The top pods

Facial ID, no thanks: Airport scanners know your face before TSA even checks your ID. It’s now live at 84 airports, pitched as “frictionless.” Opting out is possible, but no one tells you how. Critics say it screams surveillance state. TSA says it’s just “enhanced security.” Next upgrade: retina scan in the TSA PreCheck mirror.

Of all spam emails in the world come from the U.S. We’ve got loads of data centers, which makes it difficult to enforce regulations properly. This isn’t just inbox clutter, either; 67% of those messages contain phishing or malware links. You could say we’re the outbreak monkey of the internet.

Watt is love? Baby don’t Hertz me: Tesla’s wheeling out its long-hyped robotaxis in Austin, starting with 10 cars and ramping to a thousand, basically a product experiment with bumpers. Musk says they’ll “geofence” the cars into safer areas. Everyone’s watching, especially Waymo. 

Netflix cuts off Fire TV devices: Starting June 3, first-gen Fire TV, Fire TV Stick and the Alexa remote version will stop working. Why? They haven’t received security updates in years and can’t handle newer streaming tech. If you need an upgrade, the latest 4K Max model is 33% off.

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“Destroying my mind”: That’s how 22-year-old Sarah Hills felt about her Oura Ring (paywall link). Every spike in heart rate or dip in her “readiness score” sent her into a panic. It’s called “Oura paranoia,” and she’s not alone. Oura’s own head of science says he takes breaks from wearing his ring. You might want to do that with a wearable, too.

📸 Talk about driving a point home: Rep. Nancy Mace displayed a censored still of her naked body at a congressional hearing, saying it was taken without her consent by her ex-fiancé’s security cam. She’s pushing two bills to beef up federal voyeurism laws. The ex denies it all. The Founding Fathers did not die for 4K creep shots.

Dumb TikTok prank: Kids are sneaking up behind people in stores, tapping their phone to your phone and playing the Apple Pay “ding” sound. No, they’re not stealing your money. They’re just faking it with a sound clip. It gets worse. Someone’s filming your reaction. Because apparently, that counts as great content now.

🧳 TSA bans chargers: Portable chargers and power banks now have to go in your carry-on only. Why? Most use lithium-ion batteries, which can catch fire in a plane’s cargo hold (paywall link). Easy rule to remember: If it can spark, leak, ignite or explode, it doesn’t belong in your suitcase.

📡 Siri’s not OK: Maybe you’re like me getting so frustrated at it because it just sucks. Apple’s AI fix is … other people’s AI. Siri flopped so hard, Apple’s sending us off to ChatGPT (and maybe Gemini and Perplexity, too) to avoid embarrassment. A shiny new, non-humiliating Siri is in the works, but don’t hold your breath. It’s not even invited to Apple’s developers conference in June.

🤖 AI > teachers? Duolingo’s CEO says AI will out-teach humans … it knows what you know, when you know it and maybe when to yell at you with eerie accuracy. He expects computers to do most instruction “in a few decades,” but schools won’t go extinct, only because we need childcare, at least until ChatGPT can watch toddlers at home.