A Democratic congressman had harsh criticism for Polymarket for allowing users to bet on the date the United States would confirm the rescue of Air Force service members shot down over Iran.

In a social media post on Friday, Representative Seth Moulton wrote, “They could be your neighbor, a friend, a family member. And people are betting on whether or not they’ll be saved. This is DISGUSTING.” (President Donald Trump announced early Sunday that the second service member, a weapons system officer, has been rescued.)

Moulton also described Polymarket as a “dystopian death market” and noted that Donald Trump Jr. is an investor. The congressman recently banned his staff from participating in prediction markets like Polymarket and Kalshi. 

Polymarket responded that it had taken the market down “immediately” for not meeting the company’s integrity standards.

“It should not have been posted, and we are investigating how this slipped through our internal safeguards,” the company said.

Polymarket previously saw hundreds of millions of dollars traded on contracts tied to the bombing of Iran by the United States and Israel.

Old shop tools have a reputation for resilience and sturdiness, and though some of this is due to survivorship bias, some of it certainly comes down to an abundance of cast iron. The vise which [Marius Hornberger] recently restored is no exception, which made a good stand indispensable; it needed to be mobile for use throughout the shop, yet stay firmly in place under significant force. To do this, he built a stand with a pen-like locking mechanism to deploy and retract some caster wheels.

Most of the video goes over the construction of the rest of the stand, which is interesting in itself; the stand has an adjustable height, which required [Marius] to construct two interlocking center columns with a threaded adjustment mechanism. The three legs of the stand were welded out of square tubing, and the wheels are mounted on levers attached to the inside of the legs. One of the levers is longer and has a foot pedal that can be pressed down to extend all the casters and lock them in place. A second press on the pedal unlocks the levers, which are pulled up by springs. The locking mechanism is based on a cam that blocks or allows motion depending on its rotation; each press down rotates it a bit. This mechanism, like most parts of the stand, was laser-cut and laser-welded (if you want to skip ahead to its construction, it begins at about 29:00).

Unlike locking caster wheels, this provides significant grip when the wheels are retracted; considering the heft of the vise [Marius] restored, this must be helpful. If you’re more interested in building a vise than a stand, we’ve seen that too.

Thanks to [Keith Olson] for the tip!

NASA has shared a stunning image (above) captured by the crew of the Artemis II mission as they head toward the moon. It shows a tiny Earth, mostly in darkness and surrounded by the inky blackness of space.

The photo was taken on day four of the Artemis II mission that will see four astronauts fly around the moon before returning to Earth. On Monday, the crew — NASA’s Victor Glover, Reid Wiseman, and Christina Koch, along with Jeremy Hansen of the Canadian Space Agency — will loop around our nearest neighbor, setting a new flight record in the process.

“One last look at Earth before we reach the moon,” NASA said in a post on X that shared the incredible photo.

“This view of the Earth was captured on April 5, the fourth day of the Artemis II mission, from inside the Orion spacecraft. The four astronauts will reach their closest approach of the moon tomorrow, April 6.”

Tantalizingly for the crew, the Orion spacecraft is expected to pass within about 4,070 miles of the moon, giving astronauts their closest view of the cratered, rugged terrain in more than five decades.

But that’s not all. On Monday afternoon, shortly before 2 p.m. ET, the Artemis II crew will surpass the greatest distance from Earth ever reached by humans, set by the Apollo 13 crew in 1970 when it flew 248,655 miles from our planet. Then, about five hours later, the Artemis II astronauts will reach their farthest point from Earth, 252,760 miles, setting a new record.

The 10-day mission, which launched from the Kennedy Space Center in Florida on April 1, has so far been going mostly to plan. One hiccup, however, concerns the onboard toilet, which has been experiencing intermittent problems during the flight.

The latest issue has been caused by what engineers believe may be ice blocking a pipe that expels the astronauts’ urine into space. It means that for now, the crew members are having to use special bags to collect and store their liquid waste. Fortunately, the toilet still works for number-2 waste, which is dealt with differently.

Artemis II marks the first crewed flight of the Orion spacecraft and the second Orion flight overall. The mission is designed to test the spacecraft’s systems in preparation for more complex missions like Artemis IV, which will endeavor to return humans to the lunar surface after an absence of more than five decades.

Quordle was one of the original Wordle alternatives and is still going strong now more than 1,400 games later. It offers a genuine challenge, though, so read on if you need some Quordle hints today – or scroll down further for the answers.

Enjoy playing word games? You can also check out my NYT Connections today and NYT Strands today pages for hints and answers for those puzzles, while Marc’s Wordle today column covers the original viral word game.

A WIRED investigation based on Department of Homeland Security records this week revealed the identities of paramilitary Border Patrol agents who frequently used force against civilians during Operation Midway Blitz in Chicago last fall. Several of the agents, WIRED found, appeared in similar operations in other states around the US.

Customs and Border Protection may want to remember to protect its sensitive facility information. Using basic Google searches, WIRED discovered flashcards made by users of the online learning platform Quizlet that contained gate codes to CBP facilities and more.

In a rare move, Apple this week released “backported” patches for iOS 18 to protect millions of people still using the older operating system from the DarkSword hacking technique that was found in use in the wild. Discovered in March, DarkSword allows attackers to infect iPhones that simply visit a website loaded with the takeover tools embedded in it. Apple initially pushed users to update to the current version of its operating system, iOS 26, but ultimately issued the iOS 18 patches after DarkSword continued to spread.

The US-Israel war with Iran careened into its second month this week, with Iran threatening to launch attacks against more than a dozen US companies, including tech giants like Apple, Google, and Microsoft, which have offices and data centers in the Gulf region. The deadly conflict, which has no clear end in sight, continues to wreak havoc on the global economy as shipping crews remain stranded in the Strait of Hormuz, a key trade route. Meanwhile, some are beginning to wonder what could happen if US strikes cause real damage to Iran’s nuclear facilities.

And that’s not all! Each week, we round up the security and privacy news we didn’t cover in depth ourselves. Click the headlines to read the full stories. And stay safe out there.

Earlier this week, a security researcher flagged that Anthropic accidentally made the source code for its popular vibe-coding tool, Claude Code, public. Immediately, people began reposting the code on the developer platform GitHub. But beware if you want to try to download some of those repos yourself: BleepingComputer reports that some of the posters are actually hackers who have tucked a piece of infostealer malware into the lines of code.

Anthropic, for its part, has been trying to remove copies of the leak (malware-ridden or not) by issuing copyright takedown notices. The Wall Street Journal reported that the company initially tried to remove more than 8,000 repositories on GitHub but later narrowed that down to 96 copies and adaptations.

This isn’t the first time that hackers have capitalized on interest in Claude Code, which requires users who might not be as familiar with their computer’s terminal to copy and paste install commands from a website. In March, 404 Media reported that sponsored ads on Google led to sites that were masquerading as official Claude Code installation guides, which directed users to run a command that would actually download malware.

The FBI formally classified a recent cyber intrusion into one of its surveillance collection systems as a “major incident” under FISMA—a legal designation reserved for breaches believed to pose serious risks to national security. The determination, reported to Congress earlier this week, is understood to be the first time since at least 2020 that the bureau has declared a major incident on its own systems. Politico, citing two unnamed senior Trump administration officials, reported that China is believed to be behind the intrusion. If confirmed, the breach could mark a significant counterintelligence failure for the FBI.

The FBI said it detected “suspicious activities” on its networks in February. In a notice to Congress on March 4, reviewed by Politico, the bureau said the compromised systems were unclassified and held “returns from legal process,” citing, as examples, phone and internet metadata collected under court orders and personal information “pertaining to subjects of FBI investigations.” The intruders reportedly gained access through a commercial internet service provider, an approach the FBI characterized as reflecting “sophisticated tactics.” In its only public statement, the bureau said it had deployed “all technical capabilities to respond.”

Good morning! Let’s play Connections, the NYT’s clever word game that challenges you to group answers in various categories. It can be tough, so read on if you need Connections hints.

What should you do once you’ve finished? Why, play some more word games of course. I’ve also got daily Strands hints and answers and Quordle hints and answers articles if you need help for those too, while Marc’s Wordle today page covers the original viral word game.

Strands is the NYT’s latest word game after the likes of Wordle, Spelling Bee and Connections – and it’s great fun. It can be difficult, though, so read on for my Strands hints.

Want more word-based fun? Then check out my NYT Connections today and Quordle today pages for hints and answers for those games, and Marc’s Wordle today page for the original viral word game.