Category: Blog

In 1977, the Voyager 1 and Voyager 2 spacecraft launched from Cape Canaveral, Florida. Their mission was to explore the solar system and beyond. Aboard each was a “golden record,” a copper phonograph disk containing images, sounds from nature, and music to provide a snapshot of life on Earth to any intelligent life the craft might encounter. These were the first images to be sent into outer space.

Now, as the Voyagers travel into interstellar space, artists are beginning to explore what they can do off Earth. In March a piece by Dubai-based artist and philanthropist Sacha Jafri is set to land on the moon. 

Jafri’s work, “We Rise Together — By the Light of the Moon,” is scheduled to fly into space on a United Launch Alliance rocket powered by engines developed by Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin. The launch is scheduled to take place at the Kennedy Space Center in Cape Canaveral, Florida, in the first week of March.

The work is an engraving depicting a male and a female figure surrounded by 88 hearts. 

“The original artwork was this beautiful heart motif. Two figures entwined, reconnecting and around them is blossoming flora, fauna,” explained Jafri. He says he wanted to capture “the unification of humanity through love and empathy” in his design.

For his canvas, a gold alloy was developed over two years to withstand the extreme environment on the lunar surface whilst keeping the artwork intact. But the piece isn’t intended only for extraterrestrial art lovers.

“When we land the physical work of art on the moon, a little beep sounds in the control room,” said Jafri. On that signal, 88 NFTs will be released for sale back on Earth.

Jafri plans to donate all proceeds to humanitarian charities. “I’m hoping to raise a huge amount of money for the four main charitable concerns of our world — health, education, sustainability, and equality,” he said.

The work was commissioned by Spacebit, a UK-based company that develops space robotics technology and data analytics tools, and will be sent to the moon by Spacebit and NASA Commercial Payload Services (CLPS). UAE-based company Selenian Network, which specializes in blockchain technologies, will facilitate the launch of the NFTs.

With Happy Birthday, Stevie Wonder successfully campaigned to honor Martin Luther King Jr with a national holiday, in a long career of socially conscious songwriting, writes Diane Bernard.

On 15 January 1981, music legends Diana Ross and Gladys Knight, along with the “godfather of rap”, Gil Scott-Heron, joined renowned musician Stevie Wonder on stage at the National Mall in Washington, DC. The 50,000-strong audience chanted: “Martin Luther King Day, we took a holiday,” according to Scott-Heron’s 2012 memoir, The Last Holiday, as the stars began to sing Wonder’s hit song, Happy Birthday, a tribute to the murdered civil rights leader.

“I just never understood/ How a man who died for good/ Could not have a day that would/ Be set aside for his recognition,” they sang, electrifying the crowd.

The 1980 song represented the start of Wonder’s campaign to make the birthday of renowned peace activist, Martin Luther King Jr, into a federal holiday. For three years Wonder put his life on hold and dedicated tours, rallies, and marches to bring his vision to life – a quest that would establish the first holiday in the US that honored a black American.

This year marks the 40th anniversary of US President Ronald Reagan signing into law the bill that established Martin Luther King Day. Many today might be surprised to realize the instrumental role Stevie Wonder played in getting the legislation passed. But in fact, the global superstar’s artistry and political activism were intertwined throughout his career, even before the MLK Day drive, as he repeatedly called attention to social issues of mid-century America.

After Dr. King’s assassination in April 1968, US Representative John Conyers Jr from Detroit, Michigan, and Wonder’s congressman, introduced a bill to make the activist’s birthday a federal holiday. But for 13 years, the bill languished, facing opposition from southern Democrats and conservative Republicans. For years, Wonder had quietly advocated for the holiday. But then, in 1979, he shared a dream he had with King’s widow, Coretta Scott King. In a 2011 interview with CNN’s Anderson Cooper, Wonder said: “I said to her… ‘I imagined in this dream I was doing this song. We were marching with petition signs to make Dr. King’s birthday a national holiday.’”

Scott King was excited, Wonder explained, but she also doubted his dream could come true at a time the nation was turning more and more conservative with the rise of Reaganism and New Right politicians in the Sun Belt (the Southern US), a reaction against President Lyndon Baines Johnson’s liberal agenda of the 1960s. But Wonder felt compelled by his dream and the next year he wrote Happy Birthday, for Hotter than July, a 1980 album that peaked at number three in the US charts and number two in the UK. Joined by Scott King, Wonder used his 1981 tour for that album as a worldwide drive to advocate for the holiday.

North Korea-backed hackers stole $1.7bn (£1.4bn) of crypto in 2022, says blockchain analysis firm Chainalysis.

This nearly quadruples the country’s previous record for cryptocurrency theft – $429m in 2021.

The loot also made up 44% of the $3.8bn stolen in crypto hacks last year, which the firm called “the biggest year ever for crypto hacking”.

Experts have said the country, facing heavy sanctions, is turning to crypto theft to fund its nuclear arsenal.

North Korea has conducted six nuclear tests and analysts expect the seventh one this year, as the country accelerates its nuclear weapons program under leader Kim Jong-un. Last year, Pyongyang launched a record number of ballistic and other missiles. This is despite the country’s struggling economy. 

“For context, North Korea’s total exports in 2020 totaled $142m worth of goods, so it isn’t a stretch to say that cryptocurrency hacking is a sizable chunk of the nation’s economy,” Chainalysis said in a report on Wednesday.

These hackers typically launder crypto through “mixers”, which blend cryptocurrencies from various users to obfuscate the origins of the funds, the firm said.

Other experts have also said that North Korea launders stolen crypto through brokers in China and non-fungible tokens (NFTs). 

Last month, the FBI confirmed that North Korea-affiliated Lazarus Group was responsible for a $100m crypto heist on a blockchain network called Horizon bridge last year. 

Overall, decentralized finance protocols, or DeFi, accounted for over 82% of cryptocurrency stolen in 2022, Chainalysis’ report said.

DeFi users know what will happen to their funds when they use them because smart contract codes governing these protocols are publicly accessible by default. 

But this transparency also makes DeFi particularly attractive to hackers, who can scan the codes for vulnerabilities and “strike at the perfect time” to maximize their loot, according to the report. 

David Schwed, chief operating officer at blockchain security firm Halborn, noted that DeFi developers “prioritize growth over all else”, and funds that could be used to enhance security are often directed instead to rewards, in order to attract users.

DeFi developers can take a leaf from traditional financial institutions in making their platforms more secure, Mr Schwed said. 

For instance, they can simulate different hacking scenarios to test their protocols or design mechanisms to pause or halt transactions when suspicious activity is detected.

“You don’t need to move as slow as a bank, but you can borrow from what banks do,” he said.

Children are being exposed to online pornography from as young as nine, according to a study for the children’s commissioner for England.

A quarter of 16-21-year-olds first saw pornography on the internet while still at primary school, it suggests. By the age of 13, 50% had been exposed to it.

The findings have been linked to low self-esteem among young people and harmful views of sex and relationships. 

Commissioner Dame Rachel de Souza said it was “deeply concerning”.

In a nationally representative survey of more than 1,000 16-21-year-olds, 38% had found pornographic content accidentally.

Joanne Schneider’s son stumbled across a pornography website, aged eight after typing swear words he had heard at school into a search engine.

“We’d put all the normal safety features in place and had removed apps such as YouTube but didn’t for one second think that my son could find himself on adult-entertainment sites within a few seconds,” Ms Schneider, from London, said.

“As soon as I saw what was happening, I closed the site – but both him and I were left in shock at what he had seen. I felt so terrible about the whole thing.

“All of a sudden I was having to explain it all, including the fact that what he saw was artificial and far from what real people look like.”

Of the 18-21-year-olds, 79% had seen pornography involving sexual violence as children.

Almost half of the young people say girls expect sex to involve physical aggression, such as airway restriction, the commissioner’s report says.

One 12-year-old told Dame Rachel her boyfriend had “strangled” her during their first kiss. He had seen it in pornography “and thought it normal”.

The commissioner urges “every adult in a responsible position” to take the findings seriously.

The Online Safety Bill, going through the House of Lords, should be used to protect children from internet pornography, she says.

“It should not be the case that young children are stumbling across violent and misogynistic pornography on social-media sites,” Dame Rachel says.

“I truly believe we will look back in 20 years and be horrified by the content to which children were being exposed. 

“Let me be absolutely clear – online pornography is not equivalent to a ‘top-shelf’ magazine.

“The adult content which parents may have accessed in their youth could be considered ‘quaint’ in comparison to today’s world of online pornography.”

Dame Rachel encouraged parents not to shy away from the topic at home and make it clear extreme pornography is “not real, it’s acting”.

She told BBC Breakfast children “want their mums and dads to talk to them often, even when they’re really young, in an age-appropriate way about the things they might see so they’re not confused”.

She said conversations about “simple boundaries” like why it might not be right for youngsters to have internet-connected phones or social media accounts were also important.

The Online Safety Bill is due to be debated in Parliament this week amid calls from some MPs and peers for it to include tougher measures on age restrictions on social media.