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Key developments
FBI and Google disrupt NetNut botnet
CNET's Joe Hindy reported that the FBI carried out a court-authorized July 2 seizure of domains and infrastructure tied to NetNut, working with Google, Lumen Technologies, the Shadowserver Foundation, the Justice Department and IRS Criminal Investigation. The residential proxy service was associated with the Popa botnet, which controlled about 2 million Android TVs and similar smart-home devices used for password spraying, credential attacks, sensitive-data scraping and malicious task execution. Google said the action significantly degraded NetNut's proxy network and reduced the available device pool by millions.
Why it matters
Residential proxy botnets turn household devices into privacy-abusing infrastructure that masks criminals behind real home IP addresses.
Sources & driving stories
CNET · Joe Hindy
CNET coverageCanada deepfake criminal law takes effect soon
Let's Data Science reported that Canada's Bill C-16 received Royal Assent on June 18, with most reforms set to take effect July 18. The law expands Criminal Code intimate-image protections to sexually explicit deepfakes, creates an offence for threats to distribute intimate images including deepfakes, and raises the indictment maximum for that threat offence to 10 years. The report says platforms and image-generation teams will need stronger intake, provenance records, access logs, human review and evidence-preservation workflows for high-risk intimate-image complaints.
Why it matters
The law makes synthetic sexual imagery an explicit privacy and abuse category, increasing legal exposure for platforms handling consent-based takedown claims.
Sources & driving stories
LET'S DATA SCIENCE
Let's Data Science coverageRights groups press probe of UK eVisa failures
Yahoo reported that 20 civil-rights organizations, in a letter coordinated by Open Rights Group, called for an investigation into the UK Information Commissioner's Office over its handling of Home Office eVisa data failures. Campaigners said merged identities caused personal information and immigration histories to be wrongly shared with strangers, while eVisa errors left some people unable to prove rights to work, study, rent or travel. The ICO disclosed it received 851 complaints about the Home Office between December 2023 and December 2025, and critics also cited its decision not to formally investigate the Afghan resettlement data breach.
Why it matters
The dispute tests whether the UK's privacy regulator will take enforcement action against systemic government identity-system failures.
Sources & driving stories
YAHOO
Yahoo coverageWorth noting
WORTH NOTING
Meta privacy controls remain contested
CNET's Scott Stein and BGR's Jonathan Sayers reported Meta is pushing a mandatory smart-glasses update that disables cameras if the recording LED is tampered with, while Gadget Review's Alex Barrientos reported Meta's new Muse Image tool lets users tag public Instagram accounts for AI image generation without notifying the account holder.
WORTH NOTING
Gemini privacy lawsuit dismissed
MLex reported that a US federal judge dismissed privacy claims over Gemini AI features in Gmail and Chat for insufficient standing, while giving plaintiffs leave to amend.
WORTH NOTING
Election-worker data subpoena quashed
Reason's Jacob Sullum reported that U.S. District Judge William M. Ray II quashed a grand jury subpoena seeking home addresses, emails and phone numbers for thousands of Fulton County election workers and volunteers.
Still unclear
OPEN QUESTION
Can residential proxy takedowns stay durable?
Google warned that proxy networks often share and resell botnet access, meaning one takedown may not fully remove the privacy risk from hijacked home devices.
OPEN QUESTION
How will platforms prove deepfake consent?
Canada's new law puts practical pressure on platforms to preserve provenance, metadata, triage records and human-review decisions in disputed intimate-image cases.