The Galaxy S25 is going to come in a few colors for each device. The less expensive Galaxy S24 and S24+ will mirror each other in choices, while the Galaxy S25 Ultra is going to come in several exclusive options. In the latest leak, we get a good look at every color (almost) in the flesh.
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The US Treasury Department announced in a letter back in December that it had been the victim of a security breach, attributing it to a “China state-sponsored Advanced Persistent Threat actor.” Now we know more about the extent of the hack, thanks to reporting by Bloomberg.
The hacking group got into more than 400 laptop and desktop computers, many of which were linked to senior leaders focused on “sanctions, international affairs and intelligence.” They also accessed employee usernames and passwords, in addition to more than 3,000 files on unclassified personal computers. These documents included travel data, organizational charts, sanction materials and foreign investment metrics.
An agency report indicates that the perpetrators likely stole a whole lot of this data, but were unable to get into the Treasury’s classified or email systems. The hackers did access materials regarding investigations run by the Committee on Foreign Investment. This committee reviews security implications surrounding real estate purchases and foreign investments in the US.
The agency report also notes that there wasn’t any evidence to suggest that the hackers tried to hide in the Treasury’s systems for the purpose of long-term intelligence gathering, and they didn’t leave behind any malware.
China reacts on ‘Treasury-Hack’ pic.twitter.com/7j7OaQ6eKD
— Willem Middelkoop (@wmiddelkoop) January 2, 2025
Investigators have attributed the intrusion to a notorious Chinese state-sponsored hacking group called Silk Typhoon, Halfnium or UNC5221. It has been suggested that they performed the hack outside of normal working hours to avoid detection. Last month, a spokesperson for the Chinese Foreign Ministry called the accusation that the attack was state-sponsored “unwarranted and groundless.”
Counterintelligence officials are still in the midst of a “comprehensive damage assessment” but Treasury employees are set to brief the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing and Urban Affairs on the matter this week.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/cybersecurity/china-linked-hackers-accessed-over-400-us-treasury-computers-182420268.html?src=rss©
© Wikimedia Commons
Tesla is declaring the Cybertruck to be “America’s bestselling electric pickup truck in 2024.” And yet for the first time, the company offering discounts of up to $2,600 on the low-poly truck, a sign that demand may not be as strong as Tesla would like you to think.
The discounts, which appear on the company’s inventory webpage, are as high as $1,600 for brand new Cybertrucks, and up to $2,600 for slightly used demo versions of the truck. The price reduction you see will depend on how you configure your Cybertruck.
The discounts come as the electric vehicle market is suddenly brimming with a multitude of offerings, from established players like Chevy and Hyundai, to upstarts like Rivian and Lucid. People shopping for an electric truck in particular have a lot of options, including the Ford F-150 Lightning, Chevy Silverado EV, GMC Hummer and Sierra EVs, and Rivian R1T.
The truck that
— Cybertruck (@cybertruck) January 15, 2025
“they won’t make” & that “nobody will buy”
… has become America’s bestselling electric pickup truck in 2024
Thank you Cybertruck owners! pic.twitter.com/8YBFNeCXjh
But the Cybertruck is outselling all of those options, according to Tesla. How do we know? You’re just going to have to take their word on it, because Tesla doesn’t break out sales numbers for the Cybertruck — instead just lumping it in with its “other models,” like the Model S, Model X, and Tesla Semi. As noticed by Electrek, that stands in contrast to how Ford reports its sales numbers.
For example, Ford said it sold 33,510 F-150 Lightnings in 2024. And Tesla sold an estimated 40,000 Cybertrucks, which would back up its claim of best-selling electric truck in the US. But again, those are just estimates.
The discounts certainly add a wrinkle to Tesla’s claim. Prices tend to be reduced when a manufacturer has too many cars to sell. And since Tesla bypasses the traditional dealership model to sell vehicles directly to customers, the discounts come directly from the company.
After appearing on the company’s inventory page late last year, Foundation series Cybertrucks were recently removed. And earlier this month, Tesla asked factory employees working on the Cybertruck line to stay home for three days, according to Business Insider. It would seem as if demand is starting to weaken — a phenomenon being experienced by almost every automaker with EVs to sell. After selling cars to all the early adopters, companies are struggling to push their products on more price conscious, mass market shoppers.
All of this evidence points to weakening demand for the Cybertruck. The EV certainly has its fans, but the polarizing design, as well as Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s hard right politics, has also been a factor in the truck’s diminishing appeal.
And with EV incentives likely to disappear under Donald Trump, and tariffs expected to roil the auto industry, the Cybertruck looks like it’s in for an even harsher 2025.
More than 700,000 US-based users have downloaded RedNote, a popular Chinese social app, as the TikTok ban deadline looms — but they may find themselves looking for yet another TikTok alternative soon. A US official told CBS News that Xiaohongshu, the app more commonly referred to as RedNote, has many of the same issues that caused Congress to ban TikTok and that the app could eventually face a similar ban unless it divests from its China-based parent company.
“This appears to be the kind of app that the statute would apply to and could face the same restrictions as TikTok if it’s not divested,” the anonymous official told CBS News on Thursday, referring to the Protecting Americans from Foreign Adversary Controlled Applications Act, the bill under which Congress banned TikTok.
Among the problems lawmakers raised in the lead-up to the TikTok ban was the Chinese government’s sway over TikTok’s content moderation practices — an issue that appears to apply to RedNote as well. Per The Information, RedNote has begun removing US users’ posts that are considered “too sensitive” for the app, including posts discussing LGBTQ topics. Three people with knowledge of communications between RedNote and officials with the Cyberspace Administration of China told The Information that regulators are concerned about politically sensitive posts — and Chinese officials told RedNote’s government relations team to ensure that users in China can’t see US users’ posts.
Privacy advocates are also warning against using RedNote. In an emailed statement, Cooper Quintin, the senior staff technologist at the Electronic Frontier Foundation, said “anyone for whom privacy is a matter of personal safety” should think twice before downloading RedNote, adding that the EFF has similar concerns about US-based apps like Facebook.
“People looking for alternative social media apps should be cautious about the privacy implications of sharing information with an app that has not yet seen substantial public scrutiny outside of China,” Quintin said. “This is certainly not a platform which values free speech – it’s a heavily censored application on which topics such as political speech, drugs and addiction, and sexuality are more tightly controlled even than similar social networks. This is also not a platform that will protect you from US-based surveillance capitalism as it shares data with Facebook and Google ad networks.”
Welcome back to TechCrunch Mobility — your central hub for news and insights on the future of transportation. Sign up here for free — just click TechCrunch Mobility! Before we move into the news of this week, we have one more roundup of transportation tech at CES 2025. As I noted last week, autonomous vehicle […]
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Trading platform eToro has reportedly filed confidentially for a US IPO that could value the company at over $5 billion.
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Cosmos SDK-based blockchains face significant hurdles in scaling effectively. As validator networks expand, existing consensus mechanisms often falter, creating performance bottlenecks that slow transaction throughput. Inefficient network communication and the overhead of validator consensus messages exacerbate these issues. Additionally, integrating […]
The post Meter launches Supernova Core: A Cosmos SDK-compatible framework to address blockchain scalability and performance challenges first appeared on Tech Startups.
As we swiftly approach a public release later this month, Apple has released iOS 18.3 beta 3 for developers.
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Apple has just released new beta software for Mac and Vision Pro. macOS Sequoia 15.3 and visionOS 2.3 beta 3 are rolling out now for users with a developer account.
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Microsoft is bundling its AI-powered Office features into Microsoft 365 Personal and Home subscriptions, but it’s also raising prices as a result. Previously, Microsoft 365 subscribers had to pay an extra $20 per month to get Copilot inside Office apps like Word, Excel, and PowerPoint as part of a Copilot Pro subscription, but Microsoft is now adding these AI features to Microsoft 365 apps for an extra $3 per month. Existing subscribers can opt out of the AI features and not suffer the price increase, though.
Microsoft has been testing adding AI-powered Office apps, the most important feature of Copilot Pro, into the Microsoft 365 subscriptions in recent months. What was previously only available in Australia, New Zealand, and a number of countries across Asia is now expanding to most markets worldwide.
While it feels like Microsoft is admitting that people aren’t willing to pay an extra $20 a month for AI-powered Office features, Microsoft argues it has always wanted to bring AI features to more users.
“We know that people are willing to pay for the integration into Microsoft 365,” says Gareth Oystryk, senior director of marketing for Copilot Pro and Microsoft 365, in an interview with The Verge. “Copilot Pro is an opportunity to learn from our power users and early adopters. Our plan all along has been how do we bring this value to as many subscribers as possible in a way that works for them and for us.”
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Image: Microsoft
Copilot Pro isn’t going away, and Microsoft isn’t reducing its $20 monthly pricing, either. It will remain for power users who want priority access to the latest AI models, along with early access to new AI features. “We definitely have a place for Copilot Pro,” says Oystryk. “There is still a group of folks that enjoy the power use of Copilot Pro.”
Microsoft is raising the price of Microsoft 365 Personal and Family subscriptions by $3 per month in the US to bring these AI-powered Office features to all subscribers. “We are raising the prices of Microsoft 365 Personal and Family for the first time in 12 years,” says Oystryk. “We’ve never actually raised the price in the US and we’re raising it by $3 a month, along with similar amounts in other markets.”
Nobody likes price increases, and consumers are especially sensitive to being asked to pay more for AI features right now. If you don’t want to pay extra for these AI features, then Microsoft will have plans for existing subscribers to remain at the same price point without Copilot in Office apps.
“We’ve created two new plans that are really only going to be available for the next year, Personal Classic and Family Classic,” explains Oystryk. “They’ll be available as folks go through the renewal cycle. If they go to cancel they’ll have the opportunity to pick one of these Personal Classic or Family Classic plans.”
/cdn.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/25833729/PowerPoint.png)
Image: Microsoft
These plans will only be available to existing Microsoft 365 subscribers, and new subscribers will get AI-powered Office features by default with the new pricing changes. It sounds like the classic plans won’t get any of Microsoft’s big new features, though. “They’ll continue to get security updates and minor feature updates, but any new additional innovations that we deliver in the future won’t be included in those plans,” says Oystryk.
Microsoft is also introducing a new AI credits system today, alongside its Microsoft 365 subscription changes. It’s a new system that works across most of Microsoft’s AI-powered consumer experiences, including Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and OneNote. You’ll get a monthly allotment of credits within Microsoft 365 Personal and Family to use on things like image generation in the Designer app or in apps on Windows like Paint, Photos, and Notepad. Copilot Pro essentially includes unlimited usage of all of these AI features, based on a fair usage policy.
Microsoft is also making it easy to turn off Copilot in Office apps if you simply don’t want the AI assistant or you’re a student and your school has policies against using AI. “The most interesting piece of feedback we learned is that there are times where our users want to turn off Copilot,” says Oystryk. “We’ve been working to add new settings to some of our key apps that allow people to toggle off Copilot.” This is coming to Word first today and then Excel and PowerPoint in the coming weeks.
Nintendo has finally revealed its new console, debuting the Switch 2 with a short video that went heavy on visuals but light on information. The video was paired with a brief follow-up press release from Nintendo that also didn’t go into much detail, with the company ostensibly saving all the juicy stuff for the Switch 2 Direct set to take place on April 2nd. While we wait for official word, here are the burning questions we still have about the Nintendo Switch 2.
Perhaps the most glaring omission in the Switch 2 reveal was the fact that Nintendo didn’t say anything about how powerful the new console is. We can see that the console is bigger, but what’s the screen size? Is it OLED or LCD? Is the screen resolution still 720p? Is 4K resolution supported?
Though visible for a few brief moments, the reveal video showed off the Switch 2’s new dock. What’s the docked resolution? Is it just a charging shell, or is it still required for TV play? Can you dock the Switch 2 in the original Switch dock, or will it support all the super-portable third-party docks?
The Switch 2 also features a second USB-C port at the top. It’s likely there to offer a way to...
The US Food and Drug Administration is banning the use of Red Dye No. 3 in food, drinks, and medication, the agency announced Wednesday. The dye, which the FDA says gives certain candies, cakes, and frostings a “bright, cherry-red color,” was found to cause cancer in male rats.
Food manufacturers in the US now have until January 15th, 2027 to reformulate their products without Red Dye No. 3, while drugmakers must take action by January 18th, 2028. Its ban as a food additive comes 35 years after the FDA banned its use in cosmetics and topical drugs in 1990. California similarly banned Red No. 3 and other food additives in 2023, while the European Union, the UK, Australia, and New Zealand also restrict the use of the dye.
Under the Delaney Clause of the Federal Food, Drug, and Cosmetic Act (FD&C Act), the FDA must ban foods that induce cancer in humans or animals. However, the FDA notes that studies involving other animals and humans “did not show these effects,” adding that claims stating Red Dye No. 3 in humans “are not supported by the available scientific information.”
Here are some foods that may use Red Dye No. 3, according to Amanda Beaver, a wellness dietician at Houston Methodist Hospital:
You can check whether a food has Red Dye No. 3 by checking the product’s ingredient list, or using food databases from the US Department of Agriculture and the Environmental Working Group.
The FDA’s decision to ban Red Dye No. 3 comes just days before President-elect Donald Trump will be sworn into office. Robert F. Kennedy Jr., Trump’s pick for secretary of the Department of Health and Human Service, has considered taking action against food dyes and other potentially harmful additives.
In a bid to get even more people regularly coming back to the theater, AMC is rolling out a new set of perks for the cheapest (read: free) tier of its loyalty rewards program.
Though AMC doesn’t seem to be getting rid of the original Insider level of its AMC Stubs membership, the theater chain announced today that it’s introducing a new Premiere Go! tier that will offer subscribers even more benefits. In addition to discounted tickets on Tuesdays, free (large) popcorn refills, and access to AMC theaters’ priority lanes, Premiere Go! members will earn twice the amount of AMC points (which can be redeemed for more discounts) for every dollar spent.
Unlike the Insider tier, Premiere Go! Subscribers’ points won’t expire. But like the Premiere ($17.99 / year) and A-List (the monthly price varies by location) tiers, people using Premiere Go! will also be able to upgrade the size of their popcorn and fountain drinks at no additional cost. To become a Premiere Go! member, you’ll have to see at least eight movies a year or earn 5,000 points, and once you do, you’ll keep the status through the entirety of the next year.
In a statement about the new tier, AMC’s senior VP of marketing Ellen Copaken described it as a way of offering customers “an exciting and achievable pathway to unlock enhanced rewards simply by enjoying the movies they love.”
Everything about the new tier feels like AMC is trying to get more people to consider signing up for Stubs’ A-Tier, which launched back in 2018 as a direct response to MoviePass. And given how MoviePass’ legacy just became even more tarnished by former CEO Mitch Lower pleading guilty to fraud, Stubs is probably looking a lot more attractive by comparison now.
Will Instagram Threads truly integrate with the fediverse, also known as the open social web, to allow its users not only to interact with people on other services like Twitter alternative Mastodon but also to move their account elsewhere if they decide that Meta’s policies are no longer to their liking? Today that answer remains […]
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