News for hackers. Stuff that matters.
Re:Alibaba to Stop Sales of E-Cigarettes to U.S. Buyers by grawprog on Wednesday October 09, 2019 @08:42PM (#21209792)
Yeah as far as I read the problems were linked to illicit THC cartridges purchased on the streets tainted with hydrogen cyanide. A recent hacker news discussion about it.

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=21092770

Street drugs have always had problems with contaminants, whatever kinds of drugs they are. Unfortunately prohibition and black markets tend to lead to this sort of problem.

Re:Alibaba to Stop Sales of E-Cigarettes to U.S. Buyers by cactus2093 on Wednesday October 09, 2019 @09:58PM (#21210169)
The latest CDC statements have still been that there hasn't been a single common ingredient found in all the cases. And there have been something like 10% of the cases that claim to have only used tobacco and not any THC vapes.

The guy that died in Oregon was using a legal vape from a regulated dispensary.

News publications do a disservice by over-playing the danger, and not differentiating between thc and tobacco, or street products and regulated thc and large nationwide brands like juul. But I don't think you can fully write this off yet either. I'm personally still avoiding vaping for the time being.

Re:Alibaba to Stop Sales of E-Cigarettes to U.S. Buyers by bitcoinmoney on Wednesday October 09, 2019 @09:09PM (#21209947)
Why would you add cyanide to a product you’re selling?
Re:Alibaba to Stop Sales of E-Cigarettes to U.S. Buyers by dx87 on Wednesday October 09, 2019 @09:13PM (#21209967)
According to Wikipedia, some countries use hydrogen cyanide as an ingredient in pesticide.
Re:Alibaba to Stop Sales of E-Cigarettes to U.S. Buyers by cwkoss on Wednesday October 09, 2019 @09:20PM (#21210004)
To be a bit more precise: myclobutanil degrades into HCN when heated to vaporization temperature

The process of extracting and concentrating THC can also extract and concentrate this pesticide.

Imidacloprid is another pesticide with harmful effects that has been found on cannabis, but seems to be toxic itself (rather than it's byproducts)

Source: https://www.planetnatural.com/marijuana-pesticides/

Re:Alibaba to Stop Sales of E-Cigarettes to U.S. Buyers by otterley on Wednesday October 09, 2019 @09:54PM (#21210150)
Pretty sure they meant "for a product for human consumption" :)
Re:Alibaba to Stop Sales of E-Cigarettes to U.S. Buyers by rolltiide on Wednesday October 09, 2019 @09:25PM (#21210033)
they don't, the heating process makes molecules bind to other molecules forming cyanide.