Graciela Gómez Hernández, 30, crossed from Tijuana into Southern California on September 14, 2025, hoping to work and support her three children and parents in Mexico. She sent voice messages to family as she hiked through the rugged Otay Mountain Wilderness, but stopped responding by mid-afternoon, saying she could not continue. Her remains were not recovered until two weeks later, despite the area being heavily monitored by border surveillance cameras and technology.
iFixit tore down Apple's new iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max to examine the variable aperture camera, which uses six overlapping blades roughly as thin as a human hair. The team called the mechanism a precision engineering feat but warned it leaves almost no margin for error during repairs, likely requiring full module replacement if damaged.
iFixit's teardown of the iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max found Apple's first variable aperture camera, using six hair-thin blades that slide with high precision to control light intake. The report also revealed a new chip packaging layout that places the A20 Pro processor beside its memory rather than stacked, separating memory from the chip's heat path, and noted that three of four test units cracked their display frames during battery removal.
A new app called ZuckOff scans nearby Bluetooth signals to alert users when smart camera glasses like Ray-Ban Meta, Oakley Meta, or Snap Spectacles are in the vicinity. The app processes everything locally on the phone, requires no account, and lets users log all detected devices, mark their own glasses to silence alerts, and export scan history as CSV. It also sells branded merchandise through Fourthwall to help fund development.
iFixit's teardown of the iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max exposes the new variable aperture lens, which uses six overlapping blades thinner than a human hair to control light via a magnetic mechanism. The site praises the engineering that fits this system into the same camera footprint as last year's model, but warns the mechanism is essentially impossible to repair if it fails.
Engineers at Delft University of Technology built a lightweight whisker sensor system that lets tiny drones under 100 grams navigate by physical contact rather than cameras or LiDAR. Two whiskers mounted at the front connect to miniature pressure sensors that detect surface contact, letting the drone estimate depth, avoid obstacles, and map its surroundings using just 34KB of software.
Noctua has revealed that its NF-A4x10 5V PWM fan is being used inside the CAIM1, a compact 4K60 camera built to generate cryptographic proof that its footage is genuine and unaltered by AI. Because the device simultaneously handles high-bitrate video capture and cryptographic proof generation within a tightly enclosed shell, its processors run hot enough to need active cooling to avoid throttling.
DXOMARK's lab and perceptual testing of Apple's iPhone 18 Pro camera system awarded the device 172 points, citing strong dynamic range, improved contrast, accurate skin tones and effective stabilization. The triple 48 MP setup—wide, ultra-wide, and 8x tetraprism telephoto—performed well across photo, zoom, and video tests, with the new variable aperture lens standing out for maintaining sharpness in busy scenes.
Robot vacuums lack arms and can't move objects out of their path, leaving them stuck on cables, socks, or lightweight rugs. While pricier models use infrared, LiDAR, or AI cameras to navigate around obstacles more intelligently than basic bump-sensor units, most still can't physically clear a room the way a human cleaner can.
A blog post highlighted by developer tsoding breaks down 3D perspective projection into one basic operation: dividing a point's x and y coordinates by its z (depth) value. The piece demonstrates this with live shader examples, showing how a ball's position and size shrink toward a vanishing point as it moves farther from the camera along the z-axis.
Petlibro has released the Granary 2 series, a new lineup of four automatic dry-food dispensers ranging from $129.99 to $249.99, including a base model, a camera-equipped Vision version, a dual-bowl Vision Duo for multiple pets, and a top-tier X model with individualized AI portioning. Each device uses a built-in scale to measure both dispensed food and what remains in the bowl, letting owners track actual consumption rather than just dispensing times.
Australian authorities are reportedly considering a ban on smart glasses with built-in cameras inside government offices, driven by rising concerns about covert recording and privacy breaches. A BBC report from Sydney canvassed public opinion on the proposal and asked where else people might want such devices restricted.
GoKawiil