Did you know that Google Chrome includes an automatic download of the Gemini Nano AI model? If not, you won’t be alone. Those who use Google’s hugely popular browser realized this week that Gemini Nano is taking up 4GB of space on their desktops by 2024, causing irritation and privacy concerns. Luckily, you can disable the AI models—but not without losing some useful security features. Obviously, you can also download a separate browser for free.
Researchers revealed this week that thousands of apps containing Vibe code were released onto the open Internet, exposing sensitive corporate and personal data. The security failures are a reminder: Just because you can code something vibey doesn’t mean you should.
The Department of Homeland Security subpoenaed Google in an effort to obtain location data and account activity of a Canadian man who criticized U.S. immigration enforcement tactics following the killings of Renee Good and Alex Pretty in Minneapolis earlier this year. The American Civil Liberties Union filed a complaint against DHS this week on behalf of a man who has not visited the US in more than 10 years.
Scammers, low-level hackers and other cybercriminals have joined the ranks of humanity looking to break free from the AI slide, according to new research. Meanwhile, Meta is beefing up its age-verification technology after a study found that children are cheating online age checks using simple techniques – including a child hero who failed online age verification by sporting a fake moustache. Finally, we detailed Russia’s effort to create a local competitor to Starlink satellite Internet service – with all the privacy and security concerns that come with it.
There is so much more. Each week, we round up security and privacy news that we haven’t covered in depth ourselves. Click on titles to read full stories. And stay safe there.
Most people expect that 200-pound robot with blades in their backyard that can’t be easily hacked. Unfortunately for owners of Yarbo, a $5,000 lawn mowing robot that can also serve as a leaf blower, snowblower and edger, that was not the case. The Verge reports that a security researcher found several vulnerabilities in Lawn Bot that could allow hackers to remotely take over the machines (including their camera feeds), as well as extract owners’ email addresses, Wi-Fi passwords, and home locations.
While a spokesperson for Yarbo told The Verge that the robot’s “diagnostic environment is not publicly accessible”, the reporter and researcher demonstrated the security flaws and their potential consequences by nearly crushing the reporter with the hijacked robot. The company has since reported that they are developing a fix for at least one of the flaws identified by the researcher.
Mark Zuckerberg’s Meta has withdrawn support for end-to-end encrypted messages on Instagram, backing away from its plan to protect people’s privacy by providing messages the company can’t spy on. The company stopped offering encryption on Instagram on May 8, making it technically easier than ever for the firm to access DMs.
After spending years building the encryption systems needed to secure its chat apps, Meta said in 2023 that it had introduced default encryption for the messenger. It also said it was introducing an opt-in version to Instagram, which it planned would eventually become the default setting. However, that day never came when Meta decided in March this year that not enough people had opted-in and it would remove the option to encrypt Instagram chats. The U-turn has angered privacy and security experts, who fear the rollback could harm end-to-end encryption efforts around the world.
The Trump administration unveiled a new counterterrorism strategy, which President Donald Trump described in the preamble included in the document as “a return to peace through common sense and strength.” According to the document, the three largest types of terrorist groups are cartels, Islamic terrorist groups and “violent left-wing extremists”, which the memo said include anarchists and anti-fascists and whose ideologies are “anti-American” and “radical pro-transgender”.
The memo promises, “We will use all the tools constitutionally available to us to map them at home, identify their membership, map their ties to international organizations like Antifa, and use law enforcement tools to operationally paralyze them before they can maim or kill innocents.”
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