be clearing up the dispute over the stone pillar, which Boudreau says he would like to see again.

"I haven't heard from the museum," he said.

"But I wouldn't mind having it back, and seeing what kind of life it has after that."

Mike Smyth is host of ‘The Mike Smyth Show’ on Global News Radio 980 CKNW in Vancouver and a commentator for Global News. You can reach him at mike@cknw.com and follow him on Twitter at @MikeSmythNews​.

Yellow penguin spotted in Antarctica—here's why it's so rare

On an expedition to the South Atlantic in 2019, Belgian photographer Yves Adams expected a familiar sight: king penguins, easily identified by the black and yellow feathers adorning their heads and necks, and the orange flash of color running the length of their beaks.

Instead, Adams saw something electrifying: a vivid yellow penguin. 

On the shore known as Salisbury Plains on South Georgia Island, as many as 120,000 king penguins have been observed milling about, in a veritable sea of black feathers.

But the animal Adams saw stood out from the rest: A bird with an ivory-white bill, a cream-colored body, and a mane of lemon-hued feathers. Adams was offloading equipment from the expedition ship when he saw the unique bird amid a group of other penguins. He dropped everything and grabbed his camera. (See more pictures of the yellow penguin on Adams' Instagram.)

"To our surprise they swam towards us,” Adams recounted in an email. “So for a few minutes we were very lucky, and I was so happy I got these good photo conditions!”

During the two-month expedition, Adams took thousands of photos. It wasn’t until recently that he finally went through each one and edited the special photos, which have since gone viral.

In some cases when an individual animal’s coloring diverges sharply from the species’ typical coloration, it’s an example of albinism. In this case, penguin expert P. Dee Boersma says the proper term for the yellow-maned bird is leucism, a genetic mutation in which an animal is mostly white but can produce some pigment. (See a picture of a “blonde” chinstrap penguin.)

“How they lack pigment kind of differs between individuals but, in general, it looks like they've been dipped in bleach,” says Boersma, a conservation biologist at the University of Washington and a National Geographic Explorer.
Bird of a different color

Daniel Thomas, an ornithologist and expert in penguin pigments at Massey University of New Zealand, also agrees that the bird is most likely leucistic, and not albino, which occurs when there is a total lack of pigment.

"There are two different melanin pigments—eumelanin and phaeomelanin," Thomas says in an email. "Eumelanin is responsible for black coloration (and most shiny blues and greens), and phaeomelanin is responsible for brown and chestnut colors."

Looking closely at the yellow penguin photos, Thomas points to the dark border between the yellow and white feathers, as well as the beige feathers on the penguin's back, as evidence that the bird is still producing phaomelanin but no eumelanin—a common arrangement for leucistic birds, he says.

In 38 years of studying penguins, Boersma figures she could count on two hands the number of leucistic animals she’s seen. And though she’s never personally seen a leucistic king penguin, she’s not surprised they’re out there.

There have been numerous reported observations of leucistic king, rockhopper, and macaroni penguins. In 2019, a king penguin with a brown genetic mutation, which turned its gray feathers tan, was spotted in South Georgia. (Read more about king penguins, one of the tallest species.)
Rare but not unique

It’s not possible to tell if the yellow penguin is a male or a female just by looking at it, Adams says. But discoloration can be a problem for male Magellanic penguins, a species Boersma studies, when it comes time to find a mate.

“If you're a female, you'll be fine, because there's about three males to every female,” she says—but males that look different don’t stand much chance of mating. As a result the leucistic trait only has an opportunity to get passed on roughly half the time. (See pictures of albino and leucistic animals, from squirrels to crayfish.)

The king penguin population is increasing, and the International Union for Conservation of Nature lists them as “of least concern.”

But generally, when uncommon colorations do get passed on, they can endanger the individuals and further increase their rarity.

When penguins have more pigment in their feathers than normal—a condition called melanism—it gives them a darker color overall. These darker animals may be more visible than other penguins in the water, and have a harder time sneaking up on fish.

And paler penguins are more likely to be eaten by leopard seals or killer whales in the Antarctic, she says.

So “you're not going to get a chance to see very many,” Boersma says—a fact that makes Adams’ sighting all the more amazing.

Ancient dog bone reveals when man's best friend migrated to North America

Researchers have narrowed down a timeline for when man's best friend may have migrated to North America based on a 10,000-year-old bone fragment of a dog found in southeast Alaska.



The femur fragment, smaller than the size of a dime, was uncovered by surprise as scientists were studying how climate changes during the Ice Age impacted animals' survival and movements, according to a press release by the University of Buffalo.

© Bob Wilder/University at Buffalo A map shows the location where a dog bone dated to be from 10,150 years ago was found.

Researchers were sequencing DNA from a collection of hundreds of bones found in the region years ago when they realized that the small bone, originally thought to have come from a bear, contained DNA from a dog that lived about 10,150 years ago, the release stated.

"This all started out with our interest in how Ice Age climatic changes impacted animals' survival and movements in this region," University of Buffalo evolutionary biologist Charlotte Lindqvist, lead author of the study published Tuesday in the U.K.-based journal The Royal Society, said in a statement. "Southeast Alaska might have served as an ice-free stopping point of sorts, and now -- with our dog -- we think that early human migration through the region might be much more important than some previously suspected."

© Douglas Levere/University at Buffalo

This bone fragment, found in Southeast Alaska, belongs to a dog that lived about 10,150 years ago, a study concludes. Scientists say the remains, a piece of a femur

Dogs were domesticated in Europe between 32,000 and 18,800 years ago. The findings suggest that dogs first migrated to the Americas around 16,000 years ago, according to the study.

© Douglas Levere/University at Buffalo Flavio Augusto da Silva Coelho, a University at Buffalo PhD student in biological sciences, holds the ancient dog bone fragment that was found in Southeast Alaska.

The bone's DNA suggests that it came from a canine that diverged from a Siberian dog as early as 16,700 years ago, scientists determined. The timing of that split coincides with a period when humans may have been migrating into North America along a coastal route that included southeast Alaska.

There have been multiple waves of dogs migrating to the Americas, according to the study. Arctic dogs arrived from East Asia with the Thule, ancestors of all modern Inuit peoples inhabiting the Arctic. Siberian huskies were imported to Alaska during the Gold Rush, and other dogs were brought by European colonizers.MORE: Ancient North Americans bred dogs for their wool: Study

But, the exact timeframe for when dogs first ventured into the Americas was previously unclear. The findings from the bone coincide with when humans first arrived to the Americas, after the last Ice Age when coastal glaciers began to retreat..

This suggests "that dogs accompanied the first humans that entered the New World," according to the study.

"The history of dogs has been intertwined, since ancient times, with that of the humans who domesticated them," the release stated.

However, the fossil record of ancient dogs on the North American continent is still incomplete, so any new remains that are discovered will provide important clues, said University of Buffalo biological sciences student Flavio Augusto da Silva Coelho.

Prior to the discovery, the earliest ancient dog bones found in the U.S. were in the Midwest, Coelho said.

SMALL NUCLEAR REACTORS

Climate change and 'advanced nuclear' solutions

Gregory Jaczko, opinion contributor THE HILL

As the dust continues to settle from the 2020 election, winners and losers are starting to appear.

© Getty Images Climate change and 'advanced nuclear' solutions

One victor could be carbon-free energy and storage industries. During the campaign, President Biden pledged legislation for zero net carbon emissions from the U.S. economy by 2050 - the most ambitious climate agenda ever set by a president. These goals are in line with the Paris Agreement's aspirations for keeping temperature rise to much less than 2 degrees Celsius and ideally less than 1.5 degrees Celsius. Global temperature has risen about 1-degree already, so time is short. Climate scientists predict we have less than 10 years to significantly reduce emissions.

Nuclear power is knocking on the government's door offering solutions. The Biden platform answered by including so-called "advanced nuclear" in its list of climate options. The question now is will they wisely fund any such efforts?

THE TRUDEAU GOVERNMENT IN CANADA IS ALSO PROMOTING 

NUCLEAR AS GREEN

While talk of advanced nuclear reactors is ubiquitous, a precise definition is elusive. Without a clear target in which to aim, government funds will not hit the mark. Advanced nuclear has become the catch-all for the knight-in-shining-armor reactors that promise to address issues that have kept nuclear a marginal electricity player since its inception. But we need more than this open-ended definition. The Biden administration should support projects only if they can compete with renewables and storage on deployment cost and speed, public safety, waste disposal, operational flexibility and global security. There are none today.

The only advanced nuclear technologies close to realization are called small modular reactors. These reactors are smaller than traditional reactors and are self-contained. These features allow companies to manufacture most of the reactor in a factory and ship it to a plant site. This concept evokes images of smart phones rolling out of factories by the billions - each design identical and mass produced. Their small size reduces the amount of radiation that can be released to the environment, greatly reducing - but not eliminating - safety to a plant's community. And their modular nature promises operation that adapts to fluctuating power demands, addressing some grid flexibility concerns.

Yet the economic competitiveness of small modular reactors appears weak. Shrinking the size of a traditional reactor and splitting it among many modules increases the cost of the electricity it produces. It is the same reason airlines fly large capacity jets instead of private jets. You maximize the revenue per area of the aircraft hull. 

Proponents argue mass production will overcome this problem with fleet-wide economies of scale and construction efficiencies. Only wide scale adoption of the technology would deliver those benefits and there is no obvious market to support that today.

Moreover, the nuclear industry always promises better, faster and cheaper yet it fails to deliver. A case in point: two traditional reactors currently under construction in Georgia are five years behind schedule and more than $10 billion over budget, even though they promised to do better. A "twin" reactor project in South Carolina failed before completion, leaving ratepayers holding the bag for billions in wasted costs.

Small modular designs are only promising to be cheaper than traditional reactors. Current estimates show they are more expensive than renewables, like wind and solar, even with storage and without subsidies. Small reactors have a long way to go to be competitive. Dramatic cost decreases for high-volume energy storage, which address the intermittency of some renewables, make the competitive case for any form of nuclear even tougher.

Even if everything else was lined up perfectly, nuclear has little time to catch up. After reentering the Paris Agreement, the U.S. will again strive to achieve drastic reductions in greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) within the next 10 years. Even in the most optimistic scenario, we won't see even a handful of small modular nuclear reactors in the U.S. until 2029 or 2030, which means a large-scale impact would come far after the climate tipping point.

What about the other factors like proliferation resistance and waste disposal? For those criteria, small modular reactors offer no advantages over their traditional reactor cousins. Even if the cost factors are addressed, proliferation concerns and waste management will be hurdles. Waste generation, however, is a problem for competing technologies. No electricity source operates without some impact to the planet and its resources. Renewables, too, must improve their use and reuse of materials.

Most importantly, no small modular reactors have been deployed yet in the United States, despite government efforts. In 2011, the Department of Energy (DOE) offered $400 million grants to support two small modular reactor designs. After providing tens of millions, only one design is still under development. That company originally planned to build a 12-module plant at the Idaho National Laboratory.

Predictably, this project is in trouble. Electricity customers have committed to purchase just a small fraction of the power produced annually by that plant, which now is likely to be scaled down, diminishing the economies of scale from mass production. It will not operate until at least 2030, years behind schedule and too late to help deal with the problem forecast in the best climate models.

Despite these challenges, the federal government agreed in concept to a $1.4 billion direct subsidy over 10 years for the project. Without this cash infusion, the project will not meet its already disputed targets for price competitiveness. Such largesse is part of the billions Congress and the Trump administration committed to other advanced reactor concepts, none of which are close to deployment.

To avoid wasting money on advanced nuclear reactors, the Biden administration must establish clear metrics for advanced nuclear reactors and apply them rigorously. Only ideas that can meet the pressing timetable of climate demands and electricity market realities deserve a serious look. My list is a good place to start. If advanced reactors cannot meet these metrics, they should not receive funding. Proponents of nuclear power will certainly say that living up to my list is an arduous task. Perhaps it is, but the future of our planet hangs in the balance. That is more important than the profits of an industry.

Dr. Gregory Jaczko was the chairman of the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission from 2009 to 2012 and currently develops clean energy projects and teaches at Princeton University.

FIRST NATIONS REPATRIATIONS
Jordan's Principle order may cost feds $15 billion in compensation, PBO says

OTTAWA — The parliamentary budget office says it could cost the federal government up to $15 billion to compensate First Nations families and children impacted by the child welfare system, as well as denials or delays of essential services.

 Provided by The Canadian Press

The figure updates the budget office's initial estimate to include thousands more children, parents and grandparents who would qualify for the $40,000 payments under recent developments in the case.

Jordan's Principle requires governments to cover the cost of services for First Nations children, and work out any disputes over jurisdiction afterwards.

The Canadian Human Rights Tribunal has ordered the government to compensate children and families who had been denied service, or faced delays.

The updated report adds roughly 100,000 more First Nations children, along with their parents and grandparents, whose compensation would alone be about $10 billion.

The new estimate of about $15 billion includes the 13,000 children originally expected to be eligible for compensation, mostly related to delayed approval of claims, as well as those taken into care unnecessarily, and their families.

NDP MP Charlie Angus said the high cost of compensating First Nations children and families is a result of the government's refusal to negotiate a solution with them after the human rights tribunal found Canada guilty of systemic discriminations against Indigenous children in 2016.

Angus said the new report shows that the cost would have been between $2.2 billion and $4.5 billion if the government began negotiating in good faith.

"The real cost has been paid in the lives of Indigenous children on reserves across this country," Angus said Tuesday.

The tribunal ordered the government in September 2019 to pay $40,000 to every First Nations child who since 2006 was inappropriately removed from their home, and pay the same amount to their parents or caregiver.

The same amount, which is the maximum the tribunal can award, was also ordered for children who faced denials or delays of basic services like medical care.

At the time, the Assembly of First Nations estimated that 54,000 children and their parents could receive compensation, for a bill of at least $2 billion.

Budget officer Yves Giroux's report pegs those figures far higher, but warns estimates are uncertain because of data limitations.

In November, a tribunal ruling expanded the scope of its order to allow First Nations to decide whether a particular child is entitled to federally funded services, not just the federal government under the Indian Act.

Ottawa announced before Christmas it would seek a judicial review of the decision.

Angus said the government has used numerous arguments against the tribunal's rulings that ensure justice for Indigenous children.

"They've used jurisdiction. They've attacked the Human Rights Tribunal. They said that the costs would be outrageously high," he said.

"The Human Rights Tribunal ruling is a watershed moment in Canadian history, and there's no going back from that."

A spokeswoman for Indigenous Services Minister Marc Miller said the department is committed to "move quickly" to compensate First Nations children and families harmed by the underfunding of child and family services in the past.

"We are also firmly committed to undertaking the work necessary to reform Child and Family Services in Canada to ensure that the best interest of the child prevails and that this new system is one that respects First Nations’ right to self-determination," Vanessa Adams said in a statement Tuesday evening.

Adams said the department is working with First Nations partners, provinces, and territories to reform to guarantee full implementation of Jordan’s Principle.

The recent developments flow back to a 2016 ruling from the tribunal that found the federal government at fault for not providing funding on-reserve for child welfare services equal to provincial payments for those living in urban and rural settings.

The government subsequently broadened its definition of Jordan's Principle, named for Jordan River Anderson, a boy from Norway House Cree Nation in Manitoba. He spent five years in hospital while the Manitoba and federal governments argued over which level of government needed to pay for his care in a special home.

The PBO report notes that more than 594,000 claims under Jordan's Principle were approved between July 2016 and April 2020.

Crunching the numbers, the budget office said that amounts to one claim per person for each of the approximately 375,000 First Nations children living on- and off-reserve, as well as those who became adults over that almost four-year period.

This report by The Canadian Press was first published Feb. 23, 2021.

This story was produced with the financial assistance of the Facebook and Canadian Press News Fellowship.

Jordan Press and Maan Alhmidi, The Canadian Press