Travel can be dehumanizing, which is why it’s important to be the best human you can be as you slog through airport security. Even if you can’t make the experience of getting herded and scrutinized fun, you can take simple steps to at least avoid adding to the unpleasantness.
“14-Year Anniversary of Crash Bandicoot Passes By Largely Unnoticed” is an Onion headline from 2010, and it’s true: Naughty Dog’s version of Sonic and Mario was an unofficial PlayStation mascot, but Crash Bandicoot didn’t achieve the iconic status of his forebears. Still, when rumors of a Bandicoot reboot circulated…
You might never know if police or FBI agents are reading your emails or files stored in the cloud, because the DOJ frequently issues indefinite gag orders that block companies from telling you. Microsoft argues that this secrecy is unconstitutional—and now it’s suing the government to stop it.
It started with a Craigslist ad. Not the furniture-for-sale section or a melancholy Missed Connection. I’m talking “Gigs” section Craigslist. It was 2009, and I had just graduated from college. I had no job or skills, and I’d moved back in with my parents. After getting a “we’ll keep your resume on file, hon” from…
I was kind of tired of the FBI vs. Apple story, but now it has a secret collective of morally ambiguous hackers, and I’m into it again.
The latest startup to “catch Silicon Valley’s eye” is a company called Juicero that’s selling, essentially, a $700 Keurig for organic cold-pressed juice. Even though it offers the kind of overpriced, niche gizmo you’d find in a Hammacher Schlemmer catalog, the company is flush with $120 million in investment capital.…
Ever feel like you’re a walloping failure at adulthood, and every choice you make wastes time and money? Here’s an excellent tip to pull at least one area of your life together: Plan most meals you eat for a week around around one delicious slow-cooked chicken. Organizing your food intake around a single,…
If you’re one of the 17 million people with a grandfathered-in Netflix subscription, take note: Netflix is raising its prices for those plans next month.
GOP presidential candidate and sentient sac of millions of spiders Donald Trump—literally more spiders than you’ve ever seen—does not have a coherent stance on cybersecurity. In his business ventures, though, his cybersecurity record sucks. Trump has failed to encourage policies to prevent large-scale data breaches at…
The Department of Defense launched a new program last week, “Hack the Pentagon,” to reward hackers for pointing out security flaws in some of its public-facing websites. It’s a bug bounty, the same kind of program that most big tech firms use to encourage hackers to help instead of harm. The program budget is…
If I created a hierarchy of cyberattack nightmares, I’d slot attacks on hospitals right up there with having my Google search history downloaded and posted publicly. Maybe dying would be less explicitly humiliating, but getting murdered Homeland-style via hacked medical device is a specifically modern anxiety shudder.
The government used the All Writs Act in a failed attempt to make Apple write software that would weaken its security to help unlock a seized iPhone. That case was vacated this month, after a dramatic public battle. But the government is still using the All Writs Act to corral tech companies, including Google.
Want to know whether the drivers of Uber think you’re a complete dirtbag or not? Finding your passenger rating on the ride-hailing app is now a much simpler process.
When the DEA bought a spy plane in 2008, it was supposed to be a way to catch and transport dealers in Afghanistan. Instead, it turned into a corroding rust bucket in the desert, and a reminder of how dumb the government can be.
FBI vs. Apple is over. At least round one, anyways. The government has confirmed that it was able to get the data off the iPhone of the San Bernardino shooter Syed Farook without Apple, and it is dropping the lawsuit compelling Apple to write security-weakening malware.
The two leading GOP presidential candidates, burnt sienna businessman Donald Trump and Friendless Senator Ted Cruz, are in a microblog insult tussle about the women they married.
The company reportedly helping the FBI access the San Bernardino shooter’s iPhone data isn’t a household name in the US, but its data-extraction tools are all over the country. Cellebrite has been quietly helping US law enforcement bulk up its arsenal of surveillance gear for years.
An anticipated courtroom showdown between Apple and the FBI was scheduled for today—but that’s not happening anymore. The hearing was postponed following an FBI court filing claiming a “third party” had shown the government an alternate method to unlock the San Bernardino shooter’s iPhone, one that doesn’t require…
A former State Department employee will spend 57 months in prison for a “sextortion” cyberstalking crime that sounds like an SVU sweeps-week plot, only weirder and more awful.
