Notices by Joseph Cox (josephcox@infosec.exchange)

Flock's CEO just told local media its license plate readers don't take video. This came after the LAPD cancelled its contract

Except, Flock announced a new feature that can turn "all" Flock cameras into live video cameras. Flock has now deleted the announcement https://www.404media.co/flocks-ceo-says-its-alprs-dont-do-video-after-repeatedly-announcing-they-can/

New: the highly controversial AI music generator Suno was hacked. The hacker sent us Suno source code; it shows the company scraped YouTube Music, Deezer, and Genius. In all, Suno scraped *decades* worth of music from the internet. Obviously didn't pay artists https://www.404media.co/hack-reveals-suno-ai-music-generator-scraped-youtube-deezer-and-genius/

New: there is a major vulnerability with Apple’s Hide My Email feature that lets attackers discover peoples’ real emails. Verified it works on my own email. We’re not disclosing how it works because Apple has not fixed it. But Apple has known for more than a year https://www.404media.co/apple-hide-my-email-vulnerability-reveals-peoples-real-email-addresses/

If AI is conscious, then so is Age of Empires II

Here's how someone built the fundamentals of an LLM in the classic video game, breaking down the whole 'are LLMs conscious' debate

Watch and subscribe here for more every week: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LlWJTM18z3E

We tried Snap's new Snap Specs, the 132 grams AI-powered glasses.

The augmented reality was unimpressive, it kept breaking, they cost $2,195 and they look fucking stupid

https://www.404media.co/snaps-ai-ar-specs-lol/

New: here's how hackers broke into Madison Square Garden. As I was going through the data, I noticed a lot came from a specific OneDrive. I found that employees identity in the dump, found their LinkedIn. They work at MSG. Hackers confirmed they voice-phished them https://www.404media.co/how-hackers-broke-into-madison-square-garden/

New: the tokenpocalypse is here, companies scrambling to stop spending so much on AI. I got leaked audio from consulting giant Accenture showing AI token spend/'chewing' is not from supercharged engineers. It's non-technical workers converting PDFs to presentations! https://www.404media.co/the-tokenpocalypse-is-here-companies-are-scrambling-to-stop-spending-so-much-on-ai/

This is wild: essentially every LLM—ChatGPT, Claude, Gemini—keeps using the same character when asked to make up a story, a guy called 'Elias Thorne'. He appears so much it's impacting Google Trends data and the self-published book market. Now we might know why https://www.404media.co/elias-thorne-chatbots-llms-chatgpt-lighthouse-keeper-story/

Some really crazy cases in here
- cop looked up ex-girlfriend and family in Flock 100+ times
- cop stalked wife giving "test" as reason
- cop searched one plate 395 times in 10 months; was later fired

Cops keep getting arrested for using Flock to stalk people

https://www.404media.co/cops-keep-getting-arrested-for-using-flock-to-stalk-people/

DHS just confirmed the plan to roll out a facial recognition app for local cops to scan peoples' faces to verify their immigration status. Agency said this is related to the 287(g) program; more than a thousand local and regional police departments are part of that https://www.404media.co/ices-plan-to-let-cops-around-the-country-scan-faces-to-verify-immigration-status/

We got a bunch of internal Amazon memes in which employees mock Amazon's own AI, refer to its output as “slop,” and joke about the company’s failed attempt to motivate employees to use AI tools effectively.

More here: https://www.404media.co/sloppenheimer-amazon-employees-mock-the-companys-ai-on-slack/

New: we've seen a bunch of internal Google memes that employees are making about how Google's AI sucks. While Google CEO Sundar Pichai tells the world 75% of all new code at Google is AI-generated, Google employees memeing about how AI is bad at that exact task. More: https://www.404media.co/google-employees-internally-share-memes-about-how-its-ai-sucks/

New from 404 Media: companies are using Reddit to manipulate ChatGPT and Google AI Search. The strategy is to systematically manipulate answers provided by chatbots by manipulating the underlying source material those chatbots scrape—in this case, a popular subreddit
https://www.404media.co/companies-are-using-reddit-to-manipulate-chatgpt-and-google-ai-search/

New from 404 Media: we've seen internal documents that show Microsoft is explicitly planning to "make people addicted" to its new AI assistant 'Scout' which the company just announced. It is a clear goal according to the documents, with addiction being the first phase https://www.404media.co/microsoft-wants-to-make-people-addicted-to-scout-its-new-ai-assistant-internal-documents-reveal/

This is absolutely nuts: hackers are hijacking high-profile Instagram accounts by simply asking Meta's AI chatbot to change the email on the account. Meta's AI does it, hacker gets password reset code, they're in. A staggering security issue

https://www.404media.co/hackers-simply-asked-meta-ai-to-give-them-access-to-high-profile-instagram-accounts-it-worked/

The owner of an app that uses AI to scan peoples' poop is now trying to sell the database of peoples' poop

Watch, subscribe here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VE0EtqQLcgY

Recently I opened up Microsoft Teams and was greeted with a deepfaked version of my own face. Here's how we got the Chinese-language software being marketed to scammers, and which can be used on WhatsApp, Zoom, other platforms. This is where fraud is right now

More: https://www.404media.co/hello-boss-inside-the-chinese-realtime-deepfake-software-powering-scams-around-the-world/

New from 404 Media: Skyrocketing hard drive and storage costs caused by the AI data center boom are making it more expensive and more difficult for digital archivists, academics, Wikipedia, and hobby data hoarders to save data and archive the internet https://www.404media.co/the-ai-hard-drive-shortage-is-making-it-more-expensive-and-harder-to-archive-the-internet/

RightsCon was suddenly delayed because Zambia's Ministry of Information has issues with the speakers. Several participants reached by 404 Media said they were unsure what they were going to do, and weren’t sure if they were going to get on their flights to Lusaka https://www.404media.co/rightscon-human-rights-conference-suddenly-postponed/

Apple pushed an update that stopped deleted Signal messages being stored in the iPhone’s notification database. This comes directly in response to 404 Media finding the FBI was using this technique to recover deleted Signal messages. No longer an issue now https://www.404media.co/apple-fixes-bug-that-let-fbi-extract-deleted-signal-messages-after-404-media-coverage/