Snippings

xxx

MUMBAI : The Reserve Bank of India (RBI) on Monday set the upper limit for individual offline payment transactions at ₹200 and said such payments could only be done face-to-face.

These are part of the its “framework for facilitating small value digital payments in offline mode” and follows pilot testing by some entities from September 2020 to July 2021. On 6 August, RBI had permitted a pilot scheme to encourage technological innovations that enable small value digital transactions done offline.

From Offline payments capped at ₹200/transaction.

xxx

xxx

But as much as [AI and the blockchain] differ, they both share an underlying desire: to implicitly or explicitly abstract away human fallibility in service of a fully automated vision of perfection. In this, they risk falling prey to the mistaken belief that automation can achieve any meaningful autonomy at all.

From AI And Blockchain Have An Autonomy Problem:

xxx

xxx

In 2019 during a military exercise, the North Atlantic Treaty Organization’s Strategic Communications Center of Excellence deployed a “red team” to see if it could disrupt 150 soldiers. Spending only $60 on Russian bots and using only open-source data, researchers were able to learn the usernames, phone numbers, emails and identities of soldiers. They also engaged with them on Facebook and Instagram, mapped their connections with other armed-forces members, determined their location within a kilometer, and even got soldiers to send selfies with their equipment. Apparently even soldiers believe that if it isn’t on Instagram, it didn’t happen.

According to the report on the exercise, they could “pinpoint the exact locations of several battalions” and track troop movements. Here’s the scariest part: “The level of personal information we found was very detailed and enabled us to instil [sic] undesirable behaviour during the exercise.” Janis Sarts, a director of NATO StratCom, told me: “Every time we attempted to manipulate behaviors, we succeeded.”

From Can Social Media Alter a War? – WSJ:

xxx

xxx

my long-deceased goldfish remains on the register as a bona fide upper-tier waste dealer

From Britain through the looking glass: my dead goldfish is now a registered waste disposer | George Monbiot | The Guardian:

xxx

xxx

This study concluded that to supply 10% of the global energy demand by 2040, roughly 200 tons of Helium-3 would be required annually. To do this would require a regolith mining rate of about 630 tons per second. This number is based on an optimistic concentration of 20 ppb helium-3 in the lunar regolith. All this translates to a requirement of between 1,700 to 2,000 helium-3 mining vehicles.

From China Pursues Helium-3 on the Moon:

xxx

xxx

Blockchain as a technology and discursive formation represents the zenith of tech-empowerment rhetoric and the geopolitical imperatives of computational capitalism.

From (PDF) Blockchain Imperialism in the Pacific:

xxx

xxx

In order to guard against the loss of bank notes that were sent by Royal Mail, the Post Office issued an advertisement on the February 9. 1782 recommending that all persons who send banknotes in the post to cut them in half, and send them by different posts.

From Stockton banknote is example of how Royal Mail defeated highway robbery | The Northern Echo:

xxx

Generally speaking, if you are going to con someone, it’s best not to write a book about it.

In March this year, the man who wrote the book on scamming bookmakers, literally, was sentenced to 21 weeks in prison for following his own advice.

Jason Haddigan, author of How and Why I Conned the Bookies, was described in court as a “notorious conman.”

Haddigan pleaded guilty to two counts of fraud and two counts of fraud by false representation at Swansea Crown Court.

From Ladrokes Coral Bilked Out of £600K by Gang Using Laminated Banknotes:

xxx

xxx

The court heard the scam involved the gang covering £20 and £50 notes in plastic before entering them into self-service kiosks to register bets. Then they used a plastic cord attached to the banknote to yank it out of the machine.

From Ladrokes Coral Bilked Out of £600K by Gang Using Laminated Banknotes:

xxx

xxx

Some banks have already become a part of the super-app ecosystem by providing unbranded “banking as a service” to the apps, making all of this seamless integration possible. The regulatory framework around financial services is so onerous that many super-apps simply don’t want to navigate it themselves, especially across multiple markets and regulatory regimes.

From Rise of the super-app | Accenture Banking Blog:

xxx