News From Around the Web
#10 Hackers Want Ransom From Patients for Hospital Records They Threaten to Sell on Dark Web - Mansur Shaheen for M.
Patients at Oklahoma’s largest health system are receiving frightening emails this holiday season that say their personal information will be sold on the dark web unless they pay a ransom. Reports emerged on Reddit that patients were being asked by the hackers to purchase their own data off of a dark web website accessible through the Tor browser. One user reports that their own personal information was listed in the email, which asked for $50 to purchase it exclusively. If a person were to make this purchase, their data would be removed from the online database.
#9 Michigan Health System Reports 2nd Data Breach, Affecting More Than 1M Patients - Mary Kekatos for ABC News
Michigan Attorney General Dana Nessel announced Tuesday there was a breach at HealthEC, a vendor that provides services to Corewell Health's southeast Michigan properties. The breach exposed patients' personal and medical information. Patients affected by the breach had notice letters mailed to them on Dec. 22, according to Nessel's office.
#8 Left-Wing Activists Sue to Change Public Policy Where Their Candidates Cannot Win - Breccan F. Thies for The Washington Examiner
A new Alliance for Consumers report obtained by the Washington Examiner shows how groups such as the anti-gun Everytown for Gun Safety or climate change activist group EarthRights International sue companies to advance their policy preferences to circumvent the legislative process. Public nuisance lawsuits have rightly attracted attention for being an avenue to shake down deep-pocketed companies,” according to the report. “But that valid criticism falls short in terms of grappling with the bigger peril. Public nuisance claims are about liberal control, not just money, and the list of targets is sweeping.”
#7 Biden Admin Parole Program Sparks 550% Increase of Undocumented Migrants Pouring Into Florida From Just Last Year - Selim Algar for The NY Post
A federal parole program approved by the Biden Administration earlier this year has sent a soaring number of undocumented migrants pouring into Florida.
Sunshine State migrant encounters rocketed from 35,349 in fiscal year 2022 to 236,691 in fiscal year 2023 — an increase of 550%, the numbers show. The initiative has sparked a stampede into Florida, with 56,547 migrant encounters in October and November this year alone — compared to just 13,580 over the same stretch last year and only 2,886 in 2021.
#6 Homeowner Fed Up With Porch Pirates Leaves Heavy Surprise in Box for Next Culprit — and One Actually Lugs it Away - Dave Urbanski for Blaze Media
North Carolina homeowner fed up with the plague of porch pirates over the Christmas holidays decided to play a little trick on the next culprit to steal from him — and one crook actually was caught on video lugging away the heavy surprise in a box. So ... "What's in the box?" you might be asking. “I hope they enjoy their bricks for Christmas,” the resident added to the outlet.
#5 Immigration Court Backlog Surpasses Record-Breaking 3M Pending Cases - Victor Nava for The NY Post
Despite hiring hundreds of new judges, the nation’s immigration court backlog under President Biden has reached a record level, ballooning to more than 3 million pending cases in November, according to a new report. Record levels of migrants crossing the southern US border under Biden, 81, have left immigration judges swamped, according to the TRAC report, with each judge now handling an average of 4,500 cases. “If every person with a pending immigration case were gathered together, it would be larger than the population of Chicago, the third largest city in the United States,” the report notes. “Indeed, the number of waiting immigrants in the Court’s backlog is now larger than the population found in many states.”
#4 Tesla Robot ATTACKS an Engineer at Company's Texas Factory During Violent Malfunction - Leaving 'Trail of Blood' and Forcing Workers to Hit Emergency Shutdown Button - Matthew Phelan for The Daily Mail
A Tesla engineer was attacked by a robot during a brutal and bloody malfunction at the company's Giga Texas factory near Austin. Two witnesses watched in horror as their fellow employee was attacked by the machine designed to grab and move freshly cast aluminum car parts. The robot had pinned the man, who was then programming software for two disabled Tesla robots nearby, before sinking its metal claws into the worker's back and arm, leaving a 'trail of blood' along the factory surface.
Rep. Lauren Boebert, the Republican congresswoman representing a huge swath of western and southern Colorado, announced Wednesday that in the 2024 election, she plans on changing districts. Boebert said in a Facebook video that she intends to seek office in Colorado's 4th Congressional District, which covers the Eastern Plains, currently represented by Republican U.S. Rep. Ken Buck. Buck said last month that he won't seek reelection in 2024 due to the Republican Party's support of former President Donald Trump and what he called an embrace of conspiracy theories. He's represented the district since 2015.
#2 Argentina's Milei Cuts 5,000 Government Jobs, Will Not Renew Contracts - Timothy H.J. Nerozi for Fox News
The newly-elected president of Argentina has announced he will be cutting 5,000 government jobs, refusing to renew the workers' contracts. President Javier Milei will not continue the employment of anyone hired by the federal government in 2023 before his election earlier this month. Individuals hired by the government before 2023 will be reviewed on a case-by-case basis. Milei, who ran on promises of radical free-market capitalism, has made substantial layoffs and rolled back regulatory red tape in order to disentangle what he believes is a suffocating web of government control. "The goal is (to) start on the road to rebuilding our country, return freedom and autonomy to individuals and start to transform the enormous amount of regulations that have blocked, stalled, and stopped economic growth," Milei said.
Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick was elected in January 2022 to fill the seat vacated by the late Rep. Alcee Hastings. The House Ethics Committee announced it will investigate whether Rep. Sheila Cherfilus-McCormick, D-Fla., has violated campaign finance laws, among other allegations. The Ethics Committee voted unanimously to investigate accusations against the Florida lawmaker after getting a referral from the Office of Congressional Ethics, an independent agency that investigates misconduct complaints. Cherfilus-McCormick has been a generally reliable Democratic voice in the U.S. House and joined her colleagues in the historic vote ousting former Speaker Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., in October. A month later, however, she broke ranks with some of her South Florida Democratic colleagues by not supporting the censure of Michigan Rep. Rashida Tlaib, R-Mich., Congress' only Palestinian American, for her comments about the Israel-Hamas conflict.
And Now for Something Special 
The Secret Ingredient For Optimum Health? Kindness, Says This Fitness Expert - Jem Collins for Positive News
You’d be forgiven if you thought the key to improving your health was a new diet or more willpower. Turns out it's kindness, says the founder of a unique program launching in January. Every Sunday, participants in Eddie Jones’ health program fill in a form to let him know how they got on during the week. But they’re not tracking workout duration, weight loss, or calories. Instead, they’re totting up acts of kindness. “It’s completely anonymous, so I can’t tell who’s writing. I’ll never know,” Jones says. “I just dip into it every week or two. There have been some really, really wonderful things in there.” He points to a participant who bought a supermarket voucher for someone who was struggling to feed their children. Another cared for a bee with an injured wing. Someone else simply wrote a kind note to an acquaintance and slipped it into a flower pot for them to find.
This is something we should all consider doing for the New Year!
