Meg Cherry Member Oct 25, 2017 7,847 Seattle, WA So, Panic - a studio out of Portland that mostly does Mac software - is going to release a custom handheld with a 'premium' black-and-white screen - with 12 games that will be kept a secret until they unlock after release (one a week). Also, one of the inputs is a hand crank. One of those games is the game you saw above: Crankin's Time Travel Adventure from Katamari Damacy designer Keita Takahashi. The crank is used to manipulate time forwards and backwards. Despite the presence of buttons, the only way to interact with Crankin' is with said crank. Not all games will work that way, obviously, but it's reasonable to expect many will make use of it. There are other games coming from Bennett Foddy (Getting Over It), Zach Gage (SpellTower), and Shaun Inman (The Last Rocket), among others. What exactly they're making for Playdate, however, remains unannounced, with more details later this year. Click to expand... Click to shrink... $150, pre-orders out this year. This thing looks absurd, but maybe in a way worth supporting.  Last edited: May 22, 2019 KoolAid Member Oct 25, 2017 7,055 Keita Takahashi? Bennett Foddy? I'm interested.   atomsk Member Oct 28, 2017 1,762 Panic worked with Keita on those Katamari t-shirts forever ago, so that's not too surprising. Still, I wish Wattam would get a release date already.  BocoDragon Banned Oct 26, 2017 5,207 I love the hardware design.   Deleted member 42 user requested account closure Banned Oct 24, 2017 16,939 CRANKIN' IT   marrec Banned Oct 26, 2017 6,775 I'm sooo in for wild shit like this with limited but specific use cases.   kikuchiyo Member Nov 9, 2017 1,103 atomsk said: Panic worked with Keita on those Katamari t-shirts forever ago, so that's not too surprising. Still, I wish Wattam would get a release date already. Click to expand... Click to shrink... Didn't get those shirts when they came out and I've been kicking myself for it ever since :(  JamboGT Vehicle Handling Designer Verified Oct 25, 2017 1,537 The most hipster of hipster gaming stuff I have ever seen.   Tiktaalik Member Oct 25, 2017 3,749 Looks like a lot of fun. There's an opportunity for these small little devices now that 3DS is going away. Come on Nintendo, make Game Boy Classic happen.  Deleted member 54469 User requested account closure Member Mar 4, 2019 320 design is cool but what exactly is the point? for it's niche community i'm not going to ask. forever everyone else kinda feel like this is one of those things (like everything else now) cashing in on nostalgia and basically gentrifying by giving it a new instagram worthy paint coat and new name. $150 for a black and white game boy with some weird gimmick? i'm cool lol. that's nice they found some great (also niche) developers to make great (also niche) games for it. just not sure why this exists though? especially for that absurd price? i mean you can get a 2ds bundle with a game and another free nintendo select for like $80 now.  eyeball_kid Member Oct 25, 2017 12,138 Panic, Takahashi (please why are you distracting him from finishing Wattam!), and Teenage Engineering (makers of the awesome OP-1 synth). This is like a videogame hipster dream come true. Not sure how well that crank is going to feel for left-handed users though.  Colloco Self-Requested Ban Banned Oct 27, 2017 403 florida 150 kind of hurts for a black and white screen device in 2019, but DAT CRANK THO   Ghos Member Oct 25, 2017 3,986 cute design Keita tho? 👀  Weltall Zero Game Developer Banned Oct 26, 2017 19,343 Madrid Kind of weird there's only going to be 12 games for it; visually simple B/W games should be relatively easy to crank out.   Lego Killer Moth Avenger Oct 25, 2017 1,292 This is the coolest thing I've ever seen   Toumari Member Oct 27, 2017 8,811 England Cute and bizarre. Never expected Panic to ever dabble in hardware like this.   Deleted member 41931 User requested account closure Member Apr 10, 2018 3,744 I'm in for Keita Takahashi. No idea if this is going to be good, but it'll certainly be different.   marrec Banned Oct 26, 2017 6,775 JamboGT said: The most hipster of hipster gaming stuff I have ever seen. Click to expand... Click to shrink... It's like they made it specifically for me  CloseTalker Sister in the Craft Member Oct 25, 2017 38,131 Yeah, I'll buy one of those   Colloco Self-Requested Ban Banned Oct 27, 2017 403 florida Is this secretly Soulja Bois new console?   corn_fest Member Oct 27, 2017 323 I can't help but compare this with the 32blit which recently sprung up on Kickstarter. Spec-wise, the console seems a little disappointing in comparison, but Panic, Teenage Engineering, and the developers they've partnered with all create great stuff so I feel like this will be cool regardless. Ugh I'm gonna end up getting both aren't I.  Lego Killer Moth Avenger Oct 25, 2017 1,292 Weltall Zero said: Kind of weird there's only going to be 12 games for it; visually simple B/W games should be relatively easy to crank out. Click to expand... Click to shrink... There's gonna be more if it's a success. It's 12 so far. One a month for the first year.   KoolAid Member Oct 25, 2017 7,055 Weltall Zero said: Kind of weird there's only going to be 12 games for it; visually simple B/W games should be relatively easy to crank out. Click to expand... Click to shrink... ...i see what you did there also they say there's potential for more games, unsure if they'll charge for them though  Deleted member 33571 User requested account closure Banned Nov 17, 2017 907 very very cool, the lil bit of the Keita Takahashi game they showed looked really neat I immediately got teenage engineering vibes between the price (eek) and the concept so it makes sense they worked on some of the hardware  Kirksplosion Member Aug 21, 2018 2,682 Eh, can't say I'm interested at all-- Keita Takahashi Click to expand... Click to shrink... So I make this check out to Panic in Portland, OR?  Ginger Hail One Winged Slayer Avenger Oct 25, 2017 3,358 It's a cute little thing. Definitely gonna keep my eye on it.   jml Member Mar 9, 2018 4,849 Seems ridiculous and I do not understand the appeal at that price at all   Conan Member Oct 25, 2017 707 It's like having a bad analog stick. Cool?   Jonnykong Member Oct 27, 2017 8,992 It looks pretty nifty when you see the game in action by spinning that delightful crank.   marrec Banned Oct 26, 2017 6,775 jml said: Seems ridiculous and I do not understand the appeal at that price at all Click to expand... Click to shrink... The appeal is in the design and the games.  makonero Member Oct 27, 2017 11,177 If it was $50 I could see myself grabbing it for novelty purposes But I can't justify $150 for a black and white handheld with no backlight. I had an original GBA for five years, not going back now  Vivian-Pogo Member Jan 9, 2018 2,142 It's neat but about 3x the price of what I would want to pay for it.   wideface ▲ Legend ▲ Avenger Oct 25, 2017 7,184 Hidamari Apartments Keita Takahashi? Okay, I'll buy it.   NickatNite Member Oct 27, 2017 6,217 California An interesting concept, but may or may not be worth the price point. I definitely will keep my eye on it.   Deleted member 23046 Account closed at user request Banned Oct 28, 2017 6,876 Panic is also the first publisher of Campo Santo's Firewatch.   Dancrane212 Member Oct 25, 2017 14,110 Edge cover gets it a good amount of cred with me. Consider me curious.  JamesQuall Member Oct 27, 2017 752 I'm in. I already love Panic for publishing Firewatch and the Goose Game, and for putting a cool sign on their building that I can change the colors on during my lunch break!   RyougaSaotome Member Oct 25, 2017 5,365 It seems absurd so I'm in.   eyeball_kid Member Oct 25, 2017 12,138 Here's a peek at Keita Takahashi's game:   ryushe Member Oct 27, 2017 5,063 If this were black and white WITH backlight, then I'd be on board. But as it stands, I can't justify $150 for this no matter how hard I'd like to try.   Anno Member Oct 25, 2017 7,889 Columbus, Ohio That's weird enough that I'm at least interested.   the_wart Member Oct 25, 2017 2,346 That's so dumb. ...I want it.  KilgoreTrout696 Member Oct 25, 2017 667 ryushe said: If this were black and white WITH backlight, then I'd be on board. But as it stands, I can't justify $150 for this no matter how hard I'd like to try. Click to expand... Click to shrink... 100% with you on the backlight. I'm looking into getting older gameboys modded with backlights not getting something new without them. Just flashing back to trying to play pokemon at night while in the car driving home, would have to wait to pass a streetlight in order to see the screen for a second.   boontobias Avenger Apr 14, 2018 10,144 Dancrane212 said: Edge cover gets it a good amount of cred with me. Consider me curious. Click to expand... Click to shrink... Rebels huh? There goes my interest  8bit Member Oct 27, 2017 5,390 Oh fuck yes, I want one.   pronk Member Oct 26, 2017 2,034 Swery retweeted this, then retweeted a tweet about the Ouya store closing lol Also pretty sure EDGE had an Ouya cover.  Deleted member 2791 User requested account closure Banned Oct 25, 2017 19,054 I like the idea and the hardware execution, but 150 bucks for twelve short games just doesn't cut it.   Brian_FETO The Million Post Man Member Oct 25, 2017 19,825 I think I love this? idk $150 is an investment but like......it's also not that bad? hmm The curious thing is whether future seasons would be downloadable (it does have wifi) or if the intent is to have limited run systems with preset seasons  RoboitoAM Member Oct 25, 2017 3,271 This thing looks stupid.   El Pescado Member Oct 26, 2017 2,042 That thing looks right up my alley. I'm 100% in.  

screen time Google Is Burying the Web Alive 5:00 A.M. saved Save this article to read it later. Find this story in your account’s ‘Saved for Later’ section. Photo-Illustration: Intelligencer By now, there’s a good chance you’ve encountered Google’s AI Overviews, possibly thousands of times. Appearing as blurbs at the top of search results, they attempt to settle your queries before you scroll — to offer answers, or relevant information, gleaned from websites that you no longer need to click on. The feature was officially rolled out at Google’s developer conference last year and had been in testing for quite some time before that; on the occasion of this year’s conference, the company characterized it as “one of the most successful launches in Search in the past decade,” a strangely narrow claim that is almost certainly true: Google put AI summaries on top of everything else, for everyone, as if to say, “Before you use our main product, see if this works instead.” This year’s conference included another change to search, this one more profound but less aggressively deployed. “AI Mode,” which has similarly been in beta testing for a while, will appear as an option for all users. It’s not like AI Overviews; that is, it’s not an extra module taking up space on a familiar search-results page but rather a complete replacement for conventional search. It’s Google’s “most powerful AI search, with more advanced reasoning and multimodality, and the ability to go deeper through follow-up questions and helpful links to the web,” the company says, “breaking down your question into subtopics and issuing a multitude of queries simultaneously on your behalf.” It’s available to everyone. It’s a lot like using AI-first chatbots that have search functions, like those from OpenAI, Anthropic, and Perplexity, and Google says it’s destined for greater things than a small tab. “As we get feedback, we’ll graduate many features and capabilities from AI Mode right into the core Search experience,” the company says. I’ve been testing AI Mode for a few months now, and in some ways it’s less radical than it sounds and (at first) feels. It resembles the initial demos of AI search tools, including those by Google, meaning it responds to many questions with clean, ad-free answers. Sometimes it answers in extended plain language, but it also makes a lot of lists and pulls in familiar little gridded modules — especially when you ask about things you can buy — resulting in a product that, despite its chatty interface, feels an awful lot like … search. Again, now you can try it yourself, and your mileage may vary; it hasn’t drawn me away from Google proper for a lot of thoughtless rote tasks, but it’s competitive with ChatGPT for the expanding range of searchish tasks you might attempt with a chatbot. From the very first use, however, AI Mode crystallized something about Google’s priorities and in particular its relationship to the web from which the company has drawn, and returned, many hundreds of billions of dollars of value. AI Overviews demoted links, quite literally pushing content from the web down on the page, and summarizing its contents for digestion without clicking: Photo-Illustration: Intelligencer; Screenshot: Google Meanwhile, AI Mode all but buries them, not just summarizing their content for reading within Google’s product but inviting you to explore and expand on those summaries by asking more questions, rather than clicking out. In many cases, links are retained merely to provide backup and sourcing, included as footnotes and appendices rather than destinations: Photo-Illustration: Intelligencer; Screenshot: Google This is typical with AI search tools and all but inevitable now that such things are possible. In terms of automation, this means companies like OpenAI and Google are mechanizing some of the “work” that goes into using tools like Google search, removing, when possible, the step where users leave their platforms and reducing, in theory, the time and effort it takes to navigate to somewhere else when necessary. In even broader terms — contra Google’s effort to brand this as “going beyond information to intelligence” — this is an example of how LLMs offer different ways to interact with much of the same information: summarization rather than retrieval, regeneration rather than fact-finding, and vibe-y reconstruction over deterministic reproduction. This is interesting to think about and often compelling to use but leaves unresolved one of the first questions posed by chatbots-as-search: Where will they get all the data they need to continue to work well? When Microsoft and Google showed off their first neo-search mockups in 2023, which are pretty close to today’s AI mode, it revealed a dilemma: Search engines still provide the de facto gateway to the broader web, and have a deeply codependent relationship with the people and companies whose content they crawl, index, and rank; a Google that instantly but sometimes unreliably summarizes the websites to which it used to send people would destroy that relationship, and probably a lot of websites, including the ones on which its models were trained. And, well, yep! Now, both AI Overviews and AI Mode, when they aren’t occasionally hallucinating, produce relatively clean answers that benefit in contrast to increasingly degraded regular search results on Google, which are full of hyperoptimized and duplicative spamlike content designed first and foremost with the demands of Google’s ranking algorithms and advertising in mind. AI Mode feels one step further removed from that ecosystem and once again looks good in contrast, a placid textual escape from Google’s own mountain of links that look like ads and ads that look like links (of course, Google is already working on ads for both Overviews and AI Mode). In its drive to embrace AI, Google is further concealing the raw material that fuels it, demoting links as it continues to ingest them for abstraction. Google may still retain plenty of attention to monetize and perhaps keep even more of it for itself, now that it doesn’t need to send people elsewhere; in the process, however, it really is starving the web that supplies it with data on which to train and Two years later, Google has become more explicit about the extent to which it’s moving on from the “you provide us results to rank, and we send you visitors to monetize” bargain, with the head of search telling The Verge, “I think the search results page was a construct.” Which is true, as far as it goes, but also a remarkable thing to hear from a company that’s communicated carefully and voluminously to website operators about small updates to its search algorithms for years. I don’t doubt that Google has been thinking about this stuff for a while and that there are people at the company who deem it strategically irrelevant or at least of secondary importance to winning the AI race — the fate of the web might not sound terribly important when your bosses are talking nonstop about cashing out its accumulated data and expertise for AGI. I also don’t want to be precious about the web as it actually exists in 2025, nor do I suggest that websites working with or near companies like Meta and Google should have expected anything but temporary, incidental alignment with their businesses. If I had to guess, the future of Google search looks more like AI Overviews than AI mode — a jumble of widgets and modules including and united by AI-generated content, rather than a clean break — if only for purposes of sustaining Google’s multi-hundred-billion-dollar advertising business. But I also don’t want to assume Google knows exactly how this stuff will play out for Google, much less what it will actually mean for millions of websites, and their visitors, if Google stops sending as many people beyond its results pages. Google’s push into productizing generative AI is substantially fear-driven, faith-based, and informed by the actions of competitors that are far less invested in and dependent on the vast collection of behaviors — websites full of content authentic and inauthentic, volunteer and commercial, social and antisocial, archival and up-to-date — that make up what’s left of the web and have far less to lose. Maybe, in a few years, a fresh economy will grow around the new behaviors produced by searchlike AI tools; perhaps companies like OpenAI and Google will sign a bunch more licensing deals; conceivably, this style of search automation simply collapses the marketplace supported by search, leveraging training based on years of scraped data to do more with less. In any case, the signals from Google — despite its unconvincing suggestions to the contrary — are clear: It’ll do anything to win the AI race. If that means burying the web, then so be it. Sign Up for the Intelligencer Newsletter Daily news about the politics, business, and technology shaping our world. This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply. By submitting your email, you agree to our Terms and Privacy Notice and to receive email correspondence from us. Tags: Google Is Burying the Web Alive

Ben Wiley and Tomer Cohen first met while working on a project together at Scale AI.David AI If David AI founders Tomer Cohen and Ben Wiley had been a little less quick on their feet, they might not have made it into Y Combinator’s Summer 2024 batch. They agreed to create the company about a week before application submissions closed, and spent the ensuing days crashing theirs out, turning it in at midnight on the day of the deadline. After hitting submit, “I was like, did that count as late or was that on time?” Cohen recalls. A year later, David AI, the company they founded through Y Combinator, has quickly established itself as a leading provider of audio training data for artificial intelligence. Now it's closed a $25 million Series A round, led by Altman Capital and Amplify Partners, with participation from First Round Capital, Y Combinator and BoxGroup, with a valuation north of $100 million. Cohen is a former McKinsey business analyst and first met cofounder Wiley while working together at AI training behemoth Scale AI. The two became close friends, and after Cohen was promoted to chief of staff and built a new business for the firm, he felt he had the skills he needed to start a company. “We started to think that the next phase of AI, the final evolution of AI, is where the AI moves out of the laptop and keyboard interface and into the real world,” Cohen told Forbes. That idea became David AI, an audio data research company providing high quality training audio for AI companies building voice models. The needs here are varied and highly specific, so David AI not only collects and refines real world audio data, it also designs and produces it. It’s amassed about 100,000 hours of audio so far, across more than 15 languages, complete with metadata on dialects and accents. In the heady world of AI, it’s a relatively simple business: paying individuals to read scripts or host conversations and recording them. “If you're an AI lab, you probably want to be focused on algorithms and model development and not just this very low-level operational, technical, niche work,” Cohen said. And it appears he’s right. In the year since its founding, David AI has grown to more than eight figures in annualized revenue run rate, making customers of most of the “magnificent Seven” tech companies — Alphabet, Amazon, Apple, Meta, etc. As Liz Wessel, a partner at First Round Capital, notes, that’s hardly surprising. “It makes sense,” she said. “Everyone knows that it's been text-based AI for the last couple of years with ChatGPT, and now everyone is starting to figure out how to bring AI to voice.” Wessel was one of David AI’s first investors, leading the $5 million seed round it closed in January. She continues to see promise in the company given the massive data shortage that AI firms are facing. Sarah Catanzaro, an investor and general partner at Amplify Partners, agrees. “Companies are just voracious for data nowadays,” she said. “The beauty of [David AI] is it solves this urgent need that voice AI developers face today…but it's also a relatively simple solution. If they need data, sell them data, you don't need to overcomplicate it.”

Published May 18, 2025 10:00am EDT close Google's AI unleashes new powerful scam-busting features for Android The CyberGuy explains steps you can take to protect yourself from scams. Once considered an old-fashioned crime, check washing has roared back to life with alarming sophistication. Criminals are not just targeting personal checks anymore. They  are exploiting every vulnerability in the mailing and banking system to cash in on stolen funds. As check fraud incidents continue to rise sharply across the country, it is more important than ever to understand how check washing works and what you can do to protect yourself. Here is what you need to know to stay ahead of the scammers.JOIN THE FREE CYBERGUY REPORT: GET MY EXPERT TECH TIPS, CRITICAL SECURITY ALERTS, AND EXCLUSIVE DEALS — PLUS INSTANT ACCESS TO MY FREE ULTIMATE SCAM SURVIVAL GUIDE WHEN YOU SIGN UP! A pen placed on top of a blank check  (Kurt "CyberGuy" Knutsson)What is check washing fraud?Check washing fraud happens when a scammer steals a check you have written, erases the ink using chemicals like acetone or nail polish remover, and rewrites it to a new recipient. Often, they will change the amount to something much higher. The altered check is then deposited or cashed, and the funds are drained from your account before you even realize something is wrong.Why it's dangerous:Check washing does not require much technical skill.It can happen with checks you leave in your outgoing mail.Even mailed bill payments are vulnerable if not handled securely.FBI WARNS OF SCAM TARGETING VICTIMS WITH FAKE HOSPITALS AND POLICEUnlike digital fraud, check washing often goes unnoticed until long after the damage is done. Because checks can take days or even weeks to clear through the banking system, criminals have plenty of time to deposit altered checks and move funds before victims realize anything is wrong. By the time the missing money is discovered, tracing it back to the scammer can be extremely difficult. This delay makes it critical to monitor your accounts closely and act quickly if you spot any suspicious activity. Illustration of check fraud in progress  (Kurt "CyberGuy" Knutsson)How check washing has gotten worseSince 2023, check fraud has exploded in the United States.Financial institutions filed 665,000 suspicious activity reports (SARs) related to check fraud in 2023, which is a 134% increase compared to 2020.A 2024 Federal Reserve survey showed that check fraud now accounts for 30% of all fraud losses, second only to debit card fraud.Between February 2023 and August 2023 alone, Americans lost over $688 million to mail theft-related check fraud.The surge in fraud reports reflects more than just isolated criminal acts. Organized crime rings are increasingly turning to check washing as a hybrid crime, blending old-school mail theft with new digital tools like AI. Fraudsters now use advanced technologies to forge identities, alter check images and exploit gaps in banking security, making check washing more sophisticated than ever. As financial institutions strengthen cybersecurity defenses, scammers are targeting physical mail systems as a weaker link to bypass digital barriers.Real examples:Six people were charged with attempting to steal $80 million through fraudulent checks tied to COVID-19 relief funds.In Florida, a former mail carrier pleaded guilty to attempting to sell USPS arrow keys and stolen checks totaling nearly $550,000 to an undercover agent, leading to his arrest and confession.sNew tricks criminals are usingFraudsters have adapted their methods to stay ahead of law enforcement and banks.Mobile deposit fraud: Criminals alter check images or deposit the same check into multiple accounts.Synthetic identity fraud: Scammers create fake identities using AI-generated documents to open accounts and cash stolen checks.Business Email Compromise (BEC): Attackers impersonate executives or vendors to convince companies to send checks to fraudulent accounts.Criminals are combining old techniques like mail theft with new digital strategies, making check washing harder to recognize and prevent without proactive security measures. Recent advancements in AI technology have made it easier for scammers to forge realistic-looking documents, generate convincing fake identities and create sophisticated phishing emails. AI-generated fake IDs and altered check images can pass basic verification checks that would have caught manual forgeries in the past. This shift means check fraud is no longer just a matter of stealing a physical check, but exploiting digital vulnerabilities at every stage of the banking process. A person going over a bank statement (Kurt "CyberGuy" Knutsson)How to protect yourself from check washing fraudHere are 14 essential protective measures to shield yourself from check washing scams.1. Use a black gel pen: When writing checks, always use a black gel pen. The ink is much harder to remove compared to regular ballpoint pen ink.2. Bring checks directly to the post office when mailing them: If using a mailbox, make sure to drop off your mail before the final scheduled pickup so it is not left sitting overnight.3. Sign up for USPS Informed Delivery: Stay ahead by signing up for USPS Informed Delivery. You will receive digital previews of incoming mail so you can monitor for any missing items early. Learn more about why it's important here.4. Monitor your bank accounts: Set up real-time alerts for check clearing and review your statements weekly to catch any suspicious activity. Also, ask your bank about any other fraud-prevention tools they offer to protect your accounts.5. Switch to digital payments when possible: Use your bank’s mobile app to deposit checks without mailing or physically delivering them, reducing the risk of theft or tampering.6. Use checks with built-in security features: Choose checks printed on paper with watermarks, chemical-sensitive coatings or other security features that make check washing much harder.7. Limit the information on checks: Avoid unnecessary personal details. Do not print your Social Security number, driver’s license number or phone number on your checks. The less information available, the less a fraudster can use.HOW CYBERSCAMS ARE DRAINING AMERICANS WALLETS BY THE BILLIONS8. Store checks securely: Keep blank checks in a safe place. Store your checkbook in a locked drawer or safe, not in your purse, car or an easily accessible location at home.9. Check your mailbox security: Install a locking mailbox. If possible, use a mailbox with a lock to prevent thieves from stealing outgoing or incoming mail.10. Be cautious with endorsements: When endorsing checks, write "For Deposit Only" along with your account number to prevent others from cashing the check.11. Enroll in identity theft protection with check fraud specialization: Choose services that specifically monitor for compromised check details on dark web marketplaces and alert you to suspicious check-cashing patterns. Identity theft protection services monitor your personal data across the dark web and public databases, alert you to suspicious activity and assist you in locking down your accounts if needed. See my tips and best picks on how to protect yourself from identity theft.12. Invest in personal data removal services: Minimize exposure of sensitive details (like addresses or banking affiliations) that fraudsters could exploit for check-washing scams. Removing your personal information from these sites can help reduce your risk of becoming a victim. While no service can guarantee the complete removal of your data from the internet, a data removal service is really a smart choice. They aren’t cheap and neither is your privacy.  These services do all the work for you by actively monitoring and systematically erasing your personal information from hundreds of websites. It’s what gives me peace of mind and has proven to be the most effective way to erase your personal data from the internet. By limiting the information available, you reduce the risk of scammers cross-referencing data from breaches with information they might find on the dark web, making it harder for them to target you. Check out my top picks for data removal services here. 13. Shred sensitive documents: Shred old checks and bank statements. Don’t just throw them away. Shred any documents with sensitive banking information.14. Report suspicious activity immediately: If you suspect check fraud or missing mail, report it to your bank and the U.S. Postal Inspection Service right away.15. Use Positive Pay if you are a business: Positive Pay is a fraud prevention service offered by most banks to business customers. It works by matching the checks you issue with the ones presented for payment. If something doesn’t add up, like a changed amount or payee, the bank flags it for your review before it’s processed. You usually need to sign up through your bank, and there might be a fee, but it’s a smart way to protect your business from check fraud, especially if you write a lot of checks.What to do if you are a victimIf you think you have been targeted by check fraud:Report it to your bank immediately and freeze your account if necessary.Contact the USPS Postal Inspection Service to report stolen mail.File a complaint with the Better Business Bureau (BBB) or at IdentityTheft.gov.Time matters. The faster you act, the better your chances of recovering lost funds.Kurt’s key takeawaysCheck washing fraud is growing rapidly, and criminals are becoming more organized and sophisticated. Simple habits like using gel pens, securing your mail and monitoring your financial accounts closely can make a big difference. Services like USPS Informed Delivery, Positive Pay for businesses and personal data removal tools provide added layers of protection. Identity theft protection services can also offer critical support if you ever become a victim of check fraud.CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APPHave you or someone you know experienced check fraud? Let us know by writing us at Cyberguy.com/ContactFor more of my tech tips and security alerts, subscribe to my free CyberGuy Report Newsletter by heading to Cyberguy.com/NewsletterAsk Kurt a question or let us know what stories you'd like us to coverFollow Kurt on his social channelsAnswers to the most asked CyberGuy questions:New from Kurt:Copyright 2025 CyberGuy.com.  All rights reserved.   Kurt "CyberGuy" Knutsson is an award-winning tech journalist who has a deep love of technology, gear and gadgets that make life better with his contributions for Fox News & FOX Business beginning mornings on "FOX & Friends." Got a tech question? Get Kurt’s free CyberGuy Newsletter, share your voice, a story idea or comment at CyberGuy.com.

How every designer’s favorite app is turning design dreams into code nightmares.Image by authorIf you’re a Figma fanatic, you’ve probably heard about the launch of Figma Sites — a new tool that promises to let designers create and publish fully interactive websites directly from the platform.At first glance, it sounds revolutionary. No need to hand off Figma files to a developer or convert them into Framer or Webflow layouts. Just click a few buttons and — boom — instant websites. But if it sounds too good to be true, it probably is.Being the skeptic that I am, I decided to dig into the code it produces. And, not surprisingly, it’s a mess — a sea of <div> and <span> tags and random classes with zero regard for semantic structure.Screenshot of code generated by Figma Sites.For those who don’t know, semantics in code means using HTML elements that clearly describe their purpose — like <header> for page headers, <section> for content sections, and <article> for standalone content.Proper class structures are just as crucial — they should be meaningful, consistent, and follow naming conventions that make the code readable and maintainable.For example, instead of using class="css-z91rnx" which is the kind of autogenerated gibberish Figma Sites spits out, it should be something like class="header-main" or class="btn-primary" to clearly convey the element’s purpose and maintain consistency across the project.And good code isn’t just about neatness. It’s essential for accessibility. Semantic elements like <nav> and <button> aren’t just for show — they help screen readers and assistive technology navigate the page, making it usable for everyone.Then there’s SEO. Search engines rely on semantic structure to properly index content. If your site is a sea of <div> tags with meaningless classes, search engines struggle to understand the hierarchy and relevance of your content. That means your Figma site might look good but rank like garbage.But let’s be real — the biggest red flag here is how Figma Sites feels like another rushed-to-market product. It’s yet another low-code, no-code tool jumping on the “vibe coding” bandwagon — prioritizing drag-and-drop ease over actual code quality. It’s like they’re cashing in on the trend without caring about what’s under the hood.And that’s a problem. I get that a lot of new designers don’t know how to assess front-end code, but Figma should know better.This points to one of two things — either Figma is incompetent, or they’re deliberately misleading designers into thinking this is publishable code. And I’d like to believe a company like Figma isn’t incompetent, which leaves us with the second option — they’re selling a promise that doesn’t deliver.Don’t get me wrong — it does produce code, just in the most rudimentary way possible. By “deliver,” I mean quality code that actually aligns with the standards they claim to uphold.I’m willing to give Figma the benefit of the doubt and assume they have internal developers working on this tool who know what bad code looks like. So maybe Sites was rushed out the door to meet a deadline (cough, Config 2025), even though it wasn’t ready.To be fair, Figma does say Sites is in open beta, but there’s a big difference between a beta release and convincing people it’s nearly production-ready — and Sites is nowhere close to delivering quality websites.But if that’s the case, why not just admit it’s more of a work in progress than something shippable? Oh right, because that would hurt the bottom line. And at the end of the day, that’s what it’s always about.Figma Config 2025Figma Sites, as it stands, is nothing more than a glorified prototyping tool — because no one with an ounce of dignity would launch a site, even a basic landing page, using such atrocious code.But prototyping is what Figma already does best — it’s the platform’s core function. So unless they plan to overhaul Sites, it’s just another excuse to squeeze more money out thier users. Classic corporate move.But it’s not all doom and gloom— Figma just gave us a masterclass in what not to do. If they’re serious about empowering designers to create real websites, there’s a right way to do it.And here’s the kicker — we, as designers, have the power to push them to deliver a tool that actually lives up to the hype. But that means dropping the fanboy mentality and critiquing these features with the same scrutiny we’d apply to our own work.Instead of selling a half-baked solution, Figma could invest in making Sites a real, production-ready tool that generates semantic, accessible, and SEO-friendly code. That would be a game changer — a tool that not only simplifies the design-to-code workflow but actually upholds the standards that matter.Until then, if you care about how your work performs beyond the Figma canvas, it might be time to keep a developer on speed dial. Or better yet, learn some basic front-end code yourself. Because knowing how to spot bad code is the first step in demanding better from companies like Figma.Don’t miss out! Join my email list and receive the latest content.Figma Sites: innovation or exploitation? was originally published in UX Collective on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.