Privacy: più poteri alle Autorità nazionali e le Big Tech tremano
Mi è arrivato il certificato Covid digitale, ossia il “green pass” svizzero: come funziona
La fissa dei giornalisti per i termini inglesi ha creato l’errore del “green pass”, che è il nome sbagliato del certificato Covid digitale europeo (il green pass è il permesso israeliano di accesso ad attività commerciali e uffici per i vaccinati; la possibilità di attraversare frontiere nazionali non c’entra nulla).
Questo certificato europeo consentirà di attestare l’avvenuta vaccinazione, la guarigione o il risultato negativo di un test a partire dall’1 luglio a livello europeo. Il certificato equivalente svizzero, compatibile con quello europeo, è già pronto e in Canton Ticino è stato distribuito in forma elettronica a tutti i vaccinati con un SMS ieri (circa un migliaio di persone hanno ricevuto l’SMS il giorno precedente come prova generale).
Chi volesse richiedere questo certificato trova tutte le informazioni del caso presso www.ti.ch/certificato.
A me l’SMS è arrivato alle 19.29. Il messaggio conteneva un link personalizzato: l’ho seguito e sono arrivato a questa pagina di registrazione.
Qui ho immesso il mio indirizzo di mail, ho spuntato la casella Desidero ottenere un certificato COVID e letto l’informativa sulla privacy linkata nella pagina.
Pochi secondi dopo ho ricevuto questa risposta:
Qualche altro secondo più tardi mi è arrivata una mail contenente un link personalizzato per scaricare il certificato:
Il certificato è arrivato sotto forma di PDF in formato A4 con questo aspetto:
Contiene i dati essenziali in italiano e in inglese: la malattia per la quale sono stato vaccinato; il numero di dosi; il tipo, prodotto e fabbricante del vaccino (Comirnaty è il marchio registrato del vaccino Pfizer/BioNTech); la data e il paese di vaccinazione; il mio nome, cognome e data di nascita; e un URN (Uniform Resource Name) abbinato a un codice QR. Le specifiche tecniche dell’URN sono pubblicate qui.
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Questo certificato, autenticato dall’Ufficio federale della sanità pubblica (grazie alla firma digitale generata usando i miei dati) mi darà accesso a grandi eventi e manifestazioni in Svizzera (nei casi previsti) e dovrebbe facilitare l’attraversamento delle frontiere, perché basterà una scansione del codice QR e un controllo di un documento d’identità per documentare che sono vaccinato.
Il foglio A4 non è molto pratico da portare in giro, per cui ho provato subito l’app apposita che fa da “portadocumenti”, ossia Covid Certificate (Android; iOS). Ne avevo parlato in anteprima qualche giorno fa.
Ho lanciato l’app, ho letto le brevi informazioni di presentazione e poi ho cliccato su Aggiungere. L’app mi ha chiesto (ovviamente) il permesso di accedere alla fotocamera, che ho accettato solo per questa volta, e ho fatto la scansione del codice QR dal PDF stampato (si può fare anche partendo dal PDF visualizzato su uno schermo).
Qualche foto (l’app saggiamente non consente screenshot, per cui accontentatevi di queste immagini fatte di corsa):
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Sono insomma a posto: ho il certificato su PDF, su carta e nell’app (che, fra l’altro, consente di archiviare più di un certificato). Mi resta solo da levarmi una curiosità: come funziona la verifica?
La verifica usa l’apposita app Covid Check (Android; iOS) che è liberamente installabile da chiunque. Ho provato a scansionare il mio certificato Covid stampato, e l’app mi ha mostrato soltanto queste informazioni: validità, nome, cognome e data di nascita.
Un dettaglio interessante: l’app di verifica funziona anche senza connessione a Internet. Sembra quindi che il controllo avvenga completamente in locale, senza mandare dati ad alcun server centrale, tutelando quindi fortemente la riservatezza (l’informativa sulla privacy dell’app di verifica è qui). Però non ho capito come funziona la revocabilità: visto che per poter sapere se un certificato è stato revocato presumo che debba scaricare periodicamente (da dove?) dei dati per sapere quali certificati sono stati revocati.
In attesa di risolvere quest’ultimo dubbio, ora non mi resta che trovare un grande evento al quale partecipare oppure tentare l’attraversamento della frontiera.
F1 2021, trailer e info sulle nuove opzioni dinamiche
Google perfeziona Earthquake Alerts in vista del lancio globale
Accelerating health and wellbeing startups in Europe
COVID-19 has changed life as we know it, and around the world, startup founders are stepping up to solve new and unforeseen challenges with agility, resilience and innovative technology. In particular, the pandemic spurred a high demand for digital health and wellbeing solutions. Germany alone reported a 1,000% increase in telehealth offerings — with more than 20,000 medical doctors and psychotherapists now offering appointments through video-consultations — and Frost & Sullivan forecasts a sevenfold growth in digital health services by 2025.
Digital advancements in healthcare are evident and, post-pandemic, people are likely to need new approaches when engaging with healthcare providers. With a growing number of technology startups focused on health and wellbeing, we are excited to announce that the next class of Google for Startups Accelerator in Europe will be designed for entrepreneurs and innovators in this space.
Google for Startups Accelerator is a three-month program consisting of intensive workshops and mentorship from Google engineers and external experts tailored to their business through a mix of remote one-on-one and one-to-many learning sessions for growth-stage startups. Google for Startups is looking for startups from across Europe and Israel using technology to solve the biggest health and wellbeing challenges we face today.
WordPress 5.8: le funzionalità più attese
Broadening our COVID-19 support in India
As the pandemic has unfolded in India, it’s been humbling and inspiring to see individuals, communities, institutions, and governments work together to manage the impact of a crisis on a scale we haven’t experienced before. Technology has played a critical role, and our focus at Google has been on making sure people have the information and tools they need to stay informed, connected, and safe.
We have worked to surface timely and reliable health information, amplify public health campaigns, and help nonprofits get urgent support to Indians in need. In April, through our philanthropic arm Google.org, we announced grants totaling $18 million (135 Crore INR) to expand the reach of public health information campaigns and support emergency relief work.
Today, as India slowly emerges from the crisis of the past few months, we are turning our focus to helping strengthen India’s healthcare infrastructure and workforce — especially in rural areas.
Building on our overall COVID-19 response, we are announcing new commitments to GiveIndia, PATH, Apollo Medskills and ARMMAN, focused on setting up oxygen generation plants and expanding the health workforce by strengthening COVID-19 management skills among frontline workers.
Google.org will support procurement and installation of approximately 80 oxygen generation plants in healthcare facilities in high-need and rural locations with new grants totalling approximately $15 million (109 Crore INR) to GiveIndia and PATH. The two organizations will work together to oversee the oxygen program, providing project management support. PATH will identify the target locations and provide technical assistance, working with state governments and other authorities, and complete the installation of the plants.
As part of our new commitment, Google is also investing in the efforts of Apollo Medskills to help upskill 20,000 frontline health workers through specialized training in COVID-19 management. This will complement and strengthen the stressed rural health workforce and rural health systems.
To further bolster these efforts, Google.org will provide a $500,000 (3.6 Crore INR) grant to nonprofit ARMMAN. ARMMAN will run skilling programs for 180,000 Accredited Social Health Activists (ASHAs) and 40,000 Auxiliary Nurse Midwives (ANMs) in 15 Indian states. It will also set up a call center to provide additional help and advice for ASHAs and ANMs where required.
Google is proud to be supporting these organizations as they build a bigger, better-equipped healthcare workforce, help India steady itself after the pandemic’s second wave and lay the foundations for a sustainable healthcare system over the longer term.
Learn more about the person behind the news article
Individual voices play an important role in the news and information we consume. With so many complex, important stories unfolding daily, people not only rely on specific publishers for the latest news, but also increasingly turn to trusted individual journalists, authors and experts.
We’re committed to helping people access timely, authoritative news and information from a variety of different sources, as well as investing to help sustain a quality news ecosystem. Earlier this year, we launched Full Coverage in Search to make it easier to explore all aspects of a story from different perspectives. We also launched the fact-checking Open Fund to help journalists around the world correct misconceptions that circulate online and offline. Today, we’re rolling out a beta feature in Search to help people learn more about an individual journalist or author by more prominently highlighting their recent work.
Currently when you search for a certain journalist or author, you might see an information box (also known as a knowledge panel) at the top of your results that provides a quick snapshot of information about that person. Starting today for a small subset of these journalists, we’ll begin including a carousel of their published articles on the search results page. This carousel will help you quickly understand what subjects that person has recently covered and make it easy for you to find some of their latest work.
Open for business: A look inside our Google Store in NYC
On June 17, our first-ever physical retail store opens its doors for business in New York City. This new space will be a natural extension of our commitment to NYC and provide customers with hands-on interaction with our lineup of devices and services — from Pixel phones and Nest products to Fitbit wearables and Pixelbooks. To mark the occasion, here’s a look inside the Google Store in Chelsea — from our commitments to sustainability to new product experiences throughout the space.
A peek into our process
As we began the process to create our first retail store, the number of details to consider was daunting, but the opportunity at hand was amazing. We wanted our first store to reflect the same approach we take to designing our products: making sure they’re always helpful to people. The result is a space we believe is warm and inviting, while providing new ways to celebrate and experience Google through our phones, displays, speakers, wearables and more.
We began with group brainstorms in Mountain View across all our teams which were led by our designer, NYC based architect Reddymade. A concept for this physical space began to take shape — one that we felt lived up to our brand and mission.
Our excitement grew as we built a full-scale mockup of the space at our retail hangar in Mountain View, where we could test every element and make sure each one felt just right: the space, the layout, the technology and the overall experience each guest might have. We considered every immersive way people could learn about all the features of our Pixel phones and Nest products, and see how the best of Google’s software and services come to life when using them: products like Google Search, Google Assistant, Google Maps, YouTube, Stadia and many more.
Our commitment to sustainability
Sustainability is a core tenet of how Google does business. In addition to our Google-wide sustainability commitments, when it comes to building hardware we’ve made specific commitments to integrate sustainability into our products.
It was equally as important that our first store continue this work, and our commitment to sustainable design began on day one. Every element of the Google Store — the materials, building processes, mechanical systems and more — was painstakingly considered and selected. For example, the veneer on the walls is a soft gray responsibly sourced hickory, each lighting fixture is energy efficient and our custom cork and wood furniture was created with a local craftsman from Greenpoint, Brooklyn. We even attached our carpeting (which was manufactured with recycled materials) in a sustainable way.
We’re honored to have worked with the U.S. Green Building Council in this process, and we now can share that the Google Store Chelsea is one of fewer than 215 retail spaces in the world to have achieved a LEED Platinum rating — the highest certification possible within the Leadership in Energy and Environmental Design green building rating system.
Take a look inside
As you approach our new store, the first thing we hope you’ll notice are beautiful physical and digital product displays lining the store’s windows, which offer a peek into our products and their features. And as you enter the store, you will find a light-filled space that’s centered around experiencing the helpfulness of our products.
Near the main entrance, you’ll find a 17-foot-tall circular glass structure (designed and engineered with local New York partners) that we’re calling the Google Imagination Space. With custom interactive screens that feature rotating exhibits for visitors to experience the best of our products and technologies, we’re beginning with an experience built around Google Translate and our machine learning capabilities. As you speak to the exhibit, you’ll experience real-time translation of your speech into 24 languages simultaneously, and then learn how this all happens on the back end using several Google technologies. These same capabilities are also available across many of our devices — right in the palm of your hand.
For those who want to get up close and personal, every part of the store invites hands-on interaction with our products and services. Not quite sure where to start or want to learn more about specific features? An expert store team is on hand to answer questions, offer repairs and troubleshoot issues on the spot.
Exploring the rest of the store, you’ll find new ways to experience the best of Google’s hardware and services:
We’re so incredibly proud of the work our teams have accomplished together since we first began this project almost four years ago, and we look forward to introducing Google’s first store to the world. We can’t wait for you to experience it firsthand, starting June 17 at 10 a.m. Eastern, and see all the great things we’ve been working on.
Lenovo ThinkVision T34w, ultrawide 34 pollici per la produttività
Catastrofisti, a cuccia: Betelgeuse non cambia luminosità perché sta per esplodere. C’è un altro motivo
Qualche giorno fa vi avevo preannunciato la risoluzione di un mistero astronomico che avrebbe smontato i catastrofisti: ora l’embargo alla notizia (adottato come consueto per coordinare l’uscita mediatica) è terminato e posso quindi spiegare di cosa si tratta (avevo lasciato indizi enigmistici già nel preannuncio, ma non sembra averli colti nessuno).
Ricordate il panico periodico per la stella Betelgeuse, che secondo i giornali generalisti (tipo il Corriere della sera) minaccia di esplodere tanto violentemente che la Terra potrebbe essere “illuminata e riscaldata” da “due soli nel cielo”? Sì, questa stupidaggine la scriveva davvero il Corriere nel 2011.
Ne avevo scritto anch’io nel 2010, quando era emerso lo stesso allarme. Ogni tanto questa storiella riaffiora e va, come al solito, smentita e spiegata per l’ennesima volta.
Betelgeuse è una stella gigante che dalla Terra è visibile a occhio nudo nella costellazione di Orione: è indicata dalla freccia nell’immagine qui sopra, tratta da Wikipedia. Ha una massa venti volte maggiore del nostro Sole e un diametro circa mille volte più grande: se si trovasse al posto del Sole, la Terra e Marte sarebbero al suo interno. È una delle pochissime stelle di cui i nostri attuali telescopi riescono a scorgere qualche dettaglio della superficie. Oltre a essere immensa, è anche molto luminosa: circa centomila volte più del Sole, tanto che è fra le dieci stelle più brillanti nel nostro cielo nonostante si trovi a circa 640 anni luce di distanza (circa 6 x 1015 chilometri) da noi.
Questa stella ha una particolarità: ogni tanto cambia luminosità abbastanza di colpo. La variazione è talmente marcata che è rilevabile a occhio. A fine 2019 e all’inizio del 2020 Betelgeuse ha avuto uno di questi repentini, inspiegati cali di luminosità, per poi tornare alla brillantezza consueta ad aprile 2020. Ma stavolta gli astronomi hanno usato il telescopio VLT dell’ESO (European Southern Observatory), in Cile, per esaminare in dettaglio la situazione.
L’astronomo Miguel Montargès (Observatoire de Paris e KU Leuven) e i suoi colleghi hanno cominciato ad acquisire immagini e hanno visto che la superficie di Betelgeuse era significativamente più scura, specialmente nella sua regione meridionale. Le immagini hanno mostrato un cambiamento rapidissimo, nel giro di qualche settimana, assolutamente straordinario per un oggetto celeste di dimensioni così colossali.
Le immagini pubblicate oggi sono le uniche che documentano questa variazione di luminosità in così grande dettaglio. Qui sotto potete vedere un video che mostra la variazione di Betelgeuse.
I ricercatori coordinati da Montargès hanno pubblicato su Nature i risultati delle loro indagini: l’offuscamento misterioso è causato da un velo di polvere causato da un calo della temperatura superficiale della stella.
La superficie di Betelgeuse, spiegano i ricercatori, cambia quando delle enormi bolle di gas si spostano o cambiano dimensioni al suo interno, e la stella ha espulso una di queste bolle giganti poco prima dell’affievolimento del 2019-2020. La superficie si è poi raffreddata (relativamente parlando) e questo calo ha consentito al gas espulso di condensarsi e formare polvere solida, come si vede nell’animazione seguente.
Questo evento ha consentito di osservare la nascita della polvere stellare e ha dimostrato che avviene molto rapidamente e nelle immediate vicinanze delle stelle stesse (“vicinanze” su scala cosmica: un paio di miliardi di chilometri). Questa polvere contiene gli elementi dai quali si formano i pianeti e, in ultima analisi, la vita.
La spiegazione degli astronomi mette a tacere le teorie secondo le quali il calo di luminosità era un’avvisaglia della morte imminente di Betelgeuse in una spettacolare esplosione (supernova).
Le future osservazioni della stella, in particolare con l’Extremely Large Telescope (ELT) dell’ESO, permetteranno di vedere direttamente Betelgeuse in notevole dettaglio e di approfondire la nostra conoscenza del fenomeno. Ma già adesso abbiamo avuto, a occhio nudo, la dimostrazione che il firmamento non è così fisso come molti pensano.
La vicenda di Betelgeuse, il catastrofismo mediatico e la sua risoluzione scientifica sono un ottimo esempio della differenza fondamentale fra inspiegabile e inspiegato. Moltissimi fenomeni vengono definiti troppo disinvoltamente “inspiegabili”, quando in realtà sono spiegabilissimi se si riescono a ottenere informazioni sufficienti. Restano inspiegati, ma non inspiegabili, se queste informazioni non emergono. Tutto qui. Qualunque riferimento alla recente mania per gli avvistamenti militari di UFO “inspiegabili” è assolutamente intenzionale.
La ricerca di Montargès e colleghi è pubblicata su Nature con il titolo “A dusty veil shading Betelgeuse during its Great Dimming” (https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-021-03546-8).
Questo articolo fa parte delle Storie di Scienza: una serie libera e gratuita, resa possibile dalle donazioni dei lettori. Se volete saperne di più, leggete qui. Se volete fare una donazione, potete cliccare sul pulsante qui sotto. Grazie!
OnePlus si fonde con OPPO. Cosa cambierà per gli utenti?
Helping kids be safe, confident online explorers
We’ve heard from parents, educators and experts on ways to make technology safer for kids, and we continue to incorporate that feedback into our products. Whether it’s helping them find quality content, working to protect them from online harm or teaching them how to be good digital citizens, we’re committed to building family-friendly tools to help kids safely and confidently explore the online world.
Launching our new evidence-based Be Internet Awesome curriculum
Four years ago, we launched Be Internet Awesome as a program to help educators and parents teach kids the fundamentals of digital safety and citizenship. Since then, it’s expanded to more than 30 countries in 16 languages and has helped millions of kids around the world make safer, more informed decisions online. It’s important to teach kids how to use the internet effectively, as family technology use in and outside of the classroom continues to grow — and we’re constantly looking for ways to make Be Internet Awesome even better.
To ensure Be Internet Awesome helps students comprehend online safety and digital citizenship concepts, we commissioned the University of New Hampshire’s Crimes Against Children Research Center to do a rigorous independent evaluation of our program. The researchers learned that students who went through the Be Internet Awesome program improved their comprehension in areas such as being civil online, understanding which websites are safe and responding more confidently to cyberbullying. The research also recommended opportunities where kids could benefit from more guidance, which we’ve used to update our curriculum.
In partnership with online safety experts like Committee for Children and The Net Safety Collaborative, we’ve significantly expanded the Be Internet Awesome program, including 11 new lessons and more educator and family resources. We’ve developed content tailored to specific age groups and grade levels, included more guidance around online gaming, search engines and video consumption and added social-emotional learning lessons to help students address cyberbullying and online harassment. The program also provides an array of resources for families to help discuss online safety at home. We hope the updated curriculum gives educators and parents an even more helpful tool to teach kids about these important topics.
Navigating the world of online video
Building on our digital safety and citizenship work, we’ve also created more tools and resources to help kids explore the world of online video. For example, on YouTube, we introduced supervised experiences to give parents more choice over content settings and features, including special options for tweens and teens. We’ve also developed a comprehensive family guide and PSA videos as useful starting points for kids and families to learn how to browse and watch video content responsibly.
To help kids stay informed about what they’re seeing on YouTube, including content with commercial elements, we recently launched a new disclosure feature for all content that a creator has notified us contains paid promotions, when that content is “made for kids” or being viewed on a supervised account. This disclosure appears in easy-to-understand text on the left hand corner of the screen and links to a new family-friendly video and help center article to provide additional information.
Tools and resources for families
We’ve also created more resources to help families determine how to approach kids’ technology use. Earlier this year, we launched families.google, a one-stop technology hub that includes tips and tools about how to manage tech for your family. In addition, we introduced updates to the Family Link app that lets you set digital ground rules as kids learn, play and explore online. You can now enable your kids to spend time with apps you approve of by designating them as “always allowed,” and see added details via daily, weekly and monthly activity reports. All of this work is designed to equip parents and their kids with the resources they need to foster a healthy relationship with technology in the digital age.
We want parents and kids to have the tools they need to explore the internet confidently. We are committed to helping protect children online and will continue to share information about our ongoing work in this area.
Note: The University of New Hampshire’s study used a rigorous cluster randomized controlled trial (CRCT) evaluation methodology. Fourteen elementary schools across the U.S. were randomly assigned to either an intervention condition (Be Internet Awesome implementation) or a control condition (no or delayed Be Internet Awesome implementation). The full paper is currently under peer review.
Announcing the Google AdSense Site Approvals video series
If you want to start monetizing your online content with Google AdSense but either got an initial rejection or you’re simply not sure where to start, this series will be a useful resource for you. Throughout the episodes you’ll build on your policy knowledge to get your content ready for approval with AdSense.
Stasera alle 19 parliamo di ritorno alla Luna grazie a Telespazio
Sono stato invitato da Telespazio a parlare stasera alle 19 di ritorno umano alla Luna insieme ad Amedeo Balbi (astrofisico e professore universitario), Emilio Cozzi (giornalista e autore, nonché conduttore della serata), Koen Geurtz (Moonlight LCNS Program Manager di Telespazio) e Valentina Sumini (ingegnere e architetto).
L’annuncio di Telespazio è qui; qui sotto potete seguire la serata in video su YouTube. Gli altri canali digitali di Telespazio sono su Twitter e Linkedin.