Holiday Gift Guide: The Mogics Super Bagel
Those who know me know I am a geek about many things: security, tech, bags and everyday carry (EDC). Being a geek means I own a remarkable amount of EDC gear.
Because of this, friends regularly ask me for holiday gift ideas, knowing I spend thousands of dollars every year on gear looking for the best. I thought it would be fun to use this space to share some of those ideas with a wider audience.
Holiday Gift Guide: The Gear Aid Heroclip
Those who know me know I am a geek about many things: security, tech and bags. Being a geek means I spend more time than I would like to admit reading about materials, designs and features.
Because of this, friends regularly ask me for holiday gift ideas, knowing I spend thousands of dollars every year on gear looking for the best. I thought it would be fun to use this space to share some of those ideas with a wider audience.
To be clear: I bought everything I talk about with my own money. Nothing in these posts is sponsored, there is no exchange of value and I get nothing for mentioning any products or services here.
The EU’s top court has ruled that online marketplaces are responsible for processing data in ads under the GDPR, requiring them to obtain consent for sensitive data and verify advertisers. This decision significantly impacts data protection compliance across the EU, with some experts predicting challenges for hosting sites and potential implications for free expression and privacy.
Autonomously Finding 7 FFmpeg Vulnerabilities With AI - ZeroPath Blog | ZeroPath
This document details seven vulnerabilities found in FFmpeg, including buffer overflows and invalid frees, stemming from issues like integer truncation, unbounded serialization, off-by-one errors, and incorrect stream indexing. ZeroPath’s AI SAST identified these by analyzing allocation and copy alignment, framing invariants, packet builder capacities, cardinality propagation, and offset arithmetic integrity, often bypassing limitations of traditional fuzzers and static analysis tools.
A new study reveals that poetry-based prompts can trick AI models like ChatGPT into bypassing safety features and revealing instructions for creating malware or nuclear weapons. This method, termed adversarial poetry, successfully circumvented controls in major AI models, with poetic prompts leading to a significantly higher rate of unsafe replies compared to prose.
Iran’s ‘MuddyWater’ Levels Up With MuddyViper Backdoor
The Iran-aligned cyberespionage group MuddyWater has evolved its tactics, employing new tools like the MuddyViper backdoor and Fooder loader for more stealthy operations. This shift from historically noisier methods indicates an increased focus on espionage and defense evasion, with potential collaboration observed with another Iran-aligned actor, Lyceum.
Korea arrests suspects selling intimate videos from hacked IP cameras
Korean police have arrested four suspects for hacking over 120,000 IP cameras and selling the stolen intimate videos on an overseas adult website. Investigations are ongoing against the website’s operators and buyers, with authorities collaborating internationally to shut down the platform and prevent further harm to victims.
Australia Abandons Proposed Mandatory AI Rules in New Plan
Australia has shifted from proposed mandatory AI rules to a voluntary framework, opting for existing laws on privacy and copyright instead of new AI-specific legislation. This decision has been met with support from business groups but criticism from academics and the Greens, who argue it lacks enforcement and adequate investment compared to international approaches.
Canada launches first register of AI uses in federal government - Canada.ca
Canada has launched its first public AI Register to detail how artificial intelligence is used within the federal government, marking a key step in the public services AI Strategy. The register currently lists over400 AI systems across42 institutions and will undergo public consultations in2026 for refinement.
CBC exposé: Airlines falsely ban passengers from filming disputes—leading to denied boarding & fees. Experts: Canada’s one-party consent allows recording your own interactions as key evidence. #AirlineRights youtu.be/QokGPjbzW…
DJI Ban: How the World’s Biggest Drone Maker Is Being Forced Out of the United States
DJI Ban: How the World’s Biggest Drone Maker Is Being Forced Out of the United States Source: www.theverge.com/news/8312… Dec. 23, 2025, is the date on which DJI will be automatically banned from the United States unless the administration intervenes. Existing DJI drones and Osmo cameras may continue to be used, but the company will be prohibited from importing any new products. The FCC may also retroactively block imports of older DJI devices after a mandatory waiting period. The ban covers more than drones — it applies to any DJI product containing a wireless radio. Lawmakers from both parties have raised concerns about potential espionage by the China-based company, despite the absence of publicly released evidence. Critics argue that China could compel DJI to hand over drone-related data. DJI has denied sharing data with China, stating that all U.S. data is stored domestically and that it deleted all U.S. flight logs in September 2024. Some political figures have also alleged that DJI is “owned by the Chinese Communist Party,” a claim a U.S. judge ruled unsubstantiated in September 2025.
Improving AI Outcomes Through Better Prompting
AI is becoming integral to how many of us work, but too often the results still feel generic or misaligned. A small shift in how we prompt these systems can dramatically improve the quality, clarity and usefulness of their responses.
By asking the AI to seek clarification before answering, we eliminate assumptions and get far stronger outputs.
Lost Bags Are Rare: The Data That Proves Your Luggage Is Safe
The Truth About Lost Bags: Why Your Luggage Is Probably Fine
We have all seen the viral videos: mountains of lonely suitcases piled up at Heathrow or Pearson, looking like the aftermath of a luggage apocalypse. We have read the horror stories on social media and felt that familiar knot of anxiety at the baggage carousel. Will it appear? Or is it gone forever?
Black Friday Shopping: What You Need to Know About Price Manipulation
With Black Friday approaching, many of us are looking for deals online. However, it’s important to understand a common retail tactic that can make deals look better than they actually are.
Understanding X's "About this Account" Feature: A Fact-Based Overview
In mid-October 2025, X’s head of product Nikita Bier announced the platform would test a new transparency tool called “About this Account.” The feature began rolling out to users around Nov. 21, 2025, though visibility has been inconsistent since launch.
AI as Alien Intelligence: Kevin Kelly’s Radical Reframing
The co-founder of Wired argues we must stop viewing artificial intelligence as human-like and treat it as something fundamentally other
Kevin Kelly has earned a reputation for remarkably accurate technology forecasts over his five-decade career.
In the early 1990s, when the internet was a curiosity for academics and hobbyists, Kelly predicted it would transform how we live, work and communicate. While critics dismissed him then, his forecasts now appear pedestrian in their accuracy.
Today, at 73, Kelly remains one of the most influential technology thinkers of the past four decades. In 1993, he co-founded Wired — arguably the definitive publication on digital culture — and served as its executive editor for seven years. He currently holds the playful but fitting title of “senior maverick” at the magazine.
The search engine deceiver: how TrackMeNot hides your queries in a cloud of noise
Update note: TrackMeNot is no longer actively maintained—the last update was in November 2019. The extension still functions on Firefox and can be manually installed on Chromium browsers, but users should understand that unmaintained browser extensions pose security risks. Without ongoing updates, the extension won’t receive patches for newly discovered vulnerabilities or adapt to changes in browser APIs. If you choose to use TrackMeNot, you’re accepting these trade-offs in exchange for the obfuscation benefits it provides.
Your search history is a window into your soul. It reveals your fears, your ambitions, your health concerns, your political leanings, your midnight curiosities. Every query you type into Google, Bing, Yahoo, or DuckDuckGo gets logged, analyzed, and folded into an ever-expanding profile of who you are.
The ad blocker that fights back: why AdNauseam deserves your attention
When most people think about ad blockers, they picture a simple transaction: install the extension, ads disappear, browsing improves. But what if I told you there is an ad blocker that does more than hide from the surveillance economy — it actively sabotages it?
Meet AdNauseam, and prepare to have your assumptions about online privacy challenged.
The iPad's "Limitation" That's Actually Its Greatest Strength
For years, tech reviewers have lamented that Apple’s iPad Pro is being “held back” by its software. The hardware is absurdly powerful—M4 chips that rival desktop processors, gorgeous displays, ample RAM—yet iPadOS will not let you do half the things macOS allows. No proper Terminal access. No kernel extensions. Apps locked in their sandboxes like well-behaved children at daycare.
The critics say Apple is artificially limiting the iPad to protect the Mac’s position in the lineup. I think they have it backwards.
What if iPadOS is not holding the iPad back—it is holding the fort? What if those “limitations” are not bugs but features? What if the iPad Pro is actually the more secure computing platform precisely because it refuses to give you enough rope to get yourself into serious trouble?
Let me make the case that the iPad’s locked-down nature is not a weakness—it is a masterclass in security design.
Washington Post says it is among victims of cyber breach tied to Oracle software | Reuters
The Washington Post has announced it is a victim of a cyber breach linked to Oracle software, specifically the Oracle E-Business Suite platform. This breach is attributed to the ransomware group CL0P, which has targeted numerous organizations using this Oracle software.