Technology

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg appears so determined to win the AI race that he is willing to sacrifice some employee privacy to make it happen.

In a leaked audio recording published by the worker advocacy group More Perfect Union, Zuckerberg purportedly answered an employee's question about "device monitoring" with a six-minute monologue in which he said Meta employees are very smart and to win the most competitive technology race in history, he would need to collect their keystrokes, mouse clicks, and screenshots to make its own AI measure up to its rivals.

“We are using this to feed a very large amount of content into the AI model, so that way it can learn how smart people use computers to accomplish tasks. I think that this is going to be a very big advantage if we can do it,” Zuckerberg purportedly said during an April 30 meeting in which an employee asked about the "top of mind" issue.

Addiction rarely begins with harm. It begins with relief.

What Tim described didn’t sound like intoxication. It sounded quieter: people gradually relying on AI to reduce the discomfort of thinking.

Addiction medicine offers a useful framework. Many people use substances without developing addiction. The difference often lies in patterns of use and the role the substance plays in someone’s life. When something becomes the primary way a person manages discomfort — emotional or cognitive — risk increases.

The discomfort it relieves is subtle: the blank page, the uncertain decision, the difficult conversation, the effort of organizing thought. These moments are frustrating. They are also how competence develops.

When people hear the word “addiction,” they often assume it implies catastrophe — intoxication, loss of control, destruction. But addiction medicine describes a process long before those outcomes appear: the gradual shift from optional use to psychological reliance.

Framing AI that way makes people uncomfortable for a simple reason.

It suggests that something extraordinarily useful — something many of us already depend on — could quietly reshape how we think. And history shows that when a powerful tool offers relief from discomfort, questioning it often sounds like criticism of the people who use it.

The most transformative technologies are rarely dangerous because they are obviously harmful. They are powerful because they work so well that we stop noticing what they are replacing.

Law enforcement intercepted VPN traffic, seized domains, and arrested its operator.

Europol announced yesterday the results of the operation against the service, First VPN. The First VPN website now displays a message saying the domain was seized by a joint international law enforcement action.

“A VPN service used by cybercriminals to conceal ransomware attacks, data theft, and other serious offenses has been dismantled in an international operation led by France and the Netherlands, with support from Europol and Eurojust,” the agency said. “For years, the service, known as ‘First VPN,’ was promoted on Russian-speaking cybercrime forums as a trusted tool for remaining beyond the reach of law enforcement. It offered users anonymous payments, hidden infrastructure, and services designed specifically for criminal use.”

cross-posted from: https://piefed.world/c/tech/p/1144434/independent-review-confirms-critical-telegram-vulnerability-leaking-persistent-identifie

SpaceX conducted another successful Starship launch test yesterday evening.

You can watch the full, 1:40:00 footage here:

Invidious YouTube

I'd recommend watching it, it's a well-done video documentary, not too long, with good views.

cross-posted from: https://piefed.world/c/tech/p/1143624/americans-overwhelmingly-oppose-data-centers-women-most-of-all