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October 9, 2025

🔥 Suspect arrested: A 29-year-old Uber driver named Jonathan Rinderknecht has been arrested for allegedly starting the Palisades Fire that killed 12 and destroyed nearly 7,000 homes in LA. Feds say he started an open flame right after dropping off passengers and used ChatGPT to create images of a “dystopian painting” of a city being burned on one side while “hundreds of thousands of people in poverty are trying to get past a gigantic gate with a big dollar sign on it.” He faces 20 years.

Medicare’s not calling: Open enrollment season almost guarantees you’re going to get more scam calls. Real Medicare won’t call unless they’ve mailed you first. If someone wants your SSN over the phone, they’re shopping for gullible folks. These scammers aren’t sloppy either, they’re international pros who can drain tens of thousands before you notice.

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📞 Party like it’s 1999: A crew of Seattle parents just made a pact: no smartphones for their kids. Instead? A single landline they all share between houses. If your friend’s not home, tough. You’ll survive. Next thing you know, they’ll be making mix tapes.

AT&T owes you: Two massive data breaches exposed info from 73 million AT&T customers, and the company’s dishing out $177M to make it go away. If your SSN was part of the leak, you could grab up to $7,500. Check if you’re eligible. Go to TelecomDataSettlement.com, enter your Class Member ID (or request one) and submit your claim by Nov. 18, 2025.

🧠 Nano way! Scientists reversed Alzheimer’s in mice, using nanotech. Instead of just delivering medicine, tiny “smart” particles cut toxic brain proteins in half within an hour. Even more wild? The mice got their memory and cognitive function back. One giant leap for mousekind … and maybe one day, for us.

🎚️ Turn it down: Ever had a Hulu or Netflix ad jump-scare scream at you mid-binge? Starting 2026, your stream won’t double as a hearing test. California just passed SB 576, a new law that forces services like Netflix, Hulu and YouTube to keep commercial volume in check. Ads must match the level of whatever you were watching. It started because one guy’s baby kept waking up, and now, we all get quieter commercials. Bless that tired parent.

💬 Hide your WhatsApp status: Planning a surprise and don’t want everyone to know? When creating a status, tap Updates > Add status. In the bottom left, where it says Status (Contacts), choose My contacts except. Pick who shouldn’t see it, hit Done and your secret’s safe.

📎 PDF = Pretty Deceptive File: Think PDFs are safe because they’re “just documents”? Nope. A new tool kit called MatrixPDF lets hackers secretly bake malicious code, fake overlays or phishing traps into what look like normal, trusted PDFs. Paired with AI tools like SpamGPT, that same file you thought was harmless could be weaponized and distributed at scale. Most security filters don’t flag anything until after you click, so staying cautious is more important than ever.

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📱 Save data on Facebook: Watching videos eats up your mobile plan fast. You can cut usage by up to 40% by lowering video quality. Just tap the three-dot menu (top right) > Settings & privacy > Settings > Media > toggle on Data Saver. While you’re there, set Autoplay in Feed and Stories to Wi-Fi only.

Make AI dad go away: Zelda Williams slammed fans for sending AI-generated clips of her late father, Robin Williams, calling them “disgusting, over-processed hotdogs” of human art. She said he’d never want his voice or face used that way, and I get it. Let him rest, folks. Chill out on the deepfake Sora 2 celeb videos.

🎛️ ChatGPT’s got apps: You can summon Spotify, Zillow or Canva inside ChatGPT, no tab-hopping required. Make playlists, design posts or house-hunt mid-convo. Expedia, DoorDash and Uber are next. It’s all fun and games until $1,000 worth of Taco Bell shows up at your door. Update is rolling out now.

Discord hacked: Ever reach out to Discord support? One of their customer service vendors got hacked, leaking names, emails, billing info and even some ID and passport scans. The main app’s safe, but the help desk not so much. The hacker even tried to ransom the stolen data. Discord says the main platform and passwords are safe. So a reminder: Even when you trust the service, the companies they work with can still put your data at risk.

🧡 Taylor’s bad blood with AI bots: After the pop star hyped an elaborate “orange door” puzzle in her Life of a Showgirl release, Swifties learned the visuals were AI-generated and not handcrafted clues. Now she’s down a million Instagram followers and up a million think pieces on “authenticity.” Don’t be sad. The Life of a Showgirl has already sold over 3 million copies in the U.S. In just the first two days, its songs racked up more than 300 million official on-demand streams and counting. I think she’s gonna be OK.

🏝️ Paradise.ai: Here’s something to tell your friends that will make them say, “Wow, you’re so smart.” Tiny Anguilla (population 15,000) stumbled into a digital jackpot, owning the “.ai” domain every startup wants. In 2024 alone, those two letters brought in $39 million selling domain names to startups like Character.ai and Perplexity.ai. That’s nearly a quarter of the island’s government revenue. When in a gold rush, sell vowels.