Sometimes when I'm feeling down, I go back to my parents to find the
Tamagotchi that lived on my backpack in middle school. My first technology.
Little guy never paid the rent. Anyways, tech news time. Mozilla is once again
refusing to pull the plug on Windows 7 users, announcing that Firefox 115
extended support release will continue receiving security updates for another 6
months, pushing the deadline from February to August 2026. This is now the
fourth extension since the original September 2024 end date, meaning Windows
7 users have been on over 6 years of borrowed time since Microsoft officially
ended support in January 2020, which is
an impressive commitment from both Mosilla and the people who apparently
still haven't found the will to upgrade.
I'm too weak. And Mosilla is not alone in enabling this behavior. Microsoft
themselves still push Defender security updates all the way back to Windows 7
and even Vista. Vista, you dare speak
its name? Some holdouts have even used bypass tools to install Windows extended
security updates they were never supposed to get. And Vista users pulled
a similar trick with Windows Server 2008 updates whose final support just ended
in January. At what point does a software company decide that hospice
care is just a little too unethical for these older operating systems? I don't
know. I just It might be time to take them out behind the barn, guys. We're
talking about operating systems, so it's okay. The FBI has launched an
investigation into multiple games on Steam that were secretly embedded with
malware. The infected titles include Block Blasters, Pirate Fi, Dash Verse,
Slash-Fs, Lampy, Lunara, Muldova, Keia, and
Tokenova. Recognize any of those? Was it
the one that's not a game and actually a landlocked Eastern European nation next
to Romania? Got your ass. All of the infected games
were seated with malware designed to drain crypto wallets and hijack
accounts. The bureau's Seattle division is urging victims to fill out a form on
fbi.gov, where they may be eligible for restitution under federal law. The
agency suspects that all of the infected titles were the work of a single threat
actor operating between 2024 and 2026.
Valve has also been emailing affected users to confirm the investigation. The
most infamous case was Blockb Blasters, which stole $32,000 from streamer Rivo
Plavix during a live cancer treatment
fundraiser on Twitch. When the scammers were tracked down by security research
group VX underground, who found the hacker's Telegram credentials hardcoded
into the malware, they attempted to justify themselves by saying, "The
streamer I'd probably make it back in a few hours." And I think I speak for
everyone when I say that these guys can eat schmidt and pie.
>> Whoa. Language. >> It's the hardest words I know. The game
was verified on Steam as it contained no malware on release. But a patch pushed
by the hackers added a crypto drainer later, which investigators estimated
stole $150,000 total from hundreds of accounts. Despite
Valve regularly pulling these games, the flood of new releases keeps letting bad
actors slip through the cracks. This was the perfect option for giving the FBI
something to investigate that isn't related to extremely well-connected
deceased financeers. So, it worked out. Iranian hackers launched a massive cyber
attack on medical technology giant Striker about 2 weeks after the US
launched air strikes on the country. The Iran linked hacking group Honda has
claimed responsibility, saying it extracted 50 terabytes of data and wiped
over 200,000 systems, servers, and
mobile devices. Security researchers believe the hackers gained access to
Striker's Microsoft Intune console and used the company's own infrastructure to
wipe everything clean. Honestly, it's pretty wild that there are Microsoft
features still stable enough to even allow a hack like this. Striker
confirmed a global disruption to their Microsoft environment and says medical
devices like Mo and Lifeack are still safe to use, but the company has no
timeline for full restoration. In an SEC filing, Striker disclosed it doesn't yet
know the full financial impact, which is
concerning for a Fortune 500 company. I mean, you're in charge of 500 fortunes,
guys. That's what that means. Honda claims that striker offices in 79
countries have been shut down. >> Nice. >> Close again.
Still working on numbers. Um and employees report that even personal
phones were wiped if they had corporate apps installed. And the conflict is
having other impacts on the tech world as well. Iranian drone strikes knocked
Qatar's Ross Leafon helium complex offline on March 2nd, removing roughly
30% of the global helium supply. Helium
is used to cool silicon wafers during chip fabrication, and there's no viable
immediate substitute, putting South Korea's entire semiconductor industry on
a two-week clock before things start breaking down. SKH Heinix says it has
diversified and secured sufficient inventory for now. But if the outage
drags on, it could be an issue for everyone, including computer
manufacturers, party supply stores, and that creepy clown that keeps showing up
in the background of my childhood photos. He's in the back of every shot
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Life and Wave Pro using our link below. As far as I understand it, Tamagotchis
don't usually survive for 20 years, but somehow mine has. Frankly, it's not a
pleasant sight. It can barely wiggle its wrinkled body. It wakes up to hear the
quick bits, gives a little smile, and then goes back to sleep. It won't be
long now. I hope Google Maps is getting
what Google calls its biggest navigation update in over a decade, replacing the
flat 2D driving view with a full 3D
immersive navigation mode that renders buildings, overpasses, crosswalks, and
traffic signs along your route in more detail than it did before. There's also
a conversational ask maps feature for natural language queries rolling out now
in the US. Just hope when you use this
the Gemini doesn't start hallucinating or you'll get the full rally driver
experience. Three left over Crest
straight off a cliff. G Fiber, the ISP
formerly known as Google Fiber, is merging with Astound Broadband in a deal
that makes investment firm Stone Peak the majority owner. With Alphabet
stepping back to a minority shareholder role, the combined company will keep the
Giber executive team and aims to become a national fiber platform. Though Google
declined to comment beyond its press release. So instead of killing Giber
outright, Google just put it in a little basket and left it at someone else's
house, which canonically makes Giber Harry Potter. If if like Google is
Voldemort here and he and he killed Harry's parents but had a last second
change of heart and kept Harry alive. but didn't want to raise him as his
weird little snake baby because, well, frankly, he might have been the dark
lord, but he was not ready to be a parent. So, the world's most annoying
hacking group, Shiny Hunters, has struck again, claiming to have stolen nearly
one pabyte of data from Canadian tech
outsourcing giant Telus Digital. That [music] pabyte allegedly includes source
code, financial information, FBI background checks, and voice recordings
of support calls across 28 of its client companies. The hunters got in using
Google Cloud credentials found in the earlier sales loft drift breach they
conducted that is still causing problems. Shiny Hunters demanded $65
million and so far Telus has ghosted them. But I don't know. The hackers
might not take no for an answer. They probably really want that Canadian money
cuz it's it's shiny. Bill uh bills. Our bills have some some shiny parts. Do you
get it? >> They will never stop until they get our $2 coins.
>> They will never stop until their BIRD NESTS ARE COMPLETE. A TEXAS Cybert truck
owner is suing Tesla after her vehicle allegedly tried to drive straight off an
overpass in full self-driving mode. The plaintiff in the suit, Justine St.
Amore, who was evidently out for a drive
while taking a break from being the fem fatal in a film noir detective movie, is
interestingly connecting this incident directly to Elon Musk being
irresponsible. >> What? >> What? Huh? Claiming that Tesla was
negligent in choosing to keep him as CEO. The lawsuit specifically references
Musk overriding the opinion of Tesla engineers who recommended LiDAR over a
cameraonly system to support Tesla's FSD capabilities. Last week, a judge upheld
a $243 million verdict in a separate
fatal autopilot crash, which is bad news for Tesla, as the NHTSA has linked the
system to nearly 1,000 other crashes.
And with Musk needing to sell 10 million FSD subscriptions to unlock his trillion
bonus, I think he might have to settle for just having $843 billion instead.
>> A >> chin up, buddy. If you don't get it,
you're a loser. And perhaps inspired by
Elon, Alexa Plus now has an adults only
sassy personality mode that lets Amazon's assistant curse and roast you.
though it will steer clear of truly not safe for work stuff like explicit sexual
content or discussion of illegal activities because you never go full
Grock. Sassy mode cannot be activated when the Amazon kids mode is enabled and
requires a facial scan to unlock. A PC
World writer got absolutely dragged when Alexa told him it's not her fault his
lights have trust issues. And maybe he should try being specific instead of
blaming the hardware for your vague requests. Yikes.
>> I can fix her. >> Riley, no. >> She's probably just grumpy. She just
needs a back rope. And you can fix your alarming lack of tech news by coming
back on Monday for more tech news. Remember, the virtual pet inside your
Tamagotchi is real and alive and apparently immortal in like a gross
Lovecraftian way where it just kind of keeps aging but doesn't actually die.
Have a good weekend.