...because VPNs obscure a user’s true location, and because intelligence agencies presume that communications of unknown origin are foreign, Americans may be inadvertently waiving the privacy protections they’re entitled to under the law...

...VPNs might protect you against garden-variety criminals, but the intentional commingling of origin/destination points by VPNs could turn purely domestic communications into “foreign” communications the NSA can legally intercept (and the FBI, somewhat less-legally can dip into at will)...

Certainly the NSA isn’t concerned about “incidental collection.” It’s never been too concerned about its consistent “incidental” collection of US persons’ communications and data in the past and this isn’t going to budge the needle, especially since it means the NSA would have to do more work to filter out domestic communications and the FBI would be less than thrilled with any efforts made to deny it access to communications it doesn’t have the legal right to obtain on its own.

Since the government won’t do this, it’s up to the general public, starting with everyone sharing the contents of this letter with others. VPNs can still offer considerable security benefits. But everyone needs to know that domestic surveillance is one of the possible side effects of utilizing this tech.

The Trump administration is organising an international summit focused on countering the left-wing movement Antifa and other groups, three sources familiar with the matter said.

The effort highlights the shift in the US government’s counterterrorism priorities over the past year.

The conference, tentatively planned for June or July, will convene officials from various nations to discuss strategies for battling Antifa and encourage intelligence sharing, said the sources, who requested anonymity as they were not authorised to speak to the media.

US President Donald Trump has portrayed Antifa as a severe threat to the US.

Counterterrorism experts argue it does not exist as an organised entity, though people claiming affinity to Antifa have been involved in armed attacks in the US.

...

International humanitarian law prohibits countries from targeting civilian facilities, and dictates that a military must do everything possible to limit harm to civilians even if they are striking military targets. Photos of the facility posted by Iranian officials show that the building appears completely destroyed, with the top floor charred and blown out while destruction spilled down to the ground floor.

The letter states that Iran has never initiated a war and has resolutely repelled those who have attacked it, and that portraying Iran as a threat is not consistent with historical reality or present-day observable facts.

The President invites Americans to look beyond the machinery of misinformation and consider the realities of Iran and its people, and to choose between confrontation and engagement, which will shape the future for generations to come.

"This is not merely another war crime committed as part of an illegal war; it is a barbaric assault on basic human core values," Esmaeil Baqaei wrote on social media.

An Israeli Instagram page has sparked anger on social media after it shared an image of a soldier using a detained, blindfolded Palestinian father to advertise its jewellery business.

The Instagram page, named ‘Shilo_Jewelry’, published on Friday the image of a Palestinian man, with his hands tied and crouched down on a sofa. In his hands is a piece of paper on which the soldier appears to have written the business’s social media handle.

A Wi-Fi chip that can withstand heavy doses of radiation would give cleanup robots more freedom to move around without worrying about getting tangled in their communications line.

An investigation by Buzzfeed revealed that the UAE had hired mercenaries to assassinate prominent members of al-Islah, the Yemeni branch of the Muslim Brotherhood.

That report included leaked drone footage of a failed attempt in December 2015 to kill al-Islah's Mayo and everyone in his office.

In a BBC documentary aired in 2024, Gilmore admitted that Mayo was among the names on a "kill list".

Mayo has since said he suffers “psychological and emotional trauma” from the killing attempt, and now lives in exile in Saudi Arabia. His wife and two children remain in Yemen.

According to the NY Post, Golan plotted assassinations for the UAE from a huge $7m mansion in San Diego.

The lawsuit states Golan told Comstock that Spear had been hired by the UAE to carry out killings on its behalf.

The attempted assassination of Mayo began a spate of targeted killings in Yemen between 2015 and 2018, during which time human rights organisation Reprieve investigated 160 killings.

Reprieve found that only 23 of those killed had links to terror organisations.

The repercussions of the Israeli war of annihilation continue to burden the residents of the Gaza Strip, with a new health crisis emerging: thousands of children losing a significant portion of their hearing. The sounds of violent and continuous explosions, coupled with a severe shortage of medical care, have created a tragic reality that threatens the communicative and educational future of an entire generation.

By a vote of 62 to 48, Israel’s Knesset approved a law Monday enshrining the death penalty as the default punishment for Palestinians who carry out an “act of terrorism” on citizens of Israel. The law does not apply to the state-backed terrorism of far-right Zionist settlers, who routinely assault and kill Palestinians in the illegally occupied West Bank.

Anyone who deliberately kills a person with the intent of “negating the existence of the state of Israel” is to be executed by hanging. The law restricts access to legal counsel for the accused in Israel’s civil courts and grants immunity to all persons involved in carrying out such state executions.

For the system of military courts established by the Zionist regime in the West Bank, under which only Palestinian residents fall, execution by hanging will be the standard punishment for “acts of terrorism,” even without a prosecutorial request. Such executions must be carried out within 90 days. The only power given to the courts in this setting is to impose a life sentence in “exceptional circumstances.” Given how rampant torture and other forms of abuse in Israel’s prison system are, such a decision would in many instances amount to a death sentence by other means.

cross-posted from: https://lemmy.blahaj.zone/post/36712639

Ubisoft's first North American union, located at their Halifax, Nova Scotia studio, was certified on December 18th, 2025. Now, not even a full 30 days later, Ubisoft Halifax is closing.

This may not be an actual “Wyden siren,” but it still has his name attached to it. What’s being said here isn’t nearly as ominous as this single sentence he sent to CIA leadership earlier this year

Archived version: https://archive.is/newest/https://www.techdirt.com/2026/04/03/senators-ask-tulsi-gabbard-to-tell-americans-that-vpn-use-might-subject-them-to-domestic-surveillance/

Disclaimer: The article linked is from a single source with a single perspective. Make sure to cross-check information against multiple sources to get a comprehensive view on the situation.

Israel’s new death penalty law, which exclusively targets Palestinians, did not come out of nowhere. It was passed down from a scaffold the British had already built on the same land, testing it on the same people under the same sky. In his study of Britain’s “pacification” of Palestine, Matthew Hughes, a military historian at Brunel University, shows how the military courts established by the British Mandate in November 1937 were built for speed above all else — a terror performed so quickly that no one had time to appeal or look away. Shaykh Farhan al-Sa’di, an elderly Qassamite revolutionary leader and one of the principal field commanders of the 1936 uprising, was captured on a Monday, tried on a Wednesday, and hanged on a Saturday. It’s the same law Israel reintroduced today.

What those courts also reveal is that British execution policy was, from the beginning, applied differently depending on who stood before the judge. Palestinians were hanged for carrying four bullets; Jews received prison sentences for firing weapons. The courts were equal on paper and unequal in practice, and everyone living under them knew it.

In the first two weeks of its war on Iran, the US spent an estimated $2.1 billion a day. It’s no wonder Donald Trump is saying that the cost of war means the federal government can’t afford to spend money to help Americans meet their basic needs.

Lebanon is being ravaged as Israel’s escalated assault enters its second month. More than 1,300 people have been killed, including over 120 children, and over 4,000 injured in a relentless onslaught. Israel has issued displacement orders covering around 15% of Lebanese territory and more than 1.1 million people—about a fifth of the country’s population—have been forced from their homes. Emergency workers have also been increasingly targeted, with over 50 killed over the past four weeks.

In Friday’s briefing, army officials acknowledged the limits of their initial objectives of disarming Hezbollah, saying it “would require occupying all of Lebanon”.

The new plan, which is expected to be presented to political leaders, centres on the large-scale destruction of homes in villages near the boundary with Israel, with some exceptions reportedly made for Christian towns.

Officials said residents would not be allowed to return to areas identified as having hosted Hezbollah activity, even under future agreements.

The proposal comes as senior Israeli figures increasingly signal plans for a prolonged presence in southern Lebanon.

Earlier this week, Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the military would seize additional territory and expand the so-called “buffer zone”. Defence Minister Israel Katz has also said the army intends to “control” southern Lebanon.

Finance Minister Bezalel Smotrich went further, calling for the border to be redrawn at the Litani River, around 30km north of the current boundary and a key link between southern Lebanon and the rest of the country.

The national payment service provider NAPAS, in collaboration with Ant International and Vietcombank, has announced the launch of cross-border QR code payment services between Viet Nam and China.

Under the arrangement, Chinese tourists can use the Alipay e-wallet, an Ant International product, to scan VIETQRGlobal codes and make direct payments at merchants within NAPAS’s network in Viet Nam.

Bilateral QR code payment transactions are processed via the connectivity infrastructure between NAPAS and Ant International, supported by Vietcombank’s clearing and settlement system, enabling direct transactions in both local currencies.

The rollout comes as China continues to be one of Viet Nam’s largest source markets for international tourists.

Cross-border QR payments enhance the visitor experience by offering a familiar payment method, while also enabling businesses in retail, services, and tourism to better tap into international customer flows.

Speaking at the event, Nguyen Quang Minh, Chief Executive Officer of NAPAS, said the connection allows Chinese tourists to enjoy a familiar, convenient, and secure QR code payment experience, just as they do at home, while also creating additional growth opportunities for Vietnamese businesses.

Douglas Feagin, President of Ant International, noted that expanding cross-border payments not only serves tourists but also creates further opportunities for small and medium-sized enterprises to reach international customers.

According to NAPAS, in the near future the parties will complete the rollout of outbound payments from Viet Nam to China, allowing Vietnamese users to scan Alipay QR codes using local banking apps.

Once the two-way connection is fully established, the service is expected to significantly boost tourism and trade between the two countries.

Besides China, NAPAS has completed bilateral QR payment connectivity with Thailand, Laos, and Cambodia, and continues to expand into other markets across the region.