A Minnesota state fusion center report ties the cyberattacks on 30+ Minnesota water utilities to Iranian-affiliated hackers, according to a water utility information sharing group's memo I obtained. www.wired.com/story/a-leak...

A Leaked Memo Ties Cyberattacks on Minnesota Water Utilities to Iran

A memo obtained by WIRED, issued by the water utilities information sharing group WaterISAC, links dozens of cyberattacks against Minnesota water utilities to Tehran.

wired.com

Scam researchers told a Claude agent and human "scammers" to text test subjects and build a relationship. After a week, subjects said they trusted the AI more than the human and almost half were willing to install an app at its request. Almost none detected it was AI. www.wired.com/story/ai-sca...

AI Scammers Are Better at Building Trust Than Humans

Researchers pitted a person against a Claude agent and found that, after a week of texting, the AI chatbot was more effective at creating “exploitable trust” with others.

wired.com

You can also read our full story here: www.wired.com/story/a-devi... Please check your car—particularly if it was ever sold in Southern California, where KARR is most widely used—and if you have the device, patch it now. /end

A Device Hidden in Cars Across the US Leaves Them Vulnerable to Hacking and Paralysis. Patch It Now

Dealerships installed alarms in millions of vehicles—and left them in even if the buyer didn’t want them. Now researchers warn they can be hacked to unlock, track, and disable cars.

wired.com

In our latest episode of WIRED's Hacklab video series, UCSD's researchers talk through their discovery—which they'll present at Defcon next month—how to check if you have KARR in your car, and how to install the security update to fix its flaws if you do. www.youtube.com/watch?v=FwA3...

I Stole a Car By Hacking This Hidden Device

YouTube video by WIRED Investigations

youtube.com

As a result, the device is in over 2 million cars, about half of whose owners told dealers they didn't want it, by UCSD's estimate. They may not have any idea it's inside their vehicle. Yet it's beaconing and can be "activated" instantly by a hacker and hijacked for theft or chaotic effects.

UCSD warned KARR's manufacturer, who has now pushed out a fix. The complication: KARR is typically installed by dealers to prevent theft from their lots. If a buyer doesn't want it as an add-on, the dealer still leaves it wired in under the hood anyway in a "deactivated" state.

Researchers at UCSD found the KARR car alarm has vulnerabilities that let a hacker in Bluetooth range unlock a car, immobilize it, or trigger horns and lights. They can even hack a parking lot full of vehicles—or stealthily steal one—as we demoed in the video below. www.youtube.com/watch?v=FwA3...

I Stole a Car By Hacking This Hidden Device

YouTube video by WIRED Investigations

youtube.com

A car alarm device, KARR, inside millions of cars has a security flaw that lets hackers unlock, track, even paralyze vehicles. There's a patch. The problem? Half of car owners who have the device installed didn't ask for it, and may not even know it's there. Thread👇 www.wired.com/story/a-devi...

A Device Hidden in Cars Across the US Leaves Them Vulnerable to Hacking and Paralysis. Patch It Now

Dealerships installed alarms in millions of vehicles—and left them in even if the buyer didn’t want them. Now researchers warn they can be hacked to unlock, track, and disable cars.

wired.com

A car alarm device, KARR, inside millions of cars has a security flaw that lets hackers unlock, track, even paralyze vehicles. There's a patch. The problem? Half of car owners who have the device installed didn't ask for it, and may not even know it's there. Thread👇 www.wired.com/story/a-devi...

A Device Hidden in Cars Across the US Leaves Them Vulnerable to Hacking and Paralysis. Patch It Now

Dealerships installed alarms in millions of vehicles—and left them in even if the buyer didn’t want them. Now researchers warn they can be hacked to unlock, track, and disable cars.

wired.com

Our two investigations into Madison Square Garden are now unpaywalled and free for anyone to read.

WIRED@wired.com · 3w ago

Yesterday, WIRED learned that Madison Square Garden was suing us for our accurate reporting. We stand by our work. That’s why we’re removing the paywall from two of the MSG stories they don’t want you to read, making them free for everyone.

A statement from WIRED leadership.

i talked to several pollution + health experts about the wildfire smoke blanketing much of the northeast right now, and everyone agreed that even able-bodied adults may want to take some precautions today!!

Smoke From Canada’s Wildfires Turns Skies Sickly Orange Across the Eastern US

Roughly 100 fires are raging out of control in Ontario, sending smoke streaming 1,000 miles to the south and east.

wired.com

good morning to hazardous air and fuck u to our terrible politicians who don’t believe in science

San Francisco police accidentally livestreamed their drones’ video and data on the open web. The hours of footage—including several apparent arrests—should never have been made public, but now offer a glimpse of modern aerial urban surveillance. www.wired.com/story/sfpd-d... w/ @dmehro.bsky.social

A Leak of San Francisco Police Drone Footage Exposes the New Reality of Urban Surveillance

The SFPD’s exposure of hours of videos from drone platform Skydio reveals how broadly it’s watching the city from above—and how the results can spill online.

wired.com

NEW: The SFPD was leaking real-time footage from surveillance drones, including color and thermal imaging, location metadata, and drone pilots’ names and email addresses. "There’s a certain trust given to the police to use these things correctly."

A Leak of San Francisco Police Drone Footage Exposes the New Reality of Urban Surveillance

The SFPD’s exposure of hours of videos from drone platform Skydio reveals how broadly it’s watching the city from above—and how the results can spill online.

wired.com

San Francisco police accidentally livestreamed their drones’ video and data on the open web. The hours of footage—including several apparent arrests—should never have been made public, but now offer a glimpse of modern aerial urban surveillance. www.wired.com/story/sfpd-d... w/ @dmehro.bsky.social

A Leak of San Francisco Police Drone Footage Exposes the New Reality of Urban Surveillance

The SFPD’s exposure of hours of videos from drone platform Skydio reveals how broadly it’s watching the city from above—and how the results can spill online.

wired.com

I sat in on a close-door war game where the insurance industry simulated a cyberattack against US water utilities by Volt Typhoon, Chinese state hackers who have been penetrating US critical infrastructure since at least 2023. The results were catastrophic. www.wired.com/story/what-h...

What Happens if China Hacks the US Water Supply? I Went to a Secret War Game to Find Out

Burst water mains. Evacuated hospitals. In a closed-door simulation, insurers played out their response to a mass disruption by China’s Volt Typhoon hackers—and found a nightmare scenario.

wired.com

A security researcher using Claude Opus 4.7 found the AI tool could independently code an exploit to hack into Front Gate Tickets, the ticketing platform for almost every major US music festival from Lollapalooza to Bonnaroo. He could then issue any tickets at will. www.wired.com/story/claude...

Claude Helped a Hacker Find a Way to Issue Tickets to Almost Every US Music Festival

A researcher found that using Anthropic’s Claude Opus 4.7, he could break into the website of Front Gate—used by every festival from Lollapalooza to Bonnaroo—and freely issue any ticket he chose.

wired.com

Red Bull, the scam compound whistleblower from my story below, is struggling to rebuild his life in a new country. He desperately needs tuition funds to keep his student visa, avoid deportation and stay safe. Anything you can give would go a long way: www.gofundme.com/f/support-wh... Thank you!

Donate to Help Scam Compound Whistleblower Rebuild His Life, organized by Jonna Higgins-Freese

Red Bull was trafficked, tortured, and forced to work as a scam… Jonna Higgins-Freese needs your support for Help Scam Compound Whistleblower Rebuild His Life

gofundme.com

Andy Greenberg@agreenberg.bsky.social · 6mo ago

Last year, a human trafficking victim trapped in a crypto scam compound in the Golden Triangle region of Laos contacted me. He then proceeded to leak to me a huge collection of the compound's internal materials. Then he had to get out alive. This is his story. 🧵👇 www.wired.com/story/he-lea...

NEW: Meta paid hundreds of contractors to pretend they were kids—and then prompt rival chatbots like Gemini and ChatGPT to talk about subjects like suicide, sex, eating disorders, and self-harm. From @dmehro.bsky.social and @joelkhalili.bsky.social

Meta Contractors Posed as Teens to Prompt Rival Chatbots About Suicide, Sex, and Drugs

Hundreds of contractors working on a project for Meta pretended to be kids—and then prompted rival chatbots like Gemini and ChatGPT to discuss high-risk subjects.

wired.com

Red Bull, the scam compound whistleblower from my story below, is struggling to rebuild his life in a new country. He desperately needs tuition funds to keep his student visa, avoid deportation and stay safe. Anything you can give would go a long way: www.gofundme.com/f/support-wh... Thank you!

Donate to Help Scam Compound Whistleblower Rebuild His Life, organized by Jonna Higgins-Freese

Red Bull was trafficked, tortured, and forced to work as a scam… Jonna Higgins-Freese needs your support for Help Scam Compound Whistleblower Rebuild His Life

gofundme.com

Andy Greenberg@agreenberg.bsky.social · 6mo ago

Last year, a human trafficking victim trapped in a crypto scam compound in the Golden Triangle region of Laos contacted me. He then proceeded to leak to me a huge collection of the compound's internal materials. Then he had to get out alive. This is his story. 🧵👇 www.wired.com/story/he-lea...

NEW: Insane screwup inside Meta. The company exposed worker keystroke data that was being used to train AI — making it potentially accessible to anyone at the company. The data included personnel and performance info, private convos, full transcriptions…imagine your coworkers seeing all of that.

Meta Exposed Data Internally From Its Controversial Employee-Tracking Program

Employees had previously raised concerns about the initiative, which involves collecting workers’ keystroke data to train AI models.

wired.com

Unable to make it to the Knicks parade in person? @wired.com has found an alternative for you: www.wired.com/story/how-to...

How to Watch the Knicks Parade on NYC Traffic Surveillance Cameras

Artist Morry Kolman will be livestreaming feeds of the NBA champions’ ticker-tape parade from NYC’s traffic cameras—and this time, the city’s Department of Transportation isn’t demanding he stop.

wired.com

To spell it out, this has the potential to be a really big deal. It could help make end-to-end encryption the default for a new generation of collaboration apps the same way the Signal protocol has end-to-end encrypted Signal and WhatsApp conversations on billions of phones.

Andy Greenberg@agreenberg.bsky.social · 2mo ago

Developers from Signal (including its protocol's co-creator) along with Microsoft and Harvard unveil Encrypted Spaces, an open-source codebase for a new generation of private collaboration apps. Think Slack, Discord, Google Docs, all end-to-end encrypted. www.wired.com/story/signal...

NEW: Several fmr @signal.org devs + others have a new project out today, Encrypted Spaces, which provides the technical model for building end-to-end encrypted versions of collaborative apps like Slack/Discord (& maybe a lot more). @agreenberg.bsky.social w/ the scoop: www.wired.com/story/signal...

Signal Alums Reveal ‘Encrypted Spaces,’ a System for Making Private Collaboration Apps

The new open-source project could serve as the basis for a future of apps with features as complex as Slack, Discord, or Google Docs—but with added protection against surveillance.

wired.com

Developers from Signal (including its protocol's co-creator) along with Microsoft and Harvard unveil Encrypted Spaces, an open-source codebase for a new generation of private collaboration apps. Think Slack, Discord, Google Docs, all end-to-end encrypted. www.wired.com/story/signal...

Signal Alums Reveal ‘Encrypted Spaces,’ a System for Making Private Collaboration Apps

The new open-source project could serve as the basis for a future of apps with features as complex as Slack, Discord, or Google Docs—but with added protection against surveillance.

wired.com

SCOOP: Last year, Dan Berulis filed a whistleblower complaint against DOGE at the NLRB. Elon Musk boosted a post calling it false. The next day, Berulis' brake lines were cut. Now he's filed a defamation suit against Musk. @wired.com www.wired.com/story/he-ble...

He Blew the Whistle on DOGE. Then His Brakes Were Cut

A federal IT staffer filed a complaint about DOGE, then went public. Shortly after Elon Musk boosted a post calling his claims false, his brake lines were cut. Now he’s suing for defamation.

wired.com

Are you nervous about AI impacting your job? Worried about being left behind? We’re here to help. Today @wired.com is launching our GLOBAL AI PRINCIPLES FOR A BETTER HUMAN WORKFORCE. Please note: This ~mandatory~ training does not guarantee your non-redundancy. (But the stories are fun as hell)

Take This Mandatory AI Workplace Training Right Now—or Else

AI could make you redundant. Here’s what you need to know.

wired.com

After this week's Github breach, we checked in on hacker group TeamPCP's victim count: their supply chain attacks have tainted more than 500 pieces of software (a thousand-plus different version) and breached hundreds of companies. This is out of control. www.wired.com/story/teampc...

A Hacker Group Is Poisoning Open Source Code at an Unprecedented Scale

GitHub is just the latest victim of TeamPCP, a gang that has carried out a spree of software supply chain attacks that has impacted hundreds of organizations.

wired.com

Mohammad Muzahir, aka Red Bull, the scam compound whistleblower and human trafficking victim whose incredible bravery made possible the story below, now has a GoFundMe: www.gofundme.com/f/support-wh... I'm in touch with the creator, who is legit. Grateful to her and to anyone who can donate.

Donate to Help Scam Compound Whistleblower Rebuild His Life, organized by Jonna Higgins-Freese

Red Bull was trafficked, tortured, and forced to work as a scam… Jonna Higgins-Freese needs your support for Help Scam Compound Whistleblower Rebuild His Life

gofundme.com

Andy Greenberg@agreenberg.bsky.social · 6mo ago

Last year, a human trafficking victim trapped in a crypto scam compound in the Golden Triangle region of Laos contacted me. He then proceeded to leak to me a huge collection of the compound's internal materials. Then he had to get out alive. This is his story. 🧵👇 www.wired.com/story/he-lea...