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Scammers are once again impersonating PayPal and trying to trick users into handing over access to their accounts and their cash. The latest email campaign alerts recipients to a new (fake) transaction and payment profile and urges them to take action to set up their account.

I have personally been targeted by this scam, which has some convincing elements and several red flags.

PayPal account profile scam

At first glance, this email seems like it really does come from PayPal: The sender address is service[at]paypal[dot]com, a legitimate PayPal domain, and paypal.com is listed in the signed-by field. However, scammers are able to spoof the email in the “From” field to make it look legitimate when it isn’t. The layout looks relatively similar to other PayPal emails, including the company’s branding and footer. If you hover over the links, including the call-to-action button to “set up your profile,” they appear to go to a real PayPal site.

Credit: Emily Long

After that, though, there’s almost nothing but red flags. The message isn’t addressed to me—instead of my name and email, it was sent to an address [at]truestate.org and with the salutation “Hello, receipt34532.” As Malwarebytes Labs points out, scammers will set up distribution lists to send phishing emails in bulk, so messages aren’t addressed to individual targets. Note, too, that legitimate businesses, including PayPal, will address you by your real name, not an alias or a generic greeting.

The rest of the message content doesn’t really make sense, and it doesn’t line up with the action you’re being urged to take. It also uses common scam tactics such as urgency (the link is set to expire in 24 hours) and eye-catching details (a large sum of money and vague reference to cryptocurrency). The phone number has also been reported to the Better Business Bureau as a PayPal scam.

Obviously, you shouldn’t engage with this, but if you did, you’d likely be prompted to add a secondary user to your PayPal account, which gives them access to issue payments using your information.

How to keep your PayPal account secure

At this point, it’s hard to trust any communication about account security or financial transactions. Scammers are able to spoof or impersonate real people and organizations in increasingly convincing ways, often supported by AI, so you shouldn’t believe an email (or phone call) just because the sender looks legitimate.

You should continue to be wary of messages that sound urgent or invoke strong emotions. Instead of engaging with these emails, texts, social media messages, and calls, delete them—and go directly to the website or app and log into your account to view any relevant alerts, or contact the company using information listed on official channels.

You can also search the phone number or email in the BBB’s Scam Tracker to see if anyone has reported it as fraudulent. And where possible, enable multi-factor authentication on your accounts as an extra layer of security.

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The Samsung Galaxy Buds 3 are $74.99 on Woot right now, which is the lowest tracked price so far, according to price trackers. On Amazon, the same pair will set you back $179, so this is a steep drop. On top of that, Samsung is covering these with a two-year manufacturer’s warranty, which adds some peace of mind when buying from a deal site. For a pair of earbuds that only launched a year ago, that’s a lot of savings to weigh against what you’re actually getting. If you’re considering more options, you might want to check out our roundup of the best wireless earbuds to buy in 2025.

Samsung Galaxy Buds 3

$74.99
at Woot

$179.99
Save $105.00

$74.99
at Woot

$179.99
Save $105.00

Samsung introduced a new stem (or “Blade”) style with the Galaxy Buds 3. These triangular stems are more than just a visual refresh—they create two touch surfaces, making pinch and swipe gestures more precise and allowing playback and volume controls to feel smoother and easier to use. Available in silver or white, these earbuds also carry an IP57 rating, which means dust won’t be an issue, and they can handle rain, sweat, or even a quick dunk in water, as long as the charging case stays dry. Comfort is solid, and noise cancellation is better than expected for open-fit earbuds, although it won’t block sound as effectively as in-ear seal designs, notes this PCMag review.

Where the Buds 3 show their limitations is in sound detail and battery life. High frequencies can feel a little muted, and with just one 11mm driver per ear, they can’t quite match the depth of Samsung’s Buds 3 Pro or other dual-driver models. Battery life is another weak spot. With ANC on, you’re looking at about five hours on a charge and 19 more from the case, while turning ANC off stretches it to six hours plus 24 in the case. That’s serviceable, but not standout, especially when rivals in the same price range can push closer to eight or more hours with ANC enabled. Still, if you’re using a Samsung phone, you’ll unlock extras like 24-bit playback via Samsung’s Scalable Codec and features like Interpreter mode. Even without those perks, though, the Buds 3 are a compelling buy at this price, especially if you just want a comfortable, water-resistant pair with solid noise cancellation and a warranty to back them up.

In the harrowing aftermath of September 11, 2001, one of the most glaring and tragic failures identified was not of intelligence but of interoperability. The 9/11 Commission Report painstakingly detailed how different agencies, from the FAA to NORAD and the FBI, were unable to effectively share critical information in real-time because their systems couldn’t talk to each other. This digital Tower of Babel hampered the national response and highlighted a fundamental vulnerability. In the decades since, the challenge has only grown more complex. Now, a unique solution born from that crisis, the Syndeo Intelligent Gateway from Agile Empowerment Technologies, offers a powerful new approach to securely bridging these digital divides—not just for government, but for the corporate world as well.

A Cure for a Self-Inflicted Wound

The post-9/11 mandate was clear: connect our agencies. This led to the rise of initiatives under organizations like the Defense Information Systems Agency (DISA), tasked with creating a unified network for the Department of Defense and other federal bodies. The goal was noble and necessary: create a seamless flow of information to ensure a coordinated response to any threat. However, in solving one problem, DISA’s efforts inadvertently created a new can of worms: a vast, interconnected network with an exponentially larger attack surface.

Every new connection between once-siloed systems became a potential new backdoor for adversaries and a nightmare for access management. How do you grant a user from one agency access to a specific dataset in another without giving them the keys to the entire kingdom? This is the precise problem the Syndeo Intelligent Gateway was engineered to solve. It acts not just as a simple connector, but as a smart, security-first intermediary. It allows organizations to define granular, policy-based access rules, ensuring that users and systems only see the data they are explicitly authorized to see and nothing more. It’s the digital equivalent of a security checkpoint and escort, rather than just an open door.

Modernizing with a Scalpel, not a Sledgehammer

One of the biggest hurdles in government and large-scale enterprise IT is the albatross of legacy systems. Decades-old mainframes and databases, while often still functional, create massive interoperability headaches and are prohibitively expensive to replace all at once. The common approach is a slow, costly and often disruptive “rip and replace” strategy.

Syndeo offers a more intelligent path forward. By sitting in the middle and managing the complex, often bespoke connections between these aging systems and modern platforms, the gateway gathers invaluable data. It can effectively map out the entire interoperability landscape, identifying which legacy systems require the most complex, brittle and resource-intensive connections. This provides leadership with a data-driven roadmap for modernization. Instead of guessing, they can see precisely which systems are the biggest technological drags and prioritize their replacement for the most significant and economical impact.

A Bridge for Corporate Mergers

While Syndeo was forged in the crucible of national security, its applications in the commercial sector are profound, particularly in the chaotic world of mergers and acquisitions (M&A). When two large companies merge, they bring with them entirely different IT ecosystems—one might run on SAP, the other on Oracle; their HR systems, CRMs and financial platforms are rarely compatible. The process of integrating these systems typically takes years and costs millions, delaying the realization of merger synergies.

Syndeo can act as an instant bridge. Rather than embarking on a massive, multi-year integration project, the newly combined entity can use the gateway to connect their disparate systems seamlessly and securely on day one. This allows for the immediate sharing of critical business data, from sales pipelines to supply chain logistics, while the longer-term IT strategy is developed. It transforms a major M&A pain point from a roadblock into a manageable, phased process.

Preventing the Next Snowden

Perhaps Syndeo’s most critical feature is its ability to prevent the kind of catastrophic insider breach personified by Edward Snowden. The Snowden leaks were enabled not by a sophisticated hack, but by excessive and poorly audited access privileges. He was able to access and exfiltrate vast amounts of data because the systems had no effective way of enforcing “need-to-know” at a granular level or flagging anomalous data access patterns.

The Syndeo gateway is designed to thwart this very scenario. Its security model is built on a zero-trust foundation, meticulously controlling and logging every single data request and transaction that flows through it. Access can be restricted not just by user, but by time of day, location and the specific data fields being requested. An administrator attempting to download an entire database would trigger immediate alerts. This creates an auditable, enforceable security perimeter that can drastically reduce the risk of both malicious insider threats and external attacks.

Wrapping Up

The Syndeo Intelligent Gateway is a powerful reminder that true innovation often arises from profound necessity. Born from the need to solve the critical interoperability and security failures revealed by 9/11, it has evolved into a versatile tool for digital transformation. By enabling secure and intelligent connections between disparate systems, it offers a pragmatic path to modernizing legacy government IT, a powerful accelerator for corporate M&A and a robust defense against the kind of insider threats that have caused irreparable harm to national security. In a world of increasing digital complexity and ever-present threats, Syndeo provides a much-needed layer of secure, intelligent control.

After a successful Kickstarter campaign, Valerion is formally announcing its new premium projector, the VisionMaster Max, at IFA 2025. The boxy little projector offers improved contrast and brightness, but the feature that should be most interesting to home theater aficionados is how it tries to address the “rainbow effect” common in some cheaper projectors.

Cheaper DLP projectors sometimes display stuttery strobes of color when the projector’s color wheel is forced to quickly shift between colors during fast-paced scenes. While these doesn’t necessarily impede watching a movie or TV show, the rainbow effect can bother sensitive projector owners. The VisionMaster Max attempts to address the problem with what Valerion calls “Anti-RBE Technology” that “reduces rainbow effects by 99.9 percent.” The company pulls this off by using software to blend the individual color sequences of whatever you’re watching faster than the human eye can perceive, creating what looks like a seamless image.

Valerion

Valerion says the VisionMaster Max also has an upgraded native contrast ratio of 5,000:1 and an AI-assisted “Enhanced Black Level (EBL)” contrast of 50,000:1 for improved depth and details in shadows. Valerion’s dramatically named “NoirScene Dark Field Engine System” mixes stable luminance from a fixed iris aperture and an EBL algorithm to offer deeper blacks with less need for calibration. Combined with the VisionMaster Max’s up to 3,500 lumens of brightness, it makes the projector even more usable during day or night.

The VisionMaster Max also carries over the adjustable lens system from some of Valerion’s other projectors, offers support for Gigabit ethernet and Wi-Fi 6E and runs Google TV. Despite favoring Google’s home theater OS, Valerion guarantees you can fully integrate the VisionMaster Max with Google Home, Apple HomeKit, Amazon Alexa, Control4 and Crestron smart home systems.

If that all sounds good, just make sure you’re comfortable paying for a premium experience. Valerion says the VisionMaster Max will be available in October 2025, starting at $4,999.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/home/home-theater/valerion-launches-new-premium-projector-with-anti-rainbow-effect-technology-120058357.html?src=rss

In so many ways, privacy is dead—or at least a lot more challenging to maintain than it used to be. In public, you’re probably seen by dozens of cameras every day just as you go about your business. At home, almost everything we do online—from social media posts to the shows we watch on our screens—is tracked, packaged, and sold. The apps we use are some of the worst offenders—especially if they’re free to use, which just means you’re paying either with your eyeballs (on advertisements) or with the data the app is hoovering up and selling off.

The problem is simple: We don’t own or control the apps we use. But you can change that, to an extent. There’s a growing list of “self-hosted” alternatives to commonly used apps. A self-hosted app is just what it sounds like: Instead of relying on a third party’s servers for an app’s functionality, you host your own server. That means you control all your data, and your privacy score shoots up exponentially. It’s understandable that “running your own server” might sound intimidating, but it’s often a lot easier than it sounds. Here’s how self-hosted apps work, and which ones you can start using today to give your online privacy a boost.

How self-hosted apps work

The standard apps we use every day—provided by companies like Google or X—are extremely convenient. You can get them up and running in minutes, and they usually work pretty seamlessly. The downside is the mountain of your private data that they absorb and use in mysterious ways. Even if it’s anonymized, it’s still disconcerting—and since those companies can change their terms of service (ToS) any time they want, there’s no guarantee how your data will be used in the future. A self-hosted app makes everything local. You provide your own storage and your own functionality, and only you can decide how your data is used.

The benefits are obvious. Control over your data and privacy is number one. There’s also potentially lower cost (since you’re not paying a subscription), and you won’t be subject to the whims of a corporation that might decide to discontinue an app you love or force you to upgrade. Plus, you can decide the features and add-ons you want to use instead of having unwanted features forced on you.

Downsides of self-hosting

There are some potential downsides, too, of course. Self-hosting means you’re responsible for security and keeping your software updated. Hardware can fail, and if you don’t have a recent backup of your data there’s no one to turn to. You’re also your own customer service, and your tech support is essentially a Google search.

And going self-hosted can sometimes be a bit of a lift; some self-hosted apps require containerization environments like Docker or Homebrew, which makes it easy for software to run on any computer without having to worry about software dependencies or conflicting libraries (if that sentence meant nothing to you, keep reading, it’s not that bad).

Another barrier is hardware: Depending on what you want to self-host, you might need a lot of storage. Movies and TV shows can be enormous media files requiring gigabytes (or even terabytes) of storage, and one of the things you have to handle yourself when you self-host is backing everything up. That means a robust self-hosted setup might require a few extra hard drives (or a Virtual Personal Server—a VPS—which costs money) and possibly a cloud backup solution.

Apps you might want to self-host

But we can keep it simple: Many self-hosted apps also offer pre-packaged applications that can be easily installed on your computer like any other piece of software. And you can self-host on your everyday desktop computer, or turn an old desktop or laptop into your personal server. If you want to see if self-hosting apps works for you, you can start by just installing one of the following self-hosted alternatives to popular apps on your current computer.

• Plex. Plex is one of the best-known and most robust self-hosted solution out there. Plex is essentially your own private media server for streaming photos, audio, and video files to devices—like a self-hosted Netflix using films, TV shows, and music that you own. You can install the Plex App on a Roku device and direct it to your personal media server to stream anything you want, and give friends and family access to your server as well if you want. Plex also offers a paid service to access your media remotely—i.e., when you’re not home.

• Kodi. Similar to Plex, Kodi turns your PC’s hard drive into a media server. Unlike Plex, Kodi is open source software and not controlled by a single company, which makes a better choice for privacy. After installing it, you point it to the folders where you store videos and audio, and then Kodi streams those files over your wifi network to other devices. For example, I use Kodi at home to stream all my music files to devices using VLC. It’s a lightweight and simple way to self-host your media. If you want to just stream for yourself, Kodi is a lot simpler than Plex to set up and run.

• Jellyfin. Another media server alternative, Jellyfin is a little more complicated to set up, but it offers a free and open source alternative to Plex with a richer feature set than Kodi. If you really want total mastery of your streaming libraries without any third parties involved, Jellyfin might be your best choice.

• Grocy. If you’re using apps like Plan to Eat to organize your pantry and meal plan, Grocy offers the same functionality without the subscription fee or the third-party data vacuum. A full Grocy installation involves setting up your own server using Docker, but Grocy Desktop is an easier solution that installs like any other piece of software on your PC. Grocy lets you track purchases, track supplies in the house, automate shopping lists, track expiration dates, and incorporate recipes so you can see at a glance what you need to make dinner.

• Mastodon. If you’re leery of social media’s privacy implications—since you typically don’t own or control your own posts or audience data—there’s a self-hosted alternative: Mastodon. Mastodon received a lot of attention a few years ago, and it’s still chugging along. You can set up a Mastodon account just like any of the “Twitter-like” platforms out there, but Mastodon can also be self-hosted, meaning you can run your own social media platform with your own rules. Users on different servers can follow each other, too, so you’re not limited to just your friends or colleagues—Threads has been making an effort to integrate into the network as well.

  Setting up a Mastodon server can get a little complicated—you’ll need your own domain, a VPS, and an email provider specific to the server. But if you want true social media privacy, this is the way.

• Owncast. If you want to stream video out to the world like the folks on Twitch and YouTube do, Owncast is a self-hosted video streaming platform that keeps all your data and media under your control. That means you can never be de-platformed if YouTube decides you’ve violated some mysterious policy or someone else’s dubious copyright claim, for example.

  Owncast can be installed easily on cloud hosts like DigitalOcean if you’re willing to pay for that service, but you can run it locally as well (keeping in mind that video streaming requires a lot of storage and bandwidth). It can be installed locally pretty easily on Linux systems, but requires Docker for Windows or Homebrew for macOS.

• Immich. Google Photos is a great tool, but it does mean that your private, personal photos are stored on a corporation’s servers under their terms of service, and if you’re not careful you’ll quickly eat up the free storage and have to start paying for extra room. Enter Immich, a self-hosted alternative. It requires Docker to install, but is pretty easy to set up and uses web- or mobile-based interfaces to administer. Its feature set is very robust, including automated backups, facial recognition, and easy sharing with other folks.

• Home Assistant. If you’ve got smart devices in your home, Home Assistant offers a centralized control hub that avoids the poor security and privacy nightmares of third-party Internet of Things (IoT) platforms. It works with most open-source and proprietary smart home devices, and offers a level of customization that rivals any paid offering.

  While you can set up Home Assistant on a computer to run yourself, by far the easiest way to use it is to purchase the Home Assistant Green, a pre-built device that makes it a “plug and play” experience. The Home Assistant Green just plugs into your network and is ready to go. Otherwise it’s most commonly installed on a single-board computer like the Raspberry Pi or on a traditional PC using Docker or a virtual machine.

• Ollama. Do you use AI large language models (LLMs) like the ones powering ChatGPT, but you don’t like the fact that your chats are exposed? Ollama let’s you install lightweight versions of LLMs like gpt-oss locally on your computer and run them. The experience is very similar to using the web-based LLM tools, though they can be slower and less powerful than the full versions depending on your hardware. But if privacy is your goal, it’s an option, and Ollama offers easy installation of several different AI models to play around with.

OpenAI is gearing up to start the mass production of its own AI chips next year to be able to provide the massive computing power its users need and to lessen its reliance on NVIDIA, according to the Financial Times. The company reportedly designed the custom AI chip with US semiconductor maker Broadcom, whose CEO recently announced that it has a new client that put in a whopping $10 billion in orders. It didn’t name the client, but the Times‘ sources confirmed that it was OpenAI, which apparently doesn’t have plans to sell the chips and will only be using them internally.

Reuters reported way back in 2023 that OpenAI was already exploring the possibility of making its own AI chips after Sam Altman blamed GPU shortages for the company API’s speed and reliability. The news organization also previously reported that OpenAI was working with both Broadcom and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) to create its own product. The Times didn’t say whether OpenAI still has an ongoing partnership with TSMC. 

After GPT-5 came out, Altman announced the changes OpenAI is implementing in order to keep up with “increased demand.” In addition to prioritizing paid ChatGPT users, he said that OpenAI was going to double its compute fleet “over the next 5 months.” Making its own chips will address any potential GPU shortages the company may encounter in doubling its fleet, and it could also save the company money. The Times says custom AI chips called “XPUs” like the one OpenAI is reportedly developing will eventually take a big share of the AI market. At the moment, NVIDIA is still the leading name in the industry. It recently revealed that its revenue for the second quarter ending on July 27 rose 56 percent compared to the same period last year, and it didn’t even have to ship any H20 chips to China. 

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/openai-is-reportedly-producing-its-own-ai-chips-starting-next-year-113924707.html?src=rss

reMarkable is making a move away from its giant e-ink slate. The new Paper Pro Move is a smaller iteration with a 7.3-inch display the same size as a reporter’s notepad. The idea is an eink device you can write and edit on while on the move. Hence the name.

Engadget

There are some drawbacks, however. With the Move, the only way to write and edit typed text is with the on-screen keyboard. Bigger reMarkable devices can connect to a companion keyboard. Engadget’s Daniel Cooper spent some time with the new slate. There’s a lot to like, but it’s a different proposition to past reMarkable Papers.

The Paper Pro Move is available to order today, priced at $449 with a stylus included. Meanwhile, paper notepads cost a buck fifty. They’re not compatible with keyboards either.

— Mat Smith

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The news you might have missed

• The Apple iPhone 17 Awe dropping event: Here’s what to expect on September 9

• Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra hands-on

• The first new Bond game in over a decade is Hitman meets action blockbuster

Dolby Vision 2 is here to push picture quality ‘beyond HDR’

Hisense TVs will get the tech first.

Just when most of us figured out that our TVs and most new smartphones support high dynamic resolution (brighter whites, darker blacks, you get the gist), Dolby is here to make it look like crap. It just introduced Dolby Vision 2, with an array of new features.

Content Intelligence uses AI to automatically adapt your TV to what you’re watching.

For example, Precision Black helps keep darker scenes visible, and Light Sense detects ambient light to create the best picture — great if you keep a lamp or two on for movie night. Authentic Motion. This tool is what Dolby calls “the world’s first creative-driven motion control tool to make scenes feel more authentically cinematic.” I have no idea what that means.

Continue reading.

Eufy wants robovacs to conquer stairs

But only its robovacs.

Eufy’s MarsWalker carries the robovac between floors and drops it off at the base station when needed. It uses four control arms along with a track-drive system that “grips each step securely.”

There are a few caveats. There’s no price yet, and it will only work with a few Eufy models — and no other company’s robovacs. Don’t worry, though, Eufy has a new model that packs its own aromatherapy module and costs a punchy $1,600.

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Instagram gets an iPad app 15 years later

Better late than never?

What a week for long delays! Hollow Knight: Silksong is out (still looking for the third Mossberry here…) and Instagram developers, for some reason, decided September 2025 is the time to finally launch a dedicated iPad app. Thanks to the bigger screen, comments on Reels will appear right next to the videos, and the DMs page will include the inbox alongside the actual chat. What makes it extra baffling is that Instagram head Adam Mosseri said the iPad platform wasn’t big enough to warrant fast-tracking an app. He said that in 2023.

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The LEGO Ultimate Death Star: Over 9,000 pieces and $1,000

It’s the most expensive set ever.

Lego

LEGO just revealed the Star Wars Ultimate Death Star set, the largest LEGO Star Wars set ever made. It’s also the most expensive LEGO set ever. Bricks aside, it comes with 38 minifigures, including characters like Luke Skywalker, Darth Vader and Emperor Palpatine. It also comes with a stormtrooper figure in a hot tub — a nod to the video games.

Continue reading.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/general/the-morning-after-engadget-newsletter-111553035.html?src=rss

Welcome to Edition 8.09 of the Rocket Report! The biggest news of the week happened inside the Beltway rather than on a launch pad somewhere. In Washington, DC, Congress has pushed back on the Trump administration’s plan to stop flying the Space Launch System rocket after Artemis III. Congress made it clear that it wants to keep the booster in business for a long time. The big question now is whether the Trump White House will blink.

As always, we welcome reader submissions, and if you don’t want to miss an issue, please subscribe using the box below (the form will not appear on AMP-enabled versions of the site). Each report will include information on small-, medium-, and heavy-lift rockets as well as a quick look ahead at the next three launches on the calendar.

Israel launches SAR satellite. The Israel Ministry of Defense, Israel Defense Forces, and Israel Aerospace Industries successfully launched the Ofek 19 satellite on Tuesday from the Palmachim Airbase. The launch was carried out by the country’s solid-propellant Shavit 2 rocket. Ofek 19 is a synthetic aperture radar observation satellite with enhanced capabilities, 7 Israel National News reports.

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