How Cities Are Forced to Funnel License Plate Data to a Massive Federal Surveillance Program
Flock

How Cities Are Forced to Funnel License Plate Data to a Massive Federal Surveillance Program

How the federal government built a massive database of license plate reader data through an anti-drug trafficking program.
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404 Media is an independent media company founded by technology journalists Jason Koebler, Emanuel Maiberg, Samantha Cole, and Joseph Cox. Read more about us here.
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USPS To Put Cameras in Trucks That Scan Roads for ‘Community Safety’
Cameras

USPS To Put Cameras in Trucks That Scan Roads for ‘Community Safety’

USPS says the cameras, put on USPS truck dashboards, will scan roads, signs, and more.
Internet Infrastructure Services Empower Deepfake Abuse, New Study Finds
Deepfakes

Internet Infrastructure Services Empower Deepfake Abuse, New Study Finds

Cloudflare, Google, and Proton were among the "dominant" infrastructure providers to sites dedicated to hosting abusive content, the study found.
How the Feds Get Your Data
Newsletters

How the Feds Get Your Data

How local cops are forced to feed their license plate data to the feds, the two loudest birds on the planet, and a very strange video from the FBI.
How Cities Are Forced to Funnel License Plate Data to a Massive Federal Surveillance Program
Flock

How Cities Are Forced to Funnel License Plate Data to a Massive Federal Surveillance Program

How the federal government built a massive database of license plate reader data through an anti-drug trafficking program.
Two New Birds Louder Than Jackhammers Just Dropped
The Abstract

Two New Birds Louder Than Jackhammers Just Dropped

The bare-throated bellbird and the red-legged seriema join the white bellbird in the winner’s circle of the loudest birds on Earth, with calls exceeding 120 decibels—louder than a chainsaw or jackhammer.
Surveillance Finds a Way
Newsletters

Surveillance Finds a Way

CEO who wants to add facial recognition to Flock cameras says it's "the way the world will have to be."
Surveillance Company Tells Cops It Wants to Add Facial Recognition to Flock Cameras
Flock

Surveillance Company Tells Cops It Wants to Add Facial Recognition to Flock Cameras

A surveillance company wants to "close the gap" that Flock won't do, by pitching facial recognition on its cameras.
These Tech Workers Made ChatGPT Drive a Toyota Corolla
News

These Tech Workers Made ChatGPT Drive a Toyota Corolla

The team used frontier LLMs with no prior training data navigate a simple parking lot course.
FBI Hackers Say They Won’t Publish Massive Trove of FBI Employee Data
fbi

FBI Hackers Say They Won’t Publish Massive Trove of FBI Employee Data

ShinyHunters, the group that stole data on “all FBI employees” including addresses and details on their spouses, told 404 Media on Monday “Since the very beginning we had made our decision that we would never publish this data. We have never intended to nor have we ever planned to.”
The End of Privacy Is Here (with Kashmir Hill)
Podcast

The End of Privacy Is Here (with Kashmir Hill)

Facial recognition is everywhere now. Soon it's going to be right in your face, too.
Humans Are Reading Copilot Prompts — And They're Horrified
Microsoft

Humans Are Reading Copilot Prompts — And They're Horrified

Human contractors are reviewing Copilot users’ prompts and uploaded images, according to internal documents obtained by 404 Media. The contractors are also bombarded with users’ requests for sexual AI images.
Alien Life Can Survive on This Tiny Moon—We Just Need to Go Find It
The Abstract

Alien Life Can Survive on This Tiny Moon—We Just Need to Go Find It

Scientists have discovered that Earth-like microbes could potentially survive conditions inside Enceladus’s subsurface ocean, and that detecting signs of life on the moon may be easier than expected, according to a pair of studies.