Events

While not quite as viscerally grotesque as a 140-tonne fatberg, new details about the failures at Equifax that led to its massive data breach are still pretty disgusting: Equifax has confirmed that attackers entered its system in mid-May through a web-application vulnerability that had a patch available in March. In other words, the credit-reporting giant had more than two months to take precautions that would have defended the personal data of 143 million people from being exposed. It didn't. As the...

A 140-tonne blob of fat and other horrible things is blocking a sewer in East London: What has been named the Whitechapel fatberg is a rock-solid agglomeration of fat, disposable wipes, diapers, condoms and tampons. It was discovered to the east of the city’s financial district, occupying a sixth of a mile of sewer under Whitechapel Road, between one of London’s largest mosques and a pub called the Blind Beggar, where walking tours are taken to reminisce about a notorious gangland murder. Thames Water...

Historian John Schmidt posted today about the 11 most-mispronounced street names in Chicago: (1) Devon. Like those posts note—and like most Chicagoans I know—I pronounce it dee-VAHN. (2) Leavitt. Forget the part that looks like “leave.” It’s LEV-itt. (3) Paulina. Not pronounced like the girl’s name. The street is pull-EYE-nuh. That last one is part of a joke: What are the three street names that rhyme with female anatomy? Paulina, Malvina, and Lunt. It also reminds me of Yuri Rasovsky's infamous 1972...

Today is the 1 0000 0000th day of the year! Go hug a software developer.

Jeet Heer grapples with the depressing reality that we'll never be completely free of Donald Trump during his lifetime: For argument’s sake, let’s assume the best-case scenario: that we somehow manage to survive Trump’s first term and send him packing in 2020. At the moment, the odds of him winning reelection appear about equal to those of the Titanic triumphantly resurfacing under its own steam. His approval ratings are at historic lows, and he evinces no interest in finding a way to expand his base....

Deeply Trivial finds evidence for why there is little evidence about the safety of e-cigarettes: [T]he statistical sin here isn't really something the researchers have done (or didn't do). It's an impossibility created by confounds. How does one recruit people who have only smoked e-cigarettes or who at least have very little experience with regular cigarettes? What's happening here is really an issue of contamination - a threat to validity that occurs when the treatment of one group works its way into...

With only a very small group to insure, Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Illinois is leaving the Obamacare exchange for small businesses: Calling all small businesses with a Blue Cross & Blue Shield of Illinois plan through the Obamacare public health insurance exchange: Look out for an email this week informing you that the state's largest insurer is officially leaving the online marketplace. That leaves small employers looking for an exchange plan for 2018 with one option: downstate Health Alliance....

The science of modeling hurricane storm surges started here in Chicago after the seiche of 1954: When the surge hit Chicago, it hit a city that housed one of the world’s great meteorology departments, at the University of Chicago. One of its professors was the meteorologist George Platzman.... The meeting of those two freak concepts—real but rare deadly Great Lakes storm surges, and the bizarre possibility of an atomic bomb detonating in Lake Michigan—along with his computer-forecasting experiments, led...

Credit reporting agency Equifax reported last week that thieves had made off with 143 million customer records: According to a person familiar with the breach investigation, Equifax appears to have been targeted initially because the company keeps on file millions of active cards, belonging to people who pay $19.95 or more per month to have Equifax monitor their credit reports and alert them to potential fraud. The hack, which the company says took place in late July, put as many as 143 million...

A meme is going around Facebook: change one letter of a musical's name to ruin it. Some of my favorites so far: On A Clear Day You Can Pee Forever Oklahomo Big Liver Legally Blande The Wound of Music Babes in Farms Sweeney Toad One musician friend posted this on his wall and got over 200 responses.