The Digital Revolution Has Proven to be Disastrous
Tech companies run hoses on the roof to cool servers in heatwave
Google forced to shut down some servers as tech giants struggle to prevent heat damage to equipment
ByMatthew Field
Internet companies were forced to use hose pipes to protect their servers as temperatures surged on Tuesday, with Google and Oracle both suffering outages in the 40C heat.
The tech giants blamed Britain’s record-breaking heatwave for knocking their data centres offline. Google and Oracle, which provide backbone internet services to tens of thousands of websites, admitted they had struggled to keep server equipment cool.
Bloomberg reported on Tuesday that some companies were turning to low-tech methods to keep their equipment cool, including running hosepipes onto the roof to spray air conditioning vents.
“Many data centres in London will have people on the roof with hoses at the moment,” said Adrian Trevelyan, of Airedale International, which provides cooling systems for data centres.
On a customer service website, Oracle said problems with its “cooling systems” and “unreasonable temperatures” around its South London data centre had impacted its service on Tuesday.
Google, meanwhile, said it had been forced to shut down some of its servers “to prevent damage to machines and an extended outage” amid the searing heat. The blogging site WordPress was among those affected by the outages.
Some websites were still reporting problems on Wednesday morning as Google continued to address issues with its European data centres. The company said it had experienced “a cooling related failure in one of our buildings.”
Google said: “We apologise to all who are affected by the disruption.”
Temperatures in the UK breached 40 degrees for the first time on Tuesday as a blast of hot air caused 30 weather stations to break previous temperature records.
Major incidents were declared by 10 fire services as they battled blazes across the countryside. Train services remained heavily disrupted on Wednesday morning as operators raced to repair damage to lines and power cables caused by the heat.
Banks closing branches early to dodge law protecting cash
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/money/consumer-affairs/banks-closing-branches-early-dodge-law-protecting-cash/?li_source=LI&li_medium=liftigniter-rhr [2]
More than half of Scotland’s bank branches have closed since 2015
ByHarry Brennan
Banks are closing branches to avoid new laws that will force them to carry on operating cash machines, a group of Scottish MPs has alleged.
More than half of bank branches in Scotland have closed since 2015, according to a report from the Scottish Affairs Committee – more than in any other part of Britain.
There are now fewer than 500 branches in the country, compared with more than 1,000 five years ago, the report said. The rate of closures has increased, with eight closing every week in 2021, compared with six a week before the pandemic. Since 2018, a fifth of the country’s free-to-use cash machines have closed.
Britain as a whole has lost around a third of its branches in the past decade.
The committee accused high street banks of increasingly closing bricks and mortar sites in anticipation of new laws designed to ensure cash and in-person banking services are available for the estimated 5.4 million people – around one in ten adults – who still depend on physical money.
The report said: “The current rapid rate of branch closures may have come about as a result of banks rushing to close them before legislation to protect access to cash and banking service can take effect.”
It called on the Government to halt branch closures, saying: “There is a case for action if banks are closing branches purely to pre-empt legislative changes.”
New laws, announced in May, will give the City watchdog extra powers. Reporting to HM Treasury, the Financial Conduct Authority, will be entrusted with collecting and monitoring data from banks on customers’ ability to access cash.
A spokesman for the banking industry body UK Finance pushed back against the claims, saying branch closure decisions were “never taken lightly”.
She said banks had tried to ensure cash was still available in places other than traditional high-street branches, including at shared bank hubs found in places like local Post Offices and via “cash back without purchase” schemes in shops.
“The banking and finance industry has committed to ensuring there is continued access to cash for those who need it, when they need it.
“The vast majority of people continue to have free access to cash locally,” she added.
Once money is digital, people will have lost all control over their lives and ability to survive if they dissent from any official narrative. Servility to rulers will forever be the fate of humans. The idiots who created the digital revolution enslaved mankind. We should despise them and hate their guts.