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Received today — 26 April 2025

Trump DOJ goon threatens Wikipedia

25 April 2025 at 22:33

Interim DC attorney Ed Martin has written a letter to the Wikimedia Foundation — the organization behind Wikipedia — that calls into question its status as a nonprofit entity. In the letter, which was obtained by The Free Press, Martin claims he found that Wikipedia “is engaging in a series of activities that could violate its obligations” under US law about tax-exempt organizations.

Under the law (Section 501(c)(3) of Title 26), tax-exempt organizations must operate “exclusively for religious, charitable, scientific, testing for public safety, literary, or educational purposes.” Martin alleges that Wikipedia is “allowing foreign actors to manipulate information and spread propaganda,” including by “rewriting” historical events and through “other matters implicating the national security and the interests of the United States.”

Martin is known for thinly justified legal threats against media organizations. In recent days, Martin has sent letters to the New England Journal of Medicine, the CHEST Journal, and Obstetrics and Gynecology, accusing them of being “partisan in various scientific debates.”

Martin asks the Wikimedia Foundation to respond to several questions, such as what it’s doing to “safeguard” the public from propaganda, as well as efforts to exclude “foreign influence operatives from making targeted edits” on topics that would “reshape or rewrite history.” He’s giving the Foundation until May 15th to respond.

“Wikipedia’s content is governed by three core content policies: neutral point of viewverifiability, and no original research, which exist to ensure information is presented as accurately, fairly, and neutrally as possible,” Jacob Rogers, the Wikimedia Foundation’s associate general counsel, said in an emailed statement to The Verge. “The entire process of content moderation is overseen by nearly 260,000 volunteers and is open and transparent for all to see, which is why we welcome opportunities to explain how Wikipedia works and will do so in the appropriate forum.”

Martin’s letter reflects a broader trend of the right targeting Wikipedia. Last year, Elon Musk told supporters to “stop donating to Wokepedia” before later calling the site “an extension of legacy media propaganda.” In January, a report from Forward.com found that The Heritage Foundation, the right-wing think tank behind Project 2025, created a presentation with a series of slides geared toward “targeting” Wikipedia editors.

The Wikimedia Foundation has since created tools to protect the identities of editors, with CEO Maryana Iskander telling the community that it’s “seeing an increase in threats, both regulation and litigation across the world,” as reported by 404 Media.

Received before yesterday

WhatsApp now lets you block people from exporting your entire chat history

23 April 2025 at 17:59

WhatsApp is launching a new “Advanced Chat Privacy” feature that aims to prevent people from taking conversations outside the app. When the setting is turned on, you can block others from exporting your chat history and automatically downloading photos and videos sent in the app.

The feature will prevent people from using messages for Meta AI as well, which you can currently use to ask questions within a chat and generate images.

By default, WhatsApp saves photos and videos in a chat to your phone’s local storage. It also lets you and your recipients export chats (with or without media) to your messages, email, or notes app. The Advanced Chat Privacy setting will prevent this in group and individual chats.

This feature still doesn’t stop people from taking screenshots of your messages or manually downloading media from chats, WhatsApp spokesperson Zade Alsawah confirmed to The Verge. However, WhatsApp says this is its “first version” of the feature, and that it plans to add more protections down the line.

“We think this feature is best used when talking with groups where you may not know everyone closely but are nevertheless sensitive in nature,” WhatsApp says in its announcement. WABetaInfo first spotted this feature earlier this month, and now it’s rolling out to the latest version of the app. You can turn on the setting by tapping the name of your chat and selecting Advanced Chat Privacy.

Update, April 23rd: Added information from WhatsApp.

NSA director fired after Trump’s meeting with right-wing influencer Laura Loomer

4 April 2025 at 14:12
An image of General Timothy Haugh
General Timothy Haugh was nominated as head of the NSA and Cyber Command in 2023.

General Timothy Haugh, the director of the National Security Agency and US Cyber Command, was fired on Thursday, according to a report from The Washington Post. His removal reportedly occurred just one day after right-wing activist Laura Loomer pushed for his firing during a meeting with President Donald Trump.

Wendy Noble, the Deputy Director and senior civilian leader of the U.S. National Security Agency, has also been fired and may have been moved to another role at the Pentagon, according to The New York Times.

“NSA Director Tim Haugh and his deputy Wendy Noble have been disloyal to President Trump,” Loomer wrote in a post on X. “That is why they have been fired.” Loomer said Haugh was “hand picked” by General Mark Milley, who butted heads with Trump during his first term. “Why would we want an NSA Director who was referred to Biden after being hand selected by Milley,” Loomer wrote.

Former President Joe Biden nominated Haugh in 2023. He spent more than 30 years in the military and led the Cyber Command’s Cyber National Mission Force.

It is astonishing that President Trump would fire the nonpartisan leader of the NSA while still failing to hold any member of his team accountable for leaking classified information on Signal – even as he apparently takes staffing direction from a discredited conspiracy theorist in the Oval Office.

Senator Mark Warner (@markwarner.bsky.social) 2025-04-04T03:03:05.183Z

Democrats on the Intelligence Committee criticized Haugh’s ousting. “It is astonishing that President Trump would fire the nonpartisan leader of the NSA while still failing to hold any member of his team accountable for leaking classified information on Signal – even as he apparently takes staffing direction from a discredited conspiracy theorist in the Oval Office,” Senator Mark Warner (D-VA) said in a post on Bluesky. Representative Jim Himes (D-CT) said in a statement to The Post he was “deeply disturbed” by Haugh’s removal.

Lieutenant General William J. Hartman, who served as the Cyber Command Deputy, has been named the acting director of the NSA, while NSA executive director Sheila Thomas was appointed acting deputy, according to The Post.

PSA pauses card grading submissions from outside the US

3 April 2025 at 22:17
A photo showing graded Pokemon cards

The card grading service PSA will no longer take direct submissions from outside the US in response to the Trump administration’s new far-reaching tariffs. In an update on Wednesday, PSA says it’s “reluctantly taking these measures to protect our international customers from significant tariff expenses.”

As noted by PSA, the tariffs are “against the value of the items in the order rather than on the PSA service fee.” That means sending high-value Pokémon or sports cards to PSA would result in hefty fees. Under a 10 percent tariff, for example, a card valued at $5,000 would incur a $500 fee.

Though PSA is pausing international submissions now, that doesn’t mean cards currently at — or in transit — to its facilities will escape additional charges. PSA notes that orders entering the US after 12:01AM on April 5th may be affected by tariffs, and may also face “not-yet-announced” retaliatory tariffs upon return. “PSA will leverage available means to limit tariff exposure for customers outside of the US,” the company says.

PSA has already stopped accepting direct submissions from Canada, China, Hong Kong, and Mexico due to the first round of tariffs imposed earlier this year. However, PSA notes that customers in Canada and Japan can still get their cards graded by sending or bringing them to its physical locations in both countries.

TikTok is shutting down its Instagram-like Notes app

3 April 2025 at 20:43

TikTok is shutting down Notes, its photos-sharing app that rivaled Instagram. In a notification to users, the TikTok Notes team says the app will stop working starting May 8th, and “all related features will no longer be available.”

TikTok first rolled out Notes in April of last year, which lets users share photos alongside a caption, as well as scroll through a “For You” feed with recommended content. The app was initially rolled out in limited testing to Australia and Canada.

The decision to close the app “was not made lightly,” according to TikTok’s message. It also suggests that users try out Lemon8, another social platform owned by TikTok parent company ByteDance.

Lemon8 lets users share both photos and videos, and has a focus on lifestyle topics, like beauty, food, fashion, travel, and pets. Though TikTok started nudging users toward the app in the days leading up to its brief shutdown in the US, Lemon8 was also taken offline by the ban.

“We’re excited to bring the feedback from TikTok Notes to Lemon8 as we continue building a dedicated space for our community to share and experience photo content, designed to complement and enhance the TikTok experience,” a TikTok spokesperson said to TechCrunch.

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