Not too long ago, Gnome calculator would freeze and crash when it tried to download currency conversion data. It would make such requests on each startup, eventually it was fixed in Ubuntu LTS but was broken for quite some time.
Of all the AI features added recently, local translations is one that I would be OK with being enabled by default. It's useful, and its value proposition is much less dubious.
I don't like how translation is only unavailable when the browser "thinks" the whole site is in a particular language. What if there's a single sentence that's not? Or if it guesses the site's language incorrectly? No translation for you.
We need more control over the feature. Even just the ability to select text, right click, and have a "Translation" menu would be huge. Looks like there is such a feature, but it doesn't let you pick the language pairs, which is the most basic requirement of translation.
My version of Firefox (146.0 on Debian) has exactly this. If I select a sentence and right-click, I get the menu item "Translate selection to <LANGUAGE>". In the resulting box, I can change the language pair - but the defaults that I have seen were also reasonable.
before Firefox put it in the browser, the kinda finicky extension (which I still have installed) does in fact have this feature. highlight a work and you can translate specific passages.
I had to use it a couple times recently in Firefox on Android, and it's a nice thing to have.
The UX is not polished, and not responsive. No indicator that translation is happening, then the interface disappears for the translation to materialize, with multisecond delays. All understandable if the model is churning my mobile CPU, but it needs a clear visual insicator that something happening
What about voice to text, text to voice, alt text generation for images that dont have them. Search suggestions, auto correct, malicious website detection.
Those are all features using AI and features I consider to be useful
Thunderbird is entirely funded by donations for some years now and is more than enough. In 2024, Thunderbird received $10.3M (19% increase over the previous year) in donations which was used to employ 43 people.
> We’ve also seen the overwhelming demand to build a version of Thunderbird for the iOS community. Unlike the Android app, the iOS app is being built from the ground up.
Pardon my ignorance, but I don't believe RIPE is a US organisation or branch of the US government.
Any attempts by the US government to assert control of a foreign non-profit entity such as RIPE is only going to end in tears. I suspect would also empower those pushing to balkanise the internet should the independence of RIPE or ARIN be violated.
I'm not sure region specific intranets is a future anyone should want.
If those US companies operate in foreign countries, then yes they will be following the law in those countries or they won't be operating there. And no, the only tears flowing will be from those who don't understand how laws and borders work.
This has always been true. E.g. Google and others complying with Chinese laws, or not operating at all in places like Iran. X can simply cease operations in EU if they don't like it.
ArchiveBox open source does not, but I have set it up for paying clients in the past using TLSNotary. This is actually a very hard problem and is not as simple as saving traffic hashes + original SSL certs (because HTTPS connections use a symmetric key after the initial handshake, the archivist can forge server responses and claim the server sent things that it did not).
There is only 1 reasonable approach that I know of as of today: https://tlsnotary.org/docs/intro, and it still involves trusting a third party with reputation (though it cleverly uses a zk algorithm so that the third party doesn't have to see the cleartext). Anyone claiming to provide "verifyable" web archives is likely lying or overstating it unless they are using TLSNotary or a similar approach. I've seen far to many companies make impossible claims about "signed" or "verified" web archives over the last decade, be very critial any time you see someone claiming that unless they talk explicitly about the "TLS Non-Repudiation Problem" and how they solve it: https://security.stackexchange.com/questions/103645/does-ssl...
If web pages were signed the way emails were, it would authenticate if an archived copy of a web page is indeed authentic, but good luck getting such a major change all the way across the entire web. Why would anyone who would gladly retract / redact information on a whim even subscribe to this technology? Would be nice if they all did though.
Its not for authenticity but instead to prevent tampering of adblock,ad and tracking removals more if there is history in search many complains in this
>They replied within a few hours. The response was straightforward: the illegal content would be removed (and we verified that it was), and they had never received any previous notifications about those URLs.
They never notified archive.today of the illegal material, instead they chose to demand blocking actions of archive.today from a DNS provider. I would be interested to know whether any other DNS service providers have received similar such demands.
I would assume (like any normal individual), that you would notify the service first (archive.today) and if they've proven to be a non-responder to CSAM material then escalate to legal action.
If archive.today is honest about never receiving a prior notification, then the way in which they've decided to go about removing the illegal material is very suspicious.
Generally if you encounter CSAM you should report to your countries appropriate organisation. Skip the police and go straight there to save everyone some time and avoid confusion. This agency will handle notifications etc to the site.
UK - https://report.iwf.org.uk/org/ (technically the NCA, but they are a catch all reporting target. As a private individual IWF will handle the onward report for you).
If you are in a country without such an agency, the above agencies are good to inform, as they will both handle international reports.
These organisations will ensure the material is taken down, and will capture and analyse it. CSAM can be compared against hash databases (https://www.thorn.org/) to determine whether there it is as yet unknown material or reshared known material. This can help lead to the identification, arrest, and conviction of material creators as well as the identification and support of victims.
If you tell the site administrator directly there is a good chance they will remove the material and not report it; this is a huge problem in this space at the moment.
In the UK and the USA (and many other places) operators are obligated to report the material; in fact the controversial Online Safety Act puts actual teeth around this very obligation in the UK.
Thorn is the same organisation which drives Chat Control in the EU and to have their secret component installed in every app to scan your messages. Working with these organisations harms consumers, is detrimental for privacy and human rights even if they somehow have good intentions.
The point is that these organisations are in contact with each other and have established channels of funneling reports to each other and relevant legal systems for action.
Making the report is a long way off court action, and it would be unusual for a court to be involved. In most cases the data is connected, documented, and site owners contacted and educated.
Very few countries see accidental/unintentional hosting as a crime (it will fail most reasonableness tests) and fewer are interested in prosecuting one off offenders who can just be asked to stop.
Most countries are very interested in prosecuting the underlying creators and finding and supporting the victims.
I would generally use the standard precautions (VPN/Tor/etc.) but I think these organizations would much rather have you report the content than go after you, unless you've been reporting a suspicious amount of content that indicates you frequent such circles (i.e. you're one of those internet vigilantes).
Both of the reporting tools I linked allow fully anonymous reports.
If you are consuming or encountering CSAM in a fashion where it is not clear that you are not seeking it out and participating in its acquisition and distribution I suggest that you seek both medical and legal help.
One might even go so far to insinuate that they were the party responsible for the CSAM being there to begin with. Wouldn't be the first time someone weaponized such content. I remember at least one case were a steamer was "digitally" swatted using a Dropbox upload link.
It's not inconceivable to suggest that the people claiming that the CSAM hadn't been removed knew it was still there not only because they'd never actually sent the request for removal, but because they themselves put up the original site and requested the CSAM be indexed in the first place.
If the world ran by conspiracy theories, the goal would be to normalize censorship at DNS level. Sony has tried (>2 years ago) by taking Quad9 to court over a copyright matter. There are too many parties involved for whom this practice would be a useful tool to have.
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