So could you ice skate on the ice? Yes, but only if there's no snow on the ice. In addition, there are rougher patches of packed ice that can't be skated. The shipping lanes also pose a challenge since you need a way to cross them safely. This is definitely something that should not be attempted unless you know exactly what you're doing.

Couple of guys tour skated from mainland Finland to Åland islands: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r16NdjXhTHw

Finally, a word of warning: Avoid traversing the ice unless you know for sure where the safe routes are. The ice can be much thinner near drainages, near currents, under bridges, near shipping lanes, etc. Here are a bunch of safety tips: https://www.luontoon.fi/en/articles/safely-on-the-ice

#tourskating #adventure

The Baltic Sea hasn't had this much ice since 2011.

Ice chart: https://cdn.fmi.fi/marine-observations/products/ice-charts/latest-full-color-ice-chart.pdf

#balticsea #winter #weather

I disable all AI features outright in any tools I see. The reason is privacy and security. It is typical to have little control over what data stays on the device and what is sent over to someone else's computer for processing.

It's good to see that EU parliament is taking a similar stance: https://www.politico.eu/article/eu-parliament-blocks-ai-features-over-cyber-privacy-fears/

It's almost as if the language models are actually not intelligent at all.

Who would have thought!?

@andrew @privacyguides Yes they can.

However:

1. The US Privacy Act applies only to US citizens only. Anyone else is automatically free for all. US intelligence agencies happily exercise this right and collect and disseminate all information of non-citizens.

2. I trust Finnish authorities more than US ones, especially the current US administration. It wasn't great before either, but now the rights bestowed to them are being abused to cater for any whims of the deranged leader. The current administration has house, senate and the supreme court. There's absolutely no recourse or any legal avenue in case of abuse, even for US citizens, and definitely not for anyone who is non-citizen.

So yeah, not the same thing from my perspective.

This is exactly the problem with trusting US companies right now. They will comply with these "lawful access requests", regardless of how outrageous they are.

The Intercept: "Google Fulfilled ICE Subpoena Demanding Student Journalist’s Bank and Credit Card Numbers" - https://theintercept.com/2026/02/10/google-ice-subpoena-student-journalist/

The only recourse you have as a consumer is to switch away from these US services. It can be tricky as many have built their digital identity on top of the US services, self-hosting requires expertise and knowing which alternatives to trust is difficult. @privacyguides has some helpful guides for this: https://www.privacyguides.org/

#privacy #google #privacyguides

Expect even more fantastical claims from companies pushing AI. Their statements will get ever stupider as the calls for actual measurable value grow stronger.

https://www.businessinsider.com/microsoft-ai-ceo-mustafa-suleyman-white-collar-tasks-automation-prediction-2026-2

I've categorically stopped using any services that have started to require me to share a picture of my passport, driver's license or my face to continue using them.

#privacy

Apparently more user information was actually leaked than initially estimated. The current estimates are around 50000 user accounts. This is due to the system not actually deleting the user account from the database when the user is deleted.

Source: https://valtori.fi/-/tilannepaivitys-30.1.-todetusta-mobiililaitehallinnan-tietomurrosta (in finnish).

This btw makes the system not GDPR compliant.

There's a Finnish citizens’ initiative for digital sovereignty. The initiative proposes a law to outlaw the use of non-EU service providers and software for critical government functions. More details at https://www.kansalaisaloite.fi/fi/aloite/16691 (in finnish) https://www.kansalaisaloite.fi/sv/initiativ/16691 (in swedish)

Meanwhile, Meta blocked the Threads account of the initiative: https://mementomori.social/@digitaalinenitsenaisyys/116022479606183593

#citizensinitiative #digitalsovereignty

This Ivanti Endpoint Manager Mobile (IPMM) security advisory seems to fit the timeline of the incident: https://forums.ivanti.com/s/article/Security-Advisory-Ivanti-Endpoint-Manager-Mobile-EPMM-CVE-2026-1281-CVE-2026-1340?language=en_US

One of the Finnish Government ICT Centre (Valtori) MDM services was compromised. Apparently the attacker(s) employed a vulnerability that did not have security fix available at the time of the breach.

The attacker extracted at least name, email address, phone number and device information for the impacted users. Actual mobile devices have not been known to be targeted.

Valtori provides service to 77000 users. While not all of them had devices under the affected system, this is still quite concerning.

Source: https://valtori.fi/-/osassa-valtionhallinnon-mobiililaitehallintaa-tietomurto-hyokkaajan-toiminta-estetty (in finnish)

#infosec #cybersecurity #compromise #breach

Apparently a state-sponsored group was using Notepad++ update functionality to infect targeted people.

"According to the former hosting provider, the shared hosting server was compromised until September 2, 2025. Even after losing server access, attackers maintained credentials to internal services until December 2, 2025, which allowed them to continue redirecting Notepad++ update traffic to malicious servers."

source: https://notepad-plus-plus.org/news/hijacked-incident-info-update/

#infosec #cybersecurity

@TechConnectify Thank you for this video.