Russian forces shelled Europe's largest nuclear plant early Friday in the battle for control of a crucial energy-producing city, and the power station was on fire. The Associated Press reports: Plant spokesman Andriy Tuz told Ukrainian television that shells were falling directly on the Zaporizhzhia plant and had set fire to one of the facility's six reactors. That reactor is under renovation and not operating, but there is nuclear fuel inside, he said. Firefighters cannot get near the fire because they are being shot at, Tuz said. A government official told The Associated Press that elevated levels of radiation were detected near the site of the plant, which provides about 25% of Ukraine's power generation. The official spoke on condition of anonymity because the information has not yet been publicly released. Tuz said it is urgent to stop the fighting to put out the flames.

Mayor Dmytro Orlov and the Ukrainian state atomic energy company reported that a Russian military column was heading toward the nuclear plant. Loud shots and rocket fire were heard late Thursday. [...] Ukrainian Prime Minister Denys Shmyhal called on the West to close the skies over the country's nuclear plants as fighting intensified. "It is a question of the security of the whole world!" he said in a statement. The U.S. and NATO allies have ruled out creating a no-fly zone since the move would pit Russian and Western military forces against each other.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from TorrentFreak: Sci-Hub founder Alexandra Elbakyan says that following a legal process, the Federal Bureau of Investigations has gained access to data in her Google account. Google itself informed her of the data release this week noting that due to a court order, the company wasn't allowed to inform her sooner. In January 2021, Twitter suspended the official Sci-Hub account so when site updates are published, they now tend to appear on Elbakyan's personal account. A new tweet this week reveals that Google was also required to hand over her account data.

In an email to Elbakyan dated March 2, 2022, Google advises that following a legal process issued by the FBI, Google was required to hand over data associated with Elbakyan's account. Exactly what data was targeted isn't made clear but according to Google, a court order required the company to keep the request a secret. [...] Google notes that since it is "not in a position" to provide Elbakyan with legal advice or to discuss the substance of the legal process, the Sci-Hub founder may wish to contact an attorney. The big question remains -- what exactly is the investigation about?

Given the scale of Sci-Hub and its notoriety around the world, it's certainly possible that a criminal copyright infringement investigation is underway in the United States that could feasibly lead to an indictment for Elbakyan and any cohorts involved in the operation. However, more serious allegations have been made in the past. Back in December 2019, The Washington Post reported that Elbakyan was being investigated by the US Justice Department on suspicion that she "may" be working with Russian intelligence to "steal U.S. military secrets from defense contractors." No solid evidence was published to back up those allegations but the publication did note that Elbakyan may have collected log-in credentials from journal subscribers in order to access academic literature, presumably so that it can be offered on Sci-Hub. "I know there are some reasons to suspect me: after all, I have education in computer security and was a hobby hacker in teenage years," said Elbakyan in a statement. "But hacking is not my occupation, and I do not have any job within any intelligence, either Russian or some another."

She added: "I think that whether I can be a Russian spy is being investigated by U.S. government since they learned about Sci-Hub, because that is very logical: a Russian project, that uses university accounts to access some information, of course that is suspicious. But in fact Sci-Hub has always been my personal enterprise."

Russia has decided to stop supplying rocket engines to the United States in retaliation for its sanctions against Russia over Ukraine. Reuters reports: "In a situation like this we can't supply the United States with our world's best rocket engines. Let them fly on something else, their broomsticks, I don't know what," [Dmitry Rogozin, head of the state space agency Roscosmos, said on state Russian television]. According to Rogozin, Russia has delivered a total of 122 RD-180 engines to the U.S. since 1990s, of which 98 have been used to power Atlas launch vehicles. Roscosmos will also stop servicing rocket engines it had previously delivered to the U.S., Rogozin said, adding that the U.S. still had 24 engines that would now be left without Russian technical assistance.

Russia has earlier said it was suspending cooperation with Europe on space launches from the Kourou spaceport in French Guiana in response to Western sanctions over Ukraine. Moscow has also demanded guarantees from British satellite company OneWeb that its satellites would not be used for military purposes. OneWeb, in which the British government has a stake, said on Thursday it was suspending all launches from Russia's Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan. Rogozin said Russia would now focus on creating dual-purpose spacecraft in line with the needs of Roscosmos and the Defence Ministry.

BrendaEM shares a report from The Register: Ukrainian news website Ukrainska Pravda says the nation's Centre for Defense Strategies think tank has obtained the personal details of 120,000 Russian servicemen fighting in Ukraine. The publication has now shared this data freely on its website. The Register and others have been unable to fully verify the accuracy of the data from the leak. The records include what appears to be names, addresses, passport numbers, unit names, and phone numbers. Some open source intelligence researchers on Twitter said they found positive matches, as did sources who spoke confidentially to El Reg; others said they couldn't verify dip-sampled data. Rumors swirled on the internet that activists were behind the disclosure. The Ukrainian news agency said the personnel records were obtained from "reliable sources." Whether or not the database's contents is real, the impact on Russian military morale -- knowing that your country's enemies have your personal details and can contact your family if you're captured, killed, or even still alive -- won't be insignificant.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Mykhailo Fedorov, the vice prime minister and minister of digital transformation of Ukraine, has publicly called on "all game development companies" to "temporarily block all Russian and Belorussian accounts" in response to Russia's ongoing invasion of Ukraine. In a tweet from his verified account, Fedorov also called on esports platforms to "temporarily stop the participation of Russian and Belorussian teams and gamers in all international esports events and cancel all international events holding [sic] on the territory of Russia and Belarus."

These moves, Fedorov suggests, "will motivate the citizens of Russia to proactively stop the disgraceful military aggression" by the Russian government. "In 2022, modern technology is perhaps the best answer to the tanks, multiple rocket launchers... and missiles." In an additional note directed at the Xbox and PlayStation Twitter accounts, Fedorov wrote that "if you support human values, you should [leave] the Russian market!" In a follow-up tweet, Fedorov also asked Riot Games, EA, Ubisoft, Gameloft, and Wargaming to "close your office in Russia" in solidarity with Ukraine. "There's no place for [an] aggressor on the global technological map!"

The U.N.'s nuclear watchdog on Wednesday warned Russia's onslaught of Ukraine is raising the risk of nuclear accidents, calling for restraint from all actions that could jeopardize the safe operations of Ukraine's nuclear facilities. From a report: It comes as Russia's war with Ukraine enters its seventh day, with fighting raging across the country. The International Atomic Energy Agency said Russia's invasion of Ukraine marks the first time a military conflict has taken place amidst the facilities of a large and established nuclear power program -- which in this case includes the site of the world's worst nuclear disaster at the Chornobyl Nuclear Power Plant in 1986. "The situation in Ukraine is unprecedented and I continue to be gravely concerned," IAEA Director General Rafael Mariano Grossi said in an introductory statement to the 35-nation Board of Governors. "The safety and security of nuclear facilities, and nuclear and other radioactive material, in Ukraine must under no circumstances be endangered."

The corporate internet space race has taken a geopolitical turn. Russian space agency Roscosmos is refusing to launch the next batch of 36 OneWeb internet satellites Friday, unless the company meets the state agency's demands. From a report: Roscosmos head Dmitry Rogozin particularly emphasized that the ultimatum is a response to the U.K. sanctioning Russia over its invasion of Ukraine. Roscosmos said in a statement that the Soyuz rocket will be removed from the launchpad at Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan unless OneWeb meets two demands:

1.The U.K. government sells its stake in the company.
2. OneWeb guarantees that the satellites not be used for military purposes. U.K. Business and Energy Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng said in a statement that there is "no negotiation" with Roscosmos about OneWeb and that the government "is not selling its share." Kwarteng added, "we are in touch with other shareholders to discuss next steps."

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard, written by Joseph Cox: Around the same time Russian forces launched a massive rocket into a square in Kharkiv, Ukraine's second-largest city, killing and wounding an as of yet unknown number of people, Eugene Kaspersky, head of his namesake Russian cybersecurity firm, tweeted that he hoped negotiations between Ukraine and Russia would lead to "a compromise." The statement encapsulates the company's position since Russia invaded Ukraine six days ago -- that of attempted neutrality in a war where silence or fence sitting is implicitly siding with the Russian forces. In another statement to Motherboard sent on Monday, the company said "As a technology and cybersecurity service provider the company is not in a position to comment or speculate on geopolitical developments outside of its area of expertise."

Kaspersky is one of the best-known Russian companies, and for years its antivirus product has been among the most used in the world. The antivirus software also harvests telemetry data for Kaspersky's researchers who can then use that to identify and counter new threats. Its researchers are some of the best in the world, with its Global Research & Analysis Team (GReAT) regularly publishing leading research on various government malware operations. Famously the company first revealed details of a U.S. government hacking group that it dubbed Equation Group. Kaspersky has also researched suspected Russian government linked hackers. Eugene's tweet also brings something else to the surface again: how much is Kaspersky, the company, influenced by the Russian government, even if indirectly? As a Russian firm operating in Moscow under Russian laws, it may feel the need to toe the line on Russian issues.

Kaspersky's company statement on Monday added that "Kaspersky is focused on its mission to build a safer world. For 25 years, the company delivers deep threat intelligence and security expertise that is constantly transforming into innovative security solutions and services to protect businesses, critical infrastructure, governments and consumers around the globe. Kaspersky's business operations remain stable. The company guarantees the fulfillment of its obligations to partners and customers -- including product delivery and support and financial transaction continuity. The global management team is monitoring the situation carefully and is ready to act very quickly if needed." Kaspersky may not currently feel it is in a position to speculate or take a position on the invasion of Ukraine. But with a 40 mile long Russian military convoy making its way to Kyiv, and with the prospect of more cyber attacks playing a role in the invasion, Kaspersky may need to take a side.

Microsoft says it began detecting "destructive cyberattacks directed against Ukraine's digital infrastructure" several hours before the Russian military began launching missiles or moving tanks into the country last week. From a report: The disclosure Monday, part of a larger blog post about Ukraine by Microsoft President Brad Smith, provides a glimpse of how cyber-warfare is being used as part of the ongoing invasion. The company says it is giving ongoing guidance to the Ukrainian government about cyberthreats as the situation unfolds. Smith also outlined the company's efforts to combat state-sponsored disinformation campaigns, ensuring that its platforms are not displaying or distributing any content or apps from Russia's state-sponsored RT and Sputnik news organizations, in line with a recent European Union decision. He wrote that there's "a well-orchestrated battle ongoing in the information ecosystem where the ammunition is disinformation, undermining truth and sowing seeds of discord and distrust," he wrote.

Though the Russian government has tried geofencing access to crucial web sites, the Jerusalem Post reports that two Russian government web site still went offline Saturday — the Kremlin and the Ministry of Defense. "Gosuslugi, Russia's web portal of state services, went offline on Saturday night as well, with the Russian Ministry of Digital Development, Communications and Mass Media telling TASS that the site is facing cyberattacks on an 'unprecedented scale.'"

Meanwhile, the Washington Post interviews 22-year-old Alex Horlan, a Ukrainian cybersecurity expert in Spain "helping take down some of Russia's most powerful websites — including state media and even the official page of the Kremlin." The attacks he and others are helping to carry out on Russian websites are part of a wide information war in the background of the much larger conflict here, as Ukrainians target Russian websites to rewrite the narrative Moscow is presenting to Russians back home. "We are creating an IT army," Ukrainian Vice Prime Minister Mykhailo Fedorov tweeted on Saturday. Horlan is a cybersecurity expert who recently launched an app called disBalancer that helps take down scam websites by overwhelming them with online traffic. He has redirected his team's efforts in recent days to instead target Russian websites he says are spreading dangerous disinformation about the Russian invasion of Ukraine....

Thousands of people are joining Horlan and others' efforts to target the Russian sites, with around 2,000 logging into his app at any given time, he said. The main challenge is that many are losing WiFi when air raid sirens force them to retreat to underground bunkers....

Volunteers are gathering information on attacks and casualties to fact check and challenge Russia's version of events, posting messages on Telegram and other Russian social media platforms [according to Liuba Tsbulska, a Ukrainian analyst and activist who has tracked Russian disinformation for eight year]. Others work to educate international audiences or produce patriotic content. Some also target Russian military and intelligence officers, flooding their emails and other platforms with messages. Volunteers are reaching out to the mothers of Russian soldiers to convince them to call for Russian President Vladimir Putin to bring their boys back home.

In Kharkiv, after reports that Russian troops and armored vehicles entered Ukraine's second largest city early Sunday, one local Telegram channel with more than 400,000 subscribers urged people to continue to document the adversary's movements as a way to aid Ukraine's forces in the area. In one message, the Truha Kharkiv channel asked citizens to "carefully film and send information about the movement of Russian troops to our channel. This is vital to the defense of our city."

Another message instructed citizens on how to make molotov cocktails.

Harvard's School of Public Health has an announcement...

"Multiple sclerosis (MS), a progressive disease that affects 2.8 million people worldwide and for which there is no definitive cure, is likely caused by infection with the Epstein-Barr virus (EBV), according to a study led by Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health researchers."

Epstein-Barr virus has already been linked to some forms of cancer. But now, as the New York Times put it, "New research proves a virus — one that almost all of us have — 'causes' multiple sclerosis." (More than 90% of adults have the Epstein-Barr virus, and "The very ubiquity of Epstein-Barr has made it especially difficult to isolate as a causal factor...") Researchers from the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health and elsewhere, however, devised a novel way to carry out that study, and they published their findings in January in Science. U.S. military recruits, a group of more than 10 million people, are screened for H.I.V. when their service starts and biennially thereafter. Their blood serum samples are then archived in the Department of Defense Serum Repository and can be retested for other pathogens. Between 1993 and 2013, the researchers identified cases of M.S. among active-duty U.S. military personnel. Then they tested their first serum sample; their last sample before M.S. onset; and one in between. They found that of 801 soldiers with M.S., 800 were positive for Epstein-Barr....

"In practical terms, if you're not infected with E.B.V., your risk of M.S. is virtually zero," says Alberto Ascherio, a professor of epidemiology and nutrition at Harvard and a senior author of the Science study. "After infection, your risk jumps by over 30-fold." The odds of that increase having occurred by chance are less than one in a million....

That was the strongest evidence yet that Epstein-Barr initiates M.S., but it didn't explain why. Just over a week after the Science paper came out, though, Robinson and colleagues published their own paper in Nature that demonstrated how the virus triggers the disease in some people. Epstein-Barr produces proteins that mimic a protein in the myelin sheath, they found; when the immune system makes antibodies to attack the virus, they also attack the myelin — "the insulation around your neurons," as Robinson puts it. "Like electrical wires, if the insulation gets stripped off, it short-âcircuits," he says. "That's what results in M.S."

This protein mix-up, though, can only explain about a quarter of M.S. cases. And while the Science paper concludes that Epstein-Barr is the "leading cause" of M.S., Cohen says he wants to be careful with the word "cause." He thinks the study proves that the virus is a necessary precondition for M.S., but the fact that so many people have Epstein-Barr and so few of them get M.S. demonstrates that other factors, very likely including genetic susceptibility, must play a significant role in the development of the disease....

What is exciting about the discovery that Epstein-Barr is necessary for M.S. is that it raises the prospect that a vaccine could prevent that disease — as well as other serious conditions — even if we never understand precisely why the virus behaves as it does in a given individual.
Thanks to long-time Slashdot reader Thelasko for sharing the news!

On Friday the Washington Post's live updates on the Russia-Ukraine situation included the story of a tech firm trying to get its employees out of Kyiv: John Sung Kim, chief executive of the software outsourcing company JetBridge, has been communicating with his 24 employees in Kyiv, all software developers, through Slack. Half of them are trying to leave Ukraine, but Kim says he is struggling to help them and has been unable to get them train tickets, a rental car or gasoline.

"The other half of my team wants to stay and fight," said Kim. "I got on an all-hands with them this morning and told them it's not their responsibility to be soldiers and there's other ways they can contribute since they're software engineers, but there's nothing I can say to dissuade them." Kim said JetBridge's clients are almost exclusively Silicon Valley tech companies that are publicly traded or have raised venture capital financing. "The universal issue other than transportation logistics seems to be grandparents. 'My babushka' is the common theme of why they're torn from actually leaving," he said. The fallout from Russia's invasion has also impacted JetBridge's employees in Belarus. "The males in Belarus are scared that there's going to be military conscription, and unlike the Ukrainians, my Belarusian engineers have zero desire to pick up a rifle. Zero," he said.

In anticipation of European Union sanctions on Belarus, Kim said JetBridge has started paying employees in bitcoin.

A viral video showing the "Ghost of Kyiv" shooting down a Russian fighter yet was created with Digital Combat Simulator, "a simulation game that was first released in 2008," reports fact-checking website Snopes. From the report: The video was originally posted to YouTube by âoeComrade_Corb.â The original caption identified this clip as a simulation and noted that it was created as an homage to the Ghost of Kyiv. This footage is from DCS, but is nevertheless made out of respect for âoeThe Ghost of Kiev.â If he is real, may God be with him; if he is fake, I pray for more like "him."

When this video was posted to other social media sites, it was miscaptioned as genuine footage of the Ghost of Kyiv. While this video does not feature genuine footage, the general of the Ukrainian armed forces claimed that they had truly downed several Russian aircraft. CNN reported: "The General Staff of the Ukrainian Armed Forces has claimed five Russian aircraft and a helicopter were shot down early Thursday, as Russian forces attacked Ukraine. The Russian military has denied the claims, state news agency TASS reported on Thursday."
Further reading: 'The Ghost of Kyiv' is the first urban legend of Russia's invasion of Ukraine.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Motherboard: As of this writing, the Ruble is worth about 0.012 U.S. dollars. The Robux, the money people use to buy things in Roblox, is worth about 0.0125. This means that the Robux has slightly more buying power than the Russian ruble. The Russian economy has been in decline for some time, but both the Ruble and its main stock index took a nose dive on Thursday after Russia invaded Ukraine. As trading began that day, the Ruble collapsed and the Russian equities index, the MOEX, fell 45 percent. Both are in flux and have recovered some of their losses, but the situation with the Ruble is so dire that the Russian central bank has decided to step in and prop it up.

NATO Secretary-General Jens Stoltenberg said Friday that cyberattacks could trigger Article 5 of the organization's charter, the so-called "commitment clause" that considers an attack on any NATO ally an attack on all. NBC News reports: Stoltenberg's comment comes as national security professionals and cybersecurity industry professionals remain on high alert for any major attacks. While conflict on the ground in Ukraine continues to escalate, little has been seen thus far in terms of major cyberwar activities. Still, some hacker and activist groups have sprung into action. One ransomware group announced Friday that it supported the Russian government and would respond to cyberattacks on Russia by going after "critical infrastructures of an enemy." As for attacks on Ukraine, the country's computer emergency response team said Friday that it had seen a large email phishing campaign from Belarus targeted at military personnel. The statement comes amid a major cyberattack on Nvidia that was initiated at the same time as the Russian cyber warfare division started their offensive against Ukraine. Security researchers are concerned that somebody could put something malicious in one of the software updates that are then sent out to Nvidia's clients.

A radiation spike has been recorded near Chernobyl's nuclear power plant which has been seized by Russian forces, monitoring data shows. BBC: Invading Russian troops took control of the plant - the site of the world's worst nuclear disaster in 1986 - on Thursday, Ukraine said. Radiation levels increased about 20-fold on Thursday, monitoring stations there reported. But experts say another major nuclear disaster there is "extremely unlikely." The rise was caused by heavy military vehicles stirring contaminated soil in the 4,000-sq-km (2,485 sq-mile) exclusion zone surrounding the abandoned plant, Ukraine's State Nuclear Regulatory Inspectorate reported. The biggest spike was recorded close to the damaged reactor. Radiation levels are continuously monitored there -- measured as a dose that you would receive per hour in a location. Close to the reactor, you would normally receive a dose of about three units -- called microsieverts -- every hour. But on Thursday, that jumped to 65 microSv/hrs -- about five times more than you would get on one transatlantic flight.

Ukrainian cybersecurity officials have warned that Belarusian state-sponsored hackers are targeting the private email addresses of Ukrainian military personnel. From a report: Announcing the activity in a Facebook post, Ukraine's Computer Emergency Response Team (CERT-UA) said that a mass phishing campaign is targeting the private i.ua and meta.ua accounts belonging to Ukrainian military personnel. "After the account is compromised, the attackers, by the IMAP protocol, get access to all the messages," it added. "Later, the attackers use contact details from the victim's address book to send the phishing emails." CERT-UA has attributed the ongoing campaign to the UNC1151 threat group, which Mandiant formally linked to the Belarusian government in November 2021. Mandiant also linked the state-backed cyber-espionage group to the Ghostwriter disinformation campaign, which has been involved in spreading anti-NATO rhetoric and hack-and-leak operations throughout Europe. "The Minsk-based group 'UNC1151' is behind these activities. Its members are officers of the Ministry of Defence of the Republic of Belarus," CERT-UA wrote.

With sanctions on Russia ramping up following its invasion of Ukraine, Google's YouTube is under pressure to remove or cut commercial ties with some of its most prolific pro-Russian channels. From a report: The online video giant has a massive reach in Russia and has long been a popular platform for both government critics and state-backed media. But now officials in the U.S., the U.K. and Europe are discussing restrictions that could target groups and people with huge audiences on the platform, creating a dilemma for the Alphabet-owned business. European Union sanctions, for instance, would target Vladimir Solovyov, a TV and radio journalist behind a YouTube channel with more than 1 million subscribers. An EU report issued on Wednesday said that "Solovyov is known for his extremely hostile attitude toward Ukraine and praise of the Russian government." A four-hour video livestream published overnight on his YouTube channel about the Russian military attacks had over 2.7 million views within its first nine hours. That video also ran advertisements, at least for U.S. viewers.

Russia President Vladimir V. Putin declared the start of a "special military operation" in Ukraine on Thursday, after months of speculation about Russia's intentions as it massed tens of thousands of troops on Ukraine's border. The New York Times: Addressing his nation in a televised speech broadcast just before 6 a.m. Thursday, Mr. Putin said his goal was to "demilitarize" but not occupy the country. Minutes later, large explosions were visible near Kharkiv, Ukraine's second-largest city, and blasts were reported in Kyiv, the capital, and other parts of the country. Ukraine's Interior Ministry said that Russian troops had landed in Odessa and were crossing the border. "The invasion has begun," the ministry said in a statement.

Ukraine's foreign minister, Dmytro Kuleba, said on Twitter that Mr. Putin had "started a full-scale war against Ukraine" and had begun shelling civilian cities. "This is a war of aggression," he wrote on Twitter. "Ukraine will defend itself and win. The world must act and stop Putin. It is time to act -- immediately." Evoking the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia in 1999 and the American invasion of Iraq in 2003, Mr. Putin cast his action as a long-overdue strike against an American-led world order that he described as an "empire of lies." Even as he spoke, the United Nations Security Council held an emergency meeting imploring him not to invade. In bellicose language, Putin also issued what appeared to be a warning to other countries: "Anyone who tries to interfere with us, or even more so, to create threats for our country and our people, must know that Russia's response will be immediate and will lead you to such consequences as you have never before experienced in your history. We are ready for any turn of events." More coverage: NBC News, The Guardian and The Moscow Times.

The U.S. government's "dithering" has left the country "well behind" China in the race to build out 5G technology, former Google CEO Eric Schmidt said, as he urged Washington to step up investment in the next-generation internet technology. From a report: Writing in an op-ed in the Wall Street Journal, Schmidt and Graham Allison, a professor of government at Harvard, said that America is "far behind in almost every dimension of 5G while other nations -- including China -- race ahead." The authors urged the Biden administration to make 5G a "national priority." Otherwise, they said, "China will own the 5G future." 5G refers to next-generation wireless internet that promises super-fast download speeds. But it could also form the basis for industrial and military applications and form a way for devices to communicate with each other. That's why it's seen as a critical technology and one of the reasons China is moving quickly with its own 5G rollout and future applications.