this post was submitted on 05 Sep 2025
168 points (96.2% liked)

Technology

74890 readers
2132 users here now

This is a most excellent place for technology news and articles.


Our Rules


  1. Follow the lemmy.world rules.
  2. Only tech related news or articles.
  3. Be excellent to each other!
  4. Mod approved content bots can post up to 10 articles per day.
  5. Threads asking for personal tech support may be deleted.
  6. Politics threads may be removed.
  7. No memes allowed as posts, OK to post as comments.
  8. Only approved bots from the list below, this includes using AI responses and summaries. To ask if your bot can be added please contact a mod.
  9. Check for duplicates before posting, duplicates may be removed
  10. Accounts 7 days and younger will have their posts automatically removed.

Approved Bots


founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
top 47 comments
sorted by: hot top controversial new old
[–] Passerby6497@lemmy.world 1 points 8 hours ago

Is this a new thing? I remember hearing about this like a decade ago

[–] GreenKnight23@lemmy.world 13 points 22 hours ago
[–] 6stringringer@lemmy.zip 22 points 1 day ago

This is what they would see if I was being targeted.

[–] fodor@lemmy.zip 4 points 1 day ago (1 children)

These days it's pretty weak blackmail shit. A little AI doctoring can create the same videos... So even if it's possible, that doesn't mean it's plausible, and nobody cares what you do in your bedroom by yourself.

[–] Squizzy@lemmy.world 1 points 10 hours ago

A friend of mine had this happen to him and he just told them to release it, nothing happened. He was willing to take the embarrassment if it did though is the crucial thing.

[–] meejle@lemmy.world 26 points 1 day ago

Surprised the UK age verification selfies haven't been used to extort people yet. It'd be so easy (and is such an obvious reason why the law is bullshit).

SecurAge🛡️
"Log in with Google to verify your age."

"Sorry, we weren't able to verify you using your Google Account. Please take a selfie for verification."

"Now give us £1000, or we'll send your picture and details of the porn you were trying to access to everyone in your contacts."

[–] stickly@lemmy.world 56 points 2 days ago
[–] gnuplusmatt@reddthat.com 41 points 2 days ago (4 children)

don't stream, download your porn from usenet like a civilised person

[–] Theoriginalthon@lemmy.world 1 points 19 hours ago

You could but you know there is nsfw content right here on Lemmy

[–] Korhaka@sopuli.xyz 1 points 21 hours ago (1 children)

In my day the popular kids would share it over bluetooth.

[–] IphtashuFitz@lemmy.world 1 points 12 hours ago

Bluetooth? I got mine from a dial-up BBS via a 1200 baud modem.

[–] rapchee@lemmy.world 4 points 1 day ago (2 children)

i get how usenet is better than streaming from a popup filled website, but i fail to see how it is better than torrenting
qbittorrent has built-in search as well

[–] ripcord@lemmy.world 1 points 21 hours ago

Popups? In 2025?

[–] FreedomAdvocate@lemmy.net.au 0 points 1 day ago (1 children)

You don’t understand the difference between Usenet and torrents.

[–] rapchee@lemmy.world 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

i haven't used it, only read some available documentation, but it seems like a subscription service to access a server with stuff of dubious legality on it, but please correct me if i'm wrong. i kinda want to get into it but, as i was saying, i fail to see how it is better than torrenting

[–] FreedomAdvocate@lemmy.net.au 2 points 1 day ago* (last edited 1 day ago) (2 children)

It’s better because it basically has everything that torrent sites have, since the same groups upload everything to both, but it’s all done over SSL encrypted connections so your ISP can’t see what you’re downloading, so you don’t need a VPN and you are downloading directly from servers so it’s much faster and you don’t have to worry about the number of seeders, nor do you have to seed yourself. You have many different providers you can sign up to, and many different indexers to help find what you are looking for. It also can download parts of the same content from different sources and combine them to make a whole.

Once you’ve tried it, torrenting feels so amateur and insecure and outdated. Ideally you just set up both, which is what I have done with qbittorrent running in a docker container with a built in VPN, but the torrents are the “last resort” when the content I want can’t be found on Usenet - which is very rarely.

[–] pmk@lemmy.sdf.org 6 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Doesn't this also mean that the server can be a single point of failure? Whereas in a torrent swarm it's distributed and more resilient?

[–] FreedomAdvocate@lemmy.net.au 1 points 2 hours ago

It's not like it's just some server in some persons house. They're hosted by companies on server farms that have guaranteed uptime figures and most have 2000+ day retention of data. I've been using it for 10+ years and have never had any server failure type issues.

[–] vacuumflower@lemmy.sdf.org 2 points 1 day ago (2 children)

It's also a fscking mess to set up a Usenet downloader, especially since it'd be a bunch of buggy weird stuff ending with -arr in the names and web UIs.

And no, torrenting isn't outdated and isn't amateur. In Usenet messages are replicated over all services offering that newsgroup. I hope the downsides are clear.

Some kind of Usenet with global identifiers of messages and posters, and with something like Kademlia to find sources for a specific newsgroup(to get all the other side has in it)/post(to get it specifically)/person(their public key), would be much better than just replicating each message everywhere with a local identifier.

[–] FreedomAdvocate@lemmy.net.au 1 points 2 hours ago

It’s also a fscking mess to set up a Usenet downloader, especially since it’d be a bunch of buggy weird stuff ending with -arr in the names and web UIs.

It's really not. You pretty much need to just put in some api keys for your indexer, downloader, and provider, and away you go.

In Usenet messages are replicated over all services offering that newsgroup. I hope the downsides are clear.

What downsides are you talking about in regards to downloading content from usenet?

[–] ArcaneSlime@lemmy.dbzer0.com 3 points 13 hours ago* (last edited 13 hours ago)

Well you could use the -arr stack but you could also just set up SABnzbd which is the same difficulty to set up as qbit/jackett.

I haven't touched the -arrs myself, just go to my indexer, click download, it goes into the correct folder which sabnzbd automatically picks up and starts a-downloadin', then it transfers the complete files to another folder.

But I use both, and slsk, and ytdl. Why limit myself?

[–] HeyJoe@lemmy.world 4 points 2 days ago

empornium FTW!

[–] cerebralhawks@lemmy.dbzer0.com 66 points 2 days ago (4 children)

Black Mirror had an episode about this.

Surprised it took someone this long to actually make it.

I forget the name of the episode. If you're curious, it's on Netflix, it's in season 3, and it's right before San Junipero. It was bleak AF, which is why the only happy (and arguably the best) Black Mirror episode came right after it.

[–] vacuumflower@lemmy.sdf.org 1 points 23 hours ago* (last edited 23 hours ago)

Yeah, so I have a paranoid (or maybe not) idea that somewhere in 2012 my classmates and teachers played a prank.

That they were insulted by what I said, and decided to check my words (on Silicon Valley people being more noble than Russian elite class). I thought I was talking to them, but they in fact were recording, translating and sending my words to some of those Silicon Valley people (very improbably high-level). And things pretty normal for me to say as almost a compliment (on democracy and meritocracy and freedom and on racism being bad, and MOST of all - on my privacy being more important than their dreams) insulted those people so much that I've got a lot of such privacy invasions. So - that in the end, eh, someone of said elite class solved the problem by wasting one of those Silicon Valley people (there was the added insult of that someone being blamed for the thing).

Dunno how to check and whether I should, cause if it happened, I don't have a nuke.

[–] CallateCoyote@lemmy.world 12 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Yeah, with quite a plot twist. The entire time I was practically yelling at the tv “who cares, then let’s them release the video of you jerking off and own it. We all do it!” Then at the end, “… oh.”

Right, the part I don’t get is, the video of you isn’t going to include what you’re looking at. And if it does you can say they faked it. They could put anything there. They don’t have a shot that includes both you and the screen. They can get sound though, so they can match sound, but that can be faked too. Strip out the audio. Separate the sounds of what you were really watching from the ambient sounds (and the grunts/moans from you) and then dub those sounds over the new audio and it should be passable.

Also, I just wouldn’t do anything embarrassing with a camera pointed at me. I’d cover the camera or point it away from me. Even sitting on the toilet browsing, back cameras point down at the floor, front camera points up, maybe gets the top of my face? Nothing private is seen by the camera by my best intentions. I just do this naturally. I guess others don’t?

[–] Aatube@kbin.melroy.org 21 points 2 days ago

It's Shut Up and Dance, my fav

the only

I disagree. For starters there's also

Episodes from the first five seasons with happy endings (the way they're presented, at least), spoilers duhUSS Callister Hang the DJ Be Right Back (though the stakes aren't that high either) Arguably one from Bandersnatch

Also, I don't like San Junipero as much as others do because the final conflict goes way too fast and the way it was resolved felt abrupt. Still nice though

[–] boonhet@sopuli.xyz 5 points 2 days ago

RATs existed for a long time but you needed to manually hit record I think? I’m assuming this is just some extra automation.

[–] devfuuu@lemmy.world 52 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Been receiving emails about this for years now. Finally can trust those messages.

[–] tidderuuf@lemmy.world 47 points 2 days ago (1 children)

I've been trusting them for years. It's a miracle that they were able to setup a webcam I've never owned in my life and have it filming where I always go to spank one out.

[–] zerofk@lemmy.zip 5 points 1 day ago

They did the same to me. I think they’ve got cameras set up all through my house. So I started walking around naked so they’ll have something nice to look at. I haven’t gotten a thank you yet though.

[–] muusemuuse@sh.itjust.works 20 points 2 days ago

Let them watch. Bwahahaha

[–] ieatpwns@lemmy.world 35 points 2 days ago (1 children)

I haven’t touched a webcam in years but I just touched myself 5 minutes ago

[–] prettybunnys@sh.itjust.works 5 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Lots of folks I’d imagine use their phones, which has cameras on both sides

[–] vaionko@sopuli.xyz 5 points 1 day ago

Why the hell can't I get a phone without a front camera? I never use it and it creates an annoying hole in my screen

[–] jordanlund@lemmy.world 25 points 2 days ago (1 children)

The spam messages have been duly ignored for years. LOL.

"If you have access to my computer, why are you blackmailing me? You could just steal the money from the accounts."

[–] boonhet@sopuli.xyz 7 points 2 days ago (1 children)

No 2FA for transfers at your bank?

[–] RaivoKulli@sopuli.xyz 1 points 20 hours ago

Just capture the code when they're doing some actual shit

[–] KairuByte@lemmy.dbzer0.com 15 points 2 days ago (1 children)

I’ll reply the same way I do to the scam attempts: Do it bitch.

[–] IllNess 7 points 2 days ago

Also if you are sending my family a copy, send it to my email address too. Thanks.

[–] teft@piefed.social 18 points 2 days ago (1 children)

That only works if you're ashamed about rubbing one out.

[–] realitista@piefed.world 3 points 1 day ago (1 children)

Seriously, go ahead and try to give someone that shit. No one would be surprised I watch porn and I don't do it in any sort of interesting way. I'm guessing no one would even want to watch it.

[–] teft@piefed.social 2 points 1 day ago

Worst voyeur video ever.

[–] possumparty@lemmy.blahaj.zone 12 points 2 days ago (1 children)

Damn, they got a picture of some gaffer tape, that's cool.

[–] RaivoKulli@sopuli.xyz 1 points 20 hours ago

Weird kink but okay

[–] buddascrayon@lemmy.world 4 points 2 days ago

Why am I not surprised that this shit's freely available on GitHub.

well i hope they like ineffable husbands