AT&T tells customers to change their phones or they won’t work anymore
Even recent unlocked phones like the Galaxy S10e or the Nokia 6.1 are affected
Amid an economy-crushing pandemic, AT&T has decided that now is the best time to send a scaremongering email to some customers, telling them that their device “is not compatible with the new network and you need to replace it to continue receiving service.” The email conveniently doesn’t explicitly mention that this will only affect customers as late as February 2022, only linking to that information.
The email’s formatting suggests that the easiest path forward is just getting a new phone via the carrier straight away: It advertises that AT&T makes “getting a new device online easy,” detailing various free and fast shipping options. Someone who just skims over the mail without clicking the red “Learn More” button might conclude they need a new phone right now.
The notice is poorly worded enough to make an AT&T subscriber wonder if it’s a scam in AT&T’s forum, since they own a relatively recent Galaxy S10e. Other customers even agreed that it’s likely not a genuine email until someone could shine some light into the issue, pointing to the support page that AT&T linked to through the “Learn more” button in the email. It details that in February 2022, the carrier will turn off its 3G network, which will make some phones lose voice calls.
You might think that this isn’t a widespread issue since most modern phones support 4G data and calling (or HDVoice, as AT&T calls it). However, AT&T only whitelists a small number of handsets it directly sells to customers for 4G voice calling, and it looks like identical non-carrier phones don’t necessarily work with the carrier’s HDVoice service, like the aforementioned Galaxy S10e.
Interestingly enough, a PDF on the carrier’s website from February claims that the unlocked S10e is supposed to be compatible with AT&T’s HDVoice. We’re not sure if the email was mistakenly sent out to the S10e owner or if the list in the document is outdated (or has never been accurate). Either way, depending on how many handsets AT&T deems incompatible, this email might have gone out to a significant amount of subscribers.
AT&T needs to clarify this — many people already have enough problems in these times of economic uncertainty, and a new phone might not be among the things they want to worry about right now. AT&T could easily whitelist modern non-carrier devices like the S10e and the Nokia 6.1 (and why not even older ones like the OnePlus 5) so they could continue working on the network in 2022. The company should follow up with an email explicitly making clear that genuinely unsupported devices will only stop working in a year and a half, not tomorrow. Let’s hope no one ends up feeling pressured into getting a new phone right now involuntarily.
So there you have it: If you’ve received this email, you have more than a year and a half to upgrade your current phone. And in a best-case scenario, AT&T might even consider whitelisting more devices, which could allow you to keep your handset even longer without switching to another carrier.
For more information, check out our detailed explainer on this AT&T email situation.
AT&T statement
AT&T has provided us with the following statement:
“This email was one of many planned to keep customers informed about the shutdown of our 3G network in early 2022. It should have included the date that certain devices would no longer be supported. We apologize for any confusion this may have caused and will be more clear in future updates.”
When asked to clarify why the message was sent to some subscribers with phones that appear to support HD Voice, the carrier only reiterated that users who “have a device that does not support HD Voice on our network or that requires 3G” should have received the notice.” If you’re still confused about your handset’s fate, AT&T advises subscribers to contact customer care.
Updated to include the AT&T PDF detailing supposedly compatible unlocked devices.
Article via AndroidPolice
Madonna Claims She Was Fined $1 Million For Supporting Russia LGBTQ Rights
Madonna is boasting about not paying a $1 million fine allegedly slapped on her for supporting Russia’s LGBTQ community at a 2012 show in St. Petersburg.
But a Russian court threw out the lawsuit filed by a group of conservative activists, and the singer was never fined a single ruble.
The debacle centers around a show Madonna played on Aug. 9, 2012, in St. Petersburg, during which she voiced her support for the local gay community. At the entrance to the Peterburgsky arena, audience members were handed pink wristbands and asked to wear them during the concert to show “tolerance for the gay community.”
In a tweet and Instagram post on Monday, Madonna linked to a video showing part of her speech that night. “I was fined 1 million dollars by The government for supporting the Gay community,” she wrote. “I never paid.”
In the video she addresses the audience, many of whom were waving rainbow flags.
“I feel that people are becoming more and more afraid of people who are different,” Madonna says on the video. “People are becoming more and more intolerant. It’s a very scary time. But we can make a difference. We can change this. We have the power.”
In the same speech, she told the audience: “I am here to say that the gay community and gay people here and all around the world have the same rights — to be treated with dignity, with respect, with tolerance, with compassion, with love.”
After the 2012 show, a group of conservative activists filed a class-action lawsuit against Madonna, the venue and the promoter, Planeta Plus, demanding 333 million rubles ($10.7 million at the time) in damages, claiming they were insulted by the American singer’s statements and actions in support of the gay community.
But that November, St. Petersburg’s Moskovsky district court threw out the lawsuit, a spokesperson for the court confirmed to Billboard on Wednesday. No fine was ever imposed on the artist, venue or promoter, the spokesperson said.
“There was no gay propaganda during the show,” Yevgeny Filkenshtein, head of PMI Group, which promoted the show, tells Billboard. “Madonna just called on the audiences to be tolerant towards people of other sexual orientation and religious persuasions,” he says. “We protected Madonna from all that in any possible way and dealt with the lawsuit by ourselves. The court eventually sided with us and the artist, and no fine was imposed.”
Several months after the 2012 show, Vitaly Milonov, a conservative St. Petersburg legislator who was behind an anti-gay propaganda law first introduced in the city and then nationwide in Russia, claimed that Madonna had violated Russia’s tax and migration legislation by performing the show on the wrong type of visa and should be punished for that. But he never produced any evidence to back his claims.
Several Russian media outlets have reported on Madonna’s tweet, expressing surprise about the non-existing $1 million fine. Russia has traditionally been hostile towards homosexuality, and intolerance has been on the rise. Same-sex couples are not allowed to marry or form civil unions in Russia.
Madonna did not respond to requests for comment.
She is hardly alone in the music community for her criticism of Russia’s increasingly anti-gay laws. Lady Gaga and Elton John are among the pop stars who have spoken out about local and national laws impacting the LGBTQ community. Citing an administrative law, a St Petersburg court fined the organizers of a 2013 Lady Gaga show for “propaganda of alcohol consumption and homosexuality,” after a 13-year-old girl was exposed to simulated sexual intercourse between women. Russian President Vladimir Putin last year pushed back against John’s criticisms, saying Russia was “very neutral” toward the LGBTQ community.
Article via MSN
Phaedra Parks says mortician business is ‘booming’ amid coronavirus
Reality TV star Phaedra Parks says her business as a mortician is “booming” as a result of the coronavirus pandemic.
Parks — the former “Real Housewives of Atlanta” star who’s now on “Marriage Bootcamp” — is also a licensed funeral director and mortician, plus a top Atlanta lawyer, author and activist. She exclusively revealed on Wednesday to Page Six podcast “We Hear” of her mortuary biz: “Oh my gosh, it’s going great, didn’t you hear about that pandemic, girl? We are booming. Unfortunately. We have been jam-packed since the pandemic started.”
She said that she’s seen the devastation of the virus first-hand: “I’m not physician, however, I do have a mortuary and I’ll tell you this: Normally in the summer months, we’re waiting for a boating accident or a motorcycle crash, because otherwise, we’re pretty empty,” she said. “We are jam-packed. We are working like it’s our heaviest season, so… I tell people when they say, ‘It’s a joke, it’s not that big of a deal,’ well, let me put it to you in real terms, I’m getting 17 calls a day for pickups and that’s at one location. Last week, all of the people were under 59.”
She said she’s seen so many fatalities of people in their 20s, “it makes it extremely frightening… I’ve seen several mothers come in burying their children.” She added of the difficult situation, “the pandemic really wreaks havoc on families, so we’ve buried three or four people in one immediate family. It’s really sad. It definitely takes a toll on you emotionally seeing a mother, a father, a son, an aunt… this pandemic is really serious and people should realize that, because it’s not a joke.”
The pandemic has also kept her and boyfriend Medina Islam, an actor based in LA, in a long-distance relationship. But the couple went on the current season of “Marriage Bootcamp” together after they’d been dating for just six months, and had never been intimate together.
“I’ve been pretty awesome when it comes to being able to master different careers, and I’ve got several jobs. But when it comes to relationships, I haven’t always been so successful with it,” Parks said of her decision to go on the relationship show. “I wanted to make sure that the passion didn’t cloud my judgment, because… when you’re entangled, sometimes the entangling can be so good you can’t really [think] outside the entanglement.”
She would not reveal if the pair has since been further physically entangled, but hinted that the subject could be captured by the WE tv show’s cameras, which are on at all times — except when, “you’re on the loo.”
Photo Credit: pagesix
New Jersey Starbucks employee arrested for spitting in cops’ drinks
A New Jersey Starbucks employee spat in drinks ordered by police officers and then bragged about it — leading to his easy arrest, reports said Tuesday.
Kevin Trejo, 21, of Westwood was charged Monday with subjecting a law enforcement officer to contact with a bodily fluid, tampering with a cup of coffee knowing it was ordered by an officer and for creating a hazardous condition, police said.
Amid the coronavirus pandemic, Trejo allegedly spat in the drinks at a Park Ridge location and was “arrogant enough to be bragging about it,” which led cops to question him, Chief Joseph Madden told the outlet, calling the actions “very disturbing.”
Bodily fluids like saliva are a primary way people can contract the coronavirus, experts have said.
“This particular individual’s behavior was reprehensible and it is not at all the reflection of how our [employees] treat our customers on a daily basis,” a Starbucks spokesperson told The Post by phone.
“We will continue to support Park Ridge Police in support of their investigation and have a deep respect for the Park Ridge Police Department and the officers who help keep our partners and communities safe.”
The barista has since been fired, the spokesperson said.
“Every time I think we as society hit bottom, there is a new incident,” New Jersey Police Benevolent Association president Patrick Colligan railed in a statement about the incident.
“Officers risk their lives daily, it shouldn’t be while getting coffee.”
via: https://nypost.com/2020/07/21/nj-starbucks-employee-arrested-for-spitting-in-cops-drinks/
Photo Credit: nypost.com
Man kicked out of Wisconsin store after using his shirt as a ‘mask’
This bellyacher was no match for workers at a Wisconsin store who kicked him out after he pulled his shirt over his face – exposing his big gut — and insisted it was a mask, according to a report.
The sartorially challenged customer was caught on video at the LDF Country Market on a Native American reservation in Lac Du Flambeau, where he refused to wear an actual mask amid the pandemic, Newsweek reported.
“There’s an irate white man on the reservation trying to boss us around right here folks,” the worker recording the incident is heard saying, prompting the customer to ask why “race” was dragged into the situation.
“This is what they look like. You were asked three times
and you didn’t listen. You’re on a sovereign nation, if you don’t like it, get out,” the employee replied.
“Please leave, sir,” another employee tells the stubborn shopper, who is wearing a US Marines cap. “You have to purchase a mask at the door or you have to go home and get one.”
But the man keeps holding his shirt up to his face.
“This mask is fine, what’s wrong with this mask? It’s the same as yours,” he says.
“That’s not a mask,” a few staffers in the Lake Superior Chippewa reservation area tell him.
The local tribal council recently passed a resolution that allows only permanent residents on tribal land during the coronavirus pandemic, Newsweek reported.
“We are requiring consumers and staff to do the six-foot distancing and masks are required within the business,” a store manager told the mag.
“We do have the right under tribal reservation codes to enforce the mask requirement and we’re also within our rights to call tribal PD to escort out people being rowdy or refusing to follow our guidelines,” the manager added.
After fruitlessly asking the employees to provide their names, the customer was later removed by authorities.
via: https://nypost.com/2020/07/21/man-kicked-out-of-wisconsin-store-after-using-shirt-as-a-mask/
Photo Credit: twitter
Two Chinese hackers charged with trying to steal COVID-19 vaccine research
Two Chinese hackers have been charged with attempting to steal coronavirus vaccine research from government agencies and private companies, the Department of Justice announced on Tuesday.
The two men allegedly worked with the Chinese Ministry of State Security and the Guangdong State Security Department to conduct a “sweeping global computer intrusion campaign,” Assistant Attorney General John Demers said during a news conference.
Li Xiaoyu, 34, and Dong Jiazhi, 31, targeted intellectual property and confidential business information held by companies related to coronavirus treatment, testing and vaccines, he said.
Pharmaceutical and defense companies, high-tech manufacturing, makers of medical devices, gaming software corporations and solar energy companies were among the industries the two focused on.
“According to the indictment, these malicious cyber activities began more than 10 years ago and were ongoing as of the date of the indictment,” Demers said. “During that time, the hackers stole terabytes of data from hundreds of targets, establishing themselves as a prolific threat to U.S. and foreign networks.”
The charges allege the hackers also tried to access the accounts of non-governmental organizations, dissidents, clergy and human rights activists in the US, China and Hong Kong.
Li and Dong focused on high-tech companies in the US, Britain, Australia, Belgium, Germany, Japan, Lithuania, Spain, South Korea and Sweden.
The indictments, filed in US District Court in Washington show that Beijing is using cyber thefts as part of a worldwide campaign to “rob, replicate and replace” non-Chinese companies in the global marketplace, the Justice Department said.
Demers also noted in his remarks that China is providing a “safe haven” for criminals in exchange for their work.
“China has now taken its place, alongside Russia, Iran and North Korea, in that shameful club of nations that provide a safe haven for cyber criminals in exchange for those criminals being ‘on call’ to work for the benefit of the state, here to feed the Chinese Communist Party’s insatiable hunger for American and other non-Chinese companies’ hard-earned intellectual property, including COVID-19 research,” the assistant attorney general said.
via: https://nypost.com/2020/07/21/chinese-hackers-charged-with-trying-to-steal-vaccine-research/
Photo Credit: FBI
Michigan woman tried to use fake hitman website www.rentahitman.com to kill ex-husband
A Michigan woman tried to have her ex-husband killed for $5,000 by contacting a fake hitman website, state police said.
Wendy Wein, 51, of South Rockwood, was arrested Friday after she visited a bogus website — www.rentahitman.com — and completed a “service request form” requesting a consultation to help her with an “issue,” Michigan State Police said Tuesday.
“Wein specified her ex-husband as the target of her problems,” police said in a news release. “The owner of the website contacted the Michigan State Police because he was concerned that Wein may be attempting to kill her husband.”
An undercover state trooper posing as a hitman then met with Wein in a parking lot in her hometown, police said.
At the meeting, Wein offered the undercover trooper $5,000 to kill her ex-husband, who lives in another state, police said.
Wein was arraigned Tuesday on charges of solicitation to commit murder and illegal use of a computer to facilitate a crime. She was ordered held at a Monroe County jail on $500,000 bond, the Monroe News reports.
Since launching the fake website in 2005, the owner of http://www.rentahitman.com told investigators he had been contacted numerous times by people requesting murders, school shootings and even a child abduction, state police said.
via: https://nypost.com/2020/07/22/michigan-woman-tried-to-use-fake-hitman-website-to-kill-ex-husband/
Photo Credit: Monroe County Jail
Montana man accused of over 60 child sex abuse counts gets a year sentence
A man in Montana who was initially charged with more than 60 counts of child sex abuse has received a deferred one-year sentence after agreeing to a plea deal, according to reports.
William Edward Miller Jr., 51, of Great Falls, was arrested in February 2019 after a 14-year-old high school student accused him of raping her at her home a year prior. She alleged that Miller allowed an 11-year-old boy to rape her while he watched in a separate encounter.
Later that August, state prosecutors filed 64 counts of sexual abuse of children against Miller after investigators allegedly found images of child pornography and bestiality on his phone and laptop, the Great Falls Tribune reported. Police received a search warrant on his home after Miller allegedly began calling people from jail asking them to destroy his phone, KFBB reported.
Miller would later accept a plea deal that involved prosecutors dropping the majority of the charges against him. He pleaded guilty to one count of felony sexual abuse of children and one count of misdemeanor unsworn falsification to authorities.
Cascade County District Judge Elizabeth Best on Monday sentenced Miller to six months in the Cascade County Detention Center for the misdemeanor. He received credit for 384 days of time served. On the felony charge, Miller was slapped with a one-year deferred sentence and was ordered to complete sex offender treatment in the community, according to the Tribune. Under a deferred sentence, the child sex abuse charge could be wiped from Miller’s record if he doesn’t commit a crime over the next year, according to KFBB.
The felony count for which Miller pleaded guilty came in connection to a photograph of then 17-year-old Shiloh Young. The woman, now 19, has been married to Miller for three months and testified that she took the photo herself two years ago to help her overcome body issues.
“William is a kind, compassionate, empathetic man. Never has he manipulated or controlled me,” Young told the judge, according to the Tribune. “I ask that we be free of this charge. I feel that we have suffered enough, and I am not a victim of my husband.”
Photo Credit: Cascade County Detention Center
Man faked death to avoid jail but typo gave him away
NEW YORK (AP) — A Long Island criminal defendant tried faking his death to avoid a jail sentence, but the phony death certificate his lawyer submitted had a glaring spelling error that made it a dead giveaway for a fraud, prosecutors said Tuesday.
Robert Berger, 25, of Huntington, New York, now faces up to four years in prison if convicted in the alleged scheme. That’s in addition to pending sentences for earlier guilty pleas to charges of possession of a stolen Lexus and attempted grand larceny of a truck — punishment prosecutors say he was looking to avoid.
“It will never cease to amaze me the lengths some people will go to to avoid being held accountable on criminal charges,” Nassau County District Attorney Madeline Singas said in a telephone interview.
Arraigned by video Tuesday because of the coronavirus pandemic, Berger pleaded not guilty to a single count of offering a false instrument for filing. A judge set bail at $1 but ordered Berger back to jail because of his underlying cases. His next court date is scheduled for July 29.
A message seeking comment was left with a public defender who took over Berger’s case after the lawyer who submitted the suspicious death certificate claimed he’d been used as a pawn and had nothing to do with the alleged shenanigans.
Scheduled to be sentenced to a year in jail last October on the theft-related charges, Berger fled the state, while taking steps to convince his then-lawyer, prosecutors and the judge that he had killed himself — including allegedly using his fiance to pass along a bogus death certificate, prosecutors said.
At first glance, Berger’s purported death certificate looked like an official document issued by the New Jersey Department of Health, Vital Statistics and Registry, but there was one big problem: Registry was spelled “Regsitry,” prosecutors said. There were also inconsistencies in the font type and size that raised suspicions, they said.
The real New Jersey Department of Health, Vital Statistics and Registry confirmed that Berger’s death certificate was a fake, prosecutors said.
Berger was alive, but not entirely well. While supposedly dead, he’d been arrested in suburban Philadelphia on charges including allegations he provided a false identity to law enforcement and stole from a Catholic college. He was sentenced in January to up to a year in jail, according to Pennsylvania court records.
Berger’s case was reminiscent of one six years ago in which a former Coast Guard petty officer-turned-shoe salesman posed as a former military lawyer, soliciting clients and appearing in court. That man, Kenneth Goldstein, was outed as a fraud when he started rambling in an un-lawyerlike fashion in a Long Island courtroom.
“You’re gonna get caught,” Singas said. “We say it all the time. Crime doesn’t pay. We’ll catch up with you eventually. In this case, it’s never a good idea to submit phony documents to the district attorney. We were able to make sure that he wasn’t able to get away with it.”
via: https://currently.att.yahoo.com/att/xandr/da-man-faked-death-avoid-203349315.html
Photo Credit: courthousenews.com