Court documents confirm that Facebook spied on encrypted data via Onavo VPN

Documents have been made public about "Project Ghostbusters", Facebook's program to intercept and decrypt the encrypted traffic of Snapchat users. They did this via Onavo, "a VPN-like service that Facebook acquired in 2013" and shut down in 2019 after they were accused of paying teens to use it in order to spy on them. By funneling all user traffic via a VPN they control, Facebook were able to do adversary-in-the-middle attacks so they could "read what would otherwise be encrypted traffic so we can measure in-app usage" on competitor apps. Pedro Canahuati, the then-head of security engineering said "I can't think of a good argument for why this is okay. No security person is ever comfortable with this, no matter what consent we get from the general public", but they did it anyways. Absolute bastards.

UK court gives Julian Assange a glimmer of hope

Julian Assange has a fresh chance at avoiding extradition to the USA for publishing Wikileaks, with the UK High Court saying there's a decent chance of success if he appeals the extradition. The court said in a press release that it has given the USA "3 weeks to give satisfactory assurances: that Mr Assange is permitted to rely on the First Amendment to the United States Constitution (which protects free speech), that he is not prejudiced at trial (including sentence) by reason of his nationality, that he is afforded the same First Amendment protections as a United States citizen and that the death penalty is not imposed". If the USA can promise that, appeal denied and off to the USA he goes, but if the USA can't promise what the UK is asking for, Julian can appeal and maybe he will be allowed to return to Australia.

New Vehicle Efficiency Standard locked in, not as strong as hoped but better than nothing

The government has finalised a plan for the New Vehicle Efficiency Standard. This factsheet explains how "for each vehicle that a supplier imports that miss the target, the supplier will have to offset this over two years by bringing in less-polluting cars, or by buying credits. If they don't, they'll need to pay a penalty" and "for each vehicle that a supplier imports that beats the target, the supplier earns credits". Unfortunately the 3 most popular vehicles in Australia - Hilux, Ranger and D-Max are in the Light Commercial Vehicle class and have weaker standards, so not much will change there for many years, but we should see more cars and SUVs with modern engines, more hybrids and way more EVs imported to Australia now that there's some incentive to actually do so.

A minimum effort podcast you might like to listen to

Raj and I sat in a park with some microphones and spent an hour whinging about the internet these days - no podcast, just an audio recording you can download and listen to. Doesn't really have a purpose but maybe you'd find it cathartic to hear us reminisce about the good internet, complain about the current internet, talk about how home automation, the weird shit on TikTok and how high the bar is for notifications on our phones. Please forgive the subtle mic rumbling/handling noise, it's the first time I've used these microphones! This might be a fortnightly thing with other people I've met on the internet over the years and consider a friend.