Samsung: Galaxy S5 out by April, may scan your eyes

STORY HIGHLIGHTS

• Samsung says its Galaxy S5 phone will be released by April


• Vice president says it may have eye-scanning tech


• New Galaxy Gear smartwatch will come at same time, Lee says


• The Galaxy S5 will have a different design

(CNN) -- Samsung's Galaxy S5, the next generation of
its flagship smartphone, will be released by April and may include
innovative eye-scanning technology.

An executive for the Korean tech giant confirmed to Bloomberg
that the phone will hit stores this year on roughly the same time table
as previous iterations of the device, which has emerged as the chief
rival to Apple's iPhone.

The Galaxy S4 was announced last March and released in April.

Lee Young Hee, executive
vice president for Samsung's mobile business, also told the news service
that a new version of the company's Galaxy Gear smartwatch will be
released at the same time as the new phone.

The new phone is expected to look different from Samsung's popular Galaxy S4, shown here.

"We've been announcing
our first flagship model in the first half of each year, around March
and April, and we are still targeting for release around that time," Lee
said. "When we release our S5 device, you can also expect a Gear
successor with more advanced functions, and the bulky design will also
be improved."

Speaking at the
International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, Lee wouldn't say
whether the eye scanner -- presumably an effort to one-up Apple's iPhone
5S with its fingerprint security feature -- is a sure thing.

"Many people are
fanatical about iris recognition technology," she said. "We are studying
the possibility but can't really say whether we will have it or not on
the S5."

She did say the S5 will
look and feel significantly different than its predecessor, which some
felt wasn't different enough from the Galaxy S3.

"When we moved to S4 from
S3, it's partly true that consumers couldn't really feel much
difference between the two products from the physical perspective, so
the market reaction wasn't as big," she said. "For the S5, we will go
back to the basics. Mostly, it's about the display and the feel of the
cover."

In November, Samsung released the Galaxy Round,
with a curved, 5.7-inch screen. That release was only in South Korea,
and analysts have speculated the company isn't done with curved-screen
technology on its phones. At CES this week, Samsung rolled out a massive, 105-inch television with a curved screen.

Released in September, Galaxy Gear
helped push the growing wearable tech trend forward but, like some
other smartwatches, met with mixed reviews. Some felt the watch was too
bulky and had limited functionality.

From blue to green, red or orange: Fish put on new light

(CNN) -- There is a light show in the ocean that you
can't see, but many fish can. There's quite a display of neon greens,
reds, and oranges going on underneath the surface.

Still, the discovery of
what is hidden from human eyes -- biofluorescence in 180 species of fish
-- brings up many questions for researchers.

Do fish use it to communicate with others? Do they use it to mate? What is its function?

Biofluorescence occurs when an organism absorbs blue light, transforms it and emits it as another color.

A team of researchers
from the American Museum of Natural History and other scientific
organizations published a study Wednesday in the online journal PLOS
ONE, reporting the findings of the first in-depth look at
biofluorescence in fish.

"We've long known about
biofluorescence underwater in organisms like corals, jellyfish, and even
in land animals like butterflies and parrots," said the study's
co-author, John Sparks, who is a curator in the Museum's Department of
Ichthyology.

He said the team stumbled
on an eel that glowed green while he and a partner were studying a reef
in the Cayman Islands. The discovery in a photograph of the eel
lighting up underneath the blue lights they used led them to make four
more trips in different parts of the world to get a closer look at the
glow show.

The expeditions to the
Bahamas in the Caribbean and Solomon Islands in the Pacific revealed a
variety of fish living around coral reefs -- including sharks, rays,
eels and lizerdfishes -- that exhibited bioflourescence. s

"Many shallow reef
inhabitants and fish have the capabilities to detect fluorescent light
and may be using biofluorescence in similar fashions to how animals use
bioluminescence, such as to find mates and to camouflage," Sparks
suggested, while adding the reasons will need further study.

So how do the fish
recognize it? Many of them have yellow filters in their eyes, "possibly
allowing them to see the otherwise hidden fluorescent displays taking
place in the water," a news release from the museum of natural history
said.

"The cryptically
patterned gobies, flatfishes, eels, and scorpionfishes -- these are
animals that you'd never normally see during a dive," Sparks said. "To
our eyes, they blend right into their environment. But to a fish that
has a yellow intraocular filter, they must stick out like a sore thumb."

Some scientists cautioned that the bioflouresence might look neat in photos using special lights but also have no function.

Nico Michiels, a
zoologist at the University of Tübingen in Germany, and Steven Haddock
of the Monterey Bay Aquarium Research Institute in California, indicated to Science Now
that the need for special technology to view what the website called
weak fluorescence "casts doubt on the usefulness of the coloration in
the fish's dimly lit natural environments."

Sparks said it will be interesting to see what the team finds next.

"This paper is the first
to look at the wide distribution of biofluorescence across fishes, and
it opens up a number of new research areas," he said.

He added that there may be fluorescent proteins involved, ones that could be used in biomedical research.

Ukraine ex-minister beaten in fresh Kiev clashes

KIEV: Ukraine's ex-interior minister and current opposition
leader Yuriy Lutsenko was under intensive care in hospital Saturday
after being beaten in fresh clashes that erupted between pro-EU
demonstrators and club-wielding police.

Dozens of nationalist demonstrators protested late Friday outside a
Kiev court that had earlier in the day sentenced three men to six years
in prison for allegedly plotting to blow up a statue of Soviet founder
Lenin near the city's main airport in 2011.



Ukrainian television showed several protesters being carried by stretcher to an ambulance that had been rushed to the scene.



Russian state television said the anti-riot troops moved in after
being pelted with rocks by protesters who were trying to block police
vans as the three convicts were being led out of the court in order to
be placed in jail.



Ukrainian opposition news sites published photographs and video
images of Lutsenko with his head bandaged and a large patch over his
right eye.



Lutsenko's wife Irina said her husband had suffered a concussion and
head injuries after being attacked by club-wielding police while he was
trying to break up the unfolding violence.



“He has been placed in intensive care. They are going to keep him
under observation,” she told Ukraine's opposition Hromadske television
channel.



Ukrainian nationalists have been a driving force behind
anti-government protests that erupted in November after President Viktor
Yanukovych ditched a historic EU trade agreement in favour of closer
ties with old master Russia.



The rallies were fanned further by anger over violence that broke out
when hundreds of officers beat dozens of demonstrators while trying to
clear them off Kiev's iconic Independence Square on November 30.



The latest clash in Kiev drew no immediate response from Yanukovych or his government members.



But they threaten to fuel rallies that began to fizzle out last month
when Yanukovych signed a $15-billion economic bailout agreement with
Moscow that also slashed the price Ukraine pays for Russian gas imports.



Lutsenko was a prominent member of former prime minister Yulia
Tymoshenko's pro-Western government and remains a close ally of the
jailed opposition leader.



The 49-year-old was himself put in prison on contested charges in
late 2010 and pardoned by Yanukovych under EU pressure in April 2013.

UN Council backs Iraq government against militants

United Nations: The UN Security Council on Friday gave strong backing
to an Iraqi government campaign to retake provincial strongholds from
al Qaeda-linked militants.



The 15-nation council agreed a statement backing Prime Minister Nuri
al-Maliki amid mounting concern over the battle for Anbar province,
which runs from the western suburbs of Baghdad up to the border with
Syria.



The council condemned attacks by militants of the Islamic State of
Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) and praised the “great courage” of the Iraqi
security forces in Anbar.



“The Security Council expresses its strong support for the continued
efforts of the Iraqi government to help meet the security needs of the
entire population of Iraq,” said the statement.



The council urged “Iraqi tribes, local leaders, and Iraqi security
forces in Anbar province, to continue, expand and strengthen their
cooperation against violence and terror and it stresses the critical
importance of continued national dialogue and unity.”



Gunmen seized Fallujah, just west of Baghdad, and parts of the Anbar
provincial capital Ramadi last week, the first time militants have had
such power in major cities since the insurgency following the 2003
US-led invasion.



Tribal fighters and police retook two areas of Ramadi on Friday as part of a fightback.



While rights groups have highlighted the impact on the longer
suffering population of the province, the United States has increased
pressure on Maliki's government to focus on political reconciliation, as
well as the military operations, to end the standoff, which comes three
months from a key national election

300,000 in US told not to use water after chemical spill

CHARLESTON (USA): The White House has issued a federal disaster
declaration in West Virginia, where a chemical spill that may have
contaminated tap water has led officials to tell at least 300,000 people
not to bathe, brush their teeth or wash their clothes.



The US attorney in West Virginia said on Friday that federal
authorities are opening an investigation into what caused the spill that
tainted a river and shut down much of the state’s capital city and
surrounding counties.



The chemical, a foaming agent used in the coal preparation process,
leaked Thursday from a tank at Freedom Industries, overran a containment
area and went into the Elk River. Schools and restaurants closed, and
grocery stores sold out of bottled water.



“It was chaos, that's what it was,” convenience store cashier Danny
Cardwell said. Officials said they were not sure what hazard the spill
posed to residents. “I don't know if the water is not safe,” West
Virginia American Water company president Jeff McIntyre said.



Kanawha County emergency officials said the chemical is called
4-methylcyclohexane methanol. McIntyre said the chemical isn't lethal in
its strongest form.



The tank that leaked holds at least 40,000 gallons, said Tom Aluise, a
state Department of Environmental Protection spokesman. “We’re
confident that no more than 5,000 gallons escaped” through a breach in a
concrete wall that serves as a containment area, he said.



“Our understanding is it's not an especially toxic material. It's not dangerous necessarily to be around,” he said.



According to a fact sheet from biotechnology company Fisher
Scientific, the chemical is harmful if swallowed and causes eye and skin
irritation. Other symptoms include nausea, vomiting, dizziness,
headaches, diarrhoea, reddened skin, itching and rashes, according to a
news release from the American Association of Poison Control Centers.



Officials from Freedom, a manufacturer of chemicals for the mining,
steel, and cement industries, haven't commented since the spill, but a
woman who answered the phone at the company said it would issue a
statement Friday.



Bill Hines with the Federal Emergency Management Agency said the
emergency declaration allows for direct federal assistance in dealing
with the spill.



The West Virginia National Guard planned to distribute bottled
drinking water to emergency services agencies in the nine affected
counties. About 100,000 water customers, or 300,000 people total, were
affected, state officials said.



Early Friday, Department of Military Affairs and Public Safety
spokesman Lawrence Messina said he wasn’t aware of any hospitals closing
and that area medical centers “seemed to have adequate water supply, at
least for the short term.”—AP

Ex-Israel PM Ariel Sharon dies at 85

TEL AVIV: Former Israeli premier Ariel Sharon died in hospital
near Tel Aviv Saturday, aged 85, after eight years in a coma, drawing
tributes from Israeli leaders but contempt from Palestinians.



“The Sheba Medical Centre in Tel HaShomer announces with sorrow the
passing of former prime minister Ariel Sharon that was determined
approximately an hour ago,” senior doctor Professor Shlomo Noy told a
news conference at 1300 GMT.



Sharon has been in a coma since January 4, 2006 after suffering a
massive stroke. His condition took a sudden turn for the worse on New
Year's Day when he suffered serious kidney problems after surgery.



“He's gone; he went when he decided to go,” his son Gilad told reporters at the hospital, in remarks on Channel 2 television.



Sharon was one of Israel’s most skilled but controversial political
and military leaders, who was hailed by many Israelis as a statesman
whose ruthless methods earned him the moniker “The Bulldozer.”



As news of his death emerged, tributes poured in from senior Israeli
officials, but the Palestinians were quick to denounce him as a
“criminal” who had escaped international justice.



Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said Israel would “forever” cherish Sharon's memory.



“The State of Israel bows its head over the passing of former prime
minister Ariel Sharon,” he said in a statement, expressing “deep sorrow”
over the news. “His memory will forever be held in the heart of the
nation.”



A veteran soldier, Sharon fought in all of Israel's major wars before
embarking on a turbulent political career in 1973 that ended
dramatically when he suffered the stroke from which he never recovered.



Long considered a pariah for his personal but “indirect”
responsibility for the 1982 massacre of hundreds of Palestinians by
Israel's Lebanese Phalangist allies in Beirut's Sabra and Shatila
refugee camps, Sharon was elected premier in 2001.



The Palestinians were quick to welcome news of his death, with a
senior official labelling him a criminal and accusing him of being
responsible for the mysterious death in 2004 of the veteran Palestinian
leader, Yasser Arafat.



“Sharon was a criminal, responsible for the assassination of Arafat,
and we would have hoped to see him appear before the International
Criminal Court as a war criminal,” said Jibril Rajub, a senior official
of the Fatah party.



The Hamas movement, which rules the Gaza Strip, hailed Sharon’s death
as a “historic moment” marking the “disappearance of a criminal whose
hands were covered with Palestinian blood.”



Sarah Leah Whitson, Middle East director at Human Rights Watch, also
regretted that Sharon never faced justice, particularly over his role in
the Beirut camp killings.



“It's a shame that Sharon has gone to his grave without facing
justice for his role in Sabra and Shatila and other abuses,” she said in
a statement.



“His passing is another grim reminder that years of virtual impunity
for rights abuses have done nothing to bring Israeli-Palestinian peace
any closer. For the thousands of victims of abuses, Sharon's passing
without facing justice magnifies their tragedy.”



One of the last members of the generation that founded the Jewish
state 1948, he leaves a complex legacy which saw him push through a
policy of separation from the Palestinians, orchestrate Israel's
unilateral withdrawal from Gaza in 2005 and begin building the sprawling
West Bank barrier in 2002.



Born in British-mandate Palestine on February 26, 1928, to parents
from Belarus, Sharon was just 17 when he joined the Haganah, the
pre-state militia that fought in the 1948 war of independence and
eventually became the Israeli army.



Known throughout his military career for his boldness, Sharon also
had a stubborn sense of independence which saw him surprising friends
and foes alike.



Ever the maverick, Sharon later broke with his life-long rightwing
convictions to push through an unprecedentedly bold plan to withdraw
Israeli troops and 8,000 settlers from the Gaza Strip, earning him the
hatred of his former nationalist and settler allies.

Report on Pakistan’s online future launched

KARACHI: The impact of the Internet in a local context
particularly in relation to the state ‘compulsion’ to regulate and
control the cyberspace was discussed on Friday at the launch of a
comprehensive report about Pakistan’s online future.



While the blocking and filtering of content on the Internet by the
state resulted in numerous violations of fundamental rights, especially
the right to access to information, people successfully circumvented
these blocks by using proxy servers and virtual private networks, said
Jahanzaib Haque, author of the 28-page report ‘Pakistan’s Internet
Landscape’.



Presenting report’s main findings and recommendations to the
gathering, Mr Haque said that although the blocking and filtering of
online content was becoming increasingly organised, it continued to be
inconsistent.



He added that the blocking and filtering was mostly directed at the
content that was deemed blasphemous or obscene, even though these terms
were not properly defined. He cited examples of some educational
websites that were incorrectly defined as ‘obscene’ and therefore banned
by the authorities. Some members of the audience added to the
discussion by relating anecdotes of students who had experienced
difficulties in learning, because the Youtube ban restricted them from
accessing useful lectures and other study materials on the website.



Talking about the problems of hate speech and extremism in his
presentation, Mr Haque, web editor at The Express Tribune, said there
had been very specific and targeted attacks on well-known personalities
in recent years. In this regard, he cited the hate campaigns that
started in the wake of the deadly attack on Malala Yousafzai in October
2012, and those hailing Mumtaz Qadri as a hero for killing former Punjab
governor Salman Taseer in January 2011.



The presentation was followed by a lively, rather informal panel
discussion on the report’s findings, and their impact on the freedom of
expression in the cyberspace and Internet rights in Pakistan. Panellists
included Wusatullah Khan (senior journalist), Sabeen Mahmud (founder of
PeaceNiche/T2F), and technologist Aleem Bawany, along with Shahzad
Ahmad, Country Director of Bytes for All, Pakistan, as well as the
author of the report.



The complete report — produced by Bytes for All Pakistan (B4A), a
human rights organisation focusing on the Information and Communication
Technologies — is available online for the public to read.



The research paper provides a detailed outline of the Internet
control mechanisms deployed by the government, and describes the
existing legislative measures and their applications to the Internet. It
also provides a historical view of Internet censorship in Pakistan, and
the state’s attempts to ‘criminalise legitimate expression’ in the
cyberspace. The report also explores the current situation of Internet
surveillance, its purpose, the method used, and the effects caused by
such monitoring.



The event was attended by media practitioners, journalists, human
rights activists, members of the civil society, politicians,
researchers, as well as major stakeholders in the cyberspace.



The event concluded with the screening of a light-hearted video
titled ‘Hugs to Youtube’, starring a person dressed as the Youtube logo,
and carrying a sign stating “Hug me if you want me back”. The video was
an initiative by the #KholoBC Pakistan for All campaign that opposes
all forms of state oppression and regulation of content on the Internet.




The viewing was followed by a note of thanks by the moderator.