FBI Warns of Rising Cybercrime and Real-World Violence from Youth Network “The Com” #1836

The FBI has issued an urgent warning about “The Com,” a rapidly expanding network of youth aged 11–25 who are engaged in both cyber and real-world crimes. Split into Hacker Com, IRL Com, and Extortion Com, the group commits acts from ransomware attacks to child sextortion and swatting-for-hire. These crimes are often fueled by motives … Continue reading FBI Warns of Rising Cybercrime and Real-World Violence from Youth Network “The Com” #1836 →

The post FBI Warns of Rising Cybercrime and Real-World Violence from Youth Network “The Com” #1836 appeared first on Geek News Central.

Episode Transcript

(00:00):
Lead story for Monday,
July 28. The FBI has issued an urgent
warning about the COM,
a rapidly expanding network of youth age
11 to 25
engaged in cyber in real
world crime.
Split into hackercom,
ilcom,

(00:20):
and extortioncom,
the group commits acts from ransomware attacks to
child sextorsion
and swatting for hire.
These crimes are fueled by motives like profit,
revenge, ideology,
and noriety.
Authorities
emphasize
the group's growing threat and urge diligence,

(00:41):
especially for youth
targeted via social media and gaming platforms.
I wanna welcome you to episode 1,836.
I'm your host, Todd Cochran.
And this is a very shocking opening story.
And,
what if it didn't come from the FBI,
I would have really

(01:01):
questioned
whether or not this was was the real
deal.
But I guess in the times that we
live,
it should not come,
as a surprise
that thousands of peoples
thousands
of people between the age 11 and 25
are engaged in this

(01:22):
growing and evolving online threat to commit crime
for money,
retaliation,
ideology,
sexual gratification,
etcetera.
But they released this trove of research
warning that the sprawling cybercrime network of minors
and young adults is growing rapidly

(01:43):
and splintering into three different groups,
hackercom,
inreallifecom,
and extortioncom.
And hackercom
is members are involved in a vast array
of cybercrime activities including
distributed denial of service attacks, personal I I
I, being this personal identification,

(02:04):
theft and sale of government email accounts, ransomware
attacks, SIM swapping, and so forth.
IRL,
which is another term, some
subgroups
have gone beyond digital means
offering SWAT for hire services and targeting members
for swatting and doxxing.
Listen to this. Kidnapping and extortion

(02:26):
which the FBI refers to as IRLCOM
in real life.
And then extortionCOM
is
a where they're systematically
targeting underage
women
and vulnerable populations,
including children
and those who struggle with mental health issues.

(02:46):
Victims typically are between the age of 10
and 17 year olds but the FBI has
said
seen victims as young as nine. Threat actors
often groom their victims by first establishing
a trusting or romantic relationship. We are eventually
manipulating, coerce them into engaging
and self escalating harmful behavior.

(03:07):
So
the extortion
calm is the one that is pretty wild.
And I think as parents,
grandparents,
aunts and uncles,
we all
need to have frank
and open conversations
with
youth

(03:28):
today
to make sure that they have a place
to run.
You know?
As an example,
let's say you have a teenager
that, you know, has fell in love with
somebody online.
You may not know about this,
but, you know, you can use this as
an example,
but they have let's say they've shared some

(03:50):
images.
You need to make sure, number one,
that you talk to your young adults
prior to this activity happening
and make sure they understand the the ramifications
of this type of,
of activity. Number two,
I need to make
sure that if they have,

(04:12):
they should be able to feel that they
can come to
you irregardless
of what they have done and not be
shamed and
to be protected.
Yeah. I I think it's just a conversation
we have to have
with,
with young men and women these days.

(04:34):
And I don't think it's exclusive to
the young ladies even though they're the ones
that are being mostly,
gone after here. So,
let's be careful and let's let's talk to
this
this population,
of young adults. Now
the other stuff that's out there, the hacker

(04:56):
comm and the in real life comm,
we all understand
the ramifications
of being swatted.
Anyone that live streams understands this this can,
this can happen.
Not having your location readily available helps,
but it's not necessarily

(05:16):
going to
stop someone that is completely determined.
But at the same time cybercrime activities now
service attacks and so forth are just run
of the mill stuff.
So
here we are,
living in a in a world where,
youth between 11 and 25

(05:38):
are are now,
part of the Edge Group that are doing
these activities,
along with plenty other adults. It's, it's pretty
wild out there for sure.
So, what a story to kick off, episode
18,
36. Again, thank you for all being here
and shout out to our incredible sponsor at

(05:58):
GoDaddy Score. Exclusive deals and discounts at geeknewcentral.com/godaddy.
Of course, to all of our listeners, you're
the real heartbeat of the show. If you
wanna,
support GNC, head to geeknewcentral.com/insider
and become a GNC
insider. Of course, we are lit and live.
Don't just listen.

(06:19):
Experience the show live by grabbing a modern
podcast app at podcastapps.com.
You can interact in
real
time and, of course, check out the full
Geek News Central universe at geeknewscentral.com.
We found all of our partner shows and
tons of new content. Stay in the loop.
Follow or subscribe to the podcast
via your favorite podcast app, and don't forget

(06:40):
to sign up for the newsletter
right there on the website at geeknewscentral.com
for e or even more
insider scoops. Of course, we want you to
join
the conversation,
geek news dot chat or via email [e-mail].
You can hit me up on x as
well
at geek news, and you can even, of
course, catch me,

(07:01):
on, on Facebook.
Hope this finds everyone
well. Take just a moment here and, and
mention our sponsor
as a Geek News Central listener.
Are you ready for fantastic GoDaddy deals?
GoDaddy is a vicious sport of this show
for twenty plus years.
Get these exclusive savings right now. Geeknesscentral.com

(07:23):
forward slash GoDaddy
with our,
GoDaddy promo codes. And let's start with a
website or a podcast. GNC codes make it
easy and affordable. Grab GoDaddy's economy hosting for
just five ninety nine five excuse me, $6.99
a month.
That's a full year of hosting with a
free domain name, professional email, and an SSL

(07:44):
certificate. Interested in WordPress, which, of course, I
use exclusively WordPress managed hosting. It's just $12.99
a month, which includes a free domain name,
professional email, and, of course, an SSL certificate.
If you need a domain name, get yours
for only $11.99.
That's available immediately.
And how about GoDaddy website builder? If you're
not super technically inclined, you can get a

(08:06):
free thirty day trial on personal business or
business plus plans.
I use all of my GoDaddy products and
services,
and your support keeps this podcast alive. Use
our codes. Click and save.
You're backing this independent team of creators. Share
my codes.
And, again, thank you for keeping us online

(08:27):
and going strong. We definitely appreciate you
all being here
and,
getting ready to wrap things up. I've got,
about
seven, nine, ten days left
before I head back to The United States.
And then,
I'll be home a week, and then I

(08:48):
head to podcast movement in
Dallas.
I I come back and then I'm home,
to the end of the month. I'm gonna
go out and see my, daughter the weekend
following,
Labor Day.
And then in the September,
I go to Madrid to speak to a
podcasting conference

(09:08):
in Madrid. So that's kind of the
the quick outlook of, the next couple of
months of of activity.
And we're gonna keep the show rolling across.
Thank you again for your ongoing support of
the show.
And for those of you that are watching
on the live stream today, make sure you
say hello. We want you to check-in
and and let us know. Just say hi.

(09:30):
That'd be a great way to,
to do that.
But I tell you,
so far,
knock on wood, of course, I did have
to reboot my computer today.
So I'm watching the, RodeCaster.
I'm watching the stream.
The video is continuing. It hasn't disconnected in

(09:50):
seventeen minutes.
So
I'm hoping everything,
stays on
online. Hey. Big news here from Samsung. Samsung,
won a 16,500,000,000.0
deal to make Tesla a 16 chips. It
will use a Texas based factory that had
struggled to line up any customers. So

(10:11):
this deal goes through 02/1933.
So this is a big deal for Samsung.
Very, very, very big deal.
And,
Samsung giant new Texas fab will be dedicated
to making Tesla next generation
a 16 chips. The strategic importance of this
is hard to overstate.
Elon says this agreement marks an economic turnaround

(10:31):
from Samsung, which really is much push back
pushed back open the Texas factory until 2026
due to a lack
of customers. So
big deal there,
from
Samsung. Now Samsung currently
produces the a 14 chip that powers Cessna's
full
FSD.
However, the a 15 contract went to a

(10:53):
TSMC
in Taiwan,
but that diet design has not been yet
completed.
So the new deal comes without any streams,
strings, excuse me,
namely a lot of musk breathing over the
manufacturer's shoulder. Well, you know, Endgadget.

(11:13):
They have
Elon
issues
and they have TDR as well.
It it just goes on and on. They
hate Elon Musk. It is very obvious
that End Gadget does just by
the tone
of their content. They always put some snarky

(11:33):
shit in their articles.
The new the new deal doesn't come without
strings.
Namely a lot of must breathing over the
manufacturer's
shoulder.
You know,
there's more of this.
And, Gadget, go back
to reporting tech. Leave the effing politics out

(11:57):
of the conversation.
My god.
It's it's just
never ending with that,
website.
Over in Cyber Scoop,
senator Hanson wants to hear from SpaceX about
scammers abusing Starlink. Well, this is curious.
Mila was the governments have turned up Starlink

(12:19):
equipment
at scam compounds that are largely centered in
Southeast Asia.
And United Nations office on drugs and crime
highlighted the trend,
While SpaceX's state investigation deactivates Starlink accounts in
various contexts, it seems that not public acknowledge
use of Starlink for scams originating out of

(12:40):
Southeast Asia.
Scam networks in Myanmar, Thailand, Cambodia, and Laos,
However, apparently, continues Starlink despite service rules permitting
SpaceX to terminate access for fraudulent
activity.
Now scam compounds, especially here in The Philippines,
have been getting huge,
huge I mean it's big in the news.

(13:01):
They're rolling up and deporting people almost on
a weekly basis 89,
100
running
gambling centers,
all kinds of stuff.
And
so anyway,
the New York Democrat
Senator Hansen

(13:22):
wants SpaceX
to
to speak up and say, hey. This is
what we're doing to stop this.
I I I think this is a worthy
a worthy conversation with SpaceX, to be frank.
This these these scammers steal millions and millions
of dollars and ruin people.

(13:42):
Just absolutely, utterly
ruin people. So,
I hope they do have a question and
answer here. So but, again, thank you for
Cyber Scoop for just reporting the facts and
not putting something
quirky in here.
Now,
again and I just wanna show you this
disparity here on

(14:02):
some tech sites. And, again, this is Engadget
again and maybe Kirk.
Maybe we're gonna have to cut
the number of
articles
that we we bring up from Engadget and
find alternative,
links to this content.
So here's the headline. Everyone's a loser

(14:23):
in Trump's AI action plan.
This is this is okay. So does this
if you tell me if I'm wrong, and
I and I'll pop the email up here.
Let me know if this sounds,
if this sounds, biased.

(14:43):
On July 23, the Trump administration leases long
awaited AI action plane short of copyright exemptions
from model training.
Mister red appears ready to give open AI,
and traffic Google and other major players near
everything they ask of the White House during
public consultation.
Howard, according to Travis Hall, director of state
engagement at the Center for Democracy and Technology,

(15:05):
Trump's policy vision would put stakes
states and tech companies themselves in position extraordinary
regulatory
uncertainty.
It starts with the president's attempt to prevent
states from regulating AI systems
in the regionally in the original draft of
the past
tax bill, the president included an amendment that
would impose a ten year moratorium on any

(15:26):
state level AI regulation.
Eventually, that clause was removed from the legislation
and decisive 99 to one vote. K. So
that's all fair. So here's the next section.
It appears
the president didn't get the message. In his
action plan, the president signaled to order federal
agencies to only award AI related funding to
states without burdensome

(15:48):
AI regulations.
It's not really clear which discretionary fund will
be deemed to be AI related. It's also
not clear which current state laws and which
future proposals will be deemed burdensome or
hindering the effectiveness of federal funds that leave
state legislatures, governors, and other state level leaders
in a tight spot.

(16:10):
Extremely vague, and I think that's designed by
design.
So, again,
these nuances of
conversation, I understand. Quote people. That's fine.
But,
I
guess it's opinion pieces.

(16:32):
It just in gadgets seems so
negative
on anything.
It just goes on and on. I see
it again and again, week after week.
Amazing.
Were they critical of the previous administration?
I I don't think so.
The BBC is reporting that Microsoft servers hacked

(16:54):
by Chinese groups.
Chinese threat actors have hacked some Microsoft SharePoint
servers. Now we knew about this.
Chinese
state backed typhoon and violet typhoon typhoon
as well as China's storm twenty six zero
three were said to exploit vulnerabilities
and on premises SharePoint service.
So if you have an on point excuse

(17:16):
me, on premise
SharePoint server or one in Iraq somewhere,
we know that this system's been been hacked.
You need to patch.
So

(17:36):
this was exploited in a very broad way,
very opportunistically
before a patch was made available.
So be careful here. Again, this continues to
make the news all over the world on
this particular issue.
So,
she has SharePoint.
Apple makes major changes to App Store age

(17:57):
ratings. Update removes the 12 plus and 17
plus
aid ranges
and adds three new ones
to add 13 plus, 16 plus, and 18
plus ratings to existing four plus and nine
plus rating while removing the 12 plus and
17 plus.
So,

(18:18):
developers are also gonna have to answer a
questionnaire
dependent upon I guess it's basically to ensure
that the app is meeting the age requirements
that they're
that they're
stating.
Hackers continued. Spatter
scattered spider hackers are targeting US critical infrastructure

(18:39):
via VMware
attacks.
They perfected
social engineering. So this is a thing we
have to be
careful of here. Most of these big attacks
are getting through
because of social engineering.
The campaign
is described
as
aggressive and sophisticated.

(19:00):
So what they do in the campaign, the
hackers do not exploit exploit any vulnerabilities, but
instead go for
being creative and skilled
in doing social and energy. They first reach
out to the victim's IT desk,
impersonating an employee and asking for a reset
on the on the employee's active directory account.

(19:22):
And then after gaining initial foothold, they would
scan the network to identify high value targets
and
using domain names,
VMware, vSphere admins and other security departments.
And then they would go after those folks
by reaching out to IT again.
So again, this is all

(19:44):
this is all done by social engineering.
And they then, like, open up SSH connections
and they have free will.
And it happens within a one or two
hour period. It's not over days. They do
this very quickly trying to maybe,
hit the same person on the staff that

(20:05):
they're able to get a hit something
reset.
So, you know, if you run IT departments,
this is this is really, really important.
The BBC is also reporting that Apple and
Google effectively
have an effective duopoly
in The UK.
And while this is no kidding,
Apple and Google may be required to change

(20:27):
the way they operate some of their mobile
services in The UK
according to the proposed decision by UK's competition
regulator.
Around 90 to 100% of UK's mobile devices
are running on Apple or Google. Well, what
else is there to run on?
How can they
yeah. There's open competition,

(20:48):
but give me a break.
They're gonna have to make changes
because someone has not been able to compete
with Android or Apple iOS.
Thank god.
Yeah.
Can't be helped. It's the way we're at
today.
NASA
and SpaceX are ready for crew 11 astronauts

(21:10):
for historic liftoff.
So the, astronauts arrived at KSC.
Gearing up for the launch. Now when is
this gonna happen?
It looks like the thirty first. So just
a couple of days from now.
And,
they're gonna be,

(21:34):
they would join expedition seventy three and later
expedition seventy four. The mission will showcase continued
collaboration between
NASA,
JAXA, and Roscosmos.
So, you got one Japanese,
one Russian,
and two Americans
that are going.
So,
good for them.

(21:55):
And,
you know, look at look at how
thus far
SpaceX is knocking out of the ballpark
and, and delivering,
delivering on time to to the ISS.
Microsoft according to Yahoo Finance has to hit
its earnings not
out has to hit its earnings out of
the park.

(22:16):
You know,
why isn't making some earnings just good enough?
You know, everyone's pretty happy with this new
EU trade,
trade agreement. People are going gaga over it.
Can't believe they got that great of a
deal.
And,
of course, the eyes now turn to China,
but

(22:37):
they're basically people are really focused on Microsoft.
Microsoft had a run-in its Wednesday afternoon earnings
report. Stock is, up scoring 31%
in the last three months.
Now the tech giant has to deliver big.
So
did they report already?

(22:59):
This is Thursday,
so maybe we're waiting on the the earnings
report. But,
again, they gotta hit big. Gotta hit big
or they were gonna hurt their stock.
NASA is going to lose 4,000 employees after
latest deferred resignation around. This is voluntary resignations.
About 3,000 staffers applied to leave the Allen's

(23:21):
agency
after 870
were already approved.
So basically,
they get some nine or ten months of
additional pay. They leave. They get their retirement
if they qualify and so forth.
So about 20%
of NASA's workforce has decided
it's time to do something else. So good

(23:43):
for them.
There's a
disparity
in
basically cloud provider share
and it's huge.
European cloud providers only make up 15%
of local market
where basically
everything else is owned by US cloud market.

(24:07):
European cloud infrastructure make up 15% of their
own market and the huge investment US giants
can wield make their dominance and impossible to
climb
for any would be challenger.
According to Synergy, local companies accounted for nearly
29%
of cloud infrastructure in 02/2017,
but by 2022,
they had dropped to 15%.

(24:28):
Well, if you look
if you look at the infrastructure that AWS
has put together,
and the tools they have put together,
and the relative
ease, if you have a good development team,
it's it's it's a no brainer.
It really, really is.
So, you know, it's pretty remarkable to be

(24:50):
honest with you.
That, you know, this is another area of
competition
that has
not expanded.
And I understand the up the uphill battle
these,
these companies,
face. On today's comments, feel free to drop
me an email [e-mail]
at any time. We appreciate our or or

(25:10):
a comment on x as well as a
great place to engage.
Airloft, Aeroflops over IT issues after attackers claim
year long compromise.
Russia's top airline canceled 49 flights, delay affects
many, many more.
So AirFaust said via its Telegram channel was
a failure in the airline's information services.

(25:33):
So currently, team of specialists working to minimize
the risk of fulfilling its production flight plan.
So I don't know if they've if they
were
see here. Did they actually do a
was it a, ransomware? Or what
what was the effect of the hack? Does
it say?

(25:57):
Yeah.
Doesn't say, oh, hacktivist crow about the attack.
The silent crow and cyber partisan of Belarus,
oh,
claim responsibility for today's disruption, which is following
year long compromise of the airline system.
They claim to compromise all critical corporate systems

(26:17):
including Aerofloss,
SharePoint, and Microsoft Exchange, those used for personal
surveillance and more.
Pear also claimed destroyed 7,000 servers and stolen
22 terabytes worth of data from databases,
Windows sharing corporate email through these claims are
unverified and can be exaggerated.
So, if it's affecting flights, there's definitely something

(26:40):
going on here. There's an interesting post on,
Slashdot and
when I read this, and this is definitely
the techy,
super techies out there,
Google has a new security project called OSS
rebuild,
and it tackles
package
supply chain

(27:00):
verification.
Now I know what packages are in the
development world,
but this includes automation to to derive
declarative
build definitions,
new
new build observability,
a mouthful,
and verification tools for security teams and even

(27:22):
infrastructure
definitions
help organizations
rebuild, sign, and distribute
provenance
by running their own OSS rebuild instance.
And as part of the initiative, the team
also published SLSA
provenance
at attestations for thousands of packages across our
supported ecosystem.

(27:43):
Now that's a mouthful.
Our aim at OSS rebuild is empower the
security community deeply understand and control their supply
chain, their patch supply chain, I'm assuming,
by making package consumption, in other words, software
packages,
as transparent as using a source repository.
A rebore rebuild platforms

(28:04):
unlocks transparency by utilizing a declarative
build process, which is interesting. I wonder if
that's a blockchain,
build instrumentation and network monitoring capabilities,
which
within the SLSA
build framework. Boy, this is a mouthful.
So they're gonna be supporting Python,
JS,

(28:25):
TS, and Rust,
package registries providing
build rebuild provenance
for many of the most popular package. Now
this is very, very curious here. In other
words,
did the package that's being submitted, is it
from the person that's supposed to be submitting
it and
is it not full

(28:46):
of spyware?
So
there was a mouthful there. That was a
mouthful and a half. But let me let
me just say this,
about time, we have much more deeper
tracking of this kind of stuff for sure.
If you're a NASCAR fan, NASCAR confirms personal
information stolen in a ransomware attack.
NASCAR says names, social security numbers, and other

(29:08):
person's information was stolen in April 2025,
a ransomware attack. Now who was these individuals?
Must have been employees.
Active individual provides one or two years for
your credit identity monitoring services,

(29:31):
and they also begin sending running notifications to
impacted individuals. Must've been these were employees
and not people that were buying NASCAR,
products and services.
Amazon Fresh is gonna open its first Philadelphia
location.
So if you live in Philly, have an
Amazon Fresh.
If you run WordPress, there's a plugin that

(29:51):
has,
160,000
sites at risk. If you're running post SMTP
post SMTP
let me has it been updated?
See here.

(30:14):
You know, they have
a patch.
So there's 400,000
active installations. So 160,000
have not updated
post SMTP, you need to have your
WordPress sign up. This automatically
apply plug in updates.
Don't don't delay.

(30:34):
Have plug in updates be set now. You
want to watch your host,
they will also warn you and take plug
ins offline,
when they hit that severe severity,
level
as well.
Now this is, goes way back to 2023,
this next one.
And it's interesting. Google has admitted its earthquake

(30:57):
early warning system failed to accurately alert people
during Turkey's deadly quake in 2023.
10,000,000 people in the 98 miles epicenter could
have been sent Google's highest level alert,
giving up to thirty five seconds of warning
to find safety.
Instead, only 469
take action warnings were sent

(31:17):
out for the first 7.8 magnitude quake. Google
told BBC half a million people were sent
a lower level warning, which is designed for
light
shaking and does not alert users in the
same prominent way.
And this alert system has been working
since then in a 100 different countries and
they have resolved whatever issues there were.

(31:38):
So,
interesting that Google did actually announce this.
Now in probably the most bizarre thing that
I have
seen today,
the president has temporarily dropped export controls to
smooth negotiations with China.
After previously saying US would block exports for

(32:01):
key
AI chips to China,
The administration
may have backtracked. The US will now temporarily
block restriction export chips and other technology to
China.
The Financial Times report aims to help him
get
this trade deal due through export controls are

(32:21):
dictated by US Commerce Department,
which was reportedly told to avoid tough measures.
Last week, Nvidia said it would resume selling
key AI chips to China after being blocked
earlier.
So
what's the truth here?

(32:43):
This is a bad move. I agree. If
they've opened up export of top end AI
chips.
Okay. This is a
okay, this
again, this science has a way of just
kind of sometimes you're you're like, okay. How
did they miss that?

(33:03):
Trapped by moon dust,
there's a physics era that fooled NASA for
years.
Earth test
missed a key variable
saying sand acts firmer under Earth gravity
than lunar gravity,
and it showed that rovers that we sent

(33:25):
to the moon in the, what, sixties or
seventies
lose more traction than previously believed.
Engineers at the university was kind of uncovered
a critical flaw on how lunar and martin
rovers are tested on Earth,
simulations of Mars as well. Simulations reveal that
test results was misleading for decades because researchers
only adjusted rover weight

(33:46):
to simulate low gravity but ignored how Earth's
gravity affects the terrain itself.
Viewing a powerful seven simulation tool called chrono,
the team showed that sandy surface behave very
differently
on the moon
where they where they are fluffier
and less supportive. Okay. So we know that

(34:08):
that spirit and it got stuck for a
little bit in 2009
and some other stuff has happened. So
Well
wonder what difference that's gonna make.
Rumored iPhone 17 Pro and 17 Pro Max
feature suggests Apple's planning its biggest camp camera
upgrade
for many, many years. The top iPhone 17

(34:30):
models could get an eight times optical zoom,
an extra camera button could also be added,
and Apple said to be working a pro
level
camera app.
I would not be surprised at all.
Ladies, if you're using the t app,
the Tea app has been hacked
and that it's filled thousands of photos from

(34:50):
the from this app
and there's not a lot you can do.
Tea is a popular dating safety tool.
72,000
images pertaining to the app were involved. Some
of which were user photo IDs.
And it's,
worry here is potential identity theft, etcetera. So

(35:11):
again, if you've used t,
what is what can you do if anything?
Yeah.
Not much you can do. Just be aware.
Insurance
company Alliance Life says data on over a
million US customers stolen in breach.

(35:34):
So
these customers should be getting
some notification,
but 1,400,000
customers could be at risk.
And what did they get? Did they say?
They did not say what was revealed.
Now this should not come as a surprise.
VPN top download charts' age verification verification

(35:58):
law kicks in.
So VPN apps have become the most downloaded
in Apple's App Store in The UK
after sites such as Pornhub, Reddit, and x
began requiring add age verification
of users on Friday.
The VPNs can disguise your local location means
people are likely using to bypass requirements of

(36:19):
online safety act.
So if you have kids,
again,
in The UK,
you need to ask them or look at
their phone and see if they're
using VPN
to get access to porn. Believe me, they're
gonna get access to it one way or
the other.
But,
I guess VPNs are the way to,

(36:41):
to that to that data
or to that,
I guess, what do we want to call
that?
Information.
So,
you know, a lot of good a law
does when you can just use a VPN
to bypass it.
Insta three sixty is has unveiled anti gravity,
the world's first three sixty drone. Well, at

(37:02):
least they've talked about it. They've done a
pretty cool video,
but apparently there is a drone that's being
in work, but a three sixty camera on
a drone.
We will see
where this one goes.
So how does DJI minutes match? I don't
know.
But,
I just you know, the stuff drones can

(37:23):
do these days is so cool.
Google has confirmed new Pixel phones, a watch,
and earbuds,
and, you know, these have been already kinda
talked about.
A matter of fact, they released the, the
Pixel image,
but,
the earbuds and
and watch have already been posted all over
social.

(37:43):
So,
you know, if you're a Pixel fan, a
watch fan, or Buds fan, this is forthcoming
from Google and no surprise on the confirmation.
Also, if you're having problems with searching public
transit routes on Google Maps, you're not alone.
So there's been apparently an issue.
And,

(38:04):
I tell you, I used Google Maps almost
exclusively
when I was
in Japan to ride the train system there.
In The UK,
definitely used
the,
the local app. That was much better. And
once you learn how to use it, man,
fabulous
fabulous app. They've done a good job in

(38:25):
The UK on that mass transit piece.
Took me maybe
two or three rides to kind of get
the total hang of it,
because it's not super intuitive. But once you
learn how to operate around its quirks it's
fantastic
but it's difficult to assess
how widespread the problem is.

(38:47):
Some people are seeing it. Some people are
not. So just be
aware.
Also, a man has been awarded,
$12,500
after Google Street View camera caught caught him
naked
in his yard in Argentina.
So,
why was he naked in his yard?

(39:10):
His house number and street name were also
laid bare and no pun intended.
So
he only had himself to blame, but Google
is gonna
have to pay.
Apparently, the perimeter wall around his home,
was not tall enough

(39:32):
because, you know, the camera sits on top
of the car.
So
yeah. It was when the kind it was
they were behind a fence
that was taller than average
privacy. Well, at least that's what he said.
But, you know, if we think about a

(39:53):
Google car and how high the antenna is
or the camera is, you could see how
it would see over a fence.
And they didn't catch it and, were not
able to,
to blur him. So, yeah.
Imagine being sunbathing or whatever you may be
doing in the confines of your backyard and

(40:15):
and
being, being seen. As a reminder, don't forget
to support our sponsor GoDaddy at gatenesscentral.com/godaddy.
Also, if you haven't become an insider yet,
consider a two five ten fifteen twenty or
25
monthly donation for the show or one time
donation at geeknewscentral.com/insider.

(40:36):
As always, you can send me a tweet
at geek news or you can email me
[e-mail].
It's been my pleasure to bring you the
show today. I'll be back on Thursday
with another edition of the Geekness Central podcast.
It's been my pleasure. We'll see you next
time. Everyone, thanks for being here. Take care.
Stay safe and watch out for those cyber
criminals.
See you guys next time. Bye bye.