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Tech NewsGun Activist Cody Wilson Released From Texas Jail After Posting Bond for Sex Assault of a Minor Charges
Cody Rutledge Wilson has been released from jail in Harris County, Texas after posting $150,000 bond on Sunday. Wilson, best known for publishing blueprints of 3D printed guns, has been charged with sexual assault after he allegedly paid $500 to a 16-year-old girl for sex. Police allege that Wilson met the girl on a website … Continued
By Matt Novak -
Tech News
3D-Printed Gun Activist Accused of Child Sexual Assault Reportedly Arrested in Taiwan
Gun rights activist Cody Wilson reportedly fled from Texas to Taiwan after getting tipped off that he was going to be charged for allegedly paying a 16-year-old girl $500 for sex. But now local news outlets in Taiwan report that he has been captured. Citing an Apple Daily report, English-language Taiwan News said that Wilson … Continued
By Matt Novak -
Tech News
3D-Printed Gun Activist Cody Wilson Charged With Sexual Assault of a Child [Updated]
Cody Rutledge Wilson, the 30-year-old Texas man who’s been fighting with the U.S. government to publish instructions for 3D-printed guns on the internet, was charged today with the sexual assault of a child. Wilson allegedly met the girl on a website called SugarDaddyMeet.com. Wilson allegedly paid the girl, whose name has been withheld in court … Continued
By Matt Novak -
io9MoviesKin Would Be Way More Interesting If It Knew What Kind of Movie It Wanted to Be
There are a handful of scenes scattered throughout Lionsgate’s sci-fi thriller from directors Jonathan and Josh Baker that are direct callbacks to Bag Man, the twin directors’ 2014 short about a young boy hiding a dangerous secret from the world. In those moments, you can see how the Bakers have grown as filmmakers in the … Continued
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Tech News
Despite Everything, You Can Now Buy 3D-Printed Gun Plans Online
The DEFCAD file repository of 3D-printable gun blueprints is live. There, you can buy the plans to print parts for anything from an AR-15 to the plastic Liberator pistol. Defense Distributed, the controversial organization that wants to enable easier access to firearms, started selling these files on Tuesday morning, despite a day-old court order that … Continued
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Tech NewsPrivacy & Security
Judge Extends Defense Distributed’s Ban on Publishing 3D-Printed Gun Plans Online
A U.S. district judge in Seattle extended a ban preventing Austin, Texas-based Defense Distributed, which designs and releases digital blueprints for small arms that can be produced by 3D printers and CNC-milling machines, from continuing to do so until a lawsuit by 19 states and the District of Columbia is resolved. In 2015, the Barack … Continued
By Tom McKay -
Tech NewsThe Battle Over 3D-Printed Guns Is Getting Serious
Five years ago, a lot of people thought Cody Wilson was a wild-eyed fanatic. The New Yorker described his rhetoric about making blueprints for 3D-printed guns available to anyone on the internet as “divorced” “from any practical reality.” Yet here we are in 2018, and Wilson’s company, Defense Distributed, is still in the news being branded … Continued
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Tech NewsPrivacy & Security
LifeLock Still Gives NRA Discount It Said It Ended After Parkland School Shooting
After the Parkland, Florida, school shooting, in which 17 students and staff at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School were killed, a slew of companies sought to distance themselves from the National Rifle Association. Car rental companies like Enterprise, National, and Alamo, all announced they would no longer provide discounts to NRA members. MetLife, the insurance company, … Continued
By Dell Cameron -
Tech NewsPrivacy & Security
Feds Bust Over 35 Suspected Dark Web Vendors, Seizing Everything From Drugs to a Grenade Launcher
The Department of Justice announced on Tuesday the “first nationwide undercover action to target vendors of illicit goods” on the dark web, the portion of the internet only accessible via specific software like the Tor network. According to the DOJ, the operation involved at least five federal agencies and entailed Homeland Security Investigations agents posing … Continued
By Tom McKay -
Tech News
Facebook Will Stop Showing Ads for Gun Accessories to Kids
As of now, Facebook users under the age of 18 can be served advertisements for firearm holsters, flashlight-mounts, and silencers, and other gun accessories. But a new policy is supposed to but an end to that starting June 21. Facebook announced the new policy on Friday, explaining that this decision came during a regular reassessment … Continued
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Tech News
Florida Didn’t Run FBI Background Checks on Gun Buyers for a Year Because of a Forgotten Login
The state of Florida failed to conduct national background checks on tens of thousands of applicants looking to procure a concealed weapon permit for more than a year, and the reason is about as dumb as it gets: the person in charge of performing the checks forgot their login information. An Office of Inspector General … Continued
By AJ Dellinger -
Tech NewsTexas Official Who Blamed School Shooting on Doors Now Also Blames Facebook and Video Games
Just hours after a 17-year-old killed 10 people at a high school in Texas on Friday, Dan Patrick, the Lt. Governor of Texas, said that maybe schools should have fewer entrances and exits. But yesterday he explained that there are a lot of other things to blame than just doors. For instance, Facebook, Twitter, and … Continued
By Matt Novak -
ScienceHealth
The Stricter a State’s Gun Laws, the Fewer Children Die From Guns, Study Finds
State laws that mandate universal background checks for buying guns and ammunition may save young lives, suggests new research presented this week at the annual meeting of the Pediatric Academic Societies. The study found that states with stricter gun laws had lower rates of gun-related deaths among children compared to states without such laws. Researchers, … Continued
By Ed Cara -
Tech NewsPrivacy & Security
Police Track YouTube Shooting Copycat Threat to ‘Juvenile Suspect’ in Pennsylvania
San Bruno, California police responded to a threat of a copycat shooting on YouTube’s headquarters the day after a woman named Nasim Aghdam opened fire there on April 3rd, 2018, shooting and injuring three employees before killing herself. According to a release on Wednesday from the San Bruno Police Department, authorities were made aware of … Continued
By Tom McKay -
Tech News
Twitter Bails on the Cartoon Pistol Emoji
The pistol emoji has existed in one form or another since at least 2010, but in 2016 Apple shook shit up by replacing it with something completely different: a harmless, lime-green water gun. Today, about a year-and-a-half later, Twitter is following suit. With the release of Twemoji 2.6, Twitter is changing the way a handful … Continued
By Harri Weber -
Tech News
Hey, Maybe Don’t Make the YouTube Shooting About YouTube Ad Revenue
Authorities have identified the suspect in the mass shooting at YouTube’s headquarters, which ended in four injuries and the death of the shooter, as YouTuber Nasim Aghdam, who made videos about topics ranging from animal rights and veganism to bodybuilding. Police have not named any motive in the attack, but Aghdam has now been widely … Continued
By Tom McKay -
Tech News
The NRA Quadrupled Its Digital Ad Budget After Parkland Killings, Flooding Facebook and YouTube
Hundreds of thousands of demonstrators have churned out across the country on Saturday to support the March for Our Lives movement demanding action on gun control and that politicians begin standing up to the National Rifle Association. That movement is spearheaded by student survivors of mass shootings, particularly those who attended the Parkland, Florida high … Continued
By Tom McKay -
Tech News
The CDC May Finally Get Free Rein to Study Gun Violence
The government, after decades of resistance, is set to finally encourage the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention to study gun violence. And all it took was near constant mass shootings and the pressure of a federal shutdown. On Wednesday night, as reported by BuzzFeed News, two new provisions were added to a proposed bipartisan … Continued
By Ed Cara -
Tech News
Reddit Bans Slew of Communities Amid New Rule Targeting Sales, Trades, and Giveaways
Reddit’s bread and butter may be links and comments, but the site has a long history as a facilitator of gift swaps, and a backwoods marketplace. New site rules enacted today make much of that behavior prohibited. A post in Reddit’s site announcements community (aptly titled r/announcements) states: As of today, users may not use … Continued
By Avery Ellis -
ScienceHealth
Science Finds Once Again That Violent Video Games Don’t Turn People Into Rage Monsters
A new study published this week in Nature journal Molecular Psychology provides a well-timed rebuttal to the weary trope—occasionally alluded to by President Trump and others in the wake of mass shootings—that violent video games are causing real-life mayhem. German researchers recruited three groups of typically non-gaming, healthy volunteers, 77 in total, for their study. … Continued
By Ed Cara