Iranians Find Pockets of Connection Amid Internet Blackout
But many said they thought the connections were temporary or unsafe, with the government still imposing tight restrictions that were difficult to bypass.
'It feels like we're in a dark cave,' said Arta, an Iranian who fled Tehran on Tuesday and was able to briefly send a few messages over Instagram late Friday.
Like many others who have exchanged messages with The New York Times over the last week, he asked to be identified only by his first name to avoid scrutiny by the authorities.
'Even SMS texts don't go through sometimes,' he said.
Many Iranians rely on virtual private networks, or VPNs, to evade government restrictions on the internet, but many of those services have been disrupted since Israel's attacks began. On Saturday, as some connection returned, providers urged their users to act cautiously.
'For your own sake, don't spread the link, the server will disconnect, and our work will only get harder,' one organizer wrote on a VPN provider's Telegram channel. The organizer warned that reports of disconnection were increasing again, and asked subscribers to not share their product link because their server was overwhelmed.
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Yahoo
8 hours ago
- Yahoo
Wall Street's Next Great Shift: From AI Stocks to AI Trading
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For example: Amazon's (AMZN) throwing $13 billion into AI data centers in Australia. Meta (META) is poaching top AI talent and tossing around $100 million signing bonuses. SoftBank (SFTBY) wants to build a $1 trillion AI complex in Arizona. Microsoft (MSFT) is pushing Sovereign AI to governments. And Adobe's (ADBE) got a tool to protect brand identity in an AI-dominated web. When markets keep rising in the face of chaos, it's not a sign of delusion — . As of this writing, the S&P 500 was on track to close out the week at a new record high, its first since February. The Nasdaq Composite was approaching its own record close, and the Dow Jones had added 0.7%. This furious rally shows that investors are focused. They're thinking long-term, betting big on what comes next and filtering out the noise. So, I'm staying long. I'm staying bullish. 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17 hours ago
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The Best Growth Stocks I'd Buy Right Now
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To this end, if you've got an extra $1,000 lying around -- or any other amount -- you'd like to put to work for a while, here's a closer look at three of the best growth stocks worth adding to almost any well-diversified portfolio. Ride-hailing outfit Uber Technologies (NYSE: UBER) isn't just a clever rethinking of the planet's taxi industry. It's growing like crazy because personal mobility is undergoing a paradigm shift. Not only are younger people here and abroad decreasingly interested in owning a car, but interest in even attaining a driver's license is waning, the younger the prospective driver in question. For perspective, data from the Federal Highway Administration indicates that only about one-third of age-eligible teenagers in America currently have a driver's license, versus roughly two-thirds of this crowd 30 years ago. What gives? Sheer cost is one stumbling block. The rise of convenient alternatives is another. 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Some of that progress comes from the company's willingness to continually experiment and evolve, not unlike Facebook and Amazon. For instance, just last month, Snapchat introduced a new tool making it easier for content creators to create and edit videos using their existing media. Around that same time, the platform unveiled a subscription-based offering called Lens+ that gives its users access to more in-app features than free users will find. Some of these initiatives will pay off. Others won't. Enough of them should work out, however, to continue making the Snapchat app compelling and competitive with alternatives. The kicker: While Snap's historical bottom line has been hit-and-miss (more miss than hit), plenty of investors don't yet realize that the company's at a major turning point. Profitability is here, and profit margins are expected to widen going forward thanks to continued revenue growth. Before you buy stock in Rocket Lab, consider this: The Motley Fool Stock Advisor analyst team just identified what they believe are the for investors to buy now… and Rocket Lab wasn't one of them. The 10 stocks that made the cut could produce monster returns in the coming years. Consider when Netflix made this list on December 17, 2004... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $699,558!* Or when Nvidia made this list on April 15, 2005... if you invested $1,000 at the time of our recommendation, you'd have $976,677!* Now, it's worth noting Stock Advisor's total average return is 1,060% — a market-crushing outperformance compared to 180% for the S&P 500. Don't miss out on the latest top 10 list, available when you join . See the 10 stocks » *Stock Advisor returns as of June 30, 2025 John Mackey, former CEO of Whole Foods Market, an Amazon subsidiary, is a member of The Motley Fool's board of directors. Randi Zuckerberg, a former director of market development and spokeswoman for Facebook and sister to Meta Platforms CEO Mark Zuckerberg, is a member of The Motley Fool's board of directors. James Brumley has no position in any of the stocks mentioned. The Motley Fool has positions in and recommends Amazon, Meta Platforms, Rocket Lab, and Uber Technologies. The Motley Fool has a disclosure policy. The Best Growth Stocks I'd Buy Right Now was originally published by The Motley Fool Inicia sesión para acceder a tu cartera de valores
WIRED
17 hours ago
- WIRED
Android May Soon Warn You About Fake Cell Towers
Jul 5, 2025 6:30 AM Plus: Iran-linked hackers threaten to release Trump campaign emails, Chinese hackers still in US telecoms networks, and an abusive deepfake website plans an expansion. Photo-Illustration:In recent years, North Korea has deployed thousands of so-called IT workers to infiltrate Western businesses, get paid salaries, and send money back to support the regime. As the schemes have become more successful, they have grown increasingly elaborate and employed new tactics to evade detection. But this week, the United States Justice Department revealed one of its biggest operations to tackle IT workers to date. The DOJ says it has identified six Americans who allegedly helped enable the schemes and has arrested one of them. Law enforcement officials searched 29 'laptop farms' in 16 states and seized more than 200 computers, as well as web domains and financial accounts. Meanwhile, a group of young cybercriminals has been causing chaos around the world, leaving grocery stores empty and temporarily grounding some flights in the wake of their crippling cyberattacks. After a quiet period in 2024, the Scattered Spider hackers have returned this year and are ruthlessly targeting retailers, insurers, and airlines. Also this week, we've detailed how LGBTIQ+ organizations in El Salvador are helping activists chronicle attacks against their community and better protect themselves against state surveillance. And there's more. Each week, we round up the security and privacy news we didn't cover in depth ourselves. Click the headlines to read the full stories. And stay safe out there. Cell-site simulators, often known as stingrays or IMSI catchers, are some of the most stealthy and powerful surveillance tools in operation today. The devices, which impersonate cell towers and intercept communications, can collect call metadata, location information, and other traffic about what you do on your devices. They've increasingly been used by law enforcement and immigration officials. However, according to reporting from Android Authority and Ars Technica, upcoming hardware advances has led to Google upping its efforts to combat the potential snooping. Starting in Android 16, compatible devices will be able to identify when networks request device identifiers, such as device or SIM IDs, and issue alerts when you are connecting to a non-encrypted cell network. Examples of alerts show warnings that 'calls, messages, and data are vulnerable to interception' when connected to insecure networks. There will also be notifications when you move back to an encrypted network. An option to turn on these notifications appears on a mobile network security settings page alongside the option to avoid 2G networks, which could help block some IMSI catchers from connecting to your device. However, while the settings will reportedly be available in Android 16, it may take some time for Android devices to widely use the required hardware. Iran-Linked Hackers Threaten to Release 100 GB of Trump Campaign Emails Ahead of the presidential election last November, Iran-linked hackers attacked Donald Trump's presidential campaign and stole scores of emails in an apparent bid to influence the election results. Some of the emails were distributed to journalists and the Biden campaign. This week, following the Israel-Iran conflict and US intervention with 'bunker-buster' bombs, the hackers behind the email compromise reemerged, telling Reuters that they may disclose or sell more of the stolen emails. The cybercriminals claimed they had stolen 100 GB of emails, including some from Susie Wiles, the White House chief of staff. The cache of emails also allegedly includes those from Lindsey Halligan, a Trump lawyer, adviser Roger Stone, and adult film star Stormy Daniels. The hackers, who have used the name Robert, told Reuters they wanted to 'broadcast this matter.' It is unclear whether they will act upon the threats. In response, US officials claimed that the threat from the hackers was a 'calculated smear campaign' by a foreign power. 'A hostile foreign adversary is threatening to illegally exploit purportedly stolen and unverified material in an effort to distract, discredit, and divide,' Marci McCarthy, a spokesperson for the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, said in a statement. Chinese Hackers Lay 'Dormant' in US Telecoms Networks, FBI Says Over the past few years, Chinese hacker group Salt Typhoon has been on a hacking rampage against US telecoms networks, successfully breaking into at least nine firms and gaining access to Americans' texts and calls. Brett Leatherman, the recently appointed leader of the FBI's cyber division, tells Cyberscoop that the Chinese hackers are now 'largely contained' and lying 'dormant' in the networks. The groups have not been kicked out of networks, Leatherman said, since the longer they are in the systems there are more ways they can find to 'create points of persistence.' 'Right now, we're very focused on resilience and deterrence and providing significant support to victims,' Leatherman said. Explicit Deepfake Website Leaks User Information, Has Expansion Plans Revealed Deepfake platforms that allow people to create nonconsensual, often illegal, harmful images of women without clothes on have boomed in recent years. Now a former whistleblower and leaked documents from one of the largest so-called 'nudify' apps, Clothoff, claims the service has a multimillion-euro budget and is planning an aggressive expansion where it will create nonconsensual explicit images of celebrities and influencers, according to reporting by German publication Der Spiegel. The alleged expansion has a marketing budget of €150,000 (around $176,000) per country to promote the images of celebrities and influencers, according to the report. It says more than 'three dozen people' work for Clothoff, and the publication identified some of the potential key operators of the platform. Documents exposed online also revealed customer email addresses. A spokesperson who claimed to represent Clothoff denied there were more than 30 people as part of the central team and told Der Spiegel it does not have a multimillion-euro budget.
