After the United Kingdom demanded that Apple create a backdoor that would allow government officials globally to spy on encrypted data, Apple decided to simply turn off encryption services in the UK rather than risk exposing its customers to snooping.

Apple had previously allowed end-to-end encryption of data on UK devices through its Advanced Data Protection (ADP) tool, but that ended Friday, a spokesperson said in a lengthy statement.

"Apple can no longer offer Advanced Data Protection (ADP) in the United Kingdom to new users and current UK users will eventually need to disable this security feature," Apple said.

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Senior politicians in Japan are not going to let Nissan die easily. The automaker has been struggling for some time now, with an outdated product portfolio, ongoing quarterly losses, and soon, the closure of factories and thousands of layoffs. The Japanese government has been trying to find a suitor and had hoped that Honda would do its patriotic duty and save its rival from extinction.

That deal—one branded "a desperate move" by former Nissan CEO and fugitive from Japanese justice Carlos Ghosn— fell apart last week after Renault demanded a price premium for its shares in Nissan, and Nissan demanded a merger of equals with Honda. In reality, it was always going to be a takeover, with very little in it for Honda in the way of complimentary product lines or access to new technologies.

Today, we learned of yet another desperate move —the former Japanese Prime Minister Yoshihide Suga is among a group that is trying to get Tesla to invest in Nissan instead.

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On Friday, a Coinbase executive declared the "war against crypto" over—"at least as it applies to Coinbase."

According to Coinbase chief legal officer Paul Grewal, the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) plans to drop its lawsuit against the largest US cryptocurrency exchange, as the agency shifts to embrace Donald Trump's new approach to regulating cryptocurrency in the US.

The SEC sued Coinbase in 2023, accusing Coinbase of "operating its crypto asset trading platform as an unregistered national securities exchange, broker, and clearing agency" and "failing to register the offer and sale of its crypto asset staking-as-a-service program."

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In an odd approach to trying to improve customer tech support, HP allegedly implemented mandatory, 15-minute wait times for people calling the vendor for help with their computers and printers in certain geographies.

Callers from the United Kingdom, France, Germany, Ireland, and Italy were met with the forced holding periods, The Register reported on Thursday. The publication cited internal communications it saw from February 18 that reportedly said the wait times aimed to "influence customers to increase their adoption of digital self-solve, as a faster way to address their support question. This involves inserting a message of high call volumes, to expect a delay in connecting to an agent and offering digital self-solve solutions as an alternative.”

Even if HP's telephone support center wasn't busy, callers would reportedly hear:

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Do you remember The Simpsons episode "Scenes from the Class Struggle in Springfield"? It first aired in February 1996, and it's the one where Homer and Bart go to Appliance Zone and are confronted with "genuine" Panaphonics, Sorny, and Magnetbox TVs. Well, it seems a similar brand name-game has been going on at a Volvo dealership in China.

News started filtering out of China last week about an owner of a Volvo S60 sedan who realized the speakers in his car were not from Bowers and Wilkins, as they were supposed to be. Instead, the speakers were branded Bowers and VVilkins , substituting a pair of Vs for the W. We've seen that "typosquatting" approach in malicious emails plenty of times, but it's a first in a Volvo.

That wasn't the only phony part in the customer's S60. He also realized that the crystal transmission knob wasn't entirely right either and lacked the genuine article's backlighting.

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Some Tesla owners have yet another thing to worry about. As sales crash in Europe and protests gather outside Tesla showrooms in the US as a result of the CEO's political engagement, it now emerges that more than 376,000 Model Y crossovers and Model 3 sedans are at risk for power steering failure. So far, it has resulted in more than 3,000 warranty claims and caused 570 crashes, according to Tesla and the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.

Federal investigators have known about the problem for some time—in 2023 NHTSA's Office of Defects Investigation opened a preliminary inquiry after 12 reports of steering failures, including three Model 3s and nine Model Ys.

By February 2024, NHTSA had received 124 complaints about steering failure in 2023 Teslas and found another 2,264 reports of steering problems. Color me wrong though—at the time, I wrote that "a software patch is unlikely to help," except a software patch is indeed the remedy here.

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Regardless of the state of the world—whether you're staring down a Constitutional crisis or enjoying happier times, at ease on a beach—it's wise to remember that there will always be tiny worms with gaping mouths ringed by razor-sharp teeth ready to pierce your body, burrow into your skin, and tunnel through your flesh like an ambitious gopher in springtime.

I'm referring, of course, to hookworms, the blood-feeding parasites aptly named for the hook-like heads they use to latch onto their victims. In the US, they're most often found in international travelers. But, it's not out of the question that these petrifying parasites can strike on American soil, particularly in warm, moist areas. In a new clinical report in the New England Journal of Medicine , doctors in Los Angeles report just such a case, and a particularly unusual one at that.

“We still got ’em”

But, before we get to the gruesome details, there are some things you should know about hookworms. As the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention notes, there are two delightful categories of these helminths. First, there are the ones that make it to your intestines after digging into your flesh and invading your organs. Once in your guts (your small intestine, to be specific), the worms live their best lives, maturing to adults, finding mates, and reproducing, all while sucking the life-blood out of you from the inside. They release their eggs into your poop to start this charming cycle anew in anyone whose skin is exposed to sewage-contaminated soil.

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This article originally appeared on Inside Climate News , a nonprofit, non-partisan news organization that covers climate, energy, and the environment. Sign up for their newsletter here .

Ten new electric vehicle battery factories are on track to go online this year in the United States.

This includes large plants from global battery giants such as Panasonic, Samsung, and SK On, and automakers such as Ford, Honda, Hyundai, Stellantis, and Toyota.

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Welcome to Edition 7.32 of the Rocket Report! It's true that the US space program has always been political. Domestic and global politics have driven nearly all of the US government's decisions on major space issues, most notably President John F. Kennedy's challenge to land astronauts on the Moon amid intense Cold War competition with the Soviet Union. The Nixon administration's decision to end the Apollo program and focus on building a reusable Space Shuttle was a political move. More than 30 years later, the Clinton administration ordered a reevaluation NASA's plans for a massive space station in low-Earth orbit. In the post-Cold War zeitgeist of the 1990s, this resulted in Russia's inclusion on the International Space Station program. Flawed or not, these decisions were backstopped with some level of reasoning, debate, and national consensus-building. Today, the politics of space seem personal, small, and mean-spirited . Thankfully, there's a lot of launch action next week that might thrust us out of the abyss, even just for a moment.

As always, we welcome reader submissions . If you don't want to miss an issue, please subscribe using the box below (the form will not appear on AMP-enabled versions of the site). Each report will include information on small-, medium-, and heavy-lift rockets as well as a quick look ahead at the next three launches on the calendar.

Rocket Lab launches for the 60th time. It's safe to say Rocket Lab is an established player in the launch business. The company launched its 60th Electron rocket Tuesday from New Zealand, Space News reports . It was the second Electron launch of the year, coming just 10 days after Rocket Lab's previous mission. The payload was a new-generation small electro-optical reconnaissance satellite for BlackSky. Rocket Lab has not disclosed a projected number of Electron launches for the year beyond estimating it will be more than the 16 Electron missions in 2024. The company said on its launch webcast that the next Electron launch was planned from New Zealand in "a few short weeks."

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