DOGE
DOGE Now Has Access to the Top US Cybersecurity Agency
DOGE technologists Edward Coristine—the 19-year-old known online as “Big Balls”—and Kyle Schutt are now listed as staff at the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency.
DOGE’s Shocking $8 Billion Mistake Called Out
Elon Musk’s group of young engineers appear to have made a massive gaffe on its much-hyped “wall of receipts.”
Elon Musk’s Department of Government Efficiency claimed a saving of $8 billion on a terminated contract this week—but it was actually worth just $8 million.
The error represented about 15 percent of the total $55 billion savings DOGE has claimed it made to date. But the $55 billion claim was also apparently bogus: a set of “receipts” posted on its new website totaled just a quarter of $55 billion, even including the erroneous $8 billion.
I Just Figured Out What Elon Musk’s DOGE Really Is
That it’s a protection racket should have been obvious all along.
By Dahlia Lithwick
Commerce Agency to Order Mass Firing of Chips, AI Staffers
NIST is preparing to fire as many as roughly 500 probationary staffers.
Ukraine
Republicans Call BS After Trump Labels Zelensky a ‘Dictator’ Yet Again
A number of Republicans have finally spoken up against Trump’s wild claims.
Most vocal among the senators was Louisiana’s Sen. John Kennedy.
Ukrainian female POWs tortured and paraded naked through the snow by Russian troops
Trump blames Ukraine over war with Russia, saying it could have made a deal
Anti-Medicine
Covid vaccine faces ban for all Americans in radical U-turn by Trump team
Several experts poised for top jobs in US health agencies subscribe to the disputed idea the shots are causing widespread side effects and deaths.
America's King
Trump Signs New Order to Vastly Expand His Presidential Powers
President Donald Trump signed a landmark executive order Tuesday that would allow the White House to control independent agencies that have long operated outside of its influence.
The sweeping order, which claims to promote “Presidential supervision and control of the entire executive branch,” could affect independent agencies like the Federal Election Committee, Federal Communications Commission, Federal Trade Commission, and the Securities and Exchange Commission.
Trump signs order declaring only president and AG can interpret US law for executive branch
White House Shares Photo of Donald Trump Dressed as a King
The administration's official X (formerly Twitter) account posted a fake paper cover in the style of Time Magazine, with the caption: "CONGESTION PRICING IS DEAD. Manhattan, and all of New York, is SAVED. LONG LIVE THE KING!"
General Fascism
Veteran federal prosecutor resigns over bank freeze order from Trump appointee
Denise Cheung wrote in a resignation letter that Ed Martin, nominated by Trump to be Washington's top federal prosecutor, ordered her to take actions unsupported by evidence. She was ordered “to open a criminal investigation into whether a contract had been unlawfully awarded by an executive agency.”
It had to do with environmental grants issued during the Biden administration.
The new resignation comes amid a period of turmoil within the Justice Department. Most recently, seven prosecutors chose to resign rather than follow orders to drop the case against New York City Mayor Eric Adams, a decision that several described in letters as improper and politically motivated.
Nazi flags can fly in Utah schools, but not pride flags, GOP lawmaker says
A new bill would allow for Nazi and Confederate flags to be displayed in some instances in Utah schools and government buildings, but pride flags would be banned.
Joe Rogan Dethroned by Anti-Trump Podcast in the Charts
Joe Rogan has lost his Number One slot to a show critical of President Donald Trump, The MeidasTouch Podcast, according to Podscribe data.
Russian phishing campaigns exploit Signal's device-linking feature
Threat actors leveraged the feature by creating malicious QR codes and deceiving potential victims into scanning them to allow Signal messages to synchronize with the attacker’s device.
It is a simple trick that does not require a full compromise of the target’s device to monitor their secure conversations.
Meta Sues Alleged Violent Extortionist For Holding Instagram Accounts Hostage
Idriss Qibaa, a “professional when it comes to the banning and unbanning of Instagram accounts" who ran “Unlocked 4 Life,” claimed he made more than $600,000 a month, from over 200 people who pay him monthly to maintain access to their accounts. Part of the “Unlocked 4 Life” extortion scheme included threatening to murder victims if they didn’t cooperate. Qibaa was running the same grift on X, YouTube, TikTok, Snapchat, and Telegram.
Meta’s complaint is a look into how easy it is to manipulate its own reporting and moderation features. The company says Qibaa got people’s Instagram accounts banned by simply submitting fake reports claiming they were violating the platform’s terms. When Qibaa submitted the misleading reports, Meta alleges, Instagram disabled the account on the same day, and in some cases, reinstated it on the same day, too.
Hacker group releases updated tool to activate almost all modern Microsoft software
The MAS project is donation-free because "profiting from piracy is not good," the pirates say
Who’s Afraid of Hasan Piker?
He’s hot. He’s “dangerous.” Young men actually listen to him. Is he what Democrats are looking for?
Other channels on Twitch, the Amazon-owned livestreaming platform, tend to focus on Fortnite stunts and other video game feeds. Piker doesn’t play too many video games live. Instead, for the most part, his broadcasts consist of him clicking around the huge number of tabs compressed at the top of his Chrome browser. Piker ping-pongs between them, offering mordant insights on irritating New York Times columns, Elon Musk tweets, and Jesse Watters meltdowns. His style is open-ended and rich with digressions.
In 2020, back when he was still getting his feet wet on the platform, his stream peaked at 230,000 concurrent viewers while he covered Biden’s slim victory over Donald Trump, making him the sixth-most-watched source of election coverage across YouTube and Twitch. Four years later, Piker broke that record when 313,000 people watched him analyze the defeat of Kamala Harris.
China Launches Its Own Quantum-Resistant Encryption Standards, Bypassing US Efforts
China has announced a global call for new cryptographic algorithms to counter the security threats posed by quantum computing, signaling a move away from US-led efforts in the field.
Scientists Put a Human Language Gene Into Mice And Changed Their Voice
Catalytic Computing Taps the Full Power of a Full Hard Drive
Ten years ago, researchers proved that adding full memory can theoretically aid computation. They’re just now beginning to understand the implications.
Public Library Ebook Service to Cull AI Slop After 404 Media Investigation
Hoopla, a service that provides public libraries around the country with ebooks, announced that it will do more to prevent the spread of low quality AI-generated books after a 404 Media investigation showed that they were common on its platform.