Fighting has killed almost 20,000 Somalis since 2007, and though some semblance of order has been restored, the imposed Sharia law has banned even moderate muslims from dancing at weddings, or even playing and watching soccer. If you’re having a bad day today, take a moment and remember just how good you actually do have it. [Reuters]

Too bad if you’ve got a sore leg, right? Thankfully, they’re still investigating what level of uncomfortable shuffling would be deemed suspicious enough to call for a secondary screening.

The project is called Future Attribute Screening Technology (FAST), and has also developed machines to measure the interval between heartbeats and how deeply someone inhales.

It’s still all research, but one of the researchers told CNN the program is “doing significantly better than chance”. I’m all for better security, but it sounds pretty invasive. As Joe Stanley of the ACLU is quoted saying: “Nobody has the right to look at my intimate bodily functions, my breathing, my perspiration rate, my heart rate, from afar.”

Unless you’re entering the US perhaps. Welcome to the possible future of travel. [CNN via Kotaku]

Click for artistic impression of terrorist at CERN.

According to French newspaper Le Figaro, judicial sources point that the man—who has been working as a particle physics contractor since 2003—has links to Al Qaeda groups in the Islamic Maghreb. Le Figaro said that he had suggested terrorist targets in French soil. There’s word if the target list also included the LHC, however.

In a public statement, CERN was quick to remember that the LHC is peaceful, and no gain can be obtained from it by any terrorist:

None of our research has potential for military application, and all our results are published openly in the public domain.

Indeed. Let CERN work alone in peace and fix the LHC while the rest of us don’t do our homework.

One message to all those trying to hurt others in the world, like Osama and Co.: Go f—k yourself. [Daily Mail]

It’s an anti-explosive container, placed in a subway station in Beijing. As China prepares for its 60th Anniversary—proclaimed on October 1, 1949—authorities are tightening security against terrorist attacks even more. Because we all know that terrorists leave packages marked as “bomb” ready to be put into a bomb trashcan. [Boston]

We’re doing some testing on cloud knockdown, sort of a Chernobyl-type [1986 Chernobyl nuclear plant's reactor meltdown, which resulted in a big radioactive billow that reached Northern Europe] event.

That’s what Sam White, Evergreen senior VP, says about their Supertanker. Hopefully we will never see in action for this purpose, and it will remain fighting forest fires. Meanwhile, Darpa is testing absorbent gels—like the ones used in nappies—mixed with nanoscale materials designed to clean away contaminants. In theory, these new substances will be able to take out 98 per cent of the radioactive particles in half an hour.

That’s good news.

The bad news: They have only tested it in concrete, not humans.

[Technology via Flightglobal]

Hanke is the guy directly in charge of both Google Earth and Google Maps, and he’s not at a loss for words when defending his product with all the ferocity of a proud little league parent. From The Sydney Morning Herald:

“The evilness is in the philosophies and the desires of those that want to do evil. They will use the tools at hand to do that, whether it’s throwing a Molotov cocktail, or shooting a rifle or using some piece of technology as part of the process.”
…

“If Google Earth didn’t exist, would they have used a tourist map they could have bought or was the real intelligence actually coming from an on-the-ground informant who was working in the hotel and drawing layouts of everything on a napkin?”

The basic argument seems to be, do you blame the gun, the gun owner or the gun manufacturer when some innocent civilian gets shot? And in Google’s case, they are even another step beyond this greyness, maybe the publisher of a general interest book on ballistics—I don’t know, this metaphor is going down in flames quickly.

Read a lot more from Hanke at this link: [SMH]

The city intends to install dozens of the fancy waste receptacles in London’s financial district next year. And boy, do they sound expensive!

The technology reduces the shockwave of an explosion — which usually creates devastation by destroying nearby objects such as windows — and because most of the bin is made of steel, it can contain the heat and shrapnel generated. He said that the technology “reduces the peak pressure of an explosion and extinguishes the fireball”.

The green bins will double as an information service called Renew, with large screens on each side of the device relaying the latest news.

Traders walking past on their lunch break will be able to check the latest share prices, but on their way home the screens will display travel information and other news. The authorities will also be able to use the screens to relay urgent security information.

Is it just me or does it seem like every single decision the British government makes hinges on the threat of terrorism? You guys are starting to seem a bit obsessed over there. [Times Online]