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SN 1052: Global Cellphone Tracking - Checkout.com Fights Back
Think your cell phone is safe from tracking? Steve reveals how global networks let anyone pinpoint your location—no hacking required and no malware involved.
- Apple introduces a new Digital ID inside Wallet.
- Checkout.com refuses to pay a ransom demand.
- Google announces "Private AI Compute" in the cloud.
- Google backpedals on their "devs must register" demand.
- Win11 added a Passkeys API which 1Password & Bitwarden support.
- Russia tracks SIM card appearances to thwart drone usage.
- Google sues Chinese Phishing as a Service platform.
- Lots of interesting listener feedback.
- Global cellphone tracking is alive, well, malware free and a distressingly common commercial enterprise
Show Notes - https://www.grc.com/sn/SN-1052-Notes.pdf
Hosts: Steve Gibson and Leo Laporte
Download or subscribe to Security Now at https://twit.tv/shows/security-now.
You can submit a question to Security Now at the GRC Feedback Page.
For 16kbps versions, transcripts, and notes (including fixes), visit Steve's site: grc.com, also the home of the best disk maintenance and recovery utility ever written Spinrite 6.
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TWiT 1058: Furry Little Potatoes - Smart Glasses & Everyday "Surveillance"
Meta's Ray-Ban Display glasses steal the spotlight on a Rome trip, triggering debates about privacy, wearable tech etiquette, and the uncomfortable power of recording the world through your eyewear. Plus, gadgets scanning your urine, bots shaping your inbox, and the future of Disney+!
- Counting Renaissance butts in Rome with the Meta Ray-Ban Display
- Jury says Apple owes Masimo $634M for patent infringement
- Google ordered to pay $665 million for anticompetitive practices in Germany
- Disney and YouTube TV reach deal to end blackout
- The future of Disney Plus could involve AI-generated videos
- X is finally rolling out Chat, its DM replacement with encryption and video calling
- Tim Cook could step down as Apple CEO 'as soon as next year'
- iPhone Pocket revealed in hands-on videos of new Apple accessory
- AMD continues to chip away at Intel's X86 market share — company now sells over 25% of all x86 chips and powers 33% of all desktop systems
- Google DeepMind is using Gemini to train agents inside Goat Simulator 3
- George Lucas' narrative art museum opens next year in LA
- Spotify's new audiobook recap feature uses AI to remind you of the story so far
- PNG is back!
- 3 SeatGuru alternatives for finding the best airline seats
- What Are We Going to Do With 300 Billion Pennies?
- Withings Beamo
Host: Leo Laporte
Guests: Victoria Song and Christina Warren
Download or subscribe to This Week in Tech at https://twit.tv/shows/this-week-in-tech
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SN 1051: Amazon sues Perplexity - Nevada's Ransomware Comeback
Amazon is taking Perplexity AI to court over its agentic browser that shops on your behalf, raising urgent questions about who controls your online buying experience when bots do the heavy lifting.
- FFmpeg teaching assembly language for performance.
- The state of Nevada recovers after not paying ransom.
- A "rounding error" nets a clever attacker $128 million.
- Why would Chrome decide to start form-filling driver's licenses.
- The UK's six major telecom providers to block number spoofing.
- XSLT support being removed from browsers. Will anyone notice.
- Firefox introduced paid support options for organizations.
- Russia continues to fight against non-Russian Internet.
- Google acquires another Internet security company (Wiz).
- The EU to finally fix their cookie permission mistake.
- More countries drop Microsoft office for open choices.
- More countries question and examine Chinese made buses.
- Microsoft discovers some information leakage from LLMs.
- What does Amazon's lawsuit against Perplexity's agents mean for next-generation browsers
Show Notes - https://www.grc.com/sn/SN-1051-Notes.pdf
Hosts: Steve Gibson and Leo Laporte
Download or subscribe to Security Now at https://twit.tv/shows/security-now.
You can submit a question to Security Now at the GRC Feedback Page.
For 16kbps versions, transcripts, and notes (including fixes), visit Steve's site: grc.com, also the home of the best disk maintenance and recovery utility ever written Spinrite 6.
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TWiT 1057: Ferret Trousering - Can Apple TV Fix the Broken World of Streaming Sports?
Elon Musk's eye-popping trillion-dollar pay package, Apple's big F1 gamble, and Meta's scam-friendly ad policies set the stage for a candid debate on Big Tech's priorities and who really pays the price for innovation (and neglect).
- Musk gets approval for bumper Tesla payout but, unlike his robot, there are strings attached - Behold the one trillion dollar man
- SpaceX to Buy Another $2.6 Billion of Echostar Spectrum
- Chinese Astronauts Stuck in Space After Suspected Damage to Return Craft
- YouTube's Goes Bonkers, Removes Windows 11 Bypass Tutorials, Claims 'Risk of Physical Harm'
- Scammy Ads Generated an Estimated 10% of Meta's Revenue in 2024
- Texas Sues Roblox For Allegedly Failing To Protect Children On Its Platform
- YouTube TV responds to Disney memo with no deal in sight
- YouTube TV exec calls Disney 'unnecessarily aggressive'
- Sports streaming is a fragmented hot mess
- Denmark's Government Aims To Ban Access To Social Media For Children Under 15
- The Department Of Defense Wants Less Proof Its Software Works
- China suspends export restrictions for a year on five critical minerals to the US, including gallium and germanium, used to make certain types of semiconductors
- Immigration agents have new technology to identify and track people
- Internet Archive's legal fights are over, but its founder mourns what was lost
- FBI subpoenas the web registrar behind Archive.is
- Trump AI Czar Says 'No Federal Bailout For AI' After OpenAI CFO's Comments
- Fedora man unmasked: Meet the teen behind the Louvre mystery photo
- Take-Two delays 'GTA VI' for second time to November next year
- Apple TV's new Pluribus show might be its best sci-fi series yet
- After more than 200 years, the 'Farmers' Almanac' is shutting down for good
Host: Leo Laporte
Guests: Iain Thomson, Ashley Esqueda, and Janko Roettgers
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SN 1050: Here Come the AI Browsers - Scareware Blockers
AI-powered web browsers are hitting the scene fast, but Steve and Leo unpack why these smart assistants could usher in an era of security chaos most users aren't ready for. Brace yourself for the wild risks, real-world scams, and the privacy questions no one else is asking.
- Secret radios discovered in Chinese-made busses.
- Edge & Chrome introduce LLM-based "scareware" blocking.
- A perfect example of what scareware blocking hopes to prevent.
- Aardvark: OpenAI's new vulnerability scanner for code.
- Italy to require age verification from 48 specific sites.
- Russia to require the use of only Russian software within Russia.
- Russia further clamping down on non-MAX Telegram and WhatsApp messaging.
- 187 new malicious NPM packages. Could AI help with that?
- BadCandy malware has infiltrated Australian Cisco routers.
- Github's 2025 report with the dominance of TypeScript.
- Windows 11 gets new extra-secure Admin Protection feature.
- A bunch of interesting feedback and listener thoughts.
- And why the new AI-driven web browsers may be bringing a whole new world of hurt
Show Notes - https://www.grc.com/sn/SN-1050-Notes.pdf
Hosts: Steve Gibson and Leo Laporte
Download or subscribe to Security Now at https://twit.tv/shows/security-now.
You can submit a question to Security Now at the GRC Feedback Page.
For 16kbps versions, transcripts, and notes (including fixes), visit Steve's site: grc.com, also the home of the best disk maintenance and recovery utility ever written Spinrite 6.
Join Club TWiT for Ad-Free Podcasts!
Support what you love and get ad-free shows, a members-only Discord, and behind-the-scenes access. Join today: https://twit.tv/clubtwit
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TWiT 1056: The Big Sleep - The Great Router Ban
From AI-powered code generation boosting productivity to adversaries using the same tools to hunt zero-days, the panel exposes the coming wave of AI-fueled cyberattacks—and why most companies aren't ready for it.
- Cotton blocks Trump-backed effort to make daylight saving time permanent
- The End of Cybersecurity
- Amazon says it didn't cut 14,000 people because of money. It cut them because of 'culture'
- Here's How the AI Crash Happens
- US government is getting closer to banning TP-Link routers
- Neato cloud shutdown sees robocleaners robbed of their smarts
- FCC will vote to scrap telecom cybersecurity requirements
- Trump FCC Votes To Make It Easier For Your Broadband ISP To Rip You Off
- Swedish Death Cleaning But for Your Ditital Life
- The F5 Hack is a Big Deal
- OpenAI Releases Agentic Security Researcher
- 'Do not trust your eyes': AI generates surge in expense fraud
- Proton Data Breach Observatory aims to alert you in near real-time
- Using a Security Key on X? Re-Enroll Now or Your Account Will Be Locked
- YouTube denies AI was involved with odd removals of tech tutorials
- 10M people watched a YouTuber shim a lock; the lock company sued him. Bad idea.
- Samsung's $2000 smart fridges are getting ads - gHacks Tech News
- ESPN, ABC, and other Disney channels go dark on YouTube TV
Host: Leo Laporte
Guests: Jill Duffy, Alex Stamos, and Stacey Higginbotham
Download or subscribe to This Week in Tech at https://twit.tv/shows/this-week-in-tech
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SN 1049: DNS Cache Poisoning Returns - Ransomware Payments Plummet
Just when you thought DNS cache poisoning was a thing of the past, Steve and Leo reveal why this 17-year-old bug is making a dramatic comeback—and why most DNS resolvers still can't manage high-quality random numbers after all this time.
- The unsuspected sucking power of a Linux-based robot vacuum.
- Russia to follow China's vulnerability reporting laws.
- A pair of Scattered Spider UK teen hackers arrested.
- Facebook,Instagram and TikTok violating the EU's DSA.
- Microsoft Teams bringing user WiFi tracking bypolicy.
- You backed up. That's great. Did you test that backup?
- Coveware reports all-time lowransomware payment rate.
- Ransomware negotiator reports how the bad guys get in.
- Lots of listener thoughts and feedback about NIST passwords.
- And against all reason and begging credulity, it seems we still haven't managed to put high-quality random number generators into our DNS resolvers.
Show Notes - https://www.grc.com/sn/SN-1049-Notes.pdf
Hosts: Steve Gibson and Leo Laporte
Download or subscribe to Security Now at https://twit.tv/shows/security-now.
You can submit a question to Security Now at the GRC Feedback Page.
For 16kbps versions, transcripts, and notes (including fixes), visit Steve's site: grc.com, also the home of the best disk maintenance and recovery utility ever written Spinrite 6.
Join Club TWiT for Ad-Free Podcasts!
Support what you love and get ad-free shows, a members-only Discord, and behind-the-scenes access. Join today: https://twit.tv/clubtwit
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TWiT 1055: The Garden of Thorns - AWS Outage Exposes Our Cloud Dependency
When a major Amazon cloud outage brings everything from smart mattresses to Snapchat grinding to a halt, what does it reveal about our digital fragility—and are we trusting the cloud a little too much?
- A Single Point of Failure Triggered the Amazon Outage Affecting Million
- Pluralistic: The mad king's digital killswitch (20 Oct 2025)
- Trump and Xi will 'consummate' TikTok deal on Thursday, treasury secretary says
- 3,000 YouTube Videos Exposed as Malware Traps in Massive Ghost Network Operation
- Can YouTube Replace 'Traditional' TV?
- All the implications of F1's game-changing TV move
- Foreign hackers breached a US nuclear weapons plant via SharePoint flaws
- Browser Promising Privacy Protection Contains Malware-Like Features, Routes Traffic Through China
- iCloud data helps crack NBA and mob poker scheme
- Rubbish IT systems cost the US at least $40bn during Covid: study
- Counter-Strike cosmetics economy loses nearly $2 billion in value overnight
- GM to introduce eyes-off, hands-off driving system in 2028
- WordPress co-founder files countersuit against WP Engine over trademark violations
- a16z-Backed Startup Sells Thousands of 'Synthetic Influencers' to Manipulate Social Media as a Service
- Bill Gates-Backed 345 MWe Advanced Nuclear Reactor Secures Crucial US Approval
- Programmer Gets Doom Running On a Space Satellite
Host: Leo Laporte
Guests: Richard Campbell and Doc Rock
Download or subscribe to This Week in Tech at https://twit.tv/shows/this-week-in-tech
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