Boot up: building cars out of batteries, AI hacking CAPTCHAs, console-power smartphone GPUs and more

Plus Apple's cloudless iCloud passwords challenged, Twitter ripe for banner ads, Google+ HDR art, and more

CAPTCHAs hacked by artificial intelligence, the rise of the machines will not be stopped by confusing characters. Photograph: David Cheskin/PA Wire/Press Association Images

A quick burst of 8 links for you to chew over, as picked by the Technology team

Pirate cull: UK court orders ISPs to block 21 filesharing sites >> Wired UK

As one notorious piracy site comes back online, 21 more get blocked in the UK.

"We asked the sites to stop infringing copyright, but unfortunately they did not and we were left with little choice but to apply to the Court, where the judge considered the evidence and declared that ISPs should not serve access to them," BPI chief executive Geoff Taylor said in a statement. Virgin and BT have already stated they will comply with the court order, as is expected.

Apple’s claim that iCloud can store passwords “only locally” seems to be false >> Ars Technica 

Talking about Apple's claim that iCloud syncs passwords without storing data in the cloud:

If true, this would be an important advance in password management, allowing users to create long, complicated passwords on one device and have the passwords automatically sync to their other devices, but without storing data on Apple's servers.

That's a big if, according to Ars Technica.

Building Cars Out of Batteries Isn’t as Crazy as It Sounds >> MIT Technology Review

But batteries also open up new design possibilities because they can be shaped in more ways than gasoline tanks and because they can be made of load-bearing materials. If their chemistries can be made safer, batteries could replace conventional door panels and other body parts, potentially making a vehicle significantly lighter, more spacious, and cheaper. This could go some way toward helping electric cars compete with gas-powered ones.

Removing range anxiety by sitting in a giant battery is certainly clever, just don't talk about the centre of gravity and handling.

I HDR’d a photo 3 times over using Google+ Snapseed’s new filter and it came out like this >> The Next Web

This photo was taken with my HTC One stock Android camera. I edited it with Google+ Snapseed, repeating the max HDR effect that Google released today three times over.
Nothing else.
This is the result.

Hit the HDR button three times and you can create art out of almost anything. It reminds me of GTA's visual style.

CAPTCHA hacked by AI company >> DVICE

Obviously, this could have serious implications for Internet security, but the greater discovery here is the AI involved. In cracking CAPTCHA, this algorithm could be the next step in creating computers that see and think more like humans. If this algorithm truly can see the CAPTCHA image and understand the jumbled mess of letters and numbers it displays, companies like Vicarious may soon be able to create computers with human brain-like functions.

The rise of the machines won't be stopped, not even by the human-confusing CAPTCHA.

Facebook Considers Vast Increase in Data Collection - The CIO Report >> WSJ

New types of data Facebook may collect include “did your cursor hover over that ad … and was the newsfeed in a viewable area,” Mr. Rudin said. “It is a never-ending phase. I can’t promise that it will roll out. We probably will know in a couple of months,” said Mr. Rudin, a Silicon Valley veteran who arrived at Facebook in April 2012 from Zynga Inc., where he was vice president of analytics and platform technologies.

Surprise! Facebook's tracking your every move - try not to hover over the ads now, won't you?

Gasp! Twitter displays pictures in main feed as IPO looms >> The Register 

Admen will be delighted with the strategy because it means their visual promotions are now slotted into the main Twitter feed. Would-be investors, who have been concerned about the company's ability to turn its loss-making business into a profitable outfit, might also been encouraged by Twitter's latest move.

Just wait for the ads if you thought images were intrusive to your perfect text-only feed.

ARM releases new GPU powerful enough to take on gaming consoles >>TechRadar

The new flagship that takes over the latter is the T760, a mammoth GPU that can scale up to 16 cores and boosts a fourfold improvement over the T604 in terms of power efficiency (i.e. performance per watt).