Immich is a popular self-hosted photo and video management solution. It is one of the best Google Photos alternatives around that has a straightforward user interface and a feature set that has impressed many.

Unfortunately, the Immich team has found itself in a bit of a pickle with Google.

Open Source is Malicious According to Google

Earlier this month, Immich's .immich.cloud websites were suddenly marked as dangerous by Google Safe Browsing. Users trying to access these sites were greeted with the fear-inducing "red screen of death."

If you didn't know, Safe Browsing is Google's service that looks to protect users by warning them when they try to access malicious websites or download suspicious files. The service is integrated into major browsers like Chrome and Firefox.

A single flag from this can make a website unavailable to most internet users because not everyone will click on the "Advanced" button and check the obscure button hidden-away at the bottom.

Due to this, the Immich team found themselves locked out of their own internal tools and preview environments. They now have to click through tedious warnings just to do their daily work.

The situation got weirder when the team investigated what exactly was flagged. Google Search Console showed that the affected URLs were primarily their preview environments.

These are test sites automatically generated for pull requests on Immich's GitHub. Google's system claimed these pages were "attempting to trick users into doing something dangerous, such as installing unwanted software or revealing personal information."

They submitted a review request explaining that Immich is a self-hosted application. The team owns and operates the immich.cloud domain and all its subdomains. The flagged sites were their own deployments of their own products. They weren't impersonating anything or anyone.

A day or two later, good news arrived, but it was short-lived, as their entire immich.cloud domain got flagged as dangerous again.

To minimize damage, Immich is now moving their preview environments to a dedicated domain: immich.build. By isolating these test environments, they hope to prevent flags from taking down their main domain.

And, before you ask, this isn't just an Immich-only problem. It has affected other open source projects in the past like Jellyfin, YunoHost, Nextcloud and many others.

No Accountability Whatsoever

I had to see how ridiculous this actually was, so I tried accessing one of Immich's blocked URLs: main.preview.internal.immich.cloud (an HTTPS URL btw), and lo and behold, my daily driver web browser, Vivaldi (a Chromium-based browser), blocked me from getting through.

Google and the other big names keep rolling out these automated systems that can't tell what's actually malicious from what's legit. In the end, it's regular people and honest developers who get caught in this mess, while the actual bad actors? They either tweak their approach or just move on to the next thing, same as always.

Suggested Read 📖

Telegram, Please Learn Who’s a Threat and Who’s Not

Our Telegram community got deleted without an explanation.

It's FOSS NewsSourav Rudra

Via the WSJ (free link here)

The U.S. will impose an additional 10% tariff on Canada, President Trump said on Saturday, a punitive measure in response to an ad campaign that he said misrepresented comments by former President Ronald Reagan.

“Because of their serious misrepresentation of the facts, and hostile act, I am increasing the Tariff on Canada by 10% over and above what they are paying now,” Trump posted on his Truth Social platform on Saturday.

The ad campaign, released by the Canadian province of Ontario, uses audio from a 1987 radio address delivered by Reagan, in which he explains that despite putting tariffs on Japanese semiconductors that year, he was committed to free-trade policies. While tariffs can look patriotic, Reagan said, “over the long run such trade barriers hurt every American worker and consumer,” lead to “fierce trade wars” and result in lost jobs.

Earlier this month, Tesla rolled out a new firmware update that added a pair of new driving modes for the controversial full self-driving (FSD) feature. One, called “Sloth,” relaxes acceleration and stays in its lane. The other, called “Mad Max,” does the opposite: It speeds and swerves through traffic to get you to your destination faster. And after multiple reports of FSD Teslas doing just that, the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration wants to know more.

In fact, “Mad Max” mode is not entirely new—Tesla beta-tested the same feature in Autopilot in 2018, before deciding not to roll it out in a production release after widespread outcry.

These days, the company is evidently feeling less constrained; despite having just lost a federal wrongful death lawsuit that will cost it hundreds of millions of dollars, it described the new mode as being able to drive “through traffic at an incredible pace, all while still being super smooth. It drives your car like a sports car. If you are running late, this is the mode for you.”

Earlier this month, we learned that the NHTSA had opened a new preliminary investigation into Tesla following dozens of complaints of its EVs running stop signs or crossing into oncoming traffic while operating under FSD. Now, according to Reuters, NHTSA is seeking more information from the automaker about “Mad Max” mode.

“NHTSA is in contact with the manufacturer to gather additional information,” it told Reuters, adding that “[t]he human behind the wheel is fully responsible for driving the vehicle and complying with all traffic safety laws.”

“Tesla is deliberately programming cars to exceed speed limits and drive aggressively, putting everyone on our roads at risk. This ‘Mad Max’ rollout is the latest iteration of Tesla’s preference for aesthetics and sales over safety, and I urge regulators to take action to prevent this technology from being unleashed,” said Brett Schreiber, founding partner at the firm that won the aforementioned wrongful death lawsuit.

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A 61-year-old man in California is lucky to be alive after a combination of herbal supplements he was taking for joint pain ended up utterly wrecking his body, landing him in intensive care and in a delirious state for months. His case is reported in the Annals of Internal Medicine: Clinical Cases.

The man turned up at a hospital in San Francisco in bad shape, but with nonspecific problems that had begun just two days earlier. His back hurt, he was feverish, nauseous, bloated, and he hadn’t been eating much. He was so weak he couldn’t walk or get out of bed without help. His heart rate and breathing rate were high. His blood pressure was low. There were multiple wounds on his lower body in various stages of healing.

Initial exams and lab work revealed Staphylococcus aureus bacteria in his blood. There was also an abscess on his shoulder and an infection in and around his spine, which was worsening. Doctors wanted to perform a surgical procedure to relieve the pressure building up on his spinal cord and nerves, but his blood pressure was too low—and then he went into hemorrhagic shock from bleeding in his gastrointestinal tract. Doctors transferred him to the intensive care unit.

There, evaluations of his GI tract found more problems: his esophagus was severely inflamed, there was an ulcer in his stomach, and an “oozing” ulcer in the upper part of his small intestines. Though doctors were able to stabilize the bleeding in his GI tract, he kept going downhill. His blood pressure dropped further, and his breathing deteriorated, leading doctors to intubate him.

Haywire hormones

At that point, doctors became suspicious that there was something wrong with his adrenal glands. These glands, which sit on top of the kidneys, make steroid hormones, including the glucocorticoid cortisol, sometimes called the “stress hormone.” In response to stressors, complex interactions and feedback loops between the hypothalamus (a hormone-coordinating part of the brain) the pituitary gland and the adrenal glands control the release of cortisol—this is called the hypothalamic–pituitary–adrenal axis (HPA axis). From there, cortisol plays a variety of critical roles in the body, including helping to control blood pressure, suppressing immune responses, regulating blood glucose, and controlling metabolism. When the axis is disrupted and cortisol isn’t being released as it should be, it can result in nonspecific symptoms similar to the man’s case in a condition called adrenal insufficiency.

The man’s doctors consulted with endocrinologists and soon confirmed the suspicion—he had low cortisol levels and low levels of a hormone produced by the pituitary gland that spurs the release of cortisol.

The doctors got to work trying to figure out what was causing his adrenal insufficiency, which can be caused by various problems, from an autoimmune attack to cancer. But it was a conversation with the man’s family, rather than medical tests, that revealed the root cause.

The man’s family told doctors that, up until a few months prior, he had been taking three different types of herbal supplements that claim to treat joint pain. The man had taken the supplements for four years, and sometimes as often as four times a day, but he had stopped using them in the lead-up to his illness.

Deadly doses

The supplements were: Artri King, Nhan Sam Tuyet Lien, and Linsen Double Caulis Plus. All are known to contain unlisted glucocorticoids, according to the Food and Drug Administration. And testing of two of the man’s supplements by the hospital confirmed the presence of the steroids.

Doctors determined that the man had essentially overdosed on the glucocorticoids—he had taken doses that exceeded the normal levels of glucocorticoids in the body. The steroids likely suppressed immune responses, leading to his infections and GI ulcers. But, more significantly, the excess steroid levels also caused his HPA axis to essentially shut down. While it’s possible to get the HPA axis back up and running after withdrawal from excessive steroid use, the amount of time that takes can vary. Further, if a person stops taking large doses of glucocorticoids abruptly, rather than gradually—as in the man’s case—and particularly after chronic use—also as in the man’s case—it can lead to an adrenal crisis. In retrospect, the man had all the signs of a crisis.

The doctors started treating him with hydrocortisone (medication cortisol) to get him out of danger. But it took six weeks before his HPA axis showed signs of recovery on tests. By that time, he had developed recurrent bacterial infections in his blood and had persistent delirium. It was only after several months in the hospital that he was able to be discharged back home.

In the end, the doctors describe the man’s case as a cautionary tale. Many Americans use supplements, but their efficacy is largely unproven, and they are not rigorously regulated for safety. And even though, in this case, the FDA had issued warnings specifically about the three supplements the man took, his case highlights that public awareness of such dangers remains low.

“Clinicians must remain vigilant in assessing supplement use and educate patients on potential risks, particularly regarding hidden glucocorticoids, to prevent serious health complications such as adrenal insufficiency,” the doctors conclude.

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Donald Trump just cut off all trade negotiations with Canada because an Ontario ad campaign quoted Ronald Reagan accurately. The quotes are real. The context is accurate. But Trump called them “fake” and “fraudulent,” and the Reagan Foundation—the institution literally tasked with preserving Reagan’s legacy—backed him up by lying about what their own guy said and even threatening frivolous litigation in support of Trump’s temper tantrum.

Now, thanks to Trump’s meltdown, millions more people are watching Reagan’s actual words. And learning that Trump’s entire tariff philosophy directly contradicts what Reagan believed and said.

The ad that triggered all this is pretty straightforward. A few weeks ago, Ontario Premier Doug Ford launched a $75 million campaign using clips from a 1987 Ronald Reagan radio address about the evils of tariffs and the benefits of free trade. You can see it here:

Ford’s politics are often Trumpian, but he’s not backing down from a stupid trade war. So he pulled Reagan’s own words and ran them as a 60-second spot.

The ad campaign is definitely targeting Republicans and business execs. It first ran on the very MAGA Newsmax and the very business-focused Bloomberg, but has been expanding to Fox News (of course), CNBC, CBS, ABC, ESPN and others.

Apparently, somewhere this week, Donald Trump saw it, and it made him sad. And when Donald Trump gets sad, he lashes out like a six-year-old. He claimed that the ad was “fake” and because of that he was cutting off all trade negotiations with Canada.

If you can’t see that image, it’s Trump spewing on social media:

The Ronald Reagan Foundation has just announced that Canada has fraudulently used an advertisement, which is FAKE, featuring Ronald Reagan speaking negatively about Tariffs. The ad was for $75,000. They only did this to interfere with the decision of the U.S. Supreme Court, and other courts. TARIFFS ARE VERY IMPORTANT TO THE NATIONAL SECURITY, AND ECONOMY, OF THE U.S.A. Based on their egregious behavior, ALL TRADE NEGOTIATIONS WITH CANADA ARE HEREBY TERMINATED. Thank you for your attention to this matter! President DJT

So, first off, it’s a bit weird to cut off all negotiations with Canada based on an ad from one province, Ontario, which is run by a politician from a different party than the Prime Minister. But, okay.

But the bigger issue is the claim that the Reagan quotes are “fake” or “fraudulent.” They’re not. The Reagan Foundation put out this statement, and the only “misrepresentation” is in the Foundation’s own statement:

That one says:

The Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute learned that the Government of Ontario, Canada, created an ad campaign using selective audio and video of President Ronald Reagan delivering his “Radio Address to the Nation on Free and Fair Trade,” dated April 25, 1987. The ad misrepresents the Presidential Radio Address, and the Government of Ontario did not seek nor receive permission to use and edit the remarks.

The Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute is reviewing its legal options in this matter. We encourage you to watch President Reagan’s unedited video on our YouTube channel.

So, first off, note the difference between what the Foundation said and what Trump said. The Foundation claims that the ad is “using selective audio” in a way that “misrepresents” Reagan. Trump took that claim (which was already bullshit) and said it means the ad is “fake” and “fraudulent.” It is neither.

The Foundation also suggests it might sue, which is laughable. They have no claim here and any attempt to go to court would fail, and fail in an embarrassing manner.

The Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation has gone fully Trumpy—their website is packed with MAGA interviews—and now they’re lying about what Reagan actually said and believed. The institution designed to preserve his legacy is rewriting it to please Donald Trump.

It’s pathetic.

But, of course, the Streisand Effect kicks in, and now everyone can watch what Ronald Reagan actually said in that address:

It’s only five minutes long. Every quote in the Ontario ad is in there, accurate both in text and in context. The speech was framed around Reagan’s decision to impose tariffs on certain Japanese products in response to Japan dumping below-market semiconductors, which Reagan argued violated an earlier agreement.

However, he was quite clear throughout that he was a strong believer in free trade and against tariffs, and he was only doing this, regretfully, in response to Japan violating an earlier trade agreement.

Reagan explicitly contradicted Trump’s claim that tariffs are “very important to the national security and economy of the US.” Reagan said the opposite.

Incredibly, Trump freaking out and lying about this ad is making many more people watch it and learn what Reagan actually said about tariffs and free trade. Even CNN, which pretty typically just repeats whatever Trump says, is pointing out that Trump’s claims here are nonsense and Reagan very clearly spoke out against tariffs.

On top of all this, Canada is now cutting trade deals with China and other countries in Asia. This is effectively pushing our closest ally into the waiting arms of our biggest economic rival.

This is stunningly bad policy: a foreseeable disaster stemming from a stupid approach to trade, kicked into overdrive by a presidential temper tantrum over accurate quotes from a politician many in the MAGA world pretend to idolize. Trump lied. The Reagan Foundation lied to back him up. And now Canada is cutting deals with China while the world learns that Reagan explicitly opposed everything Trump claims tariffs accomplish.

Congratulations to everyone involved. You’ve Streisanded the world into a history lesson, and handed China a trade partner in the process.