Install the privacy-focused Tor Browser on your Chromebook in 4 simple steps – Chrome Unboxed

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More and more, security and privacy are becoming important factors for users looking to choose a web browser. While most major browsers such as Chrome, Firefox and Edge will allow users to limit the amount of data that is shared and what traces are left from browsing, that isnt the default behavior. For those wanting a more private browsing experience with the addition of relative anonymity, Tor Browser has become one of the most popular alternatives out there.

Im not that familiar with the internal workings of the Tor Browser but Ive seen a lot of users wanting to install it on their Chromebooks. So, Ive done a little research on how the Tor Browser works and why youd want to use it and threw together a quick tutorial on how to install it on a Linux-enabled Chromebook. First, well cover what Tor is not. The Tor Browser does NOT block ads like browsers such as Brave. The Tor Browser will protect your personal data, browsing history and behavior which will eliminate curated advertising but you will still see ads on websites.

The Tor Browser anonymizes user traffic with a network of circuits that sends as receives encrypted data that essentially hides the source IP. Tor also deletes all site data and cookies when the browser is closed and users can customize how much if any personal data can be utilized by the browser and websites that are accessed. Combined with a VPN like NordVPN, the Tor Browser is a powerful tool to help users stay completely anonymous online. Theres a lot more to the Tor Browser than I care to cover here but Toms Guide has a great breakdown of how Tor works and even how you can host a Tor relay to help expand the entire network.

While Tor may have gained popularity with some of the darker corners of the web, its equally useful for those who are simply concerned about privacy. As a matter of fact, an increasing number of government agencies are using Tor to assist in victim advocacy as the nature of the browser makes cyber-stalking quite difficult. Anyway, were here to figure out how to install the Tor Browser on a Chromebook. So, lets get started.

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This may be beating a dead horse but I never want to assume that someone reading this has already setup Linux on their Chromebook. If you are new to installing Linux (Beta) on Chrome OS, you can find the quick and simple setup guide here. Now, the Tor Browser doesnt live in the main Buster repository but thats okay. Where theres a will, there is a way and I have a way. You can technically install Tor using the tarball but it gets a little tricky once its unpacked. The method were going to use today only requires four commands in the terminal and then, youll be up and running.

First, we will have to add the repository that contains the Tor Browser. For this, were going to add the Buster backports. Whats a backport? Essentially, Debian backports are packages taken from the next release of the distro. Chrome OS users Debian 10 a.k.a. Buster. The next release, Debian 11, is named Bullseye. The backport for Buster comes from Bullseye. You can add the backports by editing the sources.list with a text editor but the easiest way is to run the following command.

Next, we will update the packages and install the Tor Browser. You can do this as two separate commands or in one single line. For our purposes, I will list the single line that will perform both functions. Paste the following into the terminal and hit enter.

All we have to do now is launch Tor and go through the initial setup. Once youve done this, you will find the desktop icon in your app launcher. Start Tor from the terminal with the following command. If youre a Firefox user, Tor may feel a bit familiar to you as it is built off of the same engine.

Note: If you want to remove the backports after installation, run this command in the terminal. sudo rm /etc/apt/sources.list.d/backports.list

This is another great example of how the addition of Linux apps has exponentially increased the capability of Chrome OS and in turn, opened the door to a wide range of new users. I know Ive said it before but I love tinkering with Crostini. If you have an app youd like me to test out, drop a comment or shoot us an email. I find a lot of these applications by simply poking around the web and looking at what users are trying to do on their Chromebooks. Its awesome to find ways to install and use these apps so users can get the most out of their devices.

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Install the privacy-focused Tor Browser on your Chromebook in 4 simple steps - Chrome Unboxed

Apple blocks third-party cookies in Safari – ZDNet

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Image: Nobbby

Starting today, with the release of Safari 13.1 and through updates to the Intelligent Tracking Prevention (ITP) privacy feature, Apple now blocks all third-party cookies in Safari by default.

The company's move means that online advertisers and analytics firms cannot use browser cookie files anymore to track users as they visit different sites across the internet.

But Apple says the move isn't actually a big deal, since they were already blocking most third-party cookies used for tracking anyway.

"It might seem like a bigger change than it is," said John Wilander, an Apple software engineer. "But we've added so many restrictions to ITP since its initial release in 2017 that we are now at a place where most third-party cookies are already blocked in Safari."

Apple's Safari has now become the second browser -- after the Tor Browser -- to block all third-party cookies by default for all its users.

However, while Apple was quicker to block third-party cookies in Safari, Google is actually the one who pushed browser makers towards making this move in the first place, in a May 2019 blog post.

At the time, Google announced plans to block third-party cookies by default in Chrome and in the Chromium open-source project, on which multiple other browsers are built.

Google released Chrome v80 at the start of February with support for third-party cookie blocking (under the name of SameSite cookies), but the feature won't fully roll out to all Chrome's users until 2022.

Microsoft's Edge, which runs a version of Google's Chromium open-source browser has also begun gradually blocking third-party cookies as well, but the feature is not enabled by default for all its users either.

Apple's decision today doesn't mean that Safari now blocks all user tracking, but only tracking methods that rely on planting a cookie file in Safari and (re-)checking that cookie time and time again to identify the user as he moves from site to site.

Other user tracking solutions, such as user/browser fingerprinting, will most likely continue to work.

Nonetheless, this is a major step in the right direction. With Google, Safari, Microsoft, and all the other Chromium-based browsers on board, now, the vast majority of current web browsers block third-party cookies or are on their way towards full blocks.

Besides blocking cookie-based tracking, Apple's decision today also has a benefit beyond privacy, and namely towards security.

By blocking third-party cookies, Apple has now also blocked an entire range of web attacks known as CSRF (cross-site request forgery).

More on the move and what it means to developers and website owners is available in the WebKit team's blog post.

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Apple blocks third-party cookies in Safari - ZDNet

Dark Web A cyber heaven of criminal activity – The Financial Express BD

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Md Hafez | Published: March 20, 2020 20:36:23 | Updated: March 20, 2020 20:37:54

The Internet refers to the global system of interconnected computer networks that use the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to link devices worldwide. It has brought massive revolution in our communication system and made our life easier. In almost everything we do, we use the Internet ordering a T-shirt, buying a mobile phone, sharing a moment with a friend, sending a picture over instant messaging. Before the Internet, if we wanted to keep up with the news, we had to walk down to the newsstand when it opened in the morning. But today a single click is enough to read local paper and any news source from anywhere in the world, updated up to the minute. According to Bangladesh Telecommunication Regulatory Commission (BTRC), the total number of Internet subscribers has reached 165.615 million at the end of January, 2020 from 157.544 million at the end of January, 2019.

At a first glance, the internet may seem like a cyber haven for the common people but reality is entirely different. Actually, it works as a double-edged sword, where the opportunity cost of convenience is cascading threats of cyber crimes; around 2,044 cases were filed with different police stations and the cyber tribunal over last six years, according to Cyber Tribunal (Bangladesh) data but the number of cybercrime cases was only three in 2013. Therefore, it is a high time to thoroughly understand this cyber world, spotlighting the cautionary tales.

The internet has three main parts namely surface web, deep web, and dark web. The surface web makes up about 10% of the whole internet, and includes anything that anyone can find by entering terms in a search engine like Google or Yahoo. The deep web is simply where information is stored that is not easily accessible by anyone. This includes anything that is protected by a password such as personal email, online banking, or other such sites. This section actually makes up the majority of the web. The dark web, a subset of deep web, is anything that is not accessible by standard browsers like Google Chrome or Firefox. Any type of information can reside on the dark web, it's merely dark because of its more limited accessibility.

The dark web attracts users who seek anonymity when conducting business. Motives of such anonymity can be noble, such as with journalists seeking to interview citizens of repressive countries, where communications are monitored. Contrarily, the anonymity of the dark web attracts criminal actors like drug-dealers, hackers, and child pornography peddlers. There is also a growing service economy within the dark web in which hit-men and other illegal operatives advertise their services in ways they could not do over conventional channels. These aspects should be enough for law enforcement agencies in Bangladesh, especially Counter-terrorism and Transnational Crime unit, to seriously keep an eye out on what's happening on the Dark Web. Any negligence would be the serious blunder.

People who are unaware about the mysterious Dark Web may think that complicated coding procedure is required to enter the dark web. Getting to the dark web is actually a lot easier than we might think. It's simply done by downloading a special software named as TOR browser (The Onion Router) which is totally free of cost. The dark web site is different from other website in terms of top level domain suffix. For example, the normal web site address ends with .com or .org but dark web address ends with .onion. 'TOR" servers are undetectable from search engines and offer users complete anonymity while surfing the web. These more secured features of anonymity in dark web attract criminals to perform commit crimes frequently. The dark web has flourished by bitcoin, the crypto-currency that enables two parties to conduct a trusted transaction without knowing each other's identity.

Surprisingly, 23 October, 2019, the BBC launched an .onion version (bbcnewsv2vjtpsuy.onion) of its news website on the TOR anonymizing network aimed at readers based in countries that ban its services. In October 2014, Facebook announced that users could connect to the website through a TOR onion service using the privacy-protecting TOR browser and encrypted using HTTPS. Now anyone with a TOR-enabled internet browser can visit https://facebookcorewwwi.onion/ to get a secure connection to Facebook's servers that provides end-to-end encryption. Ideally, this means that TOR users, some of whom may be using the software to circumvent government restrictions of the internet in places such as China, Iran, will be able to get onto Facebook reliably and without worrying about leaking their identifying information. For instance, if you open a Facebook account from Bangladesh using "facebookcorewwwi.onion"- it can appear that you're in U.S.A. Thus, it will create a safe cyber heaven for hackers and crackers who can fulfill their evil interests.

In Bangladesh, everyday many teenagers are victimized by a group of hackers who use TOR server to hack Facebook account and start blackmailing in different ways. The victims don't get help from the law enforcement agencies because they can't identify hackers. Therefore, it is a right time to take initiatives by law enforcement agencies in Bangladesh to increase surveillance on what is happening on the dark web. Otherwise, militants, terrorists, fundamentalist groups and hackers come back strongly which will be out of control.

Md. Hafez is Assistant Professor, at the School of Business, Ahsanullah University of Science and Technology, Email: hafez_du94@hotmail.com

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Dark Web A cyber heaven of criminal activity - The Financial Express BD

NetAbstraction Announces Support for Private and Secure Access to the Dark Web #48955 – New Kerala

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NetAbstraction has expanded the number of network egress nodes available to customers to include a TOR egress node, which enables private, secure and isolated access to Dark Web sites via a native Firefox, Google Chrome or Safari browser.

NetAbstraction's malware-protected browsing solution provides end-to-end privacy and security for online research, investigations and Dark Web activities. Leveraging browser isolation technology and NetAbstraction's obfuscated network, customers can isolate their Internet activity to a one-time use Virtual Machine (VM), and insulate their networks and devices from cyber threats, tracking cookies and Internet privacy risks. NetAbstraction's TOR egress node enables customer to browse dark-web sites, in a private and isolated fashion, directly within their native web browser.

For commercial organizations and government agencies interested in performing investigative research, intelligence collection or other activities on the Dark Web, it is clear; simply using the TOR browser does not protect anonymity or local networks from cyber threats. NetAbstraction's Malware Protected Browser solution and disguised network connectivity provide the isolation and network segmentation needed to prevent traceability while operating on the Dark Web.

NetAbstraction Capabilities

NetAbstraction is a cloud-based Network Privacy-as-a-Service offering that makes businesses a difficult target for hackers, search engine optimization companies and adversaries by disguising and dynamically shifting network communications.

NetAbstraction does this by transparently distributing communications within and across multiple clouds, and regularly churning the underlying network infrastructure.

This process obscures enterprise information, origination location and identity, and enables enterprises to confidently conduct secure business on the internet.

Key Features

Interface agnostic currently supporting Lightweight Browser Plugin, OpenVPN, Mobile routers, and Custom User-Defined solutions.Carrier-class network performance enables lossless streaming video and real-time access to all forms of Internet content.Leverages multiple cloud providers for ingress and egress to provide a range of persona management options.NetAbstraction is NOT a Proxy!

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NetAbstraction Announces Support for Private and Secure Access to the Dark Web #48955 - New Kerala

Like freedom? Then you won’t like the FREEDOM Act – The Highland County Press

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By Dr. Ron PaulFormer CongressmanThe Ron Paul Institutehttp://ronpaulinstitute.org/

Last Monday, a bipartisan group of senators and a coalition including libertarian and progressive activists thwarted a scheme to ram through the Senate legislation renewing three provisions of the USA FREEDOM Act (previously known as the USA PATRIOT Act).

The bill had already been rushed through the House of Representatives, and most expected it to sail through the Senate. But instead, Senate leadership had to settle for a 77-day extension.

Senate leadership was also forced to allow consideration of several amendments at a later date. Included is Sen. Rand Pauls amendment that would forbid the FISA court from issuing warrants targeting American citizens.

Deep state supporters claim the expiring business records provision (which authorizes the collection of our communications and was at the center of Edward Snowdens 2013 revelations), lone wolf provision (which allows government to subject an individual with no known ties to terrorists to warrantless surveillance), and roving wiretaps provision (which allows government to monitor communications on any device that may be used by a targeted individual) are necessary to keep Americans safe.

But since Congress first passed the PATRIOT Act almost 20 years ago, mass surveillance, warrantless wiretapping, and bulk data collection have not stopped a single terrorist attack.

The legislation does have reforms aimed at protecting civil liberties, but these new protections contain loopholes that render the protections meaningless. For example, the bill requires those targeted for surveillance to be notified that the government spied on them. However, this requirement can be waived if the government simply claims not proves but just clams that notifying the target would harm national security.

The notice provision also only applies to the target of an investigations. So, if you were caught up in a federal investigation because a coworker is being targeted and you shared an office computer, or if a store clerk reported to the government you and others bought pressure cookers, the government could collect your phone records, texts, and social media posts without giving you the chance to challenge the governments actions.

The bill also makes some reforms to the special FISA court, which serves as a rubber stamp for the intelligence community. These reforms are mainly aimed at protecting political campaigns and candidates. They would not stop the FISA court from rubber-stamping surveillance on organizations that oppose the welfare-warfare-surveillance-fiat money status quo.

Anything limiting warrantless wiretapping and mass surveillance should be supported. However, nothing short of repeal of the USA FREEDOM Act will restore respect for our right to live our lives free of the fear that Big Brother is watching.

The path to liberty, peace, and prosperity starts with eliminating all unconstitutional laws and returning to a system of limited government, free markets, individual liberty, sound money and a foreign policy that seeks peaceful commerce and friendship with all instead of seeking new monsters to destroy.

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Like freedom? Then you won't like the FREEDOM Act - The Highland County Press

Against the coronavirus corporate bailout | TheHill – The Hill

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Americans should oppose the nearly $2 trillion corporate bailout bill masquerading as stimulus currently under negotiation in the U.S. Senate. This profligate spending will do little to help the American economy or average citizens in the long run. But the additional debt added to an already whopping $1 trillion 2020 federal deficit will plague taxpayers for years.

Long-run thinking, though, is not in vogue in Washington, D.C. Perhaps our president, senators, and U.S. representatives are beyond hope. Perhaps they have fully embraced state control of the economy. The American people have not and if our elected representatives vote yes on this rushed and unholy bill, we should vote no on them in the fall.

We are in a dramatically deflationary period, with vast parts of the U.S. economy shut down due to the COVID-19 virus. More money and more cheap credit cant stimulate anything in such an environment, because money and credit arent goods and services. It can and will, however, saddle future generations of Americans with more debt misery and entrench a standard of moral hazard for corporations from which free markets may never recover.

The correct response to the current economic crisis is simple and painful. First, get America back to work as soon as possible. Humanitarian concerns and economic concerns are not in conflict; in fact, they are closely linked. An economic depression is far deadlier than any virus, and tradeoffs are required.A poorer America is an America with far worse public health.

Second, allow existing bankruptcy and insolvency processes to run their course. Bailouts are not the answer, new owners who can turn companies around are. Corporate assets, contracts and products dont disappear in bankruptcy. Yes, there will be pain as many (not all) existing employees lose their jobs. But executives and boards of failing companies should lose their jobs first and foremost, and new shareholders should seek clawbacks of ill-deserved bonuses and stock compensation.

Again, this will not be pretty but shareholders, not taxpayers, must bear the economic burden when companies fail.

As with most emergency spending legislation, this proposed bill is lengthy and its details are fuzzy. But todays Wall Street Journal sums up the whole sordid process nicely: Lobbyists Pile On to Get Wins for Clients Into Coronavirus Stimulus Package.

Among these opportunities: $500 billion in business loans from the U.S. Treasury, which means backed by you and me. Seventy billion dollars is earmarked for airlines and their suppliers, including Boeing, Delta, United and General Electric.

Airlines especially deserve scrutiny for approaching the public trough. Several reportedly spent more than 95 percent of their free cash flow in recent years on stock buybacks. That money was wasted, vaporized by the drop in their share prices over the last week. If they need money now, they have several choices: Borrow, sell stock or sell airplanes. Theirs is a particularly cyclical and volatile industry; dont executives remember the falloff of travel after 9/11? Why dont they hold more operating cash?

The unasked question lurking underneath the Senate bill is this: How do we pay for it all? Congress doesnt have $2 trillion to spend, and 2020 tax receipts wont begin to cover the bill. This means the federal government will effectively print the money, likely in a circuitous way by issuing new Treasury debt and using the Federal Reserve Bank as a backstop to buy it all if investors wont. And what sort of investor wants to loan Uncle Sam money for 10 years at less than 1 percent interest anyway?

At least Sen. Bernie SandersBernie SandersAgainst the coronavirus corporate bailout The Hill's Campaign Report: Biden seeks to counter Trump on coronavirus Largest public sector union endorses Biden MORE (I-Vt.) is more honest: He thinks government simply should give Americans money every month, with or without a crisis. We now see plainly that congressional Republicans agree with him, at least conditionally. What a sad state of affairs.

If the bailout of 2008 had worked, U.S. companies would not need a bailout today. They would have thanked their lucky stars then, and focused on building healthier balance sheets with more cash and less debt. Let new owners, not American taxpayers, save them today.

Jeff Deist, former chief of staff for Rep. Ron Paul (R-Texas), is president of the Mises Institute, a non-profit think tank that promotes teaching and research in the Austrian school of economics.

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Against the coronavirus corporate bailout | TheHill - The Hill

Rand Paul Proves He Is Too Good For Us, As He Upsets the Right People – The Liberator Online

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This article was featured in our weekly newsletter, the Liberator Online. To receive it in your inbox, sign up here.

Kentucky Senator Rand Paul is notorious for being a principled voice for limited constitutional government. Even better, he amuses us with how swiftly he induces tantrums among the political establishments flunkies.

Aside from President Donald Trump, its Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell who is usually the face of evil for liberals. But on Tuesday night, an NBC News story, based on two anonymous McConnell-linked sources, redirected the ire squarely on Paul.

What did the libertarian ophthalmologist-turned-politician do to deserve this? He did his job.

Paul proposed an amendment to the coronavirus bill being rushed through the Senate after passing the House 363-40. For those keeping track, libertarian-leaning Republican Thomas Massie didnt vote, and libertarian-leaning Independent Congressman Justin Amash voted present.

Pauls amendment, according to NBC News reporter Julie Tsirkin, was officially summarized as: To amend the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 to require a social security number for the purposes of the child tax credit, to provide the President the authority to transfer funds as necessary and to terminate United States military operations and reconstruction activities in Afghanistan.

Twitter is littered with righteous indignation constantly, but Tuesday night, it was mostly directed at Paul. And it was mostly thanks to the NBC News story poorly co-written by Tsirkin.

Before getting into the catty tone of the article, lets consider the actual concerns people have with Pauls amendment.

First, isnt there a national emergency going on? Now isnt the time for nitpicking whats legal under the Constitution or how Congress appropriates funds. Theres no time for delay, were led to believe.

The answer to this critique is short, because there simply is no delay in voting beyond a few minutes just because an amendment is proposed. All of this drama is just political theatre, with McConnell aides directing the show.

Second, and perhaps more reasonably, it may be asked what the war in Afghanistan has to do with this coronavirus. That almost begs the question though. Why is Congress leaping to this hot new political commodity known as a coronavirus when theyve skirted their true duties for so long?

Beyond the deadly Afghanistan misadventure being a drain on financial resources, its worth investigating how human resources are wasting away, mired down in that desert. In Syria, most of the U.S. troops are from the South Carolina National Guard. Might be nice to have them here!

Here Paul is doing the job all the other senators are supposed to be doing. Unfortunately for him, it doesnt fit into the narrative most comfortable for the political and media elites.

As a result, we end up with junior high school level journalism weaponized against patriotic dissent.

Paul is notorious for forcing votes on amendments he knows will not pass, the NBC News story goes.

It concluded in a similar fashion: He even briefly caused the government to shut down in 2018, using a procedural tactic to block the Senate from meeting the deadline to keep the government open because he objected to the price tag.

Both of these statements are lies, though the authors probably believe them. Its a sure sign of the deep divisions in the country.

Whether its the 9/11 Victims bill, the Ukrainegate impeachment failure, or foreign aid, Paul consistently upsets the right people by doing the right thing. This doesnt mean Paul is perfect, but it does mean Americans should appreciate his special role in Washington, DC.

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Rand Paul Proves He Is Too Good For Us, As He Upsets the Right People - The Liberator Online

7 Self-Isolation Tips From Scott Kelly, the NASA Astronaut Who Lived a Year in Space – Observer

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French philosopher Blaise Pascal foresaw modern societys core trouble back in the 17th century. All of humanitys problems stem from mans inability to sit quietly in a room alone, he said. And, thanks to the coronavirus, thats exactly the position we are suddenly, collectively stuck in at the moment.

But perhaps one man struggles with being socially isolated a little less than the rest of us. Between March 2015 and March 2016, now retired NASA astronaut Scott Kelly lived on the International Space Station for nearly a year. It was the longest a human had lived away from Earth. And it wasnt easy, Kelly recalled in an essay for The New York Times published on Saturday.

SEE ALSO:How to Make Work-From-Home Productive During a Pandemic: Expert Tips

But I learned some things during my time up there that Id like to share, he wrote, because they are about to come in handy again, as we all confine ourselves at home to help stop the spread of the coronavirus.

So, here are seven tips from Kelly to those who find it difficult to sit quietly by themselves.

On the space station, my time was scheduled tightly, from the moment I woke up to when I went to sleep, Kelly wrote. His normal tasks range from simple five-minute tasks to a spacewalk that could last hours. But its important that you have something planned. Maintaining a plan will help you and your family adjust to a different work and home life environment, he said.

(Also, as remote working experts advised to Observer previously, establish some sort of a routine, such as getting dressed in the morning, will help boost productivity.)

When you are living and working in the same place for days on end, work can have a way of taking over everything if you let it, Kelly warned. [Writing this article at 9 p.m. on a Monday, I can totally attest to that statement.] Living in space, I deliberately paced myself because I knew I was in it for the long haul just like we all are today.

To maintain a healthy pace, Kelly recommends carving out time for non-work activities, whether binge-watching your favorite TV shows or setting a strict time to go to bed.

This may soon be hard to do as authorities tighten self-quarantine rules. But until then, Kelly recommends going outside at least once a day, as long as you abide by social distancing and stay at least six feet from other people.

If you really cant sit still, find something to do or somewhere else (figuratively) to be. Kelly recommends reading. The quiet and absorption you can find in a physical bookone that doesnt ping you with notifications or tempt you to open a new tabis priceless, he wrote.

Learning a musical instrument is another good idea. So are making some art or trying a handcraft.

Based on studies on humans living in prolonged isolation, NASA has found that keeping a journal is one of the most effective activities that keep people sane, Kelly said.

Even if you dont wind up writing a book based on your journal like I did, writing about your days will help put your experiences in perspective and let you look back later on what this unique time in history has meant, the astronaut wrote.

This one is self-evident. Scientists have found that isolation is damaging not only to our mental health, but to our physical health as well, especially our immune systems, Kelly warned. Technology makes it easier than ever to keep in touch, so its worth making time to connect with someone every dayit might actually help you fight off viruses.

Living in space taught me a lot about the importance of trusting the advice of people who knew more than I did about their subjects, Kelly wrote. This doesnt mean that you have to follow his advice during self-quarantine. But when it comes to news and updates about the coronavirus, you should make an effort to go to reputable sources and avoid suspicious content on social media.

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7 Self-Isolation Tips From Scott Kelly, the NASA Astronaut Who Lived a Year in Space - Observer

Want to help design a moon robot? NASA needs you. – Big Think

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Are you an engineer, designer, manufacturer, or STEM student? Maybe just someone with a healthy predilection for bucket drums? Then NASA wants to hear from you.

NASA's Lunar Surface Innovation Initiative (LSII) is sponsoring a challenge hosted by GrabCAD to garner ideas for a bucket drum system to be equipped on the Regolith Advanced Surface Systems Operations Robot (RASSOR) excavator. LSII is a technology development portfolio aimed at empowering human-robotic exploration of the Moon and, one day, Mars.

RASSOR 2.0 being tested along with the MARCO POLO/Mars Pathfinder, an ISRU propellant production technology, at the Kennedy Space Center, Florida.

(Photo: NASA)

The RASSOR excavatora "tele-operated mobile robotic platform"is being iterated at NASA Kennedy Space Center. Its current 2.0 design looks like it was built with a life-size K'NEX set. Four giant tread wheels surround the main platform, which has two arms coming out from either side.

At the end of each arm is a giant bucket drum with hollow cylinders for scoping up regolith, the layer of rocky material that covers bedrock. As the bucket drums on each arm counter-rotate, baffles within trap the regolith to prevent it from falling out as the excavator roams. When RASSOR reaches its deposit site, the drums reverse direction to spill their contents.

NASA's challenge for participants is to design a better shape for the RASSOR's bucket drums and interior baffling. The drums must be able to hold regolith at 50 percent capacity without spillage. That's easier said than done, and for most people, it likely didn't sound that easy in the first.

"With RASSOR, we're no longer relying on the traction or the weight of the robot," Jason Schuler, a robotics engineer in the Exploration Research and Technology Programs at Kennedy Space Center, told CNN. "RASSOR is excavation and transportation all in one, but we'd like to improve the design.

The reason the RASSOR can't rely on traction or weight has to do with the Moon's weaker gravity. On Earth, an excavator's weight and traction can be used to overcome soil's resistive force. The Moon's gravity is only 17 percent that of Earth's, so the RASSOR cannot rely on reaction force to penetrate the regolith, especially at depths with high density. For this reason, it must incorporate near "net-zero reaction force."

The RASSOR must also be much lighter than a typical excavator while maintaining the durability and reliability required to work in such an extreme environment. With space transportation costs at about $4,000 a pound, any pound shed or square foot condensed from the design equals thousands of dollars saved.

The RASSOR will be part of NASA's Artemis program. Through Artemis, NASA hopes to put the first woman and thirteenth man on the Moonthe first people to revisit to the lunar surface in more than 40 years. Once there, the goal is to establish sustained Moon exploration by 2028, a proving ground for the technology that may one day send astronauts to Mars.

To establish sustained exploration, NASA must practice in-situ resource utilization (ISRU). This practice allows astronauts to generate much-needed resources using local materials. The farther astronauts travel from Earth, the more necessary ISRU becomes to maintaining sustainable, human-friendly habitats.

RASSOR will travel to the Moon as a precursor to human moonflight. Coupled with a lander sporting a processing plant, the robot excavator will journey onto the Moon's surface to excavate regolith. It will deposit that regolith at the lander for processing.

Regolith can be processed into valuable resources such as water, propellant, and breathable air. It also contains metals that could be used to craft structures for the astronaut's labs and habitats.

NASA is working toward launching Artemis 1an uncrewed flight to test the Orion spacecraftlater this year, but had to suspend work on the rocket due to the COVID-19 threat.

The GrabCAD challenge has a prize pool totaling $7,000. The first-place proposal will be awarded $3,000, with monetary prizes offered for second to fifth place. There is also the satisfaction and bragging rights of knowing your design will make sustained Moon exploration a reality.

The challenge ends on April 20, 2020. Finalists will be announced on April 27, and winners will be announced on May 4. To learn more, visit GrabCAD's website.

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Want to help design a moon robot? NASA needs you. - Big Think

NASA news: Space agency reveals stunning image of heart of the Milky Way – Express.co.uk

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X-ray images from NASA have shown the middle of our galaxy in stunning detail. The image from the space agency shows a plethora of stunning colours caused by gasses heated up to one million degrees Celsius and a supermassive black hole, Sagittarius A*, which has a mass of around four million times that of the Sun.

Neutron stars and white dwarf stars tearing materials apart also contribute to the bright centre of the Milky Way.

NASA said of the image: "The central region of our galaxy, the Milky Way, contains an exotic collection of objects, including a supermassive black hole weighing about 4 million times the mass of the Sun (called Sagittarius A*), clouds of gas at temperatures of millions of degrees, neutron stars and white dwarf stars tearing material from companion stars and beautiful tendrils of radio emission."

Sagittarius A* has a radius of 22 million kilometres and a mass of more than four million times that of the Sun. In other words, it is very dense.

And because it is so heavy, it has the ability to completely stretch out space-time to a point where one minute on the edge of Sagittarius A* will see 700 years pass on Earth.

Emma Osborne, an astrophysicist at the University of Southampton, told an audience at New Scientist Live: Anything mass will stretch space-time. And the heavier something is, or the more mass it has, the more it will stretch space-time.

If you were to stand just outside the event horizon of Sagittarius A*, and you stood there for one minute, 700 years would pass because time passes so much slower in the gravitational field there than it does on Earth.

There are a few ways in which a black hole can form.

Scientists believe the most common instance is when a star, thousands of times the size of the Sun, collapses in on itself when it dies - known as a supernova.

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NASA news: Space agency reveals stunning image of heart of the Milky Way - Express.co.uk

NASA Fixes Mars Lander By Telling It to Hit Itself With a Shovel – Futurism

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Percussive Maintenance

NASAs InSightlander, which is currently on the surface of Mars, has faced some unexpected problems during its mission to explore and study the planet.

Namely, a digging probe that was built to burrow beneath the surface like a jackhammer got stuck because Mars soil is clumpier than scientists expected,PopularScience reports.

After a few failed attempts to get it out, NASA had to get a bit creative. Ultimately, it freed the probe up by giving it a solid thwack with InSights shovel.

NASA expected its probe, dubbed the mole, to dig its way through sand-like terrain. But because the Martian soil clumped together, the whole apparatus got stuck in place.

Programming InSights robotic arm to land down on the mole was a risky, last-resort maneuver, PopSci reports, because it risked damaging fragile power and communication lines that attached nearby. Thankfully, engineers spent a few months practicing in simulations before they made a real attempt.

With tentative results that the mole is working again, NASA hopes to again task it with burrowing beneath the surface of Mars.

Once its down there, it will hopefully be able to complete its research mission: analyzing temperature fluctuations inside the Red Planet in an attempt to understand how similar Mars core is to that of Earth.

READ MORE: At long last, NASAs probe finally digs in on Mars [Popular Science]

More on InSight: NASA Isnt Sure Whats Wrong With Its InSight Mars Lander

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NASA Fixes Mars Lander By Telling It to Hit Itself With a Shovel - Futurism

NASA Experiment Weakens String Theory, but Doesn’t Disprove It – Popular Mechanics

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NASA/Chandra X-ray Observatory

Could some observations from a faraway galaxy add up to a refutation of string theory? Researchers who study data from NASAs Chandra Observatory think so.

Its difficult to prove somethings absence from the universe, but in the Perseus galaxy cluster, scientists found no signs of a type of boson called an axion-like particle they say is integral to some kinds of string theory.

Rather than damning for any particular form of string theory, the researchers say this was really a special opportunity to test these theories firsthand. For five days, the Chandra X-ray Observatory combed the Perseus galaxy cluster for evidence of extremely low-mass particles including axions and axion-like particles. Axions are one thing, but more variable and convertible axion-like particles are the key item in this experiment.

Galaxy clusters are giganticso large that theyre the biggest single body of things that gravity can still hold together. At the heart of the Perseus cluster is a giant black hole, and its this flow and pull, into the black hole from the rest of the cluster, where Chandra used a full spectrum of x-ray signals to search for axions and axion-like particles. The tiny particles cause distortions that can be detected by the x-rays.

There's no way around it: The lack of evidence in this experiment is disappointing. If physicists are basically panning the universe for gold in the form of axion-like particles, theyve gotten down to a strainer small enough to snag a billionth of an electron and still not found the gold. Now, they say, the options are more like Goldilocks: the axion-like particles are smaller than we thought, much larger than we thought (and therefore out of Chandras gauged range this time), or theyre just not there at all. This study is four times finer and 100 more powerful than previous observations could be.

String theory offers a way to harmonize all of physics together, something that was easier before scientists began to turn their minds toward outer space, posit the existence of bosons and other wildly tiny subatomic particles, and theorize about dark matter. Its hard to believe theres no unifying theory out there to be found, and intuitively we feel like the world is operating by some consistent idea.

But to formulate concrete suggestions and theories has required a great deal of calculation and position of these theoretical pieces that glue each theory together. If real observation doesnt reveal the right glue, that helps scientists continue to develop their theories.

These constraints dig into the range of properties suggested by string theory, and may help string theorists weed their theories, coauthor Dr. Helen Russell said in a NASA statement.

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NASA Experiment Weakens String Theory, but Doesn't Disprove It - Popular Mechanics

Nasa: ‘potentially hazardous’ asteroid will skim Earth this week – Metro.co.uk

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It should pass at a distance of about 4 million miles (Science Photo Library)

Nasa is constantly on the lookout for asteroids that may pose a threat to life on Earth.

These so-called near-Earth objects (NEOs) need to pass within a certain threshold to be considered potentially hazardous.

And the experts at the US space agency say there is one such rock on the radar for this week. The asteroid 2012 XA133 is set to pass Earth on Thursday, March 26 at a speed of 53,000mph.

The asteroid measures approximately 1,280 feet (390m) wide, which is enough to cause a major impact on Earth if it collided with the planet. Thankfully, Nasa engineers calculate the trajectory of the asteroid will take it safely past us.

Its believed to pass 0.04453 astronomical units (AU) or roughly 4.1 million miles from the center of Earth. A single AU describes the distance from Earth to the sun roughly 93 million miles.

As they orbit the Sun, NEOs can occasionally approach close to Earth, Nasa explained.

Note that a close passage astronomically can be very far away in human terms: millions or even tens of millions of kilometres.

Alongside Nasa, the European Space Agency (ESA) is also tracking the asteroid. Its actually one of about six that are being tracked as they pass Earth this week but its the only one falling into the potentially hazardous category.

Potentially Hazardous Asteroids (PHAs) are currently defined based on parameters that measure the asteroids potential to make threatening close approaches to the Earth, Nasa said in a statement.

On a daily basis, about one hundred tons of interplanetary material drifts down to the Earths surface, said Nasas Center for Near-Earth Object Studies (CNEOS).

Most of the smallest interplanetary particles that reach the Earths surface are the tiny dust particles that are released by comets as their ices vaporize in the solar neighborhood.

The vast majority of the larger interplanetary material that reaches the Earths surface originates as the collision fragments of asteroids that have run into one another some eons ago.

The agency does go into some detail about would would happen if one of these rocks did end up smashing into us: With an average interval of about 10,000 years, rocky or iron asteroids larger than about 100 meters would be expected to reach the Earths surface and cause local disasters or produce the tidal waves that can inundate low lying coastal areas.

On an average of every several hundred thousand years or so, asteroids larger than a kilometer could cause global disasters. In this case, the impact debris would spread throughout the Earths atmosphere so that plant life would suffer from acid rain, partial blocking of sunlight, and from the firestorms resulting from heated impact debris raining back down upon the Earths surface.

Since their orbital paths often cross that of the Earth, collisions with near-Earth objects have occurred in the past and we should remain alert to the possibility of future close Earth approaches. It seems prudent to mount efforts to discover and study these objects, to characterize their sizes, compositions and structures and to keep an eye upon their future trajectories.

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Nasa: 'potentially hazardous' asteroid will skim Earth this week - Metro.co.uk

Ethereum Rallies 10% and Primed To Continue Higher Towards $150 – newsBTC

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Ethereum is up around 10% and it traded above the key $130 resistance against the US Dollar. ETH price is likely to continue higher towards the $150 resistance if it clears $140.

After testing the $120 support, Ethereum started a fresh increase against the US Dollar. ETH price remained well bid above the $120 level, resulting in an upside break above $122 and $125.

The bulls were able to lead the price above the key $130 resistance and the 100 hourly simple moving average. Moreover, there was a break above a major bearish trend line with resistance near $126 on the hourly chart of ETH/USD.

Ethereum Price

The pair is now trading nicely above the $135 resistance, but it is facing another major resistance near the $138 and $140 levels. The recent swing high was formed near $138 before the price declined below the 23.6% Fib retracement level of the upward move from the $119 swing low to $138 high.

However, Ethereum remained well bid above the $128 level. The 50% Fib retracement level of the upward move from the $119 swing low to $138 high is also acting as a strong support.

On the upside, the bulls need to gain pace above the $138 and $140 resistance levels. If they succeed, there are high chances of more gains towards the $150 resistance in the near term.

On the downside, Ethereum is likely to remain well bid near the $128 level. The 100 hourly simple moving average is also positioned near the $128 level to provide support.

If there is a downside break below the 100 hourly SMA, it could change the current bias. In the stated case, the next major support is visible near the $120 level. Any further losses may perhaps spark an extended decline towards the $105 and $100 support levels in the near term.

Technical Indicators

Hourly MACD The MACD for ETH/USD is slowly losing momentum in the bullish zone.

Hourly RSI The RSI for ETH/USD is currently correcting lower from the 65 level.

Major Support Level $128

Major Resistance Level $140

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Ethereum Rallies 10% and Primed To Continue Higher Towards $150 - newsBTC

Ethereum Climbs 10% In Rally – Yahoo Finance

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Investing.com - Ethereum was trading at $136.02 by 19:59 (23:59 GMT) on the Investing.com Index on Monday, up 10.01% on the day. It was the largest one-day percentage gain since March 23.

The move upwards pushed Ethereum's market cap up to $14.83B, or 0.00% of the total cryptocurrency market cap. At its highest, Ethereum's market cap was $135.58B.

Ethereum had traded in a range of $120.20 to $136.93 in the previous twenty-four hours.

Over the past seven days, Ethereum has seen a rise in value, as it gained 19.63%. The volume of Ethereum traded in the twenty-four hours to time of writing was $14.10B or 0.00% of the total volume of all cryptocurrencies. It has traded in a range of $109.6742 to $151.8461 in the past 7 days.

At its current price, Ethereum is still down 90.44% from its all-time high of $1,423.20 set on January 13, 2018.

Bitcoin was last at $6,468.8 on the Investing.com Index, up 10.00% on the day.

XRP was trading at $0.15862 on the Investing.com Index, a gain of 6.77%.

Bitcoin's market cap was last at $117.60B or 0.00% of the total cryptocurrency market cap, while XRP's market cap totaled $6.91B or 0.00% of the total cryptocurrency market value.

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Ethereum Climbs 10% In Rally - Yahoo Finance

Ethereum Price Analysis: ETH/USD looming freefall to $100 and how to avoid it – FXStreet

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Ethereum price inability to sustain gains above $120 is putting it a risk of freefalling to $100. The path of least resistance remains downwards although all the top three cryptocurrencies are showing signs of stability. Attempts to break above the seller congestion zone at $120 fizzled out at $118.44 (intraday high). ETH/USD has explored levels slightly under $115 support forming an intraday low at $114.38.

The prevailing trend remains strongly bearish but the low volatility means that fast movements downwards are unlikely in the current session. The 1-hour chart shows Ether trading between a resistance and support moving average. Whereby the 100 SMA is capping gains at $120 while the 50 SMA is in line to offer support at $114.93.

A triangle breakout is likely in the coming sessions. Unfortunately, it could result in more losses targeting the $100 support especially if the RSI continues with the downward motion under the average (50). At the same time, if support at $114 - $115 holds, Ethereum could remain stable and allow the bulls to gather the strength to overcome the hurdles at $120.

Support 1: $111 Highlighted by the 161.8% Fibonacci one-minute.

Support two: $102.21 The previous year low.

Resistance: $118 Previous high 4-hour, Fibo 23.6% one-day and the pivot point one-month support two.

Resistance two: $122 Previous high one-day, pivot point one-day and resistance one.

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Ethereum Price Analysis: ETH/USD looming freefall to $100 and how to avoid it - FXStreet

Ethereum (ETH) Price Heading to Test $140, Analyst Says – U.Today

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After dropping to $99.08 on March 13, Ethereum (ETH) has managed to recover a little and at the time of writing is trading at the $120 level.

Traders are offering multiple scenarios on the coins further movement. Still they believe that the first thing Ethereum will do is test higher price levels.

Analyst Crypto Michael has shared his take on the ETH price scenario. Michael van de Poppe states that ETH is holding in the green area and expects it to rise high enough to test the $140 zone.

The analyst also says that should ETH lose turn red, he would expectit to go down towards $103-$80.

Trader TamasAron from TradingView has shared an ETH/USDT chart on his page, on whichhe shows the way he expects ETH to move from its currentposition.

As per TamasAron, the second biggest currency is going to rise to $128 first but then it is likely to decline to the $79 zone. Both movements are going to be made within a downward trend, as per the chart.

Trader Evgenicys from TradingView has put his prediction on the ETH price simply bearflag.

Must Read

As reported by U.Today previously, a blockchain researcher and a Placeholder partner Chris Burniske tweeted that Bitcoin and Ethereum are likely to recover from their recent large-scale losses faster than other cryptocurrencies along with a few other coins.

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Ethereum (ETH) Price Heading to Test $140, Analyst Says - U.Today

Ethereum is Laying the Groundwork to See an Explosive Rally Towards $140 – newsBTC

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Ethereum and the entire crypto market has continued trading sideways today despite the decline seen in the U.S. stock market, with Bitcoin showing some signs of breaking its correlation with the traditional markets.

Analysts are now noting that the strong support Ethereum has established within the lower-$100 region may just be enough to send it higher in the days and weeks ahead, with one prominent trader explaining that it could soon rally up towards $140.

Despite this, there is a bearish technical formation that ETH is currently caught within that bulls need to invalidate, as an inability to do so could open the gates for further losses.

At the time of writing, Ethereum is trading down marginally at its current price of $114, which is around where it has been trading at throughout the past several days.

This stability has come about as a result of that seen by Bitcoin, which has been hovering within the lower-$5,000 region over the past couple of days, following a brief visit to lows of $4,600 this past Monday.

Importantly, it does appear that Ethereum is currently caught within a bear pennant despite its ability to find some stability, which could be a dire sign that means further downside is imminent.

Jonny Moe, a popular analyst, spoke about this in a recent tweet, telling his followers that this could be a bearish sign for the crypto in the near-term.

If youre leaning bullish, ETH sure looks like a cleaner pennant, he said.

Michal van de Poppe, another well-respected cryptocurrency analyst and trader, explained in a recent tweet that he believes the support Ethereum has established within the lower-$100 region could be enough to send it rallying higher in the days ahead.

Similar here for Ethereum. Holding green and I expect a test of $135-140 to occur. However, losing green and Ill be targeting $80/92/103 as next levels, probably around the lows, he explained while pointing to the levels on the below chart.

If bulls are able to defend the key aforementioned support and push Ethereum higher in the near-term, it will invalidate the bear pennant discussed by Moe, and open the gates for significantly further upside.

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Ethereum is Laying the Groundwork to See an Explosive Rally Towards $140 - newsBTC

Ethereum Price Analysis: Big chart pattern on the hourly chart – FXStreet

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Ethereum has fallen once again on Wednesday but nothing compared to the massacre over the last few weeks. The pair has fallen around 11% year to date and over 59% from the yearly highs. Despite this, it seems the bears are still in control but only just as the market has started to consolidate just above the 100 level.

On the chart below, there is quite a large triangle that has been formed on the 1-hour chart. The price is now moving toward the apex of the pattern but it has been noted that the volume has dropped off in a big way. The resistance level to beat is around 113.16 while the major support is at 90.00.

Looking at the higher timeframe, the volume in March has been at its highest levels on the Coinbase exchange. It is hard to believe that the volume is at a higher level than the boom time in early 2018.

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Ethereum Price Analysis: Big chart pattern on the hourly chart - FXStreet

Ethereum (ETH) Vitalik Buterin retweeted on Proof of Isolation Concept for an App highlighting Quarantine – The Cryptocurrency Analytics

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Ethereum retweeted: The world may have stopped, but #Ethereum 2.0 keeps on chugging. Ive made eth2.news up to date with all the latest, and I even dare to express an opinion or two. Some of the investors are having to state that they are preparing their bags to rise through the recession period.

The latest from the Ethereum developer world is Tenderly Pro. In their announcement about their Tenderly App, they state that it is the next-generation platform for all the smart contracts and Dapps needs. Several teams and companies are building their next generation of WebApps. The Beta was open to the public. The Tenderly is now out of the Beta.

The Tenderly Pro consists of everything that the developers have been using so far. Also, to what is already there, it can simulate transactions without having to submit them on-chain, which means it is possible via an API. Advanced Analytics caters to sophisticated dApps and Protocols. Provides with Tenderly tooling for local Ganache or Geth transactions. Webhooks provides real-time notifications for smart contracts and a lot of other features.

Vitalik.eth tweeted: Its quadratic funding season again! Make sure to contribute to the projects you think are valuable.

Vitalik retweeted about Peter Szilagyi: Spent a bit of time putting together a proof of concept interface for a #coronavirus #SocialDistance aiding mobile app. Id like to request some early feedback to decide whether to pursue it or not. PS: Im not a UI/UX engineer, so dont crap on the visuals. 1/10.

In reply to Peter, a user replied: An app where infected people could share their GPS history (anonymously) would be sweet. Many feel, this can be a brilliant idea.

Some opine that the delivery company will be formed around proof-of-isolation with a 24/7 video feed + geolocation analyzed by machine learning.

The App that Peter prospects to build is expected to report different statuses like self-suspect, negative, positive carriers, potential carriers, home quarantine, and other details.

They expect to pull data from respectable sources, facilitating editing for suspicion and expiry date, further providing for assistance provider and assistance receiver as a part of the user and user contacts. The app is considering the point that some people will require assistance like buying or bringing them groceries or about just having an online chat with them. Also, facilitating those who are willing to provide assistance.

Many feel this kind of an app is needed. They feel this is a great idea to identify who nearby has corona. Also, this will help identify if we are in a high-risk area.

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Ethereum (ETH) Vitalik Buterin retweeted on Proof of Isolation Concept for an App highlighting Quarantine - The Cryptocurrency Analytics