A Researcher Figured Out How to Reveal Any Phone Number Linked to a Google Account

This article was produced with support from WIRED. A cybersecurity researcher was able to figure out the phone number linked to any Google account, information that is usually not public and is often sensitive, according to the researcher, Google, and 404 Media’s own tests. The issue has since been fixed but at the time presented a privacy…

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The AI Hard Drive Shortage Is Making It More Expensive and Harder to Archive the Internet

Skyrocketing hard drive and storage costs caused by the AI data center boom are making it more expensive and more difficult for digital archivists, academics, Wikipedia, and hobby data hoarders to save data and archive the internet. Specific drives favored by some high profile organizations like the Internet Archive have become far more expensive or…

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Women Dating Safety App ‘Tea’ Breached, Users’ IDs Posted to 4chan

Users from 4chan claim to have discovered an exposed database hosted on Google’s mobile app development platform, Firebase, belonging to the newly popular women’s dating safety app Tea. Users say they are rifling through peoples’ personal data and selfies uploaded to the app, and then posting that data online, according to screenshots, 4chan posts, and…

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Ukraine Says Russians are Surrendering to Robots

Ukrainian President Volodomyr Zelenskyy praised robots as the future of war in a Defense Industry Worker Day address on Monday. “For the first time in the history of this war, an enemy position was taken exclusively by unmanned platforms—ground systems and drones. The occupiers surrendered, and the operation was carried out without infantry and without…

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Civitai, Site Used to Generate AI Porn, Cut Off by Credit Card Processor

Civitai, an AI model sharing site backed by Andreessen Horowitz (a16z) that 404 Media has repeatedly shown is being used to generate nonconsensual adult content, lost access to its credit card payment processor. According to an announcement posted to Civitai on Monday, the site will “pause” credit card payments starting Friday, May 23. At that…

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Congress Launches Investigation into Flock After 404 Media Reporting

Two members of Congress have launched a formal investigation into automatic license plate reader (ALPR) company Flock and demanded it turn over details of all searches of its national camera network concerning Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE), Customs and Border Protection (CBP), and abortions. The move comes after 404 Media revealed that local cops were…

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