25 minutes of yoga may boost brain function, energy levels

At a time when the country is yet to recover from the shock of losing 20 Indian soldiers in a violent clash with the Chinese People's Liberation Army (PLA) troops in Ladakh's Galwan Valley, another shocker has come to light with news coming of a malware hitting the Indian Railways network and snooping its data for foreign countries, including train movements, sources in the intelligence agencies said on Friday.

Meanwhile, Railways Board Chairman V K Yadav said that the national transporter keeps on receiving malware security threats and the engineers in the railways keep on taking all precautions and keeps on updating the firewalls to prevent data theft.

The news comes a day after the Dedicated Freight Corridor Corporation Limited (DFCCIL) decided to terminate the 417-km signalling project worth Rs 471 crore with Chinese firm Beijing National Railway Research and Design Institute of Signal and Communication Group Company Limited (BNRRDISC) due to non-performance.

According to intelligence agency sources, the system of the Railways has been hit by the APT 36 Malware campaign. The source said that the intel agencies have also alerted the Railway Board to instantly disconnect the system with the Internet and change the password immediately.

The source said the APT 36 Malware is connected to Pakistan, which is a close ally of China. The source further said that following the red flag from the intel agencies, the system of a senior Principal Executive Director of the Railways, working in its vigilance department, has been taken for cleaning the malware threat.

As per the source, through the APT 36 Malware campaign, data stored in the Indian Railways systems were being stolen and stored in foreign locations, including the movement of the trains.

He further claimed that the APT 36 Malware also tried to take defence movement data. 

The source said the APT 36 Malware effect was reported from at least four systems of the Indian Railways.

Responding to queries, the Railways Board Chairman said: "Whether it is our systems or the IRCTC, we continuously update it with firewalls, and it is an ongoing process as we get the updates." 

Yadav said that our system is updated time to time. "We get malware threat on a regular basis. And we look at it continuously," he said. 

When pressed further about the malware threat in four railways systems, he said: "It has not come to our notice that some information has been leaked. Our systems are secure and our engineers keep on working on it."

According to intel sources, besides Railways, there was also malware threat in the defence, central police organisations, education and healthcare sectors, the source said.

In view of the threat, the intel agencies have asked the departments concerned to change the passwords of emails and online services from secure computers, format the hard-disk of the affected computers after taking back-up and re-install the operating systems and other softwares.

Sources in the Railways had said on Thursday that DFFCIL, which is looking after the work of the Dedicated Freight Corridor Project, has decided to terminate the tender with BNRRDISC.

A source in the Railway Ministry said that it has informed the Railway Board and the World Bank to take the final decision in the matter.

The source said the project was awarded to the Chinese firm in 2016 for signalling and telecommunication work on the 417-km Kanpur-Deen Dayal Upadhyaya section of the Eastern Dedicated Freight Corridor (EDFC). 

The source disclosed that the contract was awarded to the Beijing National Railway Research and Design Institute in June 2016. The source further said that even after four years, the progress in the project was only 20%. The issues that led to the termination of the project are reluctance by the company to furnish technical documents, as per the contract agreement, such as logic design of electronic interlocking.

The source further said that other issues like non-availability of their engineers and authorised personnel on site were a serious constraint. Even physical work could not progress as they have no tie-up with local agencies. 

The 3,373-km DFC, a flagship project of the Railways, aims to augment rail transport capacity to meet the growing requirement of movement of goods by segregating freight from passenger traffic.

Using smartphone for long hours every day may do you more harm than you can probably think of. Researchers have found that spending a lot of time with the device and on social media may lead to mental distress and suicidality among adolescents.

The findings, published in the journal CMAJ (Canadian Medical Association Journal) contains guidance for physicians, parents and teachers on how to help teenagers manage smartphone and social media use for a healthy balance between sleep, academic work, social activity, interpersonal relationships and online activity.

"Physicians, teachers and families need to work together with youth to decrease possible harmful effects of smartphones and social media on their relationships, sense of self, sleep, academic performance, and emotional well-being," said lead author of the study Elia Abi-Jaoude from Toronto Western Hospital in Canada.

This review of evidence, led by the Hospital for Sick Children (SickKids), focuses on smartphone use and does not consider online gaming.

"For adolescents today, who have not known a world without social media, digital interactions are the norm, and the potential benefits of online access to productive mental health information -- including media literacy, creativity, self-expression, sense of belonging and civic engagement -- as well as low barriers to resources such as crisis lines and Internet-based talking therapies cannot be discounted," the authors wrote.

The researchers recommend that doctors should ask teenagers to reduce social media use rather than eradicate it completely and encourage parents to be part of the conversations.

Parents should discuss appropriate smartphone use with teenagers to determine together how to reduce risks and set boundaries.

A recent poll from the US indicates that 54 per cent of teenagers think they spend too much time on their smartphones and about half said they were cutting back on usage.

"Encouragingly, youth are increasingly recognising the negative impact of social media on their lives and starting to take steps to mitigate it," the authors wrote.

Scientists have designed a “catch and kill” air filter which they say can trap the novel coronavirus and neutralise it instantly, an invention that may reduce the spread of COVID-19 in closed spaces such as schools, hospitals and health care facilities, as well as public transit environments like airplanes.

According to the study, published in the journal Materials Today Physics, the device killed 99.8 per cent of the novel coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2, in a single pass through its filter. It said the device, made from commercially available nickel foam heated to 200 degrees Celsius, also killed 99.9 per cent of the spores of the deadly bacterium Bacillus anthracis which causes the anthrax disease.

“This filter could be useful in airports and in airplanes, in office buildings, schools, and cruise ships to stop the spread of COVID-19,” said Zhifeng Ren, a co-author of the study from the University of Houston (UH) in the US.

“Its ability to help control the spread of the virus could be very useful for society,” Ren added.

The researchers said they are also developing a desk-top model for the device which is capable of purifying the air in an office worker’s immediate surroundings. According to the scientists, since the virus can remain in the air for about three hours, a filter that could remove it quickly was a viable plan, and with businesses reopening across the world, they believe controlling the spread in air conditioned spaces was urgent.

The study noted that the novel coronavirus cannot survive temperatures above 70 degrees Celsius, so by making the filter temperature far hotter — about 200 degree Celsius, the researchers said they were able to kill the virus almost instantly.

Ren said the nickel foam met several key requirements. “It is porous, allowing the flow of air, and electrically conductive, which allowed it to be heated. It is also flexible,” the researchers noted in a statement.But they added that nickel foam also had low resistivity, making it difficult to raise the temperature high enough to quickly kill the virus.

The researchers said they solved this problem by folding the foam, connecting multiple compartments with electrical wires to increase the resistance high enough to raise the temperature as high as 250 degrees Celsius. By making the filter electrically heated, rather than heating it from an external source, they said the the amount of heat that escaped from the filter is minimised, allowing air conditioning to function with very low strain.

When the scientists built and tested a prototype for the relationship between voltage/current and temperature, they said it satisfies the requirements for conventional heating, ventilation, and air conditioning (HVAC) systems, and could kill the coronavirus.

“This novel biodefense indoor air protection technology offers the first-in-line prevention against environmentally mediated transmission of airborne SARS-CoV-2, and will be on the forefront of technologies available to combat the current pandemic and any future airborne biothreats in indoor environments,” said Faisal Cheema, another co-author of the study from UH.

The researchers have called for a phased roll-out of the device, “beginning with high-priority venues, where essential workers are at elevated risk of exposure.” They believe the novel device will both improve safety for frontline workers in essential industries and allow nonessential workers to return to public work spaces.