CYBERSECURITY: This low-cost device may be the world’s best hope against account takeovers.

The Security Keys are based on Universal Second Factor, an open standard that’s easy for end users to use and straightforward for engineers to stitch into hardware and websites. When plugged into a standard USB port, the keys provide a “cryptographic assertion” that’s just about impossible for attackers to guess or phish. Accounts can require that cryptographic key in addition to a normal user password when users log in. Google, Dropbox, GitHub, and other sites have already implemented the standard into their platforms.

After more than two years of public implementation and internal study, Google security architects have declared Security Keys their preferred form of two-factor authentication. The architects based their assessment on the ease of using and deploying keys, the security it provided against phishing and other types of password attacks, and the lack of privacy trade-offs that accompany some other forms of two-factor authentication.

Two-factor authentication can be a real pain for users, as well. Just switching over from two-step authentication (not the same thing!) to two-factor a year or two ago was a confusing hassle. But according to the story, “Security Keys, by contrast to the alternatives, provide the best mix of security, usability, and privacy. They sell for as little as $10, although some of the more popular brands—such as the U2F Security Key from Yubico—list for $18. They’re smaller than a door key, plug into a computer’s USB slot, and require no batteries.”

These keys should become standard equipment.

FAKE NEWS: Pearl Harbor ceremony punctuates Obama effort to ease tensions Trump could inflame.

Obama is “one of the worst foreign policy presidents ever,” with a record of vanishing red lines, rising terrorism, a flood of refugees, nuclear proliferation, spurned allies, and emboldened rivals, topped off by last week’s shameful and petty anti-Israel abstention in the U.N. last week — but it’s Trump who’s going to set the world on fire.

Never change, WaPo.

QUESTION ASKED: Who Needs Wine Tasting When You Can Get Beer Flights?

It’s always amazing to walk into a beer-focused bar and see 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, or more beers on the menu. Long walls of taps are exciting, but can also be intimidating. What should you try? How many can you try? Can you get an Uber home? Well, many bars are now providing you with a solution: beer flights!

Common in wine bars for a long time, you can now enjoy beer in the same way, with just a little bit of each. The sampler glasses of four or so ounces allow you to pick out a few you want to try without having to worry about whether you can get home. It’s a wonderful thing for someone like me who gets paid to drink beer and tell you all about it.

Embracing the healing power of “and.”

YOU GET A GUN! YOU GET A GUN! YOU GET A GUN! Ohio Gov. Kasich Signs the ‘Guns Everywhere’ Bill.

NUTRITION: Antibiotic-Tainted Seafood From China Is Making Its Way to American Tables.

Imported farm-raised seafood from China is tainted with antibiotics and often salmonella, U.S. regulators say, and the tainted fish is making its way to American tables.

The problem is, Asian fish farmers often supplement their fish feed with feces from pigs and geese, which contain harmful bacteria and antibiotics that have a direct impact on the seafood we eat. According to the latest research, up to 90 percent of the antibiotics administered to pigs pass through their urine and feces.

The U.S. Department of Commerce slapped a 112 percent tariff on Chinese shrimp, effective 2005, but unfortunately, Chinese suppliers have found ways to get around that.

Caveat emptor.

TERROR: Virginia Man in Military-Heavy Area Was ‘Moving Closer’ to Committing ISIS Attack, Says FBI.

A man living in the heart of Virginia’s military powerhouse area, who the FBI said purchased an AK-47 after the San Bernardino terrorist attack and was close to committing his own attack, has been charged with attempting to support ISIS.

Lionel Nelson Williams, 26, of Suffolk, Va., a Virginia-born U.S. citizen who also went by the name Harun Ash-Shababi, was arrested there Wednesday.

According to the affidavit, the FBI was tipped off in March that Williams was posting ISIS content and lectures from late al-Qaeda recruiter Anwar al-Awlaki on his Facebook page — with Williams’ own commentary including “The Jihad (the struggle) doesn’t end just because it stops feeling good” — and had recently “acquired” an assault rifle.

“It’s time for me to take a stand. I stand with #Dawlah’. If that means you want nothing to do with me, then fine,” Williams publicly posted on his page in mid-March, leading the FBI to interpret this as a pledge of allegiance to ISIS. Four days later, he shared a video with the comment, “I love the Mujahideen the world over. Youtube/Facebook had the gall to delete it sometime ago, but somehow it’s been remade/reuploaded. Allahu Akhbar!”

Good work by the FBI.

OBAMA’S MIDNIGHT REGULATION EXPRESS: The goal is to issue more rules than the new administration could ever repeal.

Kimberly Strassel:

Perhaps nothing has more underlined the Obama arrogance than his final flurry of midnight regulations. With each new proposed rule or executive order, Mr. Obama is spitefully mocking the nation that just told him “enough.”

The technical definition of a midnight regulation is one issued between Election Day and the inauguration of a new president. The practice is bipartisan. George W. Bush, despite having promised not to do so, pushed through a fair number of rules in his final months. But Jimmy Carter and Bill Clinton were more aggressive, and Mr. Obama is making them look like pikers.

Mr. Obama has devoted his last year to ramming through controversial and far-reaching rules. Whether it was born of a desire to lay groundwork for a Clinton presidency, or as a guard against a Trump White House, the motive makes no difference. According to a Politico story of nearly a year ago, the administration had some 4,000 regulations in the works for Mr. Obama’s last year. They included smaller rules on workplace hazards, gun sellers, nutrition labels and energy efficiency, as well as giant regulations (costing billions) on retirement advice and overtime pay.

Since the election Mr. Obama has broken with all precedent by issuing rules that would be astonishing at any moment and are downright obnoxious at this point. This past week we learned of several sweeping new rules from the Interior Department and the Environmental Protection Agency, including regs on methane on public lands (cost: $2.4 billion); a new anti-coal rule related to streams ($1.2 billion) and renewable fuel standards ($1.5 billion).

The fundamental transformation will continue until January 20.

CINEMA: Film student stalks his phone thief, makes a thrilling documentary.

NOW HE’S HACKING OUR POST-ELECTION! Putin to Democratic Party: You lost, get over it.

That was how Putin answered a question Friday about whether Russia interfered in the U.S. presidential election in favor of Donald Trump at the Russian leader’s nationally televised annual news conference

“Democrats are losing on every front and looking for people to blame everywhere,” Putin said in answer to a Russian TV host, one of 1,400 journalists accredited to the marathon session. “They need to learn to lose with dignity.”

The Kremlin leader pointed out Republicans had won the House and Senate, remarking “Did we do that, too?”

Did you ever dream you’d live in an age when the leaders of two of the most powerful countries on Earth were also two of the world’s most powerful troll artists?

SO WE HAVE THAT GOING FOR US. WHICH IS NICE. Pharrell on Trump Win: Millennials and Women Will ‘Save This Planet’

WISHING YOU AND YOURS: Happy Hoax-idays!

Jim Geraghty:

Surely, the world has genuine hate crimes. But a lot of the most covered ones in recent weeks have turned out to be hoaxes. A Jewish family is not fleeing Lancaster County after a backlash to their complaint about their school’s Christmas play. A drunken man did not threaten to set a Michigan woman’s hijab on fire. The November burning of an African-American church and spray-painting of “Vote Trump” was committed by an African-American parishioner. That Manhattan Muslim teen who claimed she was attacked by three drunks who called her a “terrorist” on the subway while lots of New Yorkers stood and watched? Hoax. (The hoaxer’s sister later went on Facebook and criticized the police for being excessively skeptical: “It became super clear to me these past two weeks that the police’s first instinct is to doubt your story and try to disprove it.”

That “YouTube prankster” who claimed he was thrown off the plane for speaking Arabic? Other passengers say he was being disruptive and was only thrown off for repeatedly shouting.

Read the whole thing.

Uber Moves Self-Driving Car Test to Arizona After Regulatory Defeat In California.

The startup on Thursday said it would begin a test of the self-driving vehicles early next year in Phoenix, and it sent journalists photos of the vehicles leaving a warehouse hauled by a big rig. Uber touted the support for its experiment of Arizona Gov. Doug Ducey, a Republican, who had issued a statement telling Uber “California may not want you, but we do.”

Uber’s announcement came less than a day after the California Department of Motor Vehicles said it would revoke the registrations of 16 Uber vehicles because the company refused to apply for a $150 permit for autonomous cars. Uber had said the permit shouldn’t be required for its cars, and it had invited San Francisco customers to hail the vehicles in defiance of regulators over the past week before capitulating.

Your low-regulation red states are much friendlier to innovation than bureaucratic hellholes like California.

HMM: Did Russia Just Test a Weapon in Space?

The apparent anti-satellite (ASAT) test largely escaped public notice. The Washington Free Beacon was the first to report on the weapon’s trial, on Dec. 21—attributing the information to unnamed U.S. government sources. CNN also pointed out the test, again citing anonymous U.S. officials.

Capt. Nicholas Mercurio, a spokesman for the 14th U.S. Air Force, which oversees space systems, declined to specifically comment on the reported Russian test. “We monitor missile launches around the globe,” Mercurio told The Daily Beast, “but as a matter of policy we don’t normally discuss intelligence specific to those launches.”

For the anti-satellite test, the Russians have a tidy cover story—that the rocket isn’t actually an anti-satellite weapon, or ASAT. Instead, it’s a meant for shooting down incoming ballistic missiles.
That is to say, the rocket that Russia tested on Dec. 16 could be a defensive rocket-killer, rather than an offensive satellite-killer. “My take is that it could be either,” Pavel Podvig, an independent expert on Russian strategic forces, told The Daily Beast via email. “It is difficult to say at this point.”

But in fact, there’s no meaningful difference between an anti-satellite weapon and a defensive missile-interceptor. The same basic hardware can do both jobs.

THE NEXT BIG MELTDOWN: Olivia Wilde Chops Off Hair, Doesn’t Want to Look Like Melania Trump.

I’m starting to wonder if Hollywood publicists are trolling their clients with silly ways to make anti-Trump statements.

BREAKING: Suspect in the Berlin Christmas market attack shot dead.

The 24-year-old Tunisian, Anis Amri, was killed following a dramatic encounter in the Piazza I Maggio in the Sesto San Giovanni area outside Milan, after a two-man patrol stopped him for questioning around after 3 a.m. on suspicion of burglary. One of the officers requested his identification. Amri responded by pulling a gun, shooting one officer in the shoulder.

The second patrolmen — trainee Luca Scatà — fired back, killing Amri, according to Italian officials.

“He was the most-wanted man in Europe” said Italian Interior Minister Marco Minniti. “There is absolutely no doubt that the person killed is Anis Amri.”

In Germany, Federal Attorney General Peter Frank said fingerprints confirmed Amri was the man killed. But authorities struggled with other questions — still seeking to piece together how Amri slipped out of Berlin made it to Milan amid a massive manhunt.

German police, intelligence, and courts all have much to answer for.

GOD SAVE THE QUEEN: Outspoken Prince Charles again shows he’s not much like Queen Elizabeth II.

Speaking to the BBC, the Prince of Wales said the rise of populist groups around the world that are “aggressive” toward those who practice a minority faith had “deeply disturbing echoes” of the Nazi era.

The 68-year-old was delivering a segment for BBC Radio 4’s “Thought for the Day,” a feature in which contemporary issues are discussed through the prism of religious faith.

This was the third time that Charles, the queen’s eldest son and heir to the throne, has taken part in “Thought for the Day.” The queen, who is recovering from a heavy cold, has never recorded a slot for the program.

Elizabeth is Britain’s longest-serving monarch. But little is known about her personal views — she is careful to keep her own counsel. She has given exactly zero interviews to the media during her 64 years on the throne.

I get the feeling the old dear is trying to hold on long enough that she’s succeeded by her grandson, William.

Wish her luck.

JOE LIEBERMAN: Trump’s Israel envoy pick will soften hard line.

David Friedman, a conservative bankruptcy lawyer and Israel hardliner, has drawn howls from Democrats and liberal advocates for challenging the two-state solution with Palestinians and his harsh condemnation of peace-seeking Jewish groups.

But Lieberman, a former Democratic VP candidate and staunch Israel supporter, said Friedman’s most severe statements came “in the heat of the campaign” to elect Trump, predicting the nominee will soften his tone when he seeks Congressional approval.

“I think you’re going to find in the weeks ahead in the confirmation process on David Friedman that it’s going to be very clear that … he and President Trump want to be part of achieving peace between Israelis and Palestinians, and that some of the things he said really don’t reflect what he believes,” Lieberman told CNN on Thursday.

“I think you’ll find along the way that he will express some regrets.”

Diplomats have to be, well, diplomatic. So I suppose the question is whether Friedman will temper his views only when speaking to the US Senate on his own behalf, or if he also does so when speaking to the Israeli government on behalf of the United States.

If it’s the former, the howls of outrage will be even more entertaining than has become usual.

WAYNE ALLEN ROOT: New president is set to unleash a wave of prosperity.

Trump is winning on two fronts. One line of attack is to motivate business owners and business builders to start or expand by dramatically lowering corporate taxes, individual taxes, cutting regulations that strangle business, killing Obamacare and reigning in the IRS. If those things all happen, we will create a “reverse inversion.” All the companies in the world will want to move to the United States, instead of American companies running for their lives to escape. All the world’s companies rushing to relocate to America — wouldn’t that be wonderful?

But Trump is fighting on a second front, too: the psychological one. People are more productive if they feel positive, if they feel loved and appreciated. Over the past eight years, Obama has made business owners feel lousy, miserable, intimidated, targeted, persecuted, greedy. He made us feel like “Public Enemy No. 1.”

Remember Obama saying, “You didn’t build this”? That kind of thinking set the tone for the past eight years of misery and malaise. That’s why GDP has been close to zero. That’s why more than 94 million Americans are not working. That’s why business creation is the lowest in history. That’s why — for the first time in history — more businesses close each day than open.

Think about your own personal life. Would you work for a boss who treated you poorly and made you feel miserable? Would you produce your best work and efforts in that kind of hostile environment?

Then there’s John Galt’s short take: “Get the hell out of my way!”

KELLYANNE CONWAY: Trump will not pursue immigration ban based solely on religion.

Asked repeatedly if an individual’s religious affiliation would trigger heightened scrutiny, Conway said, “No.”

Instead, Trump will focus more on the country of origin, Conway said.

“You’re going back to over a year ago in what he said about the (Muslim) ban versus what he said later about it, when he made it much more specific and talked about countries where we know that they’ve got a higher propensity of training and exporting terrorists,” she told CNN’s Chris Cuomo during an interview on “New Day,” after he prodded her to share more details.
Conway also denied that Trump has changed his position.

“He doesn’t go back and forth on anything based on criticism. I mean, if you’re us, and certainly if you’re him, you are impervious to naysayers and critics in terms of them changing policy,” she said.

Changing focus to “country of origin” is very nearly a difference without distinction.

MERRY CHRISTMAS, INFIDELS: Holiday Events An Increasing Target for Terror.

TWO CAN PLAY TRANSITION POWER POLITICS: Trump Pressures Obama Over U.N. Resolution on Israeli Settlements.

President-elect Donald J. Trump publicly pressured President Obama on Thursday to veto a United Nations resolution critical of Israel, the newly elected leader’s most direct intervention in foreign policy during his transition to power.

Mr. Trump called on the president to use the United States’ veto in the United Nations Security Council to block the Arab-sponsored resolution, which condemned the “construction and expansion” of Israeli settlements in the occupied West Bank and East Jerusalem. The Obama administration, which vetoed a similar resolution in 2011, had withheld judgment over the latest measure.

With the United States’ position publicly in doubt, the resolution was pulled by its sponsor, Egypt, on Thursday morning, hours before the Council was scheduled to vote, and it was unclear when or even if it would be brought back up. But Mr. Trump’s forceful insertion into the matter reflected an unusual public split between incoming and departing presidents, and it highlighted the stark shift on Middle East policy ahead when the new administration takes over in a month.

Obama has already said he won’t demur on policy questions like almost every other former President, so Trump’s move feels like preemptive payback.

Vetoing almost anything at the UN concerning Israel also happens to be good policy.

[Typo — fixed!]

JUSTICE: Philippines leader Duterte faces investigation over killings claim.

The Philippines independent human rights watchdog has said it will investigate claims by President Rodrigo Duterte that he personally killed drug suspects while mayor of Davao.

The Commission on Human Rights will also examine reports that so-called death squads killed several hundred people in the southern city.

Mr Duterte confirmed to the BBC last week that he shot dead three men.

Since being elected in May, he has waged a brutal anti-drugs crackdown.

Critics say he has encouraged police, vigilantes and mercenaries to shoot suspected drug dealers and users on sight. Nearly 6,000 people are said to have been killed.

That’s nearly 1,000 dead each month.

I’M NOT SAYING IT’S ALIENS… Mystery of ‘Alien Megastructure’ Star Testing Astronomers’ Creativity.

In September 2015, Yale University’s Tabetha Boyajian and her colleagues reported that the star KIC 8462852 has dimmed dramatically multiple times over the past seven years, once by an astounding 22 percent.

NASA’s planet-hunting Kepler space telescope spotted these dimming events. But the brightness dips of “Boyajian’s star,” as it has come to be known, were far too significant to be caused by an orbiting planet, so astronomers began thinking of alternative explanations. [13 Ways to Hunt Intelligent Alien Life]

Researchers have come up with many possible causes for the dimming, including a swarm of broken-apart comet fragments, variability in the activity of the star itself, a cloud of some sort in the interstellar medium between Kepler and Boyajian’s star, and, most famously, an orbiting “megastructure” built by an alien civilization to collect stellar energy.

A partially completed Dyson Sphere?

NO “HO HO HO, NOW I HAVE A MACHINE GUN?” The Best Christmas Movies of All Time.

I’m partial to “About a Boy,” myself.

SO WE’VE GOT THAT GOING FOR US. WHICH IS NICE. Fear Not, Teen Vogue Says It Will Take the Lead in Holding President Trump Accountable.