The hazards are many. And they seem to come in all forms. From a report: The southwestern U.S. is reeling from record rainfall and extensive flooding from a rare tropical storm. Much of the central and southern parts of the country are in the grips of yet another oppressive heat wave. Nearly two weeks after catastrophic wildfires devastated the Hawaiian island of Maui, more fires are raging in the Pacific Northwest. And after a quiet start to this year's Atlantic hurricane season, activity in the basin is ramping up. All told, the various extremes are making for a turbulent week in nearly every corner of the country. Climate scientists also say it's an all-too-real look at how global warming increases the risks -- and consequences -- of the deadly events. "We're looking at a multi-hazard situation, where we're being hit by a string of different events over a short period of time," said Gonzalo Pita, an associate scientist and expert in disaster risk modeling at Johns Hopkins University. "It's like a double or triple whammy, and when they happen frequently or at the same time, the negative effects are compounded."

While it's sometimes difficult to measure the exact role of climate change in any particular weather event, scientists know that global warming is having an overall effect on the frequency and severity of such events. Studies have shown, for instance, that heat waves and drought are more likely in a warming world. Dry conditions subsequently increase the risk of wildfires. Similarly, warmer-than-usual oceans are a key ingredient for tropical storms and hurricanes to form. A warmer atmosphere can also hold more moisture, making the storms rainier and likelier to cause flooding. Those types of compounding risks will be on full display this week. Tropical Storm Hilary on Sunday became the first to hit Southern California in 84 years, dumping record rain over the region and causing widespread flash flooding. Though Hilary has weakened into a post-tropical cyclone, 26 million people were still under flood alerts Monday across parts of California, Arizona, Utah, Nevada, Oregon and Idaho.

An anonymous reader shares a report: When Jen Easterly, the director of the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, addresses the annual Chemical Security Summit in Arlington later this month, she'll be without a Big Stick she once wielded over the industry. Safeguarding the cybersecurity and physical security of 3,242 high-risk chemicals facilities across the country is one of CISA's critical responsibilities. Congress has renewed this authority, dubbed the Chemical Facility Anti-Terrorism Standards (CFATS), several times since enacting it in 2007. But on July 28, lawmakers for the first time allowed it to expire -- due in large part to the objections of a single senator. And there's no indication of when they might renew it after the Senate returns from recess in September.

As a result, the risk that terrorists could weaponize dangerous chemicals produced in some of these facilities has increased, according to a senior chemical security official with CISA, who requested anonymity in order to share sensitive details about the effects of the lapse. Some of the 322 most sensitive chemicals can be used to make bombs or be released as toxic clouds, according to the official, who added that a direct attack on a facility could cause an explosion comparable to a nuclear blast. That's not all. Without the CFATS rule, CISA also effectively has no idea who is visiting facilities or if they are stockpiling dangerous chemicals, according to the official. Until Congress renews the rule, the agency can't send inspectors to the 160 facilities they typically visit every month. The agency can also no longer enforce penalties on facilities that violate its safety standards. At least one high-risk facility that was paying the agency's $40,000-a-day fine for failing to redress concerns (after receiving a warning) has stopped paying, according to the official.

A draft agreement between TikTok and the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS) to avoid a ban would have given U.S. agencies unprecedented access to TikTok's facilities and servers. "Many of the concessions the government asked of TikTok look eerily similar to the surveillance tactics critics have accused Chinese officials of abusing," reports Gizmodo. "To allay fears the short-form video app could be used as a Chinese surveillance tool, the federal government nearly transformed it into an American one instead." The draft of the deal was obtained by Forbes. From a report: Forbes reports that the draft agreement, dated Summer 2022, would have given the US government agencies like the Department of Justice and Department of Defense far more access to TikTok's operations than that of any other social media company. The agreement would let agencies examine TikTok's US facilities, records, and servers with minimal prior notice and veto the hiring of any executive involved with leading TikTok US data security organization. It would also let US agencies block changes to the app's terms of service in the US and order the company to subject itself to various audits, all on TikTok's dime, per Forbes. In extreme cases, the agreement would allow government organizations to demand TikTok temporarily shut off functioning in the U.S..

The draft document, which Gizmodo could not independently verify, is reportedly around 100 pages long and contains comments sent between attorneys representing ByteDance, TikTok's Chinese-owned parent company, and CFIUS. The agreements, if accepted as written at the time, would open TikTok's U.S. operations up to supervision by a number of external third-party auditors and source code inspectors. ByteDance leaders, whom US lawmakers and whistleblowers have accused of maintaining close connections with The Chinese Communist Party, would be excluded from some security-related decisions involving the US version of the app.

Provisions described in the guidelines weren't always agreed on by both parties. In several instances, according to Forbes, TikTok's attorneys pushed back against terms that would let the government alter what types of user data ByteDance employees could view. Another point of disagreement emerged when the government reportedly asked for limitless veto power over TikTok's future contracts. At one point, TikTok reportedly altered language that would have allowed government officials to demand changes to the apps recommendations algorithm if it promoted content the agencies disagreed with. A TikTok spokesperson said in a statement: "As has been widely reported, we've been working with CFIUS for well over a year to implement a national security agreement and have invested significant resources in implementing a firewall to isolate U.S. user data. Today, all new protected U.S. user data is stored in the Oracle Cloud Infrastructure in the U.S. with tightly controlled and monitored gateways. We are doing more than any peer company to safeguard U.S. national security interests."

A decade after data analytics promised to revolutionize agriculture, most farmers still aren't using data tools or specialized software, and of those who do, many are swamped in a deluge of data. From a report: In 2013, seed and pesticide giant Monsanto acquired agriculture-data firm Climate Corporation for $1 billion, helping spur the industry's mania for data-driven farming. The hope was that by outfitting farmers with software and tools capable of ingesting and analyzing troves of data on things from weather patterns to soil conditions, they could more efficiently use their land. Many are still waiting for the technology to pay off. In the U.S., less than half of farmers surveyed by consulting firm McKinsey are using farm management software, and 25% are using remote-sensing and precision agriculture hardware. That software is a foundational technology in enabling the autonomous machinery and AI-enabled equipment of the future, analysts say, and unless farmers start using it, some will be left behind in the next decade of farm innovation. At the moment, 3% of American farmers said they plan to adopt software or precision agriculture hardware over the next two years, according to McKinsey.

Certain tools can automatically gather data from internet-connected farm equipment, but others require farmers to manually enter the information. For a specific field, for instance, that could total over a dozen crop-protection products and multiple seeds. Even those who are using the tech say they can find it difficult to draw useful conclusions from it. "We're collecting so much data that you're almost paralyzed with having to analyze it all," said David Emmert, a corn and soybean farmer in West Central Indiana who works about 4,300 acres. [...] The first generation of digital farming tools also wasn't easy for farmers to use. Software was slow, interfaces were complex and difficult to manage. "The industry does need to step up a little bit on continuing to improve the customer experience," said David Fiocco, a McKinsey partner focused on agriculture. In recent years, big tech vendors like Microsoft, Amazon and Google have begun tailoring their cloud-computing, data and artificial-intelligence services to agriculture, bringing along expertise that could help address complications that have long plagued farm data management and analytics.

An anonymous reader shares a report: For years, cops and other government authorities all over the world have been using phone hacking technology provided by Cellebrite to unlock phones and obtain the data within. And the company has been keen on keeping the use of its technology "hush hush." As part of the deal with government agencies, Cellebrite asks users to keep its tech -- and the fact that they used it -- secret, TechCrunch has learned. This request concerns legal experts who argue that powerful technology like the one Cellebrite builds and sells, and how it gets used by law enforcement agencies, ought to be public and scrutinized.

In a leaked training video for law enforcement customers that was obtained by TechCrunch, a senior Cellebrite employee tells customers that "ultimately, you've extracted the data, it's the data that solves the crime, how you got in, let's try to keep that as hush hush as possible." "We don't really want any techniques to leak in court through disclosure practices, or you know, ultimately in testimony, when you are sitting in the stand, producing all this evidence and discussing how you got into the phone," the employee, who we are not naming, says in the video.

The Biden administration on Monday continued its push toward internet-for-all by 2030, announcing about $667 million in new grants and loans to build more broadband infrastructure in the rural U.S. From a report: "With this investment, we're getting funding to communities in every corner of the country because we believe that no kid should have to sit in the back of a mama's car in a McDonald's parking lot in order to do homework," said Mitch Landrieu, the White House's infrastructure coordinator, in a call with reporters. The 37 new recipients represent the fourth round of funding under the program, dubbed ReConnect by the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Another 37 projects received $771.4 million in grants and loans announced in April and June.

The money flowing through federal broadband programs, including what was announced Monday and the $42.5 billion infrastructure program detailed earlier this summer, will lead to a new variation on "the electrification of rural America," Landrieu said, repeating a common Biden administration refrain. The largest award went to the Ponderosa Telephone Co. in California, which received more than $42 million to deploy fiber networks in Fresno County. In total, more than 1,200 people, 12 farms and 26 other businesses will benefit from that effort alone, according to USDA.

The US Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) office responsible for protecting the public from toxic substances has changed how it defines PFAS for a second time since 2021, a move critics say they fear will exclude thousands of "forever chemicals" from regulation and largely benefit industry. From a report: Instead of using a clear definition of what constitutes a PFAS, the agency's Office of Pollution Prevention and Toxics plans to take a "case-by-case" approach that allows it to be more flexible in determining which chemicals should be subjected to regulations. Among other uses for the compounds, the EPA appears to be excluding some chemicals in pharmaceuticals and pesticides that are generally defined as PFAS, current and former EPA officials say, and the shift comes amid fierce industry opposition to proposed limits on the chemicals.

The approach puts the toxics office at odds with other EPA divisions, other federal agencies, the European Union, Canada and most of the scientific world. The definition is likely to generate confusion in the chemical industry and within the agency, current and former EPA officials say. [...] PFAS, or per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, are a class of about 15,000 compounds most frequently used to make products water-, stain- and grease-resistant. They have been linked to cancer, birth defects, decreased immunity, high cholesterol, kidney disease and a range of other serious health problems. They are dubbed "forever chemicals" because they do not naturally break down in the environment. In a statement to the Guardian, the EPA said its latest definition was more "expansive" than the previous.

The White House ordered federal agencies to shore up their cybersecurity after agencies have lagged in implementing a key executive order President Joe Biden issued in 2021. From a report: Multiple federal departments and agencies have, as of the end of June, "failed to fully comply" with critical security practices prescribed by the executive order, "leaving the U.S. Government exposed to malicious cyber intrusions and undermining the example the Government must set for adequate cybersecurity practices," national security adviser Jake Sullivan said in a memo to Cabinet secretaries this week.

Sullivan asked senior officials from across the departments to ensure they achieve "full compliance" with the executive order's security requirements by the end of the year. His memo is addressed to agencies outside of the Pentagon. "This morning the National Security Advisor shared a memo with federal departments and agencies to ensure their cyber infrastructure is compliant with the President's Executive Order to improve the nation's cybersecurity," a National Security Council spokesperson told CNN. "As we've said, the Biden-Harris Administration has had a relentless focus on strengthening the cybersecurity of nation's most critical sectors since day one, and will continue to work to secure our cyber defenses."

The United States Space Force has activated its first and only unit dedicated to targeting other nations' satellites and the ground stations that support them. Space.com reports: The 75th Intelligence, Surveillance and Reconnaissance Squadron (ISRS) was activated on Aug. 11 at Peterson Space Force Base in Colorado. This unit is part of Space Delta 7, an element of the U.S. Space Force tasked with providing intelligence on adversary space capabilities. It'll do things like analyze the capabilities of potential targets, locate and track these targets as well as participate in "target engagement," which presumably refers to destroying or disrupting adversary satellites, the ground stations that support them and transmissions sent between the two.

Master Sgt. Desiree Cabrera, 75th ISRS operations superintendent, said the new unit will revolutionize the targeting capabilities of not just the Space Force, but also the entire U.S. military: "Not only are we standing up the sole targeting squadron in the U.S. Space Force, we are changing the way targeting is done across the joint community when it comes to space and electromagnetic warfare." The 75th ISRS will also analyze adversary space capabilities including "counterspace force threats," according to the Space Force's statement. Counterspace forces refer to adversary systems aimed at preventing the U.S. from using its own satellites during a conflict.

One of the most productive scientific collaborations of the 21st century is pulling apart, as deteriorating relations between the U.S. and China lead researchers to sever ties. From a report: The decoupling, which began in recent years with investigations into Chinese researchers in the U.S., has accelerated as tensions have risen between the superpowers. Now some U.S. lawmakers are pushing to let a landmark agreement to cooperate on science and technology, signed in 1979 and renewed routinely since, expire this month. China has built itself into a powerful engine of scientific discovery in recent decades, partly with American help, and many in Washington fear that China could gain a security and military advantage unless the U.S. takes decisive steps to cut off cooperation in scientific research.

Many scientists warn, however, that Washington would be severing ties as China is making its greatest contributions to scientific advancements, and cutting it off risks slowing American progress in critical areas such as biotechnology, clean energy and telecommunications. While the U.S. remains the world's pre-eminent science power, fundamental scientific research has grown borderless in the era of globalization, much as business has. More than 40% of America's scientific production -- measured by the number of high-quality papers that U.S.-based scientists produce -- involves cooperation with researchers abroad, according to Clarivate, a London-based data firm that tracks global scientific research. China and the U.S. are each other's No. 1 partner in producing scientific research, with collaborative research between the two consistently among the most-cited papers across fields, according to an analysis of Clarivate's data by Caroline Wagner, a professor of public policy at Ohio State University.

Coinbase has gained approval to sell cryptocurrency derivatives directly to retail consumers in the US. From a report: Coinbase Financial Markets, a subsidiary of the US's biggest crypto exchange, has secured approval from the National Futures Association to operate a Futures Commission Merchant and offer access to crypto futures. The offering will launch within weeks, according to a company spokesperson. Coinbase has been working on the derivatives push for some time. It applied for the NFA approval almost two years ago. In early 2022, it bought futures exchange FairX, which was already registered with US regulators. Renamed Coinbase Derivatives Exchange, it currently sends traders to buy futures from third-parties such as brokers. But with the NFA approval, Coinbase will be able to provide these same derivatives to users directly, first via Coinbase's main app.

US Representative Don Bacon said he is among those whose emails were hacked in an espionage campaign that Microsoft has attributed to China. From a report:Bacon, a Republican from Nebraska and a strong advocate for US military support to Taiwan, posted on social media that the FBI had notified him that the Chinese Communist Party hacked into his personal and campaign emails over the course of a month, from May 15 to June 16. "The CCP hackers utilized a vulnerability in the Microsoft software, and this was not due to 'user error,'" he wrote on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter.

Bacon, a member of the House Armed Services Committee, received an email from Microsoft indicating he may have been hacked and advising him to change his password on June 16, according to Maggie Sayers, Bacon's press secretary. She said that following subsequent notification from the FBI that he had been hacked, Bacon determined emails relating to political strategy, fundraising and personal banking information may have been breached. As a former US Air Force intelligence officer, he is careful to avoid writing sensitive emails relating to China and Taiwan, she said.

The top U.S. agency for consumer financial protection will announce plans at the White House on Tuesday to regulate companies that track and sell people's personal data, part of the Biden administration's widening scrutiny of that industry's privacy practices, officials said. From a report: Data brokers' conduct can be "particularly worrisome" because the sensitive data driving the use of artificial intelligence can be collected from military personnel, people experiencing dementia, and others, according to Rohit Chopra, director of the U.S. Consumer Financial Protection Bureau. "The CFPB will be taking steps to ensure that modern-day data brokers in the surveillance industry know that they cannot engage in illegal collection and sharing of our data," he said in a statement. President Joe Biden last year called on the U.S. Federal Trade Commission (FTC) to help protect the data privacy of women seeking reproductive healthcare who may face law enforcement action in some states. The FTC has also sued an Idaho company for selling mobile phone geolocation data, saying it could be traced to places like abortion clinics, churches and addiction treatment centers.

Michael Burry, the money manager made famous in the book and film "The Big Short," held bearish options against the broad S&P 500 and Nasdaq 100 Index at the end of the second quarter, according to securities fillings released on Monday. From a report: Burry's Scion Asset Management bought put options with a notional value of $739 million against the popular Invesco QQQ Trust ETF during the quarter, and separate put options with a notional value of $886 million against the SPDR S&P 500 ETF. Put options convey the right to sell shares at a fixed price in the future and are typically bought to express a bearish or defensive view. Burry rose to fame with his bets against the U.S. housing market before the 2008 financial crisis. Michael Lewis' nonfiction book "The Big Short" was released in 2010 and the movie version came out in 2015.

In the first ruling of its kind nationwide, a Montana state court decided Monday in favor of young people who alleged the state violated their right to a "clean and healthful environment" by promoting the use of fossil fuels. From a report: The court determined that a provision in the Montana Environmental Policy Act has harmed the state's environment and the young plaintiffs, by preventing Montana from considering the climate impacts of energy projects. The provision is accordingly unconstitutional, the court said. The win, experts say, could energize the environmental movement and reshape climate litigation across the country, ushering in a wave of cases aimed at advancing action on climate change. "People around the world are watching this case," said Michael Gerrard, the founder of Columbia's Sabin Center for Climate Change Law.

The ruling represents a rare victory for climate activists who have tried to use the courts to push back against government policies and industrial activities they say are harming the planet. In this case, it involved 16 young Montanans, ranging in age from 5 to 22, who brought the nation's first constitutional and first youth-led climate lawsuit to go to trial. Though the cumulative number of climate cases around the world has more than doubled in the last five years, youth-led lawsuits in the United States have faced an uphill battle. Already, at least 14 of these cases have been dismissed, according to a July report from the United Nations Environment Program and the Sabin Center. The report said about three-quarters of the approximately 2,200 ongoing or concluded cases were filed before courts in the United States. Experts said the Montana youth had an advantage in the state's constitution, which guarantees a right to a "clean and healthful environment." Coal is critical to the state's economy, and Montana is home to the largest recoverable coal reserves in the country. The plaintiff's attorneys say the state has never denied a permit for a fossil fuel project.

An anonymous reader shared this report from the Wall Street Journal: U.S. spy agencies will share more intelligence with U.S. companies, nongovernmental organizations and academia under a new strategy released this week that acknowledges concerns over new threats, such as another pandemic and increasing cyberattacks. The National Intelligence Strategy, which sets broad goals for the sprawling U.S. intelligence community, says that spy agencies must reach beyond the traditional walls of secrecy and partner with outside groups to detect and deter supply-chain disruptions, infectious diseases and other growing transnational threats. The intelligence community "must rethink its approach to exchanging information and insights," the strategy says.

The U.S. government in recent years has begun sharing vast amounts of cyber-threat intelligence with U.S. companies, utilities and others who are often the main targets of foreign hackers, as well as information on foreign-influence operations with social-media companies... The emphasis on greater intelligence sharing is part of a broader trend toward declassification that the Biden administration has pursued.
"The new strategy is meant to guide 18 U.S. intelligence agencies with an annual budget of about $90 billion... "

Last year, Queens resident David Leacraft filed a lawsuit against Canon claiming that his Canon Pixma All-in-One printer won't scan documents unless it has ink. According to The Verge's Sean Hollister, it has quietly ended in a private settlement rather than becoming a big class-action. From the report: I just checked, and a judge already dismissed David Leacraft's lawsuit in November, without (PDF) Canon ever being forced to show what happens when you try to scan without a full ink cartridge. (Numerous Canon customer support reps wrote that it simply doesn't work.) Here's the good news: HP, an even larger and more shameless manufacturer of printers, is still possibly facing down a class-action suit for the same practice.

As Reuters reports, a judge has refused to dismiss a lawsuit by Gary Freund and Wayne McMath that alleges many HP printers won't scan or fax documents when their ink cartridges report that they've run low. Among other things, HP tried to suggest that Freund couldn't rely on the word of one of HP's own customer support reps as evidence that HP knew about the limitation. But a judge decided it was at least enough to be worth exploring in court. "Plaintiffs have plausibly alleged that HP had a duty to disclose and had knowledge of the alleged defect," wrote Judge Beth Labson Freeman, in the order denying almost all of HP's current attempts to dismiss the suit.

Interestingly, neither Canon nor HP spent any time trying to argue their printers do scan when they're low on ink in the lawsuit responses I've read. Perhaps they can't deny it? Epson, meanwhile, has an entire FAQ dedicated to reassuring customers that it hasn't pulled that trick since 2008. (Don't worry, Epson has other forms of printer enshittification.) HP does seem to be covering its rear in one way. The company's original description on Amazon for the Envy 6455e claimed that you could scan things "whenever". But when I went back now to check the same product page, it now reads differently: HP no longer claims this printer can scan "whenever" you want it to. Now, we wait to see whether the case can clear the bars needed to potentially become a big class-action trial, or whether it similarly settles like Canon, or any number of other outcomes.

Pornhub, along with several other members and activists in the adult industry are suing Texas to block the state's impending law that would require age verification to view adult content. Motherboard reports: The complaint was filed on August 4 in US District Court for the Western District of Texas, and the law will take effect on September 1 unless the court agrees to block it. Governor Greg Abbott passed HB 1181 into law in June. The plaintiffs, including Pornhub, adult industry advocacy group Free Speech Coalition, and several other site operators and industry members, claim that the law violates both the Constitution of the United States and the federal Communications Decency Act.

In the complaint, the plaintiffs write that the act employs "the least effective and yet also the most restrictive means of accomplishing Texas' stated purpose of allegedly protecting minors," and that minors can easily use VPNs or Tor; on-device content filtering would be a better method of restricting access to porn for children, they write. "But such far more effective and far less restrictive means don't really matter to Texas, whose true aim is not to protect minors but to squelch constitutionally protected free speech that the State disfavors."

Under the law, porn sites would be required to display a "Texas Health and Human Services Warning" on their websites in 14-point font or larger font, in addition to age verification. "Texas could easily spread its ideological, anti-pornography message through public service announcements and the like without foisting its viewpoint upon others through mandated statements that are a mix of falsehoods, discredited pseudo-science, and baseless accusations," the complaint says.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Last Friday, Illinois became one of the few states to pass an anti-doxxing law, making it possible for victims to sue attackers who "intentionally" publish their personally identifiable information with intent to harm or harass them. (Doxxing is sometimes spelled "doxing.") The Civil Liability for Doxing Act, which takes effect on January 1, 2024, passed after a unanimous vote. It allows victims to recover damages and to request "a temporary restraining order, emergency order of protection, or preliminary or permanent injunction to restrain and prevent the disclosure or continued disclosure of a person's personally identifiable information or sensitive personal information."

It's the first law of its kind in the Midwest, the Daily Herald reported, and is part of a push by the Anti-Defamation League (ADL) to pass similar laws at the state and federal levels. ADL's Midwest regional director, David Goldenberg, told the Daily Herald that ADL has seen doxxing become "over the past few years" an effective way of "weaponizing" the Internet. ADL has helped similar laws pass in Maryland, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington. [...] The law does not involve criminal charges but imposes civil liability on individuals who dox any Illinois residents. Actions can also be brought against individuals when "any element" of a doxxing offense occurs in the state. [...]

Goldenberg told Ars that the Illinois law was written to emphasize not how information was found and gathered by people seeking to dox others, but on what they did with the information and how much harm they caused. The law might need less updating as the Internet evolves if it doesn't focus on the methods used to mine personally identifiable information. "The reality is that those who are using the Internet to spread hate, to spread misinformation, to do bad are pretty nimble and technology changes on a near daily basis," Goldenberg told Ars. "The law was crafted in a way that ensures that if technology changes, and people use new technologies to share someone's personally identifiable information with the intent to do harm and that harm actually happens, this law remains relevant."

Private equity and venture capital funds targeted in Biden administration's crackdown. From a report: After President Joe Biden announced a ban on US investment in some of China's critical tech industries, the founder of a Shanghai-based semiconductor start-up felt forced to react. "After the news came out, I was determined to move the team out of China, at least part of the team," the person said, asking not to be named because of the sensitivity of the subject. "Otherwise, the financing will be very limited." The US ban, announced in an executive order on Wednesday and due to come into force next year, aims to block investment in quantum computing, advanced chips and artificial intelligence in an effort to stop China's military from accessing American funding and knowhow.

For their part, US investors are trying to work out the potential impact of Biden's order on their holdings in China and weighing up strategies to comply or exit. Private equity groups General Atlantic, Warburg Pincus and Carlyle Group have poured billions into China in recent years as they sought the huge returns from betting on the nation's emergence as a technological superpower. Seeing the writing on the wall, though, many have already pulled back. Buyout groups struck deals in China worth $47bn in 2021, but that fell rapidly to just $2.4bn in 2022 and $2.8bn so far this year, figures from Dealogic show.