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Christians are familiar with the story of the Nativity, in which the three wise men follow the “Star of Bethlehem” to the newborn Jesus. But does this Biblical story have astronomical origins? What was the “Christmas Star”?Modern sky watchers have many theories, including that this star is a very close conjunction of Venus and Jupiter in 2 BC, or a less impressive triple conjunction of Jupiter and Saturn seen throughout 7 BC (historians continue to debate Jesus’ actual birth date). Another theory suggests it may have been the explosion of a bright star.There will be no major mergers this December,…
As the Alliance to End Plastic Waste celebrates its fifth anniversary, Innovation Platform sat down with Ted Toth, Vice President of Global Programs and Circularity, to discuss the evolving focus set out in the Alliance’s 2024 Progress Report and Strategy 2030. The Alliance to End Plastic Waste has released its Progress Report 2024, highlighting five years of impactful work aimed at tackling plastic waste. Since its launch in 2019, the Alliance has successfully reduced unmanaged plastic by approximately 240,000 tonnes and facilitated over US$610 million in funding. The progress report outlines the launch of Strategy 2030, which changes the Alliance’s…
A Canadian organization has emerged as the center of a targeted cyber campaign organized by the threat activity cluster known as STAC6565. Cybersecurity company Sophos announced that it investigated approximately 40 intrusions linked to this actor between February 2024 and August 2025. This campaign is assessed with high confidence to be an overlap with the hacking group known as Gold Blade, also known as Earth Kapre, RedCurl, and Red Wolf. The financially motivated attacker is believed to have been active since late 2018, initially targeting organizations in Russia, but has since expanded to include organizations in Canada, Germany, Norway, Russia,…
Quebec’s first virtual care program is redefining care, allowing patients and families to heal safely at home with hospital-level support. Jewish General Hospital (JGH), part of CIUSSS West-Central Montreal, has pioneered an innovative virtual care program that is reshaping the way health care is delivered in Quebec. As the first hospital in the state to implement a comprehensive virtual care model, JGH positions itself as a leader and innovator, offering scalable solutions that are now being emulated by other facilities in the region. The virtual care program, launched in early 2022, includes three main components: Hospital@Home, Recovery@Home, and a post-hospitalization…
Travis Miller, Chief Strategy Officer and General Counsel at Source Intelligence, discusses AI-powered full material declarations (FMDs) and their potential in PFAS detection and elimination. The global regulatory landscape is undergoing a seismic shift. From the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to the European Chemicals Agency (ECHA), governments are accelerating efforts to eliminate hazardous substances from consumer and industrial products. At the centre of this movement are per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances (PFAS) – a class of over 12,000 synthetic chemicals known for their persistence in the environment and potential harm to human health. The compliance crossroads For companies that manufacture,…
December 9, 2025Ravi LakshmananMalware/Threat Analysis Cybersecurity researchers have discovered two new extensions in the Microsoft Visual Studio Code (VS Code) Marketplace that are designed to infect developers’ machines with stealer malware. The VS Code extension pretends to be a coding assistant powered by a premium dark theme and artificial intelligence (AI), but it actually hides secret features that allow it to download additional payloads, take screenshots, and siphon data. The captured information is sent to an attacker-controlled server. “Your code, your email, your Slack DMs. Whatever you’re seeing on your screen, they’re seeing it too,” said Idan Dardikman of Koi…
Stalkerware makers who were forced out of the surveillance industry after data breaches that compromised the personal information of their customers and those they spied on will not be able to return to selling the invasive software, according to the Federal Trade Commission. The FTC denied a request by Scott Zuckerman, founder of consumer spyware company Support King and its subsidiaries SpyFone and OneClickMonitor, to lift the ban. On Monday, the FTC announced the denial in a press release after Mr. Zuckerman petitioned the federal watchdog agency in July to revoke or modify the restraining order. In 2021, the FTC…
Six months ago, Waymo revealed it was delivering 250,000 robotaxis per week across its service area, a list that continues to grow, including Atlanta, Austin, Los Angeles, Phoenix, and the San Francisco Bay Area. The Alphabet-owned self-driving company has remained silent since then, saying only that it provides hundreds of thousands of rides each week. Thanks to leaked documents from Tiger Global Management to IT Investors, first reported by CNBC, we now have a better idea of these weekly ridership numbers. The letter called for investment in Tiger Global’s next venture capital fund and appealed to the current fund’s previous…
After all, advanced Nvidia AI chips could be heading back to China. As first reported by Semafor, the Commerce Department plans to allow Nvidia to ship its H200 chips to China to approved customers in China. The US will receive 25% of these sales, CNBC reports. The H200 chip is much more advanced than the H20 chip that Nvidia developed specifically for the Chinese market, but Semafor reports that the company can only ship the roughly 18-month-old H200. An Nvidia spokesperson told TechCrunch about the development: “We applaud President Trump’s decision to allow the U.S. chip industry to compete to…
Scientists have turned waste cooking oil into a variety of recyclable plastics with superior strength, some durable enough to tow a car.Turning non-edible waste into useful polymers is a sustainable way to create new materials, researchers said in a new study published Nov. 28 in the Journal of the American Chemical Society.“Waste streams offer a potentially attractive alternative to biomass-derived feedstocks [to make plastics]” the researchers wrote in their study. you may like One such waste stream is used cooking oil, of which approximately 3.7 billion gallons are generated each year. This waste oil has traditionally been used as lubricants,…