Teen Behind Hundreds of Swatting Attacks Pleads Guilty to Federal Charges
In perhaps the largest swatting case to ever be prosecuted, an 18-year-old from Lancaster, California, has pleaded guilty to federal charges stemming from a nationwide spree of hundreds of shooting and bomb threat hoaxes that sent police scrambling to high schools, courthouses, and the homes of law enforcement officials and prominent politicians. Alan Winston Filion […]
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These Guys Hacked AirPods to Give Their Grandmas Hearing Aids
When Apple released a software update at the start of November that enabled its new hearing aid features in AirPods Pro 2 earbuds, Rithwik Jayasimha immediately went out with his dad to buy a pair for his grandma. “We came back home, we took them out of the case, and I was looking for the […]
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ICE Started Ramping Up Its Surveillance Arsenal Immediately After Donald Trump Won
On November 6, just hours after news outlets declared that Donald Trump had been elected the next president of the United States, Immigration and Customs Enforcement posted a notice asking companies to submit plans for how they would expand ICE’s system of ankle monitors, GPS trackers, biometric check-in technology, and human agents monitoring “non-citizens” awaiting […]
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The WIRED Guide to Protecting Yourself From Government Surveillance
President-elect Donald Trump has promised to deport millions of undocumented immigrants. He’s vowed to jail his political foes and journalists. A Republican-controlled government could further restrict abortion and transgender rights. Influential conservatives have called for a crackdown on left-leaning activist groups, a replay of Trump’s hardline attitude against protesters in his first administration. To carry […]
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The Real Problem With Banning Masks at Protests
On December 16, 1773, a group of protesters in Boston donned handkerchiefs and smeared their faces with soot, disguising themselves as Native Americans, as they hurled tea into the sea. Some of these Boston Tea Partiers were apprentices who worked for pro-government masters and worried about losing their jobs. Others feared retribution from the British […]
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The AI Machine Gun of the Future Is Already Here
Amid a rising tide of low-cost weaponized adversary drones menacing American troops abroad, the US military is pulling out all the stops to protect its forces from the ever-present threat of death from above. But between expensive munitions, futuristic but complicated directed energy weapons, and its own growing drone arsenal, the Pentagon is increasingly eyeing […]
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Auto-Rebooting iPhones Are Causing Chaos for Cops
Maybe you already heard, but Donald Trump will be president of the United States again. The far-right is celebrating by calling for mass executions. The left is responding with their own election conspiracy theories. Convicted January 6 rioters are banking on a pardon. And women who oppose Trump have frankly had enough. Ahead of Election […]
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764 Terror Network Member Richard Densmore Sentenced to 30 Years in Prison
Richard Densmore, a 47-year old Army veteran and member of the noxious criminal network known as 764, was sentenced to 30 years in federal prison on Thursday by a federal judge in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Densmore was arrested on federal charges in late January at a home in Kaleva, Michigan, where he lived with his […]
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Russia Is Going All Out on Election Day Interference
As the 2024 US presidential election comes to a close, and with Donald Trump on the ballot once again, Russian actors are spreading disinformation with unprecedented and alarming intensity—and US officials say that the Kremlin’s efforts to undermine confidence in the election and foment unrest are likely to continue into January. Russian disinformation operations have […]
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Man Arrested for Snowflake Hacking Spree Faces US Extradition
For much of this summer, a mysterious group of hackers carried out a landmark spree of major data breaches, all targeting customers of the cloud data storage company Snowflake. Now one alleged hacker—whom experts believe to be the ringleader of that group—has been arrested in Canada, and he may be on his way to a […]
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