An anonymous reader quotes a report from KrebsOnSecurity: The U.S. government today imposed economic sanctions on Funnull Technology Inc., a Philippines-based company that provides computer infrastructure for hundreds of thousands of websites involved in virtual currency investment scams known as “pig butchering.” In January 2025, KrebsOnSecurity detailed how Funnull was being used as a content delivery network that catered to cybercriminals seeking to route their traffic through U.S.-based cloud providers. “Americans lose billions of dollars annually to these cyber scams, with revenues generated from these crimes rising to record levels in 2024,” reads a statement from the U.S. Department of the Treasury, which sanctioned Funnull and its 40-year-old Chinese administrator Liu Lizhi. “Funnull has directly facilitated several of these schemes, resulting in over $200 million in U.S. victim-reported losses.”

The Treasury Department said Funnull’s operations are linked to the majority of virtual currency investment scam websites reported to the FBI. The agency said Funnull directly facilitated pig butchering and other schemes that resulted in more than $200 million in financial losses by Americans. Pig butchering is a rampant form of fraud wherein people are lured by flirtatious strangers online into investing in fraudulent cryptocurrency trading platforms. Victims are coached to invest more and more money into what appears to be an extremely profitable trading platform, only to find their money is gone when they wish to cash out. The scammers often insist that investors pay additional “taxes” on their crypto “earnings” before they can see their invested funds again (spoiler: they never do), and a shocking number of people have lost six figures or more through these pig butchering scams.

KrebsOnSecurity’s January story on Funnull was based on research from the security firm Silent Push, which discovered in October 2024 that a vast number of domains hosted via Funnull were promoting gambling sites that bore the logo of the Suncity Group, a Chinese entity named in a 2024 UN report (PDF) for laundering millions of dollars for the North Korean state-sponsored hacking group Lazarus. Silent Push found Funnull was a criminal content delivery network (CDN) that carried a great deal of traffic tied to scam websites, funneling the traffic through a dizzying chain of auto-generated domain names and U.S.-based cloud providers before redirecting to malicious or phishous websites. The FBI has released a technical writeup (PDF) of the infrastructure used to manage the malicious Funnull domains between October 2023 and April 2025.

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If you’re entrenched in tech news, you’d think Apple was on the brink of collapse. The company undoubtedly is having a rough go of all things AI—while companies like ChatGPT, Google, and Microsoft have hit the AI ground running, Apple’s AI department is in disarray. Some features, like Clean Up and Writing Tools, have made their way to products like the iPhone, but, others (notably Siri’s AI overhaul) are still nowhere to be seen.

The situation is, objectively, not great. Apple advertised these features alongside the iPhone 16 line, even casting The Last of Us’ Bella Ramsey in a commercial showing off said AI-powered Siri. (The commercial has since been deleted.) While the rest of the tech industry seems to be entirely focused on AI, Apple is, uncharacteristically, struggling to keep up. Things must be dire for the company, right?

The iPhone continues to sell like hot cakes

While I’m not here to read the company’s entire pulse, it does seem like the iPhone department is still crushing it. On Wednesday, market research firm Counterpoint released its list of the top-selling smartphones in Q1 of 2025. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the iPhone topped the list: Apple’s iPhone 16 was the best-selling smartphone in the world in the first fiscal quarter of this year, followed by the 16 Pro Max, 16 Pro, and iPhone 15. Apple also had the top four spots in the first quarter of 2024—back then, it was the 15 Pro Max in first place, followed by the 15, 15 Pro, and 14.

Samsung took the next three spots, as it did in Q1 of 2024 as well. This year, it was the Galaxy A16 5G in fifth place, followed by the Galaxy A06 and the Galaxy S25 Ultra. The Redmi 14C 4G came in eighth—impressive for a smartphone that isn’t even sold in the U.S.—followed by the Galaxy A55 5G, and, finally, the iPhone 16 Plus.

There’s a lot you can take away from the data here. The first impression is that the iPhone continues to be a global force to be reckoned with. The iPhone had five of the top 10 spots in both Q1 2024 and 2025—the only difference between them was the iPhone 15 Plus came in eighth place, while the 16 Plus came in 10th. Samsung, too, is clearly still a reigning champ in the global smartphone race, though it went from five phones in the top 10 to four between those two years—good for Redmi for stealing that eighth place spot.

Ecosystems are powerful things

It’s particularly interesting to see the iPhone continue perform like this in 2025. After all, it’s been apparent for months now that Apple did not follow through on its advertised AI promises for the iPhone 16 line. To wit, Counterpoint says that the iPhone 16e, the company’s “more affordable” device, ranked sixth in the top selling smartphones of March. People are continuing to buy iPhones in droves.

Is it possible these customers are buying iPhones based on Apple’s past advertisements? Sure. The company still advertises Apple Intelligence with each iPhone on its site, so AI could still be driving people’s desires to buy iPhones. I’m not convinced, though. If AI were a priority, I think most customers would be buying from the companies that have been rolling out AI features at a steady clip. Samsung and Google immediately come to mind: Google’s latest I/O event was all about AI, and you can experience a number of AI features on Android devices made by both companies. Again, maybe Samsung’s four “top 10” smartphones are a result of its AI efforts. It’s entirely possible, but I continue to be unconvinced.

I see this list of best-selling iPhones and Galaxies, and I see one thing: established market trends. I think the truth is, a lot of people like Galaxies, and even more people like iPhones. People switch phones all the time, especially in the Android ecosystem, but based on the data, it seems like when it’s time to buy a new phone, most iPhone users buy a new iPhone, and most Galaxy users buy a new Galaxy. Ecosystems are powerful things, and when you’ve poured your entire digital life into one platform—including all the messaging, purchases, and cloud storage—it’s rare you want to mix it up.

That’s me to a T: As much as I respect Android, I’m stuck in the Apple ecosystem, and, as such, really only consider a new iPhone when it comes time to upgrade. Almost every single person in my immediate circle is the same way. The Samsung fans I know also stick to the pattern, just with the newest Galaxy. The decision for me is never whether to buy an iPhone or a Galaxy: it’s whether to buy the Pro or the Pro Max.

AI enthusiasm isn’t strong enough to drive smartphone sales

AI is without a doubt the trend in tech right now, and people are using it. But I don’t think many are considering it when buying their devices—especially smartphones. I think people buy the phone they like, and then configure it after the fact to access their AI tools. Hell, Apple integrated ChatGPT into my iPhone, and I still have the ChatGPT app. AI features can be useful—it’s great that Apple has its own version of Magic Eraser now—but AI features alone aren’t enough to sway customers en masse. If OpenAI made a smartphone, would you buy it? I’m guessing probably not.

If the AI train continues on, maybe people will start buying the phones and devices that best integrate AI tools out of the box. Android is way ahead of Apple on this front—just look at Google replacing its assistant with Gemini—so perhaps we’ll see Galaxy phones take more of a lead in global sales in future quarters, or even an appearance from a Pixel or two. Or, maybe people are fine downloading the apps they need to get their AI fix, and leaving other factors in play when choosing a phone to buy.

I can’t predict the future; I can only note what I see in the present. And, right now, I’m seeing two things at once—I’m seeing a lot of people talking about ChatGPT, and I’m seeing a lot of people buying and using iPhones. Outside of my tech news circles, I’ve heard not a peep about Apple’s struggles in the AI race.

Instagram now supports 3:4 aspect ratio photos, allowing users to upload images that “appear just exactly as you shot it.” Instagram head Adam Mosseri announced the update in a Threads post, noting that “almost every phone camera defaults to” that format. The Verge reports: An image from Instagram’s broadcast channel shows how the change makes a difference. You can already post images with a rectangular aspect ratio of 4:5, but with 3:4, your photo won’t be cropped at the ends. 3:4 photos are supported with single-photo uploads and with carousels, according to the channel. If you want, you can still post photos with a square or 4:5 aspect ratio.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

BrianFagioli shares a report from BetaNews: Microsoft just can’t leave well enough alone. The company is now injecting formatting features into Notepad, a program that has long been appreciated for one thing — its simplicity. You see, starting with version 11.2504.50.0, this update is rolling out to Windows Insiders in the Canary and Dev Channels, and it adds bold text, italics, hyperlinks, lists, and even headers. Sadly, this isn’t a joke. Notepad is actually being turned into a watered-down word processor, complete with a formatting toolbar and Markdown support. Users can even toggle between styled content and raw Markdown syntax. And while Microsoft is giving you the option to disable formatting or strip it all out, it’s clear the direction of the app is changing.

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Language learning apps usually fall into two camps—either they’re too rigid and boring, or they gamify things so much that you stop learning and start guessing. Qlango tries to find the middle ground, and right now, you can grab a lifetime subscription for $34.97 from StackSocial (down from $119.99), which gives you access to all 50+ supported languages. That includes the big ones like Spanish, French, and German, plus less common ones like Georgian, Tatar, and even Latin. Whether you’re prepping for a trip, brushing up your vocabulary, or just trying to keep your brain busy, it’s a lot of content for not a lot of money.

What makes Qlango different is how it forces you to use your target language actively. You don’t spend time translating back into your native tongue—everything you do, from dictation to sentence-building to multiple choice, is centered around the language you’re learning. It uses spaced repetition, so if you miss something, it’ll keep coming back until it sticks. And while that might sound annoying, it’s actually one of the most effective ways to build long-term memory. You can also pick the learning style that suits you best—go slow with word matching, or dive into full sentence translations if you’re up for it.

That said, the app’s design isn’t as polished as something like Duolingo, and if you’re someone who needs visual bells and whistles to stay motivated, it might feel a bit barebones. But the real value here is in how flexible it is—you can set your own weekly goals, skip the guilt trips for missing a day, and focus on what actually helps you learn. You can hear the pronunciation of each word, learn nouns with their articles (super helpful for gendered languages), and build a vocabulary that’s actually useful. If you’ve bounced off other language apps in the past because they either felt too childish or too intense, Qlango might be the middle path you’ve been looking for. And at this price, it’s not a huge risk to find out.

From its humble beginnings in the late 20th century, Google has come to dominate online searches, putting it squarely in the US government’s antitrust crosshairs. The ongoing search antitrust case threatens to upend Google’s dominance, giving smaller players a chance to thrive and possibly wiping others out. After wrapping up testimony in the case earlier this month, lawyers for Google and the Department of Justice have now made their closing arguments.

The DOJ won the initial trial, securing a ruling that Google used anticompetitive practices to maintain its monopoly in general search. During the time this case has taken to meander its way through the legal system, the online landscape has been radically altered, making it harder than ever to envision a post-Google Internet.

To address Google’s monopoly, the DOJ is asking United States District Judge Amit Mehta to impose limits on Google’s business dealings and order a divestment of the Chrome browser. Forcing the sale of Chrome would be a major penalty and a coup for the DOJ lawyers, but this issue has been overshadowed somewhat as the case drags on. During closing arguments, the two sides dueled over how Google’s search deals and the rise of AI could change the Internet as we know it.

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An anonymous reader quotes a report from 404 Media: If you’ve left a comment on a YouTube video, a new website claims it might be able to find every comment you’ve ever left on any video you’ve ever watched. Then an AI can build a profile of the commenter and guess where you live, what languages you speak, and what your politics might be. The service is called YouTube-Tools and is just the latest in a suite of web-based tools that started life as a site to investigate League of Legends usernames. Now it uses a modified large language model created by the company Mistral to generate a background report on YouTube commenters based on their conversations. Its developer claims it’s meant to be used by the cops, but anyone can sign up. It costs about $20 a month to use and all you need to get started is a credit card and an email address.

The tool presents a significant privacy risk, and shows that people may not be as anonymous in the YouTube comments sections as they may think. The site’s report is ready in seconds and provides enough data for an AI to flag identifying details about a commenter. The tool could be a boon for harassers attempting to build profiles of their targets, and 404 Media has seen evidence that harassment-focused communities have used the developers’ other tools. YouTube-Tools also appears to be a violation of YouTube’s privacy policies, and raises questions about what YouTube is doing to stop the scraping and repurposing of peoples’ data like this. “Public search engines may scrape data only in accordance with YouTube’s robots.txt file or with YouTube’s prior written permission,” it says.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Amazon Fire Sticks are enabling “billions of dollars” worth of streaming piracy, according to a report today from Enders Analysis, a media, entertainment, and telecommunications research firm. Technologies from other media conglomerates, Microsoft, Google, and Facebook, are also enabling what the report’s authors deem an “industrial scale of theft.”

The report, “Video piracy: Big tech is clearly unwilling to address the problem,” focuses on the European market but highlights the global growth of piracy of streaming services as they increasingly acquire rights to live programs, like sporting events.

Per the BBC, the report points to the availability of multiple, simultaneous illegal streams for big events that draw tens of thousands of pirate viewers.

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Playtonic, the creators of Yooka-Laylee, is laying off some of its staff, the developer and publisher announced on social media. The post doesn’t mention how many members of Playtonic will be effected, but does credit the layoffs to the company’s struggle with “a period of profound change in how games are created and funded.”

Based on a LinkedIn post shared by Playtonic brand manager Anni Valkama, the layoffs include staff members who worked in production, various art departments, game design, narrative design and UI/UX design. Playtonic only lists around 50 staff members on LinkedIn, but given the studios growth into a publisher and its upcoming release of Yooka-Replaylee, its possible the actual team is a bit larger.

While Playtonic likely isn’t safe from the problems of funding and selling games that other developers have, hiring up for a new project like Yooka-Replaylee and then laying those new hires off before the game is released is a fairly common practice. There’s no way to know if that’s the case here without more information, but it’s worth stating.

Yooka-Laylee was pitched as a spiritual sequel to Banjo-Kazooie and other character-focused action-platformers when it debuted on Kickstarter in 2015, perhaps unsurprising given that Playtonic was founded by former developers from Rare, the creators of Banjo-Kazooie and newer hits like Sea of Thieves. In fact, many of the games Playtonic has published under its “Playtonic Friends” publishing label fall in that Rare sweet spot, whether its the cute action-adventure game Lil Gator Game or the difficult platformer Demon Turf.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/yooka-laylee-developer-playtonic-is-laying-off-over-a-dozen-staff-211759308.html?src=rss

Amazon has quietly removed billions of product listings through a confidential initiative called “Bend the Curve,” according to Business Insider. The project planned to eliminate at least 24 billion ASINs — unique product identifiers — from Amazon’s marketplace, reducing the total from a projected 74 billion to under 50 billion by December 2024. The purge targets “unproductive selection” including poor-selling items, listings without actual inventory, and product pages inactive for over two years.

The initiative represents a shift for the company that built its reputation as “The Everything Store” through three decades of relentless catalog expansion. Bend the Curve forms part of CEO Andy Jassy’s broader cost-cutting strategy, saving Amazon’s retail division over $22 million in AWS server costs during 2024 by reducing the number of hosted product pages.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention on Thursday updated its immunization schedules for children and adults to partially reflect the abrupt changes announced by health secretary and anti-vaccine advocate Robert F. Kennedy Jr. earlier this week.

In a 58-second video posted on social media on Tuesday, May 27, Kennedy said he was unilaterally revoking the CDC’s recommendations that healthy children and pregnant people get COVID-19 vaccines.

“I couldn’t be more pleased to announce that, as of today, the COVID vaccine for healthy children and healthy pregnant women has been removed from the CDC recommended immunization schedule,” Kennedy said in the video.

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United Airlines CEO Scott Kirby has harsh words for budget carriers, calling their business model “dead.”

“It’s dead. Look, it’s a crappy model. Sorry,” he said when asked about the budget airline approach. Kirby argued that budget carriers like Southwest, Spirit, and Frontier built their operations around what he characterized as customer-hostile practices, saying “The model was, screw the customer … Trick people, get them to buy, get them to come, and then charge them a whole bunch of fees that they aren’t expecting.”

He said he believes that these airlines struggle to retain customers once they reach sufficient scale to require repeat business.

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Losing your luggage might not be the end of the world, but it’s definitely the worst part of a trip. That’s where something like the SmartLock comes in, and a four-pack of these TSA-approved travel locks is going for $79.99 on StackSocial right now, which is the same price Amazon charges for a three-pack. It’s designed for Apple users, integrating directly with the Find My app, so you can track your bags on a map, ping them with sound if they’re nearby, or get alerts if you’ve walked off and left them behind.

Each lock uses a simple three-digit combination and is TSA-approved, meaning airport security can access it without cutting it open. The build feels solid, with a durable alloy shell and thick cable loop tough enough for typical travel abuse. It’s also refreshingly low-maintenance, with no constant charging needed. The built-in battery lasts about three months and is replaceable, so you’re not tossing the whole thing when it dies. You don’t need to install a separate app to manage the tracking either, if you’ve used Apple’s Find My for AirTags or devices, the setup will feel familiar and straightforward. You also get solid tracking features like Lost Mode and sound alerts.

That said, this is Apple-only. If you use Android, the Find My functionality won’t work, so you’re better off with a traditional smart tracker or lock. If you’re traveling with multiple bags or coordinating group travel, getting four in one pack makes the price easier to swallow. For frequent flyers or anyone with a track record of forgetting their carry-on at Gate 17, this is one of those travel add-ons that might actually be worth it.

Twenty-eight-year-old Nathan Laatsch was, until yesterday, a cybersecurity employee at the Defense Intelligence Agency (DIA). He had a Top Secret clearance and worked in the Insider Threat Division. Laatsch spent his days—you’ll understand the past tense in a moment—”enabling user monitoring on individuals with access to DIA systems,” including employees under surreptitious internal investigation.

Given that Laatsch was one of those who “watched the watchers,” he appears to have had supreme confidence in his own ability to avoid detection should he decide to go rogue. “Stupid mistakes” made by other idiots would “not be difficult for me to avoid,” he once wrote. DIA couldn’t even launch an investigation of Laatsch without him knowing that something was up.

The Greeks had a word for this: hubris.

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After two years of negotiating, ZeniMax Workers United-CWA, the union representing quality assurance workers at ZeniMax Media, has reached a tentative union contract with Microsoft, according to the Communication Workers of America. The union originally formed in 2023 and was immediately recognized by Microsoft, which made its commitment to stay neutral towards union organizing at ZeniMax official in 2024.

The new contract will cover over 300 ZeniMax employees and includes “substantial across-the-board wage increases as well as new minimum salaries for workers,” the CWA says. The contract also includes language protecting workers from the impacts of AI and “a crediting policy that clearly acknowledges the QA workers’ contributions to the video games they help create.”

“Video games have been the revenue titan of the entire entertainment industry for years, and the workers who develop these games are too often exploited for their passion and creativity,” Jessee Leese, a QA tester and ZeniMax Workers United-CWA bargaining committee member shared in the CWA announcement. “Our first contract is an invitation for video game professionals everywhere to take action. We’re the ones who make these games, and we’ll be the ones to set new standards for fair treatment.”

The new contract is considered “tentative” until union members ratify it, but because existing contracts often act as a reference in ongoing negotiations, the agreements ZeniMax workers secured will likely serve as a standard for other unions going forward. ZeniMax QA testers aren’t the only video game union at Microsoft — QA workers at Raven Software, QA workers at Activision, workers at ZeniMax Online Studios and the development team behind Overwatch are all still in active negotiations with the company.

Outside of Microsoft, the CWA also announced the United Game Workers-CWA union at this year’s GDC, as a another option for representation. United Game Workers-CWA is a direct-join union, a labor organization that all workers in an industry can participate in without needing legal recognition from an employer. The idea is that currently employed workers, anyone who’s been laid off and freelancers can all still wield power together, even without a potential contract hanging in the balance.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/zenimax-qa-workers-win-tentative-union-contract-with-microsoft-194204789.html?src=rss

It’s almost that time of year again. Summer Game Fest starts on June 6. The annual kickoff stream begins at 5PM ET on that date. Yeah, we know. The time isn’t ideal for folks with regular jobs, but we’ll be in Los Angeles to cover the event in person, so you can just hit up the site for updates.

The best way to watch this is likely via the YouTube stream. After all, the event is being hosted at the YouTube Theater. There will also be a Twitch stream for the YouTube-averse.

The organizers, including host Geoff Keighley, are promising “spectacular new video game announcements, surprises and reveals.” I like all three of those things. We don’t know that much about what games will be discussed during the two-hour event, but we aren’t going in totally blind.

The stream will feature a new look at Wuchang: Fallen Feathers, which is a nifty-looking Soulslike action RPG. The open-world MMORPG Chrono Odyssey (no relation to Chrono Trigger) is also making an appearance.

There’s also the Kojima of it all. This event is taking place just a couple of weeks before we get our hands on the long-anticipated Death Stranding 2: On the Beach. The legendary game creator will be on-hand to discuss the title during a dedicated event on June 8, but maybe he’ll pop up at the kickoff to give viewers a peek at whatever else he’s been working on.

However, the kickoff stream is just the beginning. The weekend is host to the Day of the Devs showcase, the Devolver Direct, Wholesome Direct and really so much more.

This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/gaming/how-to-watch-summer-game-fests-kickoff-stream-193047735.html?src=rss

WordPress.com parent company Automattic is changing direction… again. From a report: In a blog post titled “Returning to Core” published Thursday evening, Automattic announced it will unpause its contributions to the WordPress project. This is despite having said only last month that the 6.8 WordPress release would be the final major release for all of 2025.

“After pausing our contributions to regroup, rethink, and plan strategically, we’re ready to press play again and return fully to the WordPress project,” the new blog post states. “Expect to find our contributions across all of the greatest hits — WordPress Core, Gutenberg, Playground, Openverse, and WordPress.org. This return is a moment of excitement for us as it’s about continuing the mission we’ve always believed in: democratizing publishing for everyone, everywhere,” it reads.

Automattic says it’s learned a lot from the pause in terms of the many ways WordPress is used, and that it’s now committed to helping it “grow and thrive.” The post also notes that WordPress today powers 43% of the web.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.