Plus: this Sizzler’s journey to digital sovereignty ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌ ‌

April 07, 2025 | Read online
# Super 'cyber attacks' overhyped, Minecraft movie is the biggest thing in the world and election battery fight Plus: this Sizzler’s journey to digital sovereignty
Issue 2307 - Monday 7 April
# The News
### Superannuation industry ‘cyberattacks’ are overhyped but also how can you not have 2FA in 2025?
Superannuation online portals are back up and running after various funds were targeted with credential stuffing attacks last week (ABC News). According to various reports, fewer than 10,000 people were affected and only $500,000 was stolen from 4 AustralianSuper customers using stolen passwords from other accounts (The Guardian Australia). It’s not often I say this but I agree with the Prime Minister’s cybersecurity take: “There is a cyber attack in Australia roughly every 6 minutes. This is a regular issue,” he said. For an industry as big as superannuation ($4 trillion+ managed across 22+ million accounts), half a mill lost and a few thousand accounts harmlessly hacked using old passwords? Not exactly a five alarm fire. In fact, it’s a cyber attack but I wouldn’t even call it a hack as some outlets have. That being said, it boggles the mind that a company like AustralianSuper does not have mandatory 2FA. This is bush league stuff, folks, and apparently the super funds could face fines from the regulator over subpar security (The Australian, $).
### You probably haven’t noticed it but the Minecraft Movie is the biggest thing in the world right now
Unless you are in two specific groups — a child aged 6-15, or a parent or associate of said child — you probably have no idea that A Minecraft Movie just debuted at the box office. It had the highest grossing opening weekend for a video game-based movie ever (BBC). Yes, it dethroned cinematic masterpieces like The Super Mario Brothers Movie and Sonic the Hedgehog 3. What’s particularly funny about this success is that the Minecraft movie has been panned by reviewers (“Some reviewers questioned the purpose or value of the film, with some viewing it as nothing more than a product with the intent of promoting Minecraft,” says Wikipedia) but it really doesn’t matter because we’re talking about the best selling game of all time (BBC). Nor has this release been affected by a leak of an unfinished version of the movie online, which has been seeded to torrent sites so that people are unwittingly ending up with a bizarre version of the movie with PS2-level graphics (Kotaku).
| A.K.A. JLongb0ne @JonsLongs |
GTFOH 🤣🤣🤣
A.K.A. JLongb0ne @JonsLongs Apparently there's an unfinished version of the Minecraft movie floating around, without any of the polished CGI. Im about to partake lmao
5:19 AM • Apr 4, 2025
237K Likes 10.2K Retweets
419 Replies
### Home batteries promise, but otherwise no tech to be seen this election
Outside of the Trump tariff mess, the closest thing we’ve had to technology announcements so far this election has been Labor’s plan to subsidise household batteries (The Guardian Australia). The party says it’ll spend $2.3 billion to cut battery prices by 30%. The Coalition is also reportedly going to make an announcement on the policy but hasn’t yet (but still found time to again praise Elon Musk and Starlink, per Guardian Australia). But as I’ve been saying, the tech election story so far has been just how much the parties agree on tech policy that could be worth fighting over. My comrade Josh Taylor had a nice little piece responding to a fawning TIME article on Albo’s social media ban (TIME) that pointed out that the public won’t get to see a preliminary report prepared for the government about various age social media methods before the election despite it being ready (Guardian Australia). It might be nice to actually see some policy debate!
#### Leftovers
Oracle quietly admits data breach, days after lawsuit accused it of cover-up (ARN) Microsoft pull-back casts doubts on local data centre boom (AFR, $) Exclusive: how the Atlantic’s Jeffrey Goldberg got added to the White House Signal group chat (The Guardian) EU may “make an example of X” by issuing $1 billion fine to Musk’s social network (Ars Technica) UK bans £2.2bn ‘sneaky’ fees and fake reviews for online products (The Guardian) Wi-Fi is one of the great backward compatibility success stories (The Verge) Microsoft unveils AI-generated demo 'inspired' by Quake 2 that runs worse than Doom on a calculator, made me nauseous, and demanded untold dollars, energy, and research to make (PC Gamer) BBC seeks more prominent credit in Apple and Google News (BBC) ‘Views’ are lies (The Verge) Apple given permission to keep TikTok in App Store until US deal is finalized (Apple Insider) OpenAI tests watermarking for ChatGPT-4o Image Generation model (BleepingComputer) ‘Profiting from misery’: how TikTok makes money from child begging livestreams (The Guardian) Here’s the iPhone. Here’s the iPhone With Tariffs. (WSJ, $)
# Oh, Also
### A Sizzler’s journey to digital sovereignty
Sizzler Andrew shared a blog post about his plans for giving up Big Tech and attaining digital sovereignty (Bednarz). Since it’s something that I know many other Sizzlers are interested in and to peer pressure him into following through, I’m sharing it with you all here. You can either read it through your browser or subscribe it as newsletter here. Godspeed Andrew! (PS do you have a fun tech project or side-hustle? I love seeing and hearing what Sizzlers are up to. Make sure to tell me about it or to drop it into the Slack server and forum)
# Bargains
Electrical & Electronics
Philips Hue Garnea White Ambience Downlight 90mm - $42 at JB Hi-Fi Edifier PP205 Portable Party Bluetooth Speakers - $42 at Edifier Audio Amazon AU Ultimate Ears Boom 3 Portable Bluetooth Speaker - Lagoon Blue - $133 at Amazon AU Miele Duoflex HX1 Cordless Vacuum Cleaner - $295 at The Good Guys DJI Osmo Action 4 [Standard Combo] - $328 at Amazon AU [Adventure Combo] - $498 at Amazon AU Audio Technica LPW40WN Turntable - $449 at JB Hi-Fi Shure SM7B Microphone - $599 at Derringers Music Garmin Instinct 3 AMOLED 45mm (Black) - $647 at BingLee ANYCUBIC Kobra S1 Combo - $775 at Anycubic eBay Samsung Freestyle Projector - $797 at Officeworks LG LG 86" UT8050 4K UHD LED Smart TV (2024) - $1488 at JB Hi-Fi TCL 85" C745 Pro 4K UHD QLED Google TV (2024) - $1695 at JB Hi-Fi
Computing
Logitech MX Keys S Wireless Keyboard - $149 at Amazon AU PNY Mako RGB 32GB (2x 16GB) DDR5 6000MHz CL30 XMP 3.0 RAM - $149 at Centre Com Lexar ARES RGB DDR5 RAM 32GB Kit (2x16GB) 6000MHz, CL30-36-36-68 EXPO/XMP3.0 - $155 at Amazon AU ALLDOCUBE iPlay60 Mini Pro 8.4" Android 14 Tablet, LTE, 8GB+128GB, FHD, Widevine L1 - $203 at ALLDOCUBE Amazon AU ALLDOCUBE Iplay60 Mini Pro 8.4 Inch Android 14 Tablet, LTE, 8GB+128GB, 1920x1200 FHD, Widevine L1 6050mAh - $229 at Amazon AU SanDisk Extreme PRO SDXC UHS-II U3 V60 Memory Card (Back Order) [128GB] - $60 at Amazon US via AU [256GB] - $105 at Amazon US via AU Logitech G Astro A50 Gen 5 Lightspeed Wireless Headset + Base Station (White) - $412 at Amazon AU CORSAIR Vengeance RGB DDR5 RAM 96GB (2x48gb) 6000MHz CL30 - $419 at Amazon AU PowerColor Hellhound Radeon RX 7900 XTX 24GB GPU - $1599 at Scorptec Apple MacBook Air 15" M3 8-Core CPU 10-Core GPU 16GB RAM 256GB SSD (Midnight or Space Grey) - $1877 at Amazon AU
Mobile
Woolworths Mobile Prepaid 75GB 180 days - $120 215GB 365 days - $230 280GB 365 days - $280 Samsung Galaxy at amaysim (must add $30/28 day plan) [A36 6/128] - $409 [A56 5G 8GB RAM/128GB Storage] - $499
# The End
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