This Week In Techdirt History: July 27th – August 2nd
Five Years Ago This week in 2020, we took a look at tech in the pandemic, from the big ways people were using it to stay connected to the strange…
CL-STA-0969 Installs Covert Malware in Telecom Networks During 10-Month Espionage Campaign
Telecommunications organizations in Southeast Asia have been targeted by a state-sponsored threat actor known as CL-STA-0969 to facilitate remote control over compromised networks. Palo Alto Networks Unit 42 said it…
New ‘Plague’ PAM Backdoor Exposes Critical Linux Systems to Silent Credential Theft
Cybersecurity researchers have flagged a previously undocumented Linux backdoor dubbed Plague that has managed to evade detection for a year. “The implant is built as a malicious PAM (Pluggable Authentication…
Five children see HIV viral loads vanish after taking antiretroviral drugs
For years, Philip Goulder has been obsessed with a particularly captivating idea: In the hunt for an HIV cure, could children hold the answers? Starting in the mid-2010s, the University…
Akira Ransomware Exploits SonicWall VPNs in Likely Zero-Day Attack on Fully-Patched Devices
SonicWall SSL VPN devices have become the target of Akira ransomware attacks as part of a newfound surge in activity observed in late July 2025. “In the intrusions reviewed, multiple…
Smart Home Device Maker Renders Devices Dumb Unless A New Subscription Is Paid For
This isn’t going to stop happening unless governments finally get involved to do their most basic job: protect their citizens. This habit among digital and tech companies of selling a…
With Trump’s cutbacks, crew heads for ISS unsure of when they’ll come back
The next four-person team to live and work aboard the International Space Station departed from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida on Friday, taking aim at the massive orbiting research…
Creativity, The Fifth Freedom & Access To Knowledge
This series of posts explores how we can rethink the intersection of AI, creativity, and policy. From examining outdated regulatory metaphors to questioning copyright norms and highlighting the risks of…
Under RFK Jr, CDC skips study on vaccination rates, quietly posts data on drop
Vaccination rates among the country’s kindergartners have fallen once again, with coverage of the measles, mumps, and rubella (MMR) vaccination dropping from 92.7 percent in the 2023–2024 school year to…
RIP Corporation for Public Broadcasting: 1967–2026
Despite the protests of millions of Americans, the Corporation for Public Broadcasting (CPB) announced it will be winding down its operations after the White House deemed NPR and PBS a…