Category: Tech

• Lindsey Graham said Trump has the opportunity to make “one of the greatest political comebacks.”
• Graham said he has told Trump that with four more years in office, he “can do big stuff.”
• Graham said he’s also warned Trump that losing would lead to his history being written differently.

Sen. Lindsey Graham says he’s told former President Donald Trump that he stands a chance of winning the 2024 election if he runs again. 

Speaking to CNBC on Saturday, Graham said Trump has a “pretty good chance” of re-election.

“I’m literally telling you what I tell him,” Graham told CNBC’s Steve Sedgwick.

“If you lose again, the history about who you are and what you did dramatically changes,” Graham said he told Trump, per the outlet. “If you come back, it will be one of the greatest political comebacks in American history. And if you get four more years, you can do big stuff.”

Graham added, per CNBC, that Trump might see 2024 as a chance to “start over” and show voters — even those who don’t like him — that he could accomplish some things as president.

“His problem is personal,” Graham said of Trump, the outlet reported. “His policies have stood the test of time. But has he worn the American people out in terms of his personality? Time will tell.”

The South Carolina lawmaker also appeared to warn this weekend that Trump might lose to President Joe Biden in 2024 if he didn’t manage his personality a little better, quipping: “If it’s a personality contest, he’ll be in trouble.”

Graham has, by and large, stood by Trump following the latter’s departure from the White House.

Despite pro-Trump figures like Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene and Tucker Carlson going after him, Graham has continued to back Trump.

In January, he said he would not back his Senate GOP colleague Mitch McConnell for majority leader unless McConnell had a “working relationship” with Trump, despite the rift between Trump and McConnell. 

Graham said in August that if the former president were prosecuted for mishandling classified information, there would be “riots in the streets.”

Trump and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis have been pegged as leading contenders for the 2024 Republican presidential ticket, though neither has formally declared that they would be entering the race.

• The South Korean government’s YouTube channel was breached to stream cryptocurrency videos.
• The cyberattacker renamed the channel “SpaceX Invest” and broadcast an interview with Elon Musk.
• It’s the third YouTube channel run by South Korea’s government to be hacked in the last two weeks.

The South Korean government’s official YouTube channel was hacked on Saturday morning to broadcast a video featuring billionaire Elon Musk chatting about cryptocurrency, according to local media reports.

At 3:30 a.m., the channel’s name was switched to “SpaceX Invest,” per the Yonhap News Agency. A screenshot posted by the agency appears to show a clip from a June interview Musk gave to Bloomberg News editor-in-chief John Micklethwait during the Qatar Economic Forum.

In the interview, Musk discussed how his Tesla and SpaceX companies had bought bitcoin as a “small percentage” of their cash assets and said his automaker accepts Dogecoin, the cryptocurrency he helped boost by 10% after tweeting about it.

The South Korean government became aware of the breach three hours later and restored its access to the account around 7.20 a.m., the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism said, according to Yonhap.

The agency reported that the YouTube channel’s account ID and password were said to have been stolen.

The channel has around 262,000 subscribers and actively posts videos on government policies and current events. It’s the third YouTube account run by South Korea’s government to have been breached in the last two weeks, Korean daily JoongAng Ilbo’s Lee Jian reported.

The identities and motives of those behind the attacks are not immediately known, the paper wrote, citing a statement from the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism.

The Korea Tourism Organization’s YouTube channel was breached twice — once on Thursday and once on Friday — and was suspended until Sunday, JoongAng Ilbo reported.

Meanwhile, the YouTube channel of South Korea’s National Museum of Modern and Contemporary Art was also hacked on August 29 to stream a video about cryptocurrencies, the outlet wrote. It’s not clear if this attack was related to the breach on Sunday.

Google, YouTube’s parent company, confirmed the breaches to Yonhap and Joongang Ilbo, saying it would investigate the cause of the attacks. Google did not immediately respond to Insider’s request for comment.

• The skeleton of female “vampire” was discovered in a 17th-century Polish graveyard, the Daily Mail reported.
• Professor Dariusz Poliński said the skeleton was found restrained to prevent her returning from the grave.
• The remains had a sickle laying across the throat and a padlock on her big toe.

The skeletal remains of a female “vampire” were found in a 17th-century Polish graveyard — with a sickle across her neck to prevent her rising from the dead.

Professor Dariusz Poliński from Nicholas Copernicus University headed the archaeological dig that led to the discovery of the remains, which were found wearing a silk cap and with a protruding front tooth, the Daily Mail reported Friday.

“The sickle was not laid flat but placed on the neck in such a way that if the deceased had tried to get up… the head would have been cut off or injured,” Poliński told the Daily Mail.

In the 11th century, citizens of Eastern Europe reported fears of vampires and began treating their dead with anti-vampire rituals, according to Smithsonian magazine, believing that “some people who died would claw their way out of the grave as blood-sucking monsters that terrorized the living.”

By the 17th century, Science Alert reported such burial practices “became common across Poland in response to a reported outbreak of vampires.”

“Other ways to protect against the return of the dead include cutting off the head or legs, placing the deceased face down to bite into the ground, burning them, and smashing them with a stone,” Poliński told the New York Post.

Though other common anti-vampire burial methods included a metal rod hammered through the skeleton, the remains in Poland were found with the sickle across the neck and a padlocked toe to restrain her. 

The padlocked big toe attached to the skeleton’s left foot, Poliński told the Daily Mail, likely symbolized “the closing of a stage and the impossibility of returning.”

Poliński did not immediately respond to Insider’s request for comment.

• Bill Barr said the Justice Department probably had “pretty good evidence” before the Mar-a-Lago raid.
• He also said Trump’s request for a special master was a “crock of shit.”
• Trump on Friday called Barr, his one-time ally, a “weak and pathetic RINO.”

Former President Donald Trump lashed out at his one-time ally Bill Barr on Friday after the former attorney general defended the Justice Department’s raid on Mar-a-Lago.

“Bill Barr had ‘no guts,’ and got ‘no glory.’ He was a weak and pathetic RINO, who was so afraid of being Impeached that he became a captive to the Radical Left Democrats,” Trump wrote in a post on his social media site, Truth Social, referring to Barr as a “Republican In Name Only.”

“Barr never fought the way he should have for Election Integrity, and so much else. He started off OK as A.G., but faded fast – Didn’t have courage or stamina. People like that will never Make America Great Again!” Trump continued. 

In a second post, he also criticized Barr’s handling of the Russia probe and the “Laptop from Hell,” presumably a reference to Hunter Biden’s laptop.

Barr was largely considered a staunch ally of Trump while serving as his attorney general from February 2019 to December 2020. Their relationship changed when Barr came forward to say the Justice Department had found no evidence of widespread voter fraud that would have impacted the election results, directly defying Trump’s insistence that the election had been stolen from him. He departed the administration one month before the end of Trump’s term.

In an interview with Fox News on Friday, Barr dismissed arguments that the Justice Department’s decision to raid Mar-a-Lago was an overstep.

“I personally think, for them to have taken things to the current point, they probably have pretty good evidence, but that’s speculation,” Barr said.

He also dismissed Trump’s defense that he had declassified all the documents that were being held at his Florida club and residence.

“I, frankly, am skeptical of this claim that, ‘I declassified everything,’ because, frankly, I think it is highly improbable,” Barr said. “And, second, if in fact he sort of stood over scores of boxes, not really knowing what was in them, and then said, ‘I hereby declassify everything in here’ — that would be such an abuse and such recklessness that it’s almost worse than taking the documents.”

In another interview with The New York Times, Barr also called Trump’s request to have a special master, or a court-appointed outsider, to review the documents a “crock of shit.”

During the Mar-a-Lago raid on August 8, the FBI seized sets of classified documents, according to court records. the Justice Department is investigating potential violations of laws pertaining to the handling of government documents.

• Trump has escalated his feud with Senate GOP leader Mitch McConnell.
• He claimed that the Republican Party was “furious” with McConnell. 
• Trump said that the party would have to “do something” about McConnell, whom he labeled “bad news.”

Former President Donald Trump on Thursday lashed out once again at Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell.

During an appearance on the conservative medial channel Real America’s Voice, Trump was asked to respond to McConnell’s hint in August that the GOP might not win the Senate because of the quality of Trump-backed candidates. 

“He’s such a negative for the party,” Trump said, adding that he was “embarrassed” by McConnell.

“I would’ve run somebody against him in the primary. But, who would’ve known that he turned out so bad? And I was never a big fan, but he turned out bad,” the former president said.

Trump also alluded again to the idea that he wanted to replace McConnell as Senate GOP leader. 

“He’s not good, and we’re gonna go through him, and then we’ll have to do something, later on, we’ll have to do something with him,” Trump said.

“The party is furious at him. We have to put up with him for a period of time, but eventually, he’ll be gone,” Trump added. “He’s bad news.”

A representative at Trump’s post-presidential press office and representatives for McConnell did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Insider.

Trump’s comments came the same day that Sen. Rick Scott of Florida revived his ongoing rivalry with McConnell for criticizing the GOP’s “candidate quality.”

Scott said he had a “strategic disagreement” with McConnell during an interview with Politico that was published on Thursday. Scott also wrote in an op-ed in the Washington Examiner that the idea of “trash-talking” GOP candidates was “an amazing act of cowardice” and “treasonous to the conservative cause.”

Trump, too, has rebuked McConnell for questioning the quality of the GOP candidates he’s backed, calling him a “pawn for the Democrats” and calling for him to be replaced as GOP leader. 

The origins of the McConnell-Trump feud date back to February 2021, when McConnell rebuked Trump for his “disgraceful dereliction of duty” during the Capitol riot. Since then, Trump repeatedly attacked McConnell.

In November, Trump slammed McConnell and other Republicans who backed President Joe Biden’s infrastructure bill, calling them “RINOs,” an acronym for Republicans In Name Only. Trump has also called McConnell an “Old Crow” on several occasions and accused the latter of “jeopardizing” other Republican senators’ reelection chances.

In February, McConnell shrugged off rumors that Trump might succeed in an attempt to oust him as majority leader if the GOP were to take the Senate in the November midterms. The comments came after Trump called McConnell a “loser” for defending GOP Sen. Mike Rounds of South Dakota, who had contradicted Trump’s voter fraud claims.

Last month, Trump also called McConnell’s wife, former Transport Secretary Elaine Chao, “crazy” and “coco” in several Truth Social posts. McConnell, however, did not react to Trump’s insult, saying he had “no” response to the criticism.

• Michael Cohen thinks Trump could be have copies of the top-secret files found at Mar-a-Lago.
• Cohen said Trump might have stashed the documents at his homes in Bedminster and New York.
• Cohen also suggested that these files might also be in the homes of Trump’s children.

Michael Cohen, who was once former President Donald Trump’s lawyer, believes Trump likely has copies of the classified documents the FBI seized from Mar-a-Lago stashed in other locations. 

Cohen was reacting on Twitter to an article from The Washington Post on the Department of Justice’s recent court filing, in which the DOJ suggested that Trump’s team may have concealed or moved top-secret files when officials were probing the matter.

“I believe Trump has copies, potentially other documents as well, at other locations including his children’s homes, Weisselberg’s florida home, Bedminster, NJ golf course, Fifth Avenue apartment, etc…” Cohen tweeted.

Cohen was referring to Allen Weisselberg, the Trump Organization’s former CFO, who in August admitted to orchestrating a payroll tax-dodge scheme at the organization.

During its search of Mar-a-Lago on August 8, the FBI seized 11 sets of classified documents, including some marked “top secret” and files that may have concerned nuclear weapons. According to the warrant for the search, the DOJ is looking into whether Trump broke any of three federal laws — including the Espionage Act — by keeping the documents at his Florida residence. 

This week, the DOJ also released a photograph from their search of Mar-a-Lago, which showed several folders bearing the word “top secret” strewn across the floor.

It is unclear if the former president ever made copies of these documents, or if these copies are being kept at the former president’s other homes. A representative at Trump’s post-presidential press office did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Insider. 

Cohen was Trump’s lawyer and close confidante for a decade. In 2018, he was the subject of a search of his home and office, as part of a Trump-related investigation into illegal hush-money payments to adult-film star Stormy Daniels. 

• The DOJ released a photo from the Mar-a-Lago raid, showing top-secret documents strewn on the floor.
• In a corner of the photo appeared to be a framed TIME magazine cover from 2019.
• It depicts Trump’s enemies peering at him inside the Oval Office along with the words “knock knock.”

A photo released by the Department of Justice showing the documents found during the FBI’s Mar-a-Lago raid has also unveiled a curious discovery — a framed image of an unflattering TIME magazine cover featuring former President Donald Trump.

The cover, which appeared to be placed in a gold frame, was from a March 4, 2019 edition of the publication. It showed 15 of Trump’s Democratic challengers at the time — including President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris — peering into the Oval Office at a nervous-looking Trump who is seated in his chair.

—KD (@Fly_Sistah) August 31, 2022

According to TIME, Trump ended his presidency with 35 appearances on its covers. Few were flattering, such as the one that was a cartoon depiction of his melting face and another that showed his trademark hair on fire. 

The DOJ’s photo was released as one of the attachments in a court filing on the Mar-a-Lago raid. 

In the filing, the DOJ said that “efforts were likely taken” to obstruct its investigation into Trump’s handling of government records.

The DOJ also argued that Trump’s request for a court-appointed “special master” to review materials seized from Mar-a-Lago should be rejected as the former president lacked the “standing” to raise such claims and is not entitled to such recourse “because those records don’t belong to him.” 

The court filing also revealed additional information about the raid, including how, in some instances, the documents were so sensitive that FBI agents and DOJ attorneys needed additional clearances before they could view the files. 

A representative from Trump’s post-presidential press office did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Insider.

• Dershowitz said he had “concerns” about the caliber of Trump’s legal team.
• He said, however, that six other lawyers had contacted him to say they wouldn’t defend Trump.
• Dershowitz cited being “canceled” for defending Trump as a top concern for these lawyers. 

Alan Dershowitz, the lawyer who represented former President Donald Trump in his Senate impeachment trial, said six lawyers have called him to say that they would not defend Trump for fear of being “canceled.” 

Dershowitz made these comments to Newsmax host Sean Spicer on Monday, saying that while he had some “concerns” about the caliber of Trump’s current lawyers, many qualified lawyers are refusing to represent Trump. 

“I can tell you that six lawyers so far called me and said, ‘We will not defend Trump even though we’d like to because of what happened to you, Alan Dershowitz, because you have been canceled,’” Dershowitz said.

Dershowitz also said that he had lost jobs and speaking engagements after representing Trump, and those other lawyers had seen him as an example of what could happen to them if they took Trump as a client.

“People won’t speak to you. People are furious at you. I had a lawyer say to me, ‘I just don’t want to be ‘Dershowitzed,’” he said.

Dershowitz’s comments came after a report from The Washington Post this month outlined how Trump had trouble finding good lawyers to represent him. 

For his part, Dershowitz also said this month that lawyers at big firms were being asked by their companies not to touch cases involving Trump.

“These are firms that want to continue to have clients, and they know that if they represent Donald Trump, they’ll lose a lot of clients,” Dershowitz told Insider. 

“Everybody who has called me has shown reluctance to do it,” he added. “They say their law firms won’t let them do it. Their husbands or wives won’t let them do it. Their children won’t let them do it. Their friends won’t let them do it, even though they want to do it.”

Trump is currently represented by lawyers including Alina Habba, a New Jersey parking garage lawyer, and former One America News anchor Christina Bobb.

Trump’s slate of legal issues includes an investigation in New York into whether the Trump Organization violated banking, insurance, and tax laws and whether it engaged in financial fraud. He pleaded the fifth more than 440 times during his deposition in the case.

The former president could also be facing potential criminal charges following an investigation from the Department of Justice into whether he mishandled sensitive documents. According to the FBI’s warrant for its search of Trump’s Mar-a-Lago residence earlier this month — during which 11 sets of classified documents were seized — the DOJ is looking into whether Trump broke three federal laws, including the Espionage Act.

A representative at Trump’s post-presidential press office did not immediately respond to a request for comment from Insider.

• Price hikes at Disney World and Disneyland are outpacing inflation, per The Wall Street Journal.
• The outlet ran an analysis of Disney’s prices using a travel company.
• It said Disney is focusing on how much each park visitor spends as opposed to drawing large crowds.

Prices at Disney World resorts and Disneyland parks are outpacing inflation rates in the US, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing an analysis run for the outlet by travel firm Touring Plans.

The jump in consumer prices runs in tandem with a broader strategy by Disney to focus on maximizing how much each park visitor spends rather than drawing in larger crowds, the outlet reported.

The Journal noted that food and souvenir prices at Disneyland parks have jumped by as much as 33% since last summer. By comparison, the Bureau of Labor Statistics reported earlier this month that the country’s Consumer Price Index saw an 8.5% year-over-year rise in July.

Examples cited by the outlet included studded Mickey Mouse-ears headbands, which cost $39.99 this summer compared to $29.99 last year, and pineapple-flavored Dole Whip, which cost $5.99 last summer but now retails for $6.99 at some locations.

Touring Plans also found that hotel prices at three Walt Disney World Resorts have risen faster than inflation rates, per the Journal. For example, the cheapest per-night room rate at the Pop Century hotel in Disney World Orlando was $95 in 2013 but rose to $168 this year, the outlet reported.

And 10 years ago, the standard room rate at the Animal Kingdom Lodge was $486, compared to $790 today, per the Journal. It also compared the prices of Disney’s most expensive one-day pass and reported that the ticket used to cost $129 in 2018 and now costs $159. The outlet didn’t specify which resort it was referring to.

Insider previously reported that standard admission to Disney World costs at least $109 per day in 2021, while park hopper tickets were priced at $174. That means that a family of four Americans would spend around $6,000 for a typical five-day trip at a Walt Disney World resort, Insider’s Daryl Austin wrote in April last year.

The Los Angeles Times reported in October 2021 that ticket prices at the Disneyland park in Anaheim, California had risen 8% while parking costs have increased by 20% since the COVID-19 pandemic began.

This year, food and beverage prices at the same theme park went up by 12%, the outlet reported in July.

Disney did not immediately respond to Insider’s request for comment.

• A new study suggests long-tailed macaques in Indonesia engage in tool-assisted masturbation.
• Researchers observed the monkeys tapping and rubbing stones against their genitals.
• Tool use is well documented in animals, though typically for survival purposes like eating.

Tool use in animals is well documented, but researchers recently discovered some monkeys in Indonesia that appeared to be using stones in a very specific way: as sex toys.

While studying a population of 173 long-tailed macaques, researchers observed the macaques tapping and rubbing stones on their genitals and groin area, according to a paper published this month in the journal Ethology. The behavior led the researchers to the “Sex Toy” hypothesis.

The researchers evaluated the theory in several ways. They observed young males were more likely than older males to partake in the behavior, and that it was often followed by sexual physiological responses, such as an erection. They also found actions with the stone were associated with other sexual behaviors, such as mounting.

Altogether, the researchers said the data partly supported the theory that the behavior was “sexually motivated.” Meaning that the monkeys seemed to be performing “a form of self-directed, tool-assisted masturbation,” Camilla Cenni, a PhD student at the University of Lethbridge in Canada and author of the study, told The New York Times.

The authors said the paper suggested monkeys over time may continue using tools for behaviors, such as masturbation, that are not directly tied to survival but have “pleasurable” or “self-rewarding” aspects, like “underlying playful and sexual activities.”

Many animals are known to use tools. Otters use stones to crack open shells for food, like clams and mussels. Dolphins use sea sponges to kick up sand and uncover prey on the seafloor. And monkeys have been documented on video using rocks to crack open nuts and shellfish.

Animals have also been documented masturbating with objects, though it’s less common. Most tool use serves a clear survival purpose, like eating.

“It’s arguably not really adaptive or useful,” Cenni told The Times of the object-assisted masturbation.

The authors noted the macaques that were observed lived in an area where they regularly have access to human food, so they may spend less time foraging than other populations.