Daily Archives: September 4, 2021

Have you ever eaten food out of a dented can? It doesnt taste dented honest! It tastes like undented food! (I could go for an undented sandwich right now.)

Theres just something about that dent that turns people off. It is tough to stack dented cans, and a sharp dent might allow bacteria in or what I call, flavor! but still, people should see theres value in DCF (dented can food)!

This article series is meant to point out some dented-can discounted players available on some sites, while also sharing a handful of players on that site who might be overpriced.

Were finding garage-sale priced players who are worth more on other fantasy draft sites, so you can squeeze the best value out of your draft picks.

We already did this ADP hack with quarterbacks and running backs, and well hit tight ends later this week.

How it works: FantasyPros posts an Average ADP on their site, which is a combined average of the ADP on several fantasy draft sites, including ESPN, Yahoo! and My Fantasy League. Since most ADPs on those sites are influenced by the prepopulated rankings from that site (and every site ranks differently with different experts), then those ADPs are skewed, compared to other sites. We compare the ADP on those major sites with the Average ADP on FantasyPros to find good and bad values, helping you know when you need to wait or hurry to take a certain player.

Read more here:

Hacking the draft room: Exploiting the ESPN and Yahoo fantasy football rankings to optimize your wide receiver... - The Athletic

Learn more about the Yahoo Fantasy Football Championship!

We obviously love the game of fantasy football, but few things feel better than winning, and not much feels better than winning a championship!

Whether it's a prize, bragging rights, or both, becoming a fantasy football champion is unmatched and now, here at Yahoo Fantasy, we're offering the chance to be the ULTIMATE fantasy football champion!

We're happy to announce the first-ever Yahoo Fantasy Football Championship (YFFC), a 10-week contest culminating in an exclusive $200K Daily Fantasy Football event at MGM National Harbor resort in Maryland from December 11-12, during Week 14 of the NFL season.

There, the top winner of the contest will take home $100,000 and the title of best fantasy player!

Here's how it works. There will be 60 qualifiers for the championship 60 winners chosen during the 10-week competition who will earn a trip for two to MGM National Harbor to compete in the live finals. They will receive free entry to the $200K contest where they will battle it out for the championship!

In addition to cash prizes, the 60 qualifiers will be treated to a VIP experience that includes accommodation at MGM National Harbor resort, roundtrip airfare for two, MGM Resort credit for food and beverage, spa, or entertainment, a special welcome reception with some of your favorite Yahoo Sports analysts and celebrities, and a swag bag filled with Yahoo Sports goodies!

Here's how you can qualify for this exclusive championship:

-Join the Daily Fantasy NFL Yahoo Cup: Free to play! The top score in the Yahoo Cup each week will earn qualification to the YFFC.

-Play in the Daily Fantasy NFL Baller Contest: Baller contest available weekly. The top score in the weekly NFL Baller Contest will earn qualification to the YFFC.

-Play in a single game DFS contest: Each week from weeks 1-10, we will run one single game contest where the top prize includes qualification to the YFFC. Check out the lobby.

Story continues

-Join League of Champs or the DFS Invitational: These contests will be available by invitation only. To enter the applicable contest, look out for an official invitation via email to enter the contest. Top 5 scores from these contests will earn qualification to the YFFC.

-Play FREE season-long Fantasy Football: The top 5 overall ranked Fantasy Football players from weeks 1-10 of the regular season will qualify. For more information on rankings, click here.

-Play Best Ball: The top 5 cumulative scores through week 10 of the regular season for any Best Ball league with $100 or greater entry fee will qualify.

-Play in a Public Prize League: The top 5 cumulative scores through week 10 of the regular season for any Public Prize League with $100 or greater entry fee will qualify.

-Participate in weekly social media contests: Follow @YahooSportsbook and @YahooFantasy on Twitter and look out for 10 total contests where the winner will qualify for the YFFC!

Learn more about the Yahoo Fantasy Football Championship here!

View original post here:

Do you have what it takes to reach the Yahoo Fantasy Football Championship? - Yahoo Sports

Apple CEO Tim Cook announces the new iPhone 11 Pro as he delivers the keynote address during a special event on September 10, 2019 in the Steve Jobs Theater on Apple's Cupertino, California campus. (Photo by Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)

Apple (AAPL) is expected to launch its new iPhone, likely called the iPhone 13, later this month. Like football, the autumnal equinox, and pumpkin spice lattes, its all but a guarantee this fall.

So what can you expect from Apples next-generation flagship? Rumors abound that Apple CEO Tim Cook & Co. will equip the iPhone 13 with everything from satellite communication functionality to screens with improved refresh rates for better scrolling to slick new cameras.

Of course, theres also speculation about new under-display technologies for unlocking your iPhone, and more. Heres what the rumor mill is churning out about Apples upcoming iPhone.

Lets start off with the sci-fi-sounding feature that Apple is reportedly bringing to the iPhone 13. According to Apple analyst Ming-Chi Kuo, the next iPhone will come with a custom Qualcomm X60 chip that will allow the phone to connect to low Earth orbit satellites.

The technology could allow for a more global solution to 5G connectivity. But according to Apple soothsayer Mark Gurman at Bloomberg, the satellite feature will, at first, be used as a means for iPhone owners to get in touch with emergency services and contacts via text when theres no viable cell signal available.

Gurman further states that the satellite capabilities could eventually be used to make phone calls, but the full feature set may not be available until next year.

Satellite company Globalstar (GSAT) soared as much as 40% following the news that Apple might add satellite communications to its iPhones, though it came back down afterwards.

Outside of satellite connectivity, the iPhone 13 lineup could get major upgrades to its cameras. The ultra-wide angle cameras are now expected to offer improved low-light capabilities and autofocus, according to MacRumors. Still, theres confusion as to whether the upgrades will be available on all iPhone 13 models or just the Pro and Pro Max versions.

Story continues

Gurman, meanwhile, says the iPhone 13 will feature a new video version of its Portrait mode, which traditionally captures photos and allows you to add a bokeh effect that blurs the areas around your subject.

Additionally, the iPhone 13 is said to get new camera filters that apply changes to color balance and lighting using artificial intelligence rather than the blanket filters the company has used for years.

The notch, or black area at the top of the iPhones screen that holds its FaceTime camera, is either not an issue for you, or an abomination.

Either way, Apple is reportedly changing the cutout for the iPhone 13. Depending on the rumors you choose to believe, the notch could shrink significantly, making more room for on-screen content, or disappear entirely.

A shot of a notchless iPhone during an episode of "Ted Lasso" may have been Apple's way of showing off its iPhone 13. (Image: Apple)

Mock-ups of an iPhone 13 with a smaller notch have been floating around the web for some time. But the notchless version of the phone has only just come to light thanks to an episode of Ted Lasso, an Apple TV series that prominently features iPhones.

In the episode, one of the shows characters can be seen holding what is clearly an iPhone without a notch.

It would be quite an interesting move for Apple to debut the new look of one of its important products via its own series, but it could also be an editing trick.

The design of this years iPhones are likely to remain largely the same as last years. There will be a 5.4-inch iPhone mini, 6.1-inch iPhone, 6.1-inch iPhone Pro, and 6.7-inch iPhone Pro Max.

But the high-end Pro models could get faster displays this time around. According to seemingly the entirety of the internet, the iPhone 13 Pro and iPhone 13 Pro Max should get screens with variable refresh rates up to 120hz.

A 120hz refresh rate means smoother scrolling and gaming, while a variable refresh rate means the phone could kick down the refresh speed when it doesnt need to be so fast.

Faster refresh rates mean the phone has to work harder, so a variable rate can save on battery life.

The phones are also rumored to get always-on displays that could show the time and message notifications without having to activate the screen. Android phones have done this for years and display the text in white on a black panel to save on battery life.

Thats all weve got so far in terms of iPhone rumors. But theres sure to be more that crop up as we get closer to the phones big debut this month.

Sign up for Yahoo Finance Tech newsletter

More from Dan

Follow Yahoo Finance on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Flipboard, LinkedIn, YouTube, and reddit

Got a tip? Email Daniel Howley at dhowley@yahoofinance.com over via encrypted mail at danielphowley@protonmail.com, and follow him on Twitter at @DanielHowley.

Read the original here:

Apple: What to expect from the iPhone 13 - Yahoo Finance

Less than a week after Liberty University announced and enacted a temporary campus-wide quarantine amid rising infections, the school is reporting a sharp surge in positive COVID-19 cases and offering free vaccinations.

The private evangelical Christian university in Lynchburg, Virginia last week ordered a campus-wide quarantine from Aug. 30 to Sept. 10. Prior to the fall semester beginning on Aug. 24, the school did not have a mask or vaccine mandate in place.

Liberty's COVID-19 dashboard on August 25 reported 159 active COVID-19 cases, out of which 124 were students. On September 1, the number of total active cases reported within the last 10 days spiked to 488, out of which 430 were students.

The university has around 15,000 students and 5,000 faculty or staff on campus. More than 1,500 people are currently in quarantine, 1,056 of which are on-campus students. A Liberty University official told WFXR News that the quarantine annex at in the college "has reached maximum capacity."

When asked for comment, university spokesperson Scott Lamb told Yahoo Finance that it was unsurprising to see cases shoot up given that as of "two weeks ago, these people were [not] in Lynchburg at all" and that now "they are here, and hence, the [numbers] have gone up."

Lamb added that the school's quarantine, a temporary pivot to remote learning, the new offering of free vaccinations, and the suspension of all large indoor gatherings have been enacted to "slow the spread of the virus and maintain a safe and healthy campus environment while the institution continues to act responsibly as a community partner in battling the pandemic."

The school sent an email to students informing them that it will be hosting a "first dose clinic" on September 3, according to an email obtained by Yahoo Finance.

An email offering free COVID-19 vaccines to Liberty University students, faculty, and staff. (Courtesy of a Liberty University student)

One former student said that she was concerned about the outbreak spilling into the surrounding areas.

Story continues

"I know people that work in health care here in Lynchburg that are just overwhelmed by how scary it is, and they said it's worse than it was last year," Lynchburg resident Tobi Walsh, a 2015 Liberty University graduate and former employee of the school who lives less than two miles from campus, told Yahoo Finance.

"With everybody back it's kind of scary because you go like to Target and you see all these students that are Liberty students because they're wearing, their [residence hall] shirts ... it's obvious that they're on-campus students," said Walsh, who noted that the area is already experiencing a rise of COVID-19 hospitalizations. "And they're not wearing masks, they're not social distancing, they're acting like everything is normal, and it's scary."

Liberty University student Jared Marshall, right, and his roommate and fellow student Jake Baker, sit inside their apartment near Lynchburg, Virginia, on March 31, 2020. (Photo by AMANDA ANDRADE-RHOADES/AFP via Getty Images)

Earlier this week, a current Liberty University student discussed what it felt like on campus.

"To me, it's just been a very unsafe environment," Robert Locklear, a 21-year-old journalism student at Liberty, told Yahoo Finance. "We're seeing thousands of students from literally all over the country gathered together with zero restrictions ... you're on the bus with 50 other people packed together, you're in the cafeteria with hundreds of other people, you're passing in the hallways and coming in very close contact with no one wearing masks."

Walsh noted that the news of the outbreak was particularly "frustrating" given that the school is gearing up to celebrate its 50th anniversary.

"I want to be excited, and celebrate my school and these friendships that I made," she said. "But when I see stuff like this and that these students don't care, it's really hard to be proud of where you came from."

Aarthi is a reporter for Yahoo Finance. She can be reached at aarthi@yahoofinance.com. Follow her on Twitter @aarthiswami.

Read the latest financial and business news from Yahoo Finance

Follow Yahoo Finance on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Flipboard, SmartNews, LinkedIn, YouTube, and reddit.

Excerpt from:

Liberty University COVID-19 outbreak on campus worsens, vaccinations now offered - Yahoo Finance

Whoop is now valued at $3.6 billion, after its latest $200 million funding round led by Softbank. Yahoo Finances Myles Udland and Brian Sozzi discuss the company overview and outlook with Whoop CEO, Will Ahmed.

[MUSIC PLAYING]

MYLES UDLAND: All right, well, fitness tracker Whoop, it is now valued at some $3.6 billion, following the company's fundraise earlier this week. SoftBank's Vision Fund coming in with $200 million. And whoop's CEO and founder, Will Ahmed, joins us now to talk about this latest fundraising, sort of the outlook for the business here. Will, great to have you on the program once again.

Let's just start with the capital raise, the second time I believe you guys have tapped the markets within the last year, if my calendar is correct there. And I'm just curious what the backdrop has been like for you guys both on your business side, but just the environment for folks who are looking to make the kinds of big venture bets that you guys are able to underwrite.

WILL AHMED: Yeah, you're right. You know, we raised $100 million in October of last year. So that would have been nine or 10 months ago. And now, obviously, just announced the $200 million raise led by SoftBank. I think it's a time where companies that are growing very rapidly like Whoop do have access to new capital. And that was certainly the case for us. SoftBank has been a great partner for us historically. They participated in our last round. And I think this is very early days for health monitoring.

Yes, Whoop is now the most valuable wearables company in the world, but it's still early innings. Wearable technology, in my opinion, has the potential to revolutionize the healthcare industry and really improve human lifespan. And we're starting to see that now with just the way Whoop members are changing their behavior and improving their health.

You know, for folks who aren't familiar with Whoop, it's a small wearable sensor collecting data around strain and recovery and sleep. And really, the biggest benefit to using Whoop is that it will help you change your behavior and improve your health. So if you've been on Whoop for a year, you've got a lower resting heart rate. You've got a higher heart rate variability. You're getting more sleep. You're getting higher sleep quality. And all of those things are obviously positive.

Story continues

BRIAN SOZZI: Well, full disclosure, Will, I'm actually charging mine up right now. I've been using it for about eight months. So I totally get it. But when you are out there, raising--

WILL AHMED: What's your recovery today?

BRIAN SOZZI: It's still tracking. My usual average is about 40% or under. And it's very bad. It's very bad. But we're going to take that offline because I know I need to improve--

WILL AHMED: [INAUDIBLE]

MYLES UDLAND: I'm ready for [INAUDIBLE]

BRIAN SOZZI: That's pretty good. That is impressive. I would expect nothing less from the founder of Whoop. But let me ask you this. When you are out there raising this money, why are you able to raise this money at this valuation with the threat of the Apple Watch? I mean, this week, we're hearing that they might add a blood pressure monitor to the next Apple Watch. How are you closing these funding rounds?

WILL AHMED: Well, you know, the business has been growing very quickly. I think we're the fastest growing company in the space. We're also the only business that has a subscription. You know, Whoop is entirely a subscription. So whereas companies in the past like Fitbit or Jawbone were just selling hardware-- it was a one-time expense-- with Whoop, we have a very loyal membership base that is paying every month. And so that pulls us more into the Sas world than your traditional hardware business.

You know, in terms of other competitors in the space or other players in the space, this is-- health monitoring is really the future. And so I expect every single big technology company to try playing this space. Obviously, a lot of companies have entered and exited the space because they failed. I mean, it's a very hard space in general. So just the fact that there are trillion dollar companies playing in the space, I think that more so proves the market size and potential than anything else.

MYLES UDLAND: Yeah, Will, I wanted to ask a little bit about your work with high level athletes. You know, certainly, the headline might be working with Maholmes or with LeBron, some of these other folks. But, you know, I get a kick out of when, you know, you guys have the blog of someone who's in the Tour de France, right, what their strain is like. You do that with CrossFit athletes. What has that channel done for you guys? And how much more work-- I mean, do you want to have a Whoop tracker basically on every college and above athlete that you can find?

WILL AHMED: Absolutely, and we're starting to get there. I mean, I think if you meet a serious athlete who's wearing a wearable, there's, like, a 95% chance it's Whoop. You know, the technology and the origin story for Whoop was really to help optimize the best athletes in the world. And of course, we've found over time that our technology is now helpful for everyone.

But that high end, really aspirational pro athlete, I think, helps set a tone for the rest of us. I mean, sports is still a religion. People watch and enjoy their favorite athletes. We've been integrating Whoop data into live sports broadcasts with Whoop Live. I don't know if you guys have seen that, but the ability to see someone's heart rate as they're trying to make a putt to win the US Open or, shortly here, the Ryder Cup. We're now doing that in NASCAR. We're doing it in-- on the LPGA TOUR.

And we've got a bunch of announcements coming in terms of where else we'll be doing it. So that's one example where you're trying to connect the experience of the best athletes in the world and how their bodies are changing and evolving to stress with me and you. And, you know, it creates a feeling of understanding that comes with all the Whoop data. And I like that a lot.

BRIAN SOZZI: Yeah, full disclosure, Will, I'm looking at my heartbeat right now on the platform. It's about 100 beats per minute interviewing you. So maybe it'll go down a little bit. But again, that's kind of, like, my norm. I do want to ask you, because Myles and I got into a pretty big debate earlier in the week on what is next for you in the hardware. I mean, this is a pretty simple band. I think we both agree we would like to see some innovation on the battery. What does the next generation of the strap look like?

WILL AHMED: OK, I just had to check. I'm at 60 right now, guys.

BRIAN SOZZI: That's pretty good. We're not asking you tough enough questions then.

WILL AHMED: You got to push me here. All right, so the hardware, you know, it's something we're constantly innovating on. I think we're going to have some really interesting announcements coming. And I guess I just have to say, stay tuned on that front.

BRIAN SOZZI: And, well, Will, quickly, before we let you go, what is the-- what's your ultimate goal here? I mean, do you envision the company as a public company? Do you envision it where you exit and put it under a larger umbrella? What's your vision?

WILL AHMED: Well, we're building the business to be a standalone business. So for now, that's being a private company. But I do expect over time, we'll be able to take the company public. We certainly have the revenue profile and gross margin profile of a successful publicly traded company. So we're going to keep marching with that in mind. I think Whoop is a pretty unique asset as a company because it operates within health monitoring, which is new and cutting edge and has a huge market potential. But it's also a subscription business. So it plays off the tail ends of your typical Sas business.

MYLES UDLAND: All right, we'll leave it there. And Will, it has been great tracking your story through the years. Will Ahmed, founder, CEO at Whoop. Will, I know we'll be in touch. Thanks for the time.

Originally posted here:

Whoop CEO: I expect every big tech company to enter the health monitoring space - Yahoo Finance

Carole Baskin has confirmed that Joe Exotic's former animal park has sold, and cannot be used as a zoo. (Photo: Araya Doheny/Getty Images for NightFly Entertainment, Ltd.)

Carole Baskin has confirmed that the zoo previously belonging to Joseph Maldonado-Passage, known as Joe Exotic from Netflix's Tiger King: Murder, Mayhem and Madness, has been sold.

Reached by phone on Sunday, Baskin, the owner of the nonprofit sanctuary Big Cat Rescue, confirmed to Yahoo Entertainment that not only has the Oklahoma property formerly used as an exotic animal park been sold to a local couple who are known for purchasing properties that need a lot of work, but that the new owners cannot use the ownership for anything Tiger King-related.

The news was first eported by TMZ.com on Saturday.

"When we sold the property in June, we required that it never be used as a zoo, or for anything related to Tiger King or anything like that," Baskin told Yahoo.

Her husband, Howard Baskin, also stated that the couple had a covenant written into the deed that stipulates the property cannot be associated with Tiger King.

"If it became an RV park or storage unit," he explained, "We don't want it named the Tiger King RV Park. We would like the 20 years of mistreatment of animals there to be forgotten and be history."

The Baskins have big plans coming up the pipeline. They told Yahoo they recently worked on a documentary called Shooting Joe Exotic with Louis Theroux "that played in Britain back in April to rave reviews, and was on the top of their on-demand list for weeks."

Right now, the couple is in Los Angeles for the premiere of the documentary The Conservation Game, which follows the story of Tim Harrison, a retired cop who "starts to suspect that Americas top television celebrity conservationists may be secretly connected to the exotic pet trade," according to the website.

"It exposes the way these people that take cubs onto late-night shows, are asked where the animals come from and where they go and they say they came from the zoo," Howard Baskin told Yahoo. "And in the film, these people were confronted, and they all admit that they have no idea what happens to the animals after they use them. It's very powerful, and it's controversial."

Last month, it was determined that Maldonado-Passage would receive a new prison sentence, Yahoo Entertainment previously reported. In 2019, he was convicted of attempting to hire two men to kill Baskin. He was sentenced to 22 years behind bars, but the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 10th Circuit ruled in July to vacate the sentence on a technicality.

In September of 2020, Joe Exotic applied for a pardon from the Trump administration. He sent a handwritten note, obtained by Yahoo Entertainment, stating that he looked up to the then-President Trump because you stand for what you believe in no matter what anyone thinks.

Read the original:

Carole Baskin confirms sale of Joe Exotic's former zoo, says it can't be used for 'anything related to Tiger King' - Yahoo Entertainment

The WHO is tracking a COVID-19 variant called Mu, which has been found in 48 out of the 50 states in the US. Reuters

The World Health Organization is tracking a COVID-19 variant called "Mu."

Mu, also known as B.1.621, was first detected in Colombia, and has since spread to 39 countries.

The WHO says it has a "constellation of mutations" that suggests it can evade vaccine immunity.

Visit Insider's homepage for more stories.

The World Health Organization (WHO) is tracking a new COVID-19 variant that it says could have the ability to evade the immunity people get from vaccines and prior COVID-19 infections.

Called Mu, the B.1.621 variant was first detected in Colombia in January this year. It has since been detected in 39 countries and was added to the WHO's watchlist on August 30.

In the WHO's weekly bulletin, the organization said the variant "has a constellation of mutations that indicate potential properties of immune escape."

The WHO noted in its bulletin that further studies will need to be done on the mutated variant to see if it can evade immune defenses to COVID-19 like the Beta variant first detected in South Africa.

According to the open-source database Outbreak.info, 1,953 cases of the Mu variant have been reported in the US. At press time, only two states - South Dakota and Nebraska - have not yet seen infections of the Mu variant.

"At the moment, it looks like there's genuine cause for concern in USA, Central America, and South America, but as we saw with Delta, a potent variant can traverse the globe in the blink of an eye," said Danny Altmann, an immunology expert at Imperial College London, to The Telegraph.

Mutations of the COVID-19 virus have indeed wreaked havoc worldwide. The contagious Delta variant caused a devastating wave of COVID infections in India and led to a sharp surge in cases in the US.

The recent case surge in America has prompted the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to recommend that even the fully vaccinated should wear masks indoors.

At press time on September 1, the US reported a daily average of 166,080 cases of COVID-19 infections, bringing its total number of infections to 39,527,445, per The New York Times' COVID-19 case tracker. This marks an 18% increase over the last 14 days in the number of COVID cases reported in the US.

Read the original article on Insider

See the original post:

The WHO is tracking a new COVID-19 variant called Mu that might be able to evade immunity from vaccines and previous infections - Yahoo News

The definition of discount is a deduction from the usual cost of something, typically given for prompt or advance payment or to a special category of buyers.

I consider my fellow readers of The Athletic as a special category of buyers. Thats why Ive written this special article series about ADP Hacks for you this month (plus, because my editor assigned this series to me).

If this is your first exposure to this series, the elevator pitch to you is this: Our ADP hack points out which players are being drafted earlier or later in ADP compared to other draft sites. (Pretend its a long elevator ride.) This lets you know if you have to reach for a player you like higher than you expected or if you can wait a little later.

We already did this ADP hack with quarterbacks, running backs and wide receivers.

The tight ends position is interesting because the top ones are bunched at the top, which all draft sites seem to agree with in Average Draft Position. But cohesiveness starts to unravel in the middle rounds on who is deserving of a TE1 spot on your roster.

Go here to see the original:

Hacking the draft room: How to exploit ESPN and Yahoo tight end fantasy rankings using ADP - The Athletic

Goodyear Tire & Rubber Company (GT) is no stranger to very high speeds on the racetrack.

The tiremaker has had a long, storied 100-year history in the sport of racing. It all began for Goodyear back in 1901, when Ford founder Henry Ford put Goodyear rubber on his car sponsored by the Detroit Driving Club. Come 1922 and after years of wins, Goodyear dropped out of active race participation amid the economic uncertainties of the time.

Goodyears unofficial return to racing came in 1954 with the test of the Police Special Tire in Darlington, South Carolina. The company made its official return into racing in 1958.

In the 1960s, Goodyear scored major victories at the prestigious 24 Hours of Le Mans with legends Dan Gurney and Bob Bondurant behind the wheel of a GT Cobra. Legend AJ Foyt scored a few Indy 500 wins, too.

Today, its safe to say Goodyear continues to be the dominant tire player in all things racing. Producing racing tires by hand out of its high-tech Akron, Ohio, manufacturing plant, Goodyear makes every racing tire produced for Nascars top three series as well as the NHRA/Top Fuel league. The company churns out more than 100,000 tires each year for Nascar. About 4,000 tires are brought to the track by Goodyear on a typical Nascar race weekend.

A worker hand makes a Nascar tire at Goodyear's Akron, Ohio manufacturing plant.

And suffice it to say, the racing tire of today has come a long way from those Henry Ford days. A Nascar tire is constructed to handle speeds of more than 200 mph. At those 200 mph speeds, the surface area of one tire touching the track is roughly equal to half of an 8.5 inch by 11 inch piece of paper.

Each Nascar tire is 15 inches, weighs 24 pounds, has an RFID tag and the name of the person that made the tire on a sticker. The tire life ranges from 80 to 100 miles, or the distance it takes to use a full tank of fuel. Each tire costs $503.

As for the NHRA tires, they are designed to handle speeds in excess of 300 mph. The front tires for a top fuel car go for $274, and $919 for the ginormous rear tires.

Story continues

Brian Sozzi is an editor-at-large and anchor at Yahoo Finance. Follow Sozzi on Twitter @BrianSozzi and on LinkedIn.

Follow Yahoo Finance on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Flipboard, LinkedIn, YouTube, and reddit

See the original post:

Goodyear's road to making Nascar tires - Yahoo Finance

(Bloomberg) -- Days before Christmas in 2015, Juniper Networks Inc. alerted users that it had been breached. In a brief statement, the company said it had discovered unauthorized code in one of its network security products, allowing hackers to decipher encrypted communications and gain high-level access to customers computer systems.

Further details were scant, but Juniper made clear the implications were serious: It urged users to download a software update with the highest priority.

More than five years later, the breach of Junipers network remains an enduring mystery in computer security, an attack on Americas software supply chain that potentially exposed highly sensitive customers including telecommunications companies and U.S. military agencies to years of spying before the company issued a patch.

Those intruders havent yet been publicly identified, and if there were any victims other than Juniper, they havent surfaced to date. But one crucial detail about the incident has long been known uncovered by independent researchers days after Junipers alert in 2015 and continues to raise questions about the methods U.S. intelligence agencies use to monitor foreign adversaries.

The Juniper product that was targeted, a popular firewall device called NetScreen, included an algorithm written by the National Security Agency. Security researchers have suggested that the algorithm contained an intentional flaw otherwise known as a backdoor that American spies could have used to eavesdrop on the communications of Junipers overseas customers. NSA declined to address allegations about the algorithm.

Junipers breach remains important and the subject of continued questions from Congress because it highlights the perils of governments inserting backdoors in technology products.

As government agencies and misguided politicians continue to push for backdoors into our personal devices, policymakers and the American people need a full understanding of how backdoors will be exploited by our adversaries, Senator Ron Wyden, a Democrat from Oregon, said in a statement to Bloomberg. He demanded answers in the last year from Juniper and from the NSA about the incident, in letters signed by 10 or more members of Congress.

Story continues

Against that backdrop, a Bloomberg News investigation has filled in significant new details, including why Sunnyvale, California-based Juniper, a top maker of computer networking equipment, used the NSA algorithm in the first place, and who was behind the attack.

Juniper installed the NSA code an algorithm with the unwieldy name Dual Elliptic Curve Deterministic Random Bit Generator in NetScreen devices beginning in 2008 even though the companys engineers knew there was a vulnerability that some experts considered a backdoor, according to a former senior U.S. intelligence official and three Juniper employees who were involved with or briefed about the decision.

The reason was that the Department of Defense, a major customer and NSAs parent agency, insisted on its inclusion despite the availability of other, more trusted alternatives, according to the official and the three employees. The algorithm had just become a federal standard at NSAs behest, alongside three similar ones that werent mired in controversy, and the Pentagon tied some future contracts for Juniper specifically to the use of Dual Elliptic Curve, the employees said. The request prompted concern among some Juniper engineers, but ultimately the code was added to appease a large customer, the employees said. The Department of Defense declined to discuss its relationship with Juniper.

Members of a hacking group linked to the Chinese government called APT 5 hijacked the NSA algorithm in 2012, according to two people involved with Junipers investigation and an internal document detailing its findings that Bloomberg reviewed. The hackers altered the algorithm so they could decipher encrypted data flowing through the virtual private network connections created by NetScreen devices. They returned in 2014 and added a separate backdoor that allowed them to directly access NetScreen products, according to the people and the document.

While previous reports have attributed the attacks to the Chinese government, Bloomberg for the first time has identified the hacking group and its tactics. In the past year, APT 5 is suspected of engineering intrusions into dozens of companies and government agencies, according to cybersecurity firm FireEye Inc., which added that the hackers have long sought to identify or introduce vulnerabilities into encryption products to enable breaches of their ultimate targets: defense and technology companies in the U.S., Europe and Asia.

After detecting the 2012 and 2014 breaches of its network, Juniper failed to understand their significance or recognize that they were related, according to the two people involved with Junipers investigation and the internal document. At the time, the company found that hackers had accessed its e-mail system and stolen data from infected computers, but investigators mistakenly believed the intrusions were separate and limited to theft of corporate intellectual property, according to the people and the document.

Juniper declined to answer specific questions from Bloomberg. The company provided a statement that reiterated its comments from 2015 about the operating system for its Netscreen products, which is called ScreenOS.

Several years ago, during an internal code review, Juniper Networks discovered unauthorized code in ScreenOS that could allow a knowledgeable attacker to gain administrative access to NetScreen devices and to decrypt VPN connections, the company said. Once we identified these vulnerabilities, we launched an internal and coordinated external investigation and worked to develop and issue patched releases for the impacted devices. We also immediately and successfully reached out to affected customers, strongly recommending that they update their systems and apply the patched releases with the highest priority.

In a July 2020 response to Wyden and other members of Congress, Juniper provided few new details of the case but blamed the intrusions on a sophisticated nation-state hacking unit. NSA told Wydens staff in 2018 that there was a lessons learned report, but the agency now asserts that it cannot locate this document, according to a Wyden aide. Reuters previously reported NSAs claim that the document had been lost.

I am extremely disappointed that the NSA refused to answer my questions about their reported role in the Juniper affair, Wyden said in his statement.

The NSA declined to comment to Bloomberg. Chinas Ministry of Foreign Affairs said in a statement, China firmly opposes and combats all forms of cyberattacks and opposes arbitrary labeling and malicious attacks on China in the absence of conclusive evidence.

The U.S. government and related agencies have carried out large-scale, organized and indiscriminate cyber theft, surveillance and attacks on foreign governments, companies and individuals, according to the ministry. The U.S. should stop being the thief who calls out to catch the thief.

Bloombergs findings add new details to a long-running and contentious debate over the use of backdoors secret digital pathways that bypass security measures and allow high-level access to computer networks.

Some of the governments prior efforts to install backdoors in U.S. products are well known, including an ill-fated effort to equip American-designed telecommunications equipment with NSAs Clipper chip in the early 1990s. Two decades later, leaked documents from former NSA contractor Edward Snowden revealed some of the agency's secret techniques for penetrating encryption, lending credence to allegations that NSA installed a backdoor in the Dual Elliptic Curve algorithm, according to multiple news articles based on the files.

More recently, in October, the Department of Justice under then-President Trump published a joint statement with counterparts in the U.K. and Australia saying modern encryption poses significant challenges to public safety and urging technology companies to implement reasonable, technically feasible solutions to allow authorities backdoor access when required.

The governments classified policies around the practice are shrouded in such secrecy that critics worry about potential abuses.

Junipers case is a perfect example of the danger of government backdoors, said Jennifer Stisa Granick, surveillance and cybersecurity counsel for the American Civil Liberties Union. "There is no such thing as a backdoor that only the U.S. government can exploit.

NetScreen was an innovative company that Juniper acquired for $4 billion in 2004. Its products combined a firewall, which controls who can access computers on a network, and VPNs, which encrypt users data as it travels over the internet.

Customers included major banks and nine of the 10 top global telecommunications companies, according to a Juniper investor presentation. The Defense Department was a major customer, too, and enjoyed direct access to high-ranking Juniper employees.

At least once a year, Pentagon officials traveled to Junipers headquarters to meet with a small group of NetScreens senior engineering managers to review planned product upgrades and ensure they would meet federal security standards, according to the former senior U.S. intelligence official and the three Juniper employees who either attended or were briefed about the meetings.

By 2008, the Department of Defense had presented Juniper with a tricky proposition: If the company wanted NetScreen to qualify for certain future contracts with the military and intelligence agencies, it would need to add the Dual Elliptic Curve algorithm to NetScreens ScreenOS software, the four people said.

The NSA algorithm, which was purported to improve security for encrypted communications, had been approved as a standard for government systems despite red flags. In 2007, Microsoft Corp. researchers had published a technical paper warning that it contained a likely backdoor. The researchers homed in on something called the Q value, a large number in the algorithm used to help create encryption keys. At the time, NSA had a specific value it recommended. According to the researchers, whoever picked the value could calculate the secret contents of those keys and ultimately decrypt communications.

Nonetheless, the National Institute of Standards and Technology a Department of Commerce agency that sets security requirements for federal computer systems made the algorithm part of a federal cryptographic standard in 2008 at NSAs direction, one of four that could be selected. Federal agencies and government contractors are required to follow NIST guidance, and the private sector often follows those standards.

Juniper was aware of concerns about a possible backdoor and also criticism that the algorithm was notoriously slow, according to the three employees present for or briefed about the meetings with the Pentagon. But because NIST had validated the algorithm, Juniper went forward with the proposal to satisfy a big customer, they said.

After Snowdens disclosures in 2013 renewed concerns about the NSA algorithm, Juniper said in a security advisory that NetScreen products had two safeguards designed to prevent any exploitation of the vulnerability. However, after the companys breach disclosure in 2015, independent researchers discovered that one of them failed, and the other was rendered ineffective by the hackers tampering.

Juniper wasnt the only organization that used the algorithm.

OpenSSL, whose open-source encryption software is used by millions of websites, also incorporated it. A sponsor of the project requested its inclusion to meet NIST standards, Steve Marquess, a project manager, wrote in 2013. We didnt make [Dual Elliptic Curve] a default anywhere and I didnt think anyone would be stupid enough to actually use it in a real-world context," he wrote. Marquess didnt identify the sponsor. He didnt respond to a request for comment.

Microsoft Corp., Cisco Systems Inc. and other companies included it in their products as well, according to a database maintained by NIST. Dual Elliptic Curve often came in a package of encryption software that contained all four federally approved algorithms that were part of the same standard, and companies could decide whether or how to make them available to their customers.

Microsoft and Cisco made other algorithms the default choices. Cisco, in a blog post, acknowledged using third-party software that included Dual Elliptic Curve but said the algorithm was not in use in any Cisco products. A company representative declined further comment. Microsoft declined to comment.

Industry pioneer RSA Security received $10 million from the NSA in a deal that set Dual Elliptic Curve as the default in a package of encryption software that it licensed to other technology companies, Reuters reported in 2013. RSA and its owner, Symphony Technology Group, didnt respond to messages from Bloomberg.

Junipers investigations of its breaches in 2012 and 2014 underestimated the hacking threats facing the company, mistakenly concluding that those incidents were attempts to steal trade secrets that had little effect, according to the two people involved in Junipers investigation and the internal document. The company reported the incidents to the FBI and the Defense Department but downplayed their significance to those agencies, based on its understanding of the intrusions at the time, the people said.

Juniper had missed an important clue.

In its 2012 probe, Juniper learned that the hackers had stolen a file containing NetScreens ScreenOS source code from an engineers computer. The company didnt realize that the hackers returned a short time later, accessed a server where new versions of ScreenOS were prepared before being made available to customers and altered the code, according to the two people involved in the 2015 investigation and the document. The hackers' tweak involved changing the Q value that the NSA algorithm used the very same vulnerability that Microsoft researchers had identified years earlier. The hack allowed them to potentially bypass customers' encryption and eavesdrop on their communications.

Juniper said in its December 2015 statement that it discovered the tampering during an internal code review. The company hired FireEyes Mandiant division, a leader in digital forensics, to help investigate, according to the people and the document. The investigation concluded APT 5 was behind the attacks, the people said.

A spokesperson for Mandiant declined to comment.

Juniper revealed few specifics, but independent researchers filled in many details about what happened, identifying the illicit change to the Q value and the insertion of an unauthorized master password, disguised as debugging code. The hackers could use the password to gain access to NetScreen products.

Years later, Russian hackers were discovered using a similar method, inserting a backdoor in software updates from Austin, Texas-based SolarWinds Corp., an attack a Microsoft executive described as the largest and most sophisticated attack the world has ever seen. The attackers ultimately infiltrated nine U.S. agencies and at least 100 companies using the backdoor and other methods.

In the last year, a group suspected to be APT 5 has targeted VPN devices made by San Jose, California-based Pulse Secure LLC in attacks on dozens of companies and government agencies, according to FireEye. Daniel Spicer, chief security officer at Ivanti Inc., Pulse Secures parent company, said in a statement that a highly sophisticated threat actor was behind the attacks but declined to discuss the attribution or motivation. The company found no evidence that its source code had been modified. A rigorous code review is just one of the steps we are taking to further bolster our security and protect our customers, he said.

Because of their central role in telecommunications systems, Juniper products have been a longtime target for intelligence agencies, according to a 2011 document leaked by Snowden. It revealed that GCHQ the British signals intelligence agency developed secret exploits against at least 13 different models of NetScreen firewalls, with the knowledge of the NSA. Other classified NSA memos support cybersecurity experts suspicions about Dual Elliptic Curve, indicating the NSA created a backdoor and pushed the algorithm on NIST and other standards bodies. One NSA memo, cited in news articles based on the documents, called the effort a challenge in finesse.

Based on Snowdens revelations, NIST revoked its support for the algorithm in 2014. In a statement, NIST said its decision was due to the implications suggested by the Snowden revelations. Use and implementation of an encryption technology is rooted in trust, and NIST no longer had full trust in the base assumptions made for the security of the NSA algorithm, the agency said.

While the Pentagon wouldn't discuss specific questions about its relationship with Juniper, it responded to Bloomberg News with a general statement about its cybersecurity. In light of increasingly frequent and complex cyber intrusion efforts by adversaries and non-state actors, the department is constantly applying mitigations, improving defenses, and closing vulnerabilities in our global information network, said spokesman Russell Goemaere.

Juniper warned in a December 2015 technical bulletin that there was no way for customers to know if their NetScreen VPN traffic was intercepted and decrypted. And while any use of the illicit master password would have left a small record, Juniper cautioned that a skilled hacker could delete it and effectively eliminate any reliable signature that that device had been compromised.

For all the twists and lingering questions, cybersecurity experts and civil liberties defenders say the Juniper incident shows the perils of inserting backdoors for spy agencies, the companies involved and their customers.

Time and again, weve seen the government lose control of vulnerabilities, said Jim Dempsey, a lecturer on cybersecurity at the University of California, Berkeley, School of Law. The bigger lesson from the whole Juniper ordeal is that the government cannot control its vulnerabilities. With Michael Riley and Christopher Cannon

More stories like this are available on bloomberg.com

Subscribe now to stay ahead with the most trusted business news source.

2021 Bloomberg L.P.

Here is the original post:

Juniper Breach Mystery Starts to Clear With New Details on Hackers and U.S. Role - Yahoo Finance