Technology

SpaceX CEO and founder Elon Musk said on Twitter on Wednesday that the cause of the failure of a single Merlin engine during the most recent Starlink launch (which didn&t prevent the launch from ultimately succeeding at its mission) was the result of an undetected, &small amount& of a cleaning fluid that ignited during the flight.

The SpaceX Falcon 9 vehicle uses nine Merlin engines on its first-stage, and can still operate successfully in case one stops working. One did stop working during the ascent phase of the Starlink mission that took place on March 18. The engine failure didn&t affect the subsequent deployment of 60 Starlink satellites, which went as planned, but it did prompt an investigation into the cause by SpaceX, which was joined by NASA ahead of the commercial crew flight that will carry NASA astronauts for the first time using a Falcon 9 on May 27.

Musk said the cause of the Merlin failure was a &[s]mall amount of isopropyl alcohol (cleaning fluid) [that] was trapped in a sensor dead leg - ignited in flight.& Isopropyl alcohol is a common cleaning and disinfectant agent used in sterile environments, and is also available over the counter as rubbing alcohol for consumer use. Based on Muskexplanation, it sounds like some was accidentally trapped in the sensor housing for a pressure valve in the Merlinfluid systems, and then it caught fire when the engine was ignited. That likely wasn&t enough to damage the engine, but told the sensor that heat levels were exceeding acceptable limits and caused a shutdown.

Based on the fact that NASA and SpaceX have since announced an official date for their Commercial Crew Demo-2 mission, it seems very likely that the agency was satisfied with this investigation and the cause that SpaceX identified. The issue seems relatively easy to mitigate in the future through post-cleaning checks, and even in the off-chance of a similar re-occurrence, the redundancy built into SpaceXFalcon 9 engine system seems very likely to be able to ensure continued successful operation of the spacecraft.

Columbia UniversityMailman School of Public Health has released updated projections of when we can expect U.S. case numbers of COVID-19 infections to peak and decline, based on different levels of social distancing measures. The updated projects, which take into account the most recent information, show that with around a 30% decrease in social contact we could be nearing a national peak of new cases for now by the end of April — but that if you decrease social contact by just 20%, the picture changes drastically, with a late peak that extends into mid-May and grows the number of new daily cases to as many as 30,000.

The Columbia projections are used to advise the White House Coronavirus Task Force, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), New York City and many other governments across the U.S. These updated projections also note that while we may hit a peak in the coming days, that also means that hospital and ICU capacity will be at their max in the same period. Again, Columbia researchers note, too, that this info doesn&t take into account local variances in when peaks arrive, and that some areas could have different peaks at different times even with a consistent 30% social contact reduction.

The model developed by the Columbia research team includes transmission and fatality numbers, movement by populations across city and state lines and information like the capacity of emergency field hospitals, all info that was not available when the original modeling was done. You can take a look at the interactive graphs and daily estimates resulting from the model, via Columbiawebsite.

This is one of a number of recent updated projections from public health experts, epidemiologists and medical researchers that predict the impact of a relaxation of social distancing measures now could have disastrous consequences in terms of prolonging and worsening the spread of COVID-19, and also on taxing healthcare resources (not to mention front-line workers).

MIT also projected a similar impact from the relaxation of measures currently in place, predicting an &exponential explosion& would result. Meanwhile, some states are already implementing such restriction relaxations, despite consensus from informed experts and researchers indicating ittoo early to begin such rollbacks.

Earlier this week, Facebook confirmed that it had begun pulling down select COVID-19 protests, citing violations of state-enforced social distancing. The social media giant was attempting a sort of diplomacy, noting that all rallies/protests would be assessed on a case by case basis, and crosschecked with local government.

CNET today noted that Eventbrite has begun taking a similar approach, citing violations of both social distancing policy, as well as its own site guidelines. The news specifically covers a &Freedom& rally set for Ottawa on May 2, which, like a number of recent events across the U.S., is aimed at pushing authorities to reopen business, in spite of nearly universal warnings from healthcare officials.

In a statement offered to TechCrunch, the site is also quick to note that the actions being taken are not new, but rather in accordance with existing rules:

We ticket millions of events a year and strive to ensure our community has a safe and positive experience using Eventbrite. Our Community Guidelines have always prohibited events that promote or contain harmful and/or illegal behavior, and events in locations that violate the current government-issued social distancing and shelter in place mandates during this global pandemic are deemed as such. Our community plays an essential role in reporting any concerning listings or content and when we become aware of content on our platform thatin violation of our Community Guidelines, we investigate and take appropriate action. The COVID-19 global pandemic is a very dynamic situation, and any action we take will vary based on the local guidelines.

Like Facebook before it, Eventbrite appears to be taking action while attempting to avoid taking sides. The motivation for blocking events that break safety guidelines and could have massive repercussions for public health is clear. Though the current battle being waged by protesters is one that pits economic normalcy against the potential of mass death.

The tech industry (and the world at large) is not experiencing temporary anxiety — the uncertainty we&re all coping with is the new normal.

Sudden shifts in behavior have made some startups targeting slow-moving, old-school industries more relevant than they could have imagined, such as those in telehealth, distance learning and remote work. Most, however are seeing massive decreases in revenue, forcing them to cut costs and even lay off teams to slash burn rates. Other startups simply won&t be here in three to six months.

Cowboy Ventures founder and managing partner Aileen Lee, who coined the term &unicorn,& says tech companies going through scenario planning need to begin thinking long-term.

&We&ve spent the last month scenario planning with our portfolio companies, and in most cases, we&ll have conversations about what these scenarios can include,& said Lee. &And when we look at the planning around those scenarios, they often don&t feel conservative enough. Most entrepreneurs are optimists, and we are, too! But it seems safer to have more conservative plans [and start expecting] that this is going to impact us for longer and be worse than we expected.&

Lee and Cowboy Ventures partner Ted Wang joined TechCrunch on Tuesday for our first episode of Extra Crunch Live, a virtual speaker series for Extra Crunch members. In a live Q-A that included questions from myself and the Extra Crunch audience, Wang and Lee covered a wide range of topics, including PPP loans, advice for business leaders around layoffs, the right time to seek funding and the right firms from which to seek that funding, how to pitch during a downturn and which sectors in particular Cowboy is interested in financing right now.

You can check out the best insights from the call, or catch up on the full conversation via the YouTube embed below.

We have several outstanding guests, including Charles Hudson, Mitch and Freada Kapor, Mark Cuban, Roelof Botha, Hunter Walk and Kirsten Green, joining us on Extra Crunch Live over the next few weeks. Sign up for Extra Crunch to get access to all of them.

Apple will patch a newly discovered iPhone vulnerability that security researchers say hackers have already used to steal data from their victims& devices.

News of the vulnerability dropped Wednesday by security firm ZecOps. Zuk Avraham, the companychief executive, said the firm found the bug last year during a routine investigation. At least six organizations were targeted by attackers as far back as 2018, he said.

Avraham said the bug is in the iPhonedefault Mail app. By sending a specially crafted email to the victimdevice, an attacker can overrun the devicememory, allowing the attacker to remotely run malicious code to steal data from the device, he said.

Worse, the bug doesn&t require any user interaction on the latest version of iOS 13, saidAvraham.

The bug dates back to iOS 6, which was first released in 2012. Avraham later confirmed in a tweet that macOS, which also comes with an in-built Mail app, is not vulnerable.

iPhone vulnerabilities are some of the most valuable bugs for hackers because they are so difficult to find. Some buyers will snap up these highly sought-after bug for as much as $1 million. But because these more sophisticated bugs are so valuable, they are typically only ever obtained by well-resourced threat actors, such as governments. These exploits are often used against their targets, such as criminals or terrorists, in highly precise operations. But some governments are also known to target certain ethnic groups, activists and journalists.

To wit, Avraham said in his blog post that the targets of this attack included staff at a U.S.-based Fortune 500 company and a journalist in Europe. Avraham also did not name the apparent hackers but said that at least one of the attackers was likely a nation state.

When reached, an Apple spokesperson did not immediately comment. Motherboard, which first reported the story, said the bug has been fixed in a beta version of the software, and a fix will be rolled out in an upcoming update.

Until then, high-risk users should disable the Mail app for now.