In today’s Bulldog wrapup of technology and related news:

  • Researchers: We’ve discovered power grid-wrecking software
  • Thai police raid ‘click farm,’ find 347,200 SIM cards
  • Lyft joining forces with Jaguar Land Rover in tech venture
  • Trump to tout apprenticeships as way to fill jobs gap

The details:

  • Researchers: We’ve discovered power grid-wrecking software

Researchers have found a troubling new form of power grid-wrecking software, tying the discovery to a recent Ukrainian blackout in two reports published Monday.

The malicious software has the ability to remotely sabotage circuit breakers, switches and protection relays, the reports say, a nightmare scenario for those charged with keeping the lights on.

“The potential impact of malware like this is huge,” said Robert Lipovsky, a researcher with Slovakian anti-virus firm ESET, which first obtained the rogue program. “It’s not restricted to Ukraine. The industrial hardware that the malware communicates with is used in critical infrastructure worldwide.”

Policymakers have long worried over programs that can remotely sabotage industrial systems because of their potential to deal catastrophic damage across the internet. Examples of hackers being able to turn off the lights were once confined to the movie screens, but that is slowly changing. In 2010 researchers discovered Stuxnet, a groundbreaking piece of malware apparently designed to sabotage Iran’s nuclear program by sending its centrifuge machines spinning out of control. In 2015, a cyberattack left upward of 200,000 people without power in Ukraine.

ESET’s report deals with malware tied to a more modest outage reported to have hit a transmission facility outside in Kiev on the night of Dec. 17, 2016. Ukrainian officials have previous described the incident as a cyberattack, but ESET’s report — along with another write-up by the respected Maryland-based industrial cybersecurity firm Dragos — add a wealth technical details, showing how the malware could flip circuit breakers on and off with a string of code before mass-deleting data in a bid to cover its tracks.

  • Thai police raid ‘click farm,’ find 347,200 SIM cards

Thai police have arrested three Chinese men who they say operated a so-called “click farm,” using hundreds of cellphones and several hundred thousand SIM cards to run up “likes” and views on WeChat, a Chinese social media mobile application.

Immigration Police Capt. Itthikorn Atthanark said Tuesday the men said they were paid according to how many likes and views they generated, each earning 100,000-150,000 baht ($2,950-$4,400) per month. Click farms are hired to inflate an online site’s viewership for prestige and profit.

Police seized 476 cellphones and around 347,200 SIM cards during the arrests Sunday in Sa Kaeo province , about 200 kilometers (120 miles) east of Bangkok. The men were charged with working without a permit and importing the phones without paying taxes.

  • Lyft joining forces with Jaguar Land Rover in tech venture

The next Lyft car you book may soon be a Jaguar or a Land Rover.

The British company behind the two iconic car brands announced Monday that it was investing $25 million into Lyft to help the ride-hailing business expand and develop technologies. As part of the investment, Jaguar Land Rover agreed to supply a fleet of its vehicles.

The investment is from InMotion Ventures, a unit of Jaguar Land Rover that focuses on autonomous cars and other technology.

The collaboration will provide a “real-world platform helping us develop our connected and autonomous services,” InMotion Managing Director Sebastian Peck said.

InMotion earlier invested in SPLT, a Detroit-based digital carpool business. SPLT works with Lyft to provide non-emergency medical transport.

Lyft announced earlier this month that it was forming a research partnership with self-driving startup nuTonomy. The companies plan to look at how passengers book and route a self-driving car and how they interact with it.

San Francisco-based Lyft operates in 300 cities. It has also partnered with General Motors to research autonomous ride-hailing.

  • Trump to tout apprenticeships as way to fill jobs gap

The president has accepted a challenge from Salesforce.com CEO Marc Benioff to create 5 million apprenticeships over five years. Now, as part of a week-long apprenticeship push, he is visiting Waukesha Technical College in Wisconsin Tuesday with his daughter, Ivanka, as well as Acosta and Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker.

“Apprenticeships are going to be a big, big factor in our country,” Trump said during his first-ever full Cabinet meeting Monday. “There are millions of good jobs that lead to great careers, jobs that do not require a four-year degree or the massive debt that often comes with those four-year degrees and even two-year degrees.”

Many employers and economists — and Republicans and Democrats — welcome the idea of apprenticeships as a way to train people with specific skills for particular jobs that employers say they can’t fill at time of historically low unemployment. The most recent budget for the federal government passed with about $90 million for apprenticeships, and Trump so far isn’t proposing adding more.

But the Trump administration, like President Barack Obama’s, says there’s a need that can be met with a change in the American attitude toward vocational education and apprenticeships. A November 2016 report by Obama’s Commerce Department found that “apprenticeships are not fully understood in the United States, especially” by employers, who tend to use apprentices for a few, hard-to -fill positions” but not as widely as they could.

The shortages for specifically-trained workers cut across multiple job sectors beyond Trump’s beloved construction trades. There are shortages in agriculture, manufacturing, information technology and health care.