Behind The Blog
Behind the Blog: Paywall Jumping and Smart Glasses
This week, we discuss archiving to get around paywalls, hating on smart glasses, and more.
News
AI Companion Device Releases Diss Track Against ‘Friend’
The maker of Friend said he had “no relation” to the person who released the diss track.
Court Watch
DHS Cracks Large-Scale Apple Counterfeiting ‘Refund Fraud’ Ring
A traffic stop in Alabama led to the discovery of a large-scale counterfeiting ring.
Scammer Allegedly Makes $600,000 a Month Holding Instagram Accounts Hostage
The case of Unlocked4Life, who outed himself on Adam-22's No Jumper podcast, shows how Instagram account scammers have escalated to violence and intimidation too.
Podcast
Podcast: Google, Reddit, and the Robots.txt Rebellion
We go long on robots.txt, AI scraping, and what it means for search and the web today. Also, a leaked document shows a multibillion dollar AI company scraped YouTube videos from specific creators, and we discuss Skibidi.
Podcast
Podcast: The Massive Nvidia Leak
A leak of Nvidia internal emails, Slack messages, and documents; how exactly spammers are flooding Facebook with AI; and our plans for DEF CON.
News
AI ‘Friend’ Company Spent $1.8 Million and Most of Its Funds on Domain Name
AI companion Friend appears to have spent most of its funds on buying friend.com.
News
Hacker Breaches Pharma Giant Bausch Health, Wants to Extort DEA
The data includes DEA numbers used for ordering controlled substances. 404 Media contacted Bausch about the data breach last week.
News
Skibidi Toilet Copyright Takedown Request to Garry’s Mod Is Very Dumb
A copyright takedown request against Garry’s Mod is a violation of the modding culture that made Skibidi Toilet possible.
News
Hacker Shows How to Get Free Laundry For Life
Michael Orlitzky was sick of the washer and dryer machines in his building. So, he found an alternative to paying.
Microsoft
How a Microsoft App is Powering Employee Surveillance
Microsoft Dynamics 365 uses AI-generated performance metrics to single out individual workers, a new report has found.
AI
Websites are Blocking the Wrong AI Scrapers (Because AI Companies Keep Making New Ones)
Hundreds of sites have put old Anthropic scrapers on their blocklist, while leaving a new one unblocked.
Behind The Blog
Behind the Blog: Winning Awards and Cranky Babies
This is Behind the Blog, where we share our behind-the-scenes thoughts about how a few of our top stories of the week came together. This week, we discuss winning awards, sim swapping dumpster fires, and push notifications for infants.