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Alec is a technologist, writer & security consultant who has worked in host and network security for more than 30 years, with 25 of those in industry.
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‘I’ve lost my friends’: advocacy groups warn Australia’s social media ban risks isolating kids with disabilities | Social media ban | The Guardian

2026-02-07 16:46:30

“it’s okay, she should be outside playing sports” — no?

“I have autism and mental health things, it’s hard making friends in real life for me,” she says. “My online friends were easier because I can communicate in my own time and think about what I want to say. My social media was my main way of socialising and without it I feel like I’ve lost my friends.”

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2026/feb/06/ive-lost-my-friends-advocacy-groups-warn-australias-social-media-ban-risks-isolating-kids-with-disabilities

European Commission mandates Facebook (etc) must not take down right-wing hate content for 24h if posted on self-declared “editorially independent” websites

2026-02-06 22:11:45

“what could possibly go wrong”?

Presumably part of the point of this is also to get media outlets to sign up for regulatory oversight.

Commission issues guidelines to protect media content on online platforms | Shaping Europe’s digital future

https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/news/commission-issues-guidelines-protect-media-content-online-platforms


Article 18 (1) of the European Media Freedom Act introduces concrete safeguards to protect media content online produced according to professional standards from unjustified removal. These safeguards require VLOPs to notify media providers in advance when they intend to remove journalistic content and clearly explain the reasons for their decision. Media providers are also given 24 hours to respond before the removal takes effect. To benefit from these safeguards, media service providers need to declare that they fulfil certain elements, such as being editorially independent and subject to regulatory oversight, through a functionality put in place by VLOPs.

It’s almost hard to work out which country this is meant to be about…

2026-02-05 16:48:44

If foreign intelligence controlled events, the mass killings across hundreds of cities would be impossible to explain. If such networks were real, a security state that tracks teachers and workers with such meticulous attention to detail would have arrested at least one of these supposed agents in advance. The story collapses under the slightest pressure, but it survives because it is useful. Once protesters are renamed “foreign agents,” their deaths stop raising questions. Violence becomes logical. Memory becomes dangerous.

https://www.valigiablu.it/iran-protest-2026-what-happens/

Spotlighting The World Factbook as We Bid a Fond Farewell | CIA

2026-02-05 05:07:51

Sad to lose one concrete positive:

One of CIA’s oldest and most recognizable intelligence publications, The World Factbook, has sunset. The World Factbook served the Intelligence Community and the general public as a longstanding, one-stop basic reference about countries and communities around the globe. Let’s take a quick look into the history of The World Factbook. 

https://www.cia.gov/stories/story/spotlighting-the-world-factbook-as-we-bid-a-fond-farewell/

Prediction: if it hasn’t happened already there will soon be a massive media story about “Quoted Printable” encoding, possibly including somebody getting shot because of it

2026-02-04 21:23:35

There is just so much confusion and outrage as people who have never done computer forensics are suddenly faced with millions of corrupted PDF renditions of 7-bit text attempting to carry 8-bit & Unicode characters