There are eight planets in our solar system – plus poor old Pluto, which was demoted in 2006 – but what if there were more? Turns out that might be the case. Astronomers have calculated there is a 7 per cent chance that Earth has another neighbour hiding in the Oort cloud, a spherical region of ice chunks and rocks that is tens of thousands of times farther from the sun than we are. “It’s completely plausible for our solar system to have captured such an Oort cloud planet,” said Nathan Kaib, a co-author on the work and an astronomer at the Planetary Science Institute. Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Hidden worlds like this are “a class of planets that should definitely exist but have received relatively little attention” until now, he said.. If a planet is hiding in the Oort cloud, it’s almost certainly an ice giant. Large planets like Jupiter and Saturn are generally born as twins. They have huge gravitational pulls of their own, however, and sometimes destabilise one another. That could have led to a planet to be nudged out of the solar system entirely – or exiled to its outer reaches, where the Oort cloud resides. “The survivor planets have eccentric orbits, which are like the scars from their violent pasts,” said lead author Sean Raymond, researcher at the University of Bordeaux’s Astrophysics Laboratory. That means that the Oort cloud planet could have a significantly elongated orbit, unlike the near-perfect circle Earth tracks around the sun. Trouble is, when things are that far away, they’re pretty difficult to spot. “It would be extremely hard to detect,” added Raymond. “If a Neptune-sized planet existed in our own Oort cloud, there’s a good chance that we wouldn’t have found it yet,” said Malena Rice, an astronomer at MIT not involved in this work. “Amazingly, it can sometimes be easier to spot planets hundreds of light-years away than those right in our own backyard.” Time to crack out the telescope. Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

By Amina Niasse NEW YORK Some Americans who have been priced out of the tight residential real estate

WESTON, Fla.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jun 21, 2023--

More than 46 million signals of potential cyber attacks are spotted by cyber security experts every day around the world, according to new data from BT. The telecoms giant said more than 530 signals of potential attack were logged per second. It said hackers were relentlessly scanning devices connected to the internet looking for weaknesses by using automation and machine learning to identify vulnerabilities in cyber defences. The BT data showed that over the last 12 months the IT, defence, banking and insurance sectors were the most targeted by cyber criminals, followed by the retail, hospitality and education industries. According to the figures, around 785,000 cyber attacks also targeted charities over the last year. The company warned that these trends should be of greater concern when over half of businesses (61%) told a BT survey in May that they find keeping up with cyber security measures increasingly difficult. BT has published the figures to mark Cyber Security Awareness Month, and has also launched a new podcast series called True Cybercrime Stories by BT, which details the true stories behind some of the world’s most notable cyber attacks. Tris Morgan, manager director for security at BT, said: “The volume of cyber threats in the UK is rising at an alarming rate, so it’s really concerning that so many businesses and public services are leaving themselves open to attack. “The fabric of the modern business has changed, and there’s now more connected tech for hackers to exploit, more valuable data to target and a bigger prize at stake if they make it through. “With more than a million business customers, BT is the first line of cyber defence for organisations across the world – and we’re proud of our long heritage of protecting people, businesses and critical national infrastructure. That’s why we’re launching the True Cybercrime Stories podcast: to shine a light on the shocking impact this crime epidemic can have, raise awareness of the risks and encourage everyone to think about what they could be doing to protect our businesses and essential services.” Read More AI being used to create child abuse imagery, watchdog warns ChatGPT and other chatbots ‘can be tricked into making code for cyber attacks’ Tinder adds Matchmaker feature to let friends recommend potential dates

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NASHVILLE, Tenn.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sep 26, 2023--

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