Moscow just potentially created a big opening for Ukrainian elections to actually happen, with an unexpected overture:

Russia is ready to ensure that there will be no airstrikes on election day in Ukraine if Kiev decides to hold elections, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Galuzin said an interview with TASS.

However, the big question remains of if President Zelensky decides to actually proceed with an election. Given that months ago he didn’t even cave to Trump pressuring him to do so, it’s very up in the air whether he wants to actually see this through, or if martial law will continue to be used as an excuse to block a vote.

Russian President Vladimir Putin himself has floated willingness to halt airstrikes deep into Ukraine on election day if elections are held there – but he’s also also recently said that the millions of Ukrainians currently living in Russia should have the right to vote.

These are mostly Russian-speaking Ukrainians who lived in the Donbass – as well as Crimea – before war broke out, or who are still there amid the conflict.

“Of course, Russian President Vladimir Putin’s statements remain relevant. But, as I earlier noted, there is no talk yet of the practical organization of voting in Ukraine,” Galuzin said.

“I would like to draw attention to our experience. In March 2024, presidential elections were held in Russia, and polling stations – even taking into account the ongoing military operations -were opened in close proximity to the combat zone. Kiev tried every way possible to disrupt the electoral process in the frontline regions, not shying away from resorting to terrorist means and sabotage. However, it proved unable to achieve its goal,” Galuzin added.

He then emphasized that Russia “will not stoop to Kiev’s practices and will allow the people of Ukraine to fully exercise their constitutionally enshrined electoral rights and independently determine the future development of their country.”

“Of course, if the Kiev regime finally decides to take this democratic step,” the Russian Deputy Foreign Minister added.

Ukraine has said a parliamentary committee is still studying the issue, and that the total safety of all citizens would have to be guaranteed – also by international powers – while the vote proceeds.

Via Middle East Eye

Indonesia is readying 1,000 troops to be deployed in Gaza as early as April as part of the UN-mandated International Stabilization Force, an army spokesperson said on Monday.

A total of 8,000 Indonesian soldiers will be ready for deployment by June, while the final decision will be made by Indonesian President Prabowo Subianto. “The departure schedule remains entirely subject to the political decisions of the state and applicable international mechanisms,” the spokesman said in a text message to news agency Reuters.

Indonesian Army Chief of Staff Maruli Simanjuntak previously estimated that between 5,000 and 8,000 military personnel could be deployed, with final numbers “still being negotiated”. 

On Saturday, Indonesia’s foreign ministry said that its military’s participation in Gaza as part of the peace plan devised by US President Donald Trump should not be interpreted as a normalization of political relations with Israel. 

“Indonesia consistently rejects all attempts at demographic change or the forced displacement or relocation of the Palestinian people in any form,” the ministry said.

The deployment, which has a non-combatant, humanitarian mandate, could only be carried out with the consent of the Palestinian Authority, the ministry said.

“Indonesian troops will not be involved in combat operations or any action leading to direct confrontation with any armed group,“ the statement said. Indonesian troops would also have no mandate to demilitarize any party, it added.

However the mandate of the stabilization force includes ensuring “the process of demilitarizing the Gaza Strip” and “the permanent decommissioning of weapons from non-state armed groups”. The resolution authorizes the force to “use all necessary measures to carry out its mandate”.

$5bn to rebuild Gaza 

Indonesia confirmed last week that President Prabowo Subianto will attend the inaugural leaders’ meeting of Trump’s “Board of Peace”, whose members have pledged $5bn toward “rebuilding war-ravaged Gaza”. 

Indonesian foreign ministry said that Prabowo would use the forum on 19 February to advocate for the protection of Palestinians and push for a sustainable peace based on a two-state solution, which envisions the establishment of an independent Palestinian state.

Prabowo is also expected to sign a tariff agreement with the United States during the trip, the government said. “We are just preparing ourselves in case an agreement is reached and we have to send peacekeeping forces,” Prabowo told journalists.

The president also said he will seek to negotiate the board’s reported $1bn membership fee. Indonesia’s foreign ministry said that its troops’ participation in Gaza would not be aimed at imposing peace, but would instead focus on humanitarian objectives. 

Indonesia is one of the largest contributors to UN peacekeeping operations globally, with more than 2,700 personnel deployed in missions across Africa and the Middle East.

Indonesia’s largest deployment is with the United Nations Interim Force is in Lebanon. Public support for Palestine is strong in Indonesia, where mass demonstrations have taken place against Israel’s genocide in Gaza. 

On August 3, thousands of Indonesians gathered at Jakarta’s National Monument, waving Palestinian flags and holding placards demanding justice for Gaza.

Indonesia, the world’s largest Muslim-majority country, has consistently called for an end to Israeli genocide in Gaza and has pushed for a two-state solution through international forums. Its government has also provided humanitarian aid, medical support and diplomatic backing for Palestinian institutions.

In November, Indonesia’s defense minister announced that its military had trained 20,000 troops for healthcare and construction efforts in Gaza. Jakarta has also provided humanitarian aid, including the delivery of 10,000 tonnes of rice in August last year, and has launched a long-term cultivation initiative in Sumatra and Kalimantan to support Palestinian food security.

Last summer North Korea began for the first time airing footage which provided public confirmation that it was receiving many of its soldiers home in coffins after they served alongside Russian forces in the context of the Ukraine war.

It’s believed that the some ten to fourteen thousand DPRK troops dispatched to assist Moscow had primarily fought in Russia’s Kursk province, where they helped repel the previous six-month Ukrainian occupation of the southern border oblast (in 2024-2025).

On Monday, North Korean leader Kim Jong Un unveiled that families of soldiers killed in the battle abroad would receive free new housing. He presided over a ribbon-cutting ceremony marking the completion of a new block of apartments for that purpose, state media reported Monday.

“The new street has been built thanks to the ardent desire of our motherland that wishes that… its excellent sons, who defended the most sacred things by sacrificing their most valuable things, will live forever,” Kim said in a speech, as cited by the Korean Central News Agency.

This comes after Kim last week having publicly declared he’s ready to “unconditionally support” all of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s policies and decisions.

“Before their death, the heroic martyrs must have pictured in their mind’s eye their dear families living in the ever-prospering country,” the North Korean leader said.

KCNA images also showed Kim touring the new apartments alongside his teenage daughter Ju Ae, believed to be the most likely future successor to Kim.

International reports based on South Korean intelligence estimates say that around 2,000 North Korean soldiers have been killed while fighting alongside Russia so far.

The apartments for families of fallen soldiers is a program clearly intended to create incentives for the military to support Pyongyang’s foreign adventurism on behalf of Moscow, and to deflect potential criticism.

Kim Jong Un opens new Saeppyol Street housing in Pyongyang

Homes built for families of fallen soldiers, KCNA reports

Ceremony marks what he called a ‘heroic era’ pic.twitter.com/kBxdAtm564

— RT (@RT_com) February 16, 2026

Ukraine has bitterly complained about the foreign contingencies helping Russia, and in previously claimed that North Korea could send up to 30,000 – though there’s been little evidence of such a high figure.

Authored by Andrew Korybko,

The cascading consequences of such a blockade, which might not ultimately be imposed due it entailing a high risk of war with Iran, could simultaneously weaken Russia, India, and China.

The Wall Street Journal reported that Trump 2.0 is considering imposing a Venezuelan-like oil blockade against Iran. It hasn’t yet done so due to concerns that Iran might attack the US’ regional military assets and/or seize its Gulf allies’ oil tankers, with either scenario destabilizing the global oil market and spiking the risk of war, so it might never ultimately happen. If the US were to successfully impose such a blockade, however, then it might be able to adroitly divide-and-rule Russia, India, and China (RIC).

“The US Wants To Replicate The Venezuelan Model In Iran” by coercing Iran into subordinating itself and its energy industry to the US. The “Trump Doctrine”, which is shaped by Under Secretary of War for Policy Elbridge Colby’s “Strategy of Denial”, seeks to deny strategic resources to the US’ rivals. Accordingly, it has an interest in cutting off China’s average import of 1.38 million barrels of Iranian oil per day last year, which could hit its economy hard if they’re not replaced (and that might be difficult).

These exports could then be redirected to India, thus enabling India to more than replace its average import of 1 million barrels per day of Russian oil last month, with the revenue placed in an escrow account per the Venezuelan precedent for release to Iran if it cuts a nuclear and missile deal with the US. Through these means, India could zero out its import of Russian oil while raising the US’ role over its energy security exactly as Trump 2.0 wants, with the end result dealing incredible harm to RIC.

Russia’s budgetary revenue from such sales would be reduced and could only realistically be replaced in part through more sales to China, though that might not be as easy as it sounds. The UK is preparing a campaign to seize Russia’s “shadow fleet” in the English Channel after being emboldened by the US’ seizure of a Russian-flagged oil tanker near its coast. If Russia doesn’t impose unacceptable costs on the UK, and it didn’t impose any on the US for doing this, then its Baltic Sea tankers might never reach China.

Those from the Black Sea might not reach it either if the UK allies with Greece and Cyprus to cut off Russia’s “shadow fleet” from that vector too. Pipeline exports, which have limits to how much they can be scaled, would then be the only means for replacing part of Russia’s lost oil exports to India with China apart from relatively minimal tanker exports from the Far East. The resultant economic pressure on Russia and China might make them susceptible to lopsided deals with the US on Ukraine and trade.

As for India, it already entered into a partially lopsided deal with the US as regards the informal quid pro quo of it agreeing to zero out its import of Russian oil in exchange for their trade deal, and the US’ growing influence over India’s energy security could curtail its hard-earned strategic autonomy. This might then be leveraged for coercing a reduction in India’s purchase of Chinese goods and services so as to place more pressure on the People’s Republic to agree to its own lopsided trade deal with the US.

This worst-case scenario of the US’ dividing-and-ruling RIC can be averted by Iran deterring or breaking a US blockade on its oil in parallel with Russia doing the same with respect to any British one against its “shadow fleet”. These options require immense political will since they entail the potential cost of a hot war breaking out between Great Powers so it’s unclear whether they’ll be implemented, but likewise, so too might the US and UK ultimately back off from their possible blockades for the same reason.

Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) may be retiring from Congress at the end of this term, but she’s not done trying to shape presidential races. The 85-year-old former House speaker has turned into what one former aide calls “a Gavin fan-girl,” deploying her legendary donor network and political capital to boost California Gov. Gavin Newsom as a 2028 White House contender. The move lands as a calculated slight to Kamala Harris, who polls ahead of Newsom nationally but appears to have lost Pelosi’s confidence after the 2024 debacle.

According to a report from Axios, Pelosi has spent months publicly and privately vouching for Newsom.

 “From the standpoint of leadership, vision, and values, knowledge of the issues, strategic thinking about how to get things done, he’s masterful,” she told The New Yorker. She told Vogue earlier this month, “I’ve seen him grow politically, I’ve also seen him have this beautiful family, and for all of us who love him, seeing him evolve has been wonderful to behold.”

She’s even trying to help Newsom shed the perception of coming from privilege, telling The Atlantic, “Everybody thinks of Gavin and a silver spoon. But that isn’t right. He was a very hard worker in everything that he did, whether it was personally, professionally, and then civically.”

This week, Pelosi told Politico that Newsom “would make a great president,” though she added Democrats have many strong potential candidates. 

The hedge shouldn’t fool anyone. 

Pelosi isn’t likely to gush unless she’s decided. Former aides say she’s been eager to publicly vouch for Newsom whenever asked and has privately admired how he’s navigated Trump “with a combination of defiance and charm.” One former staffer said Pelosi “doesn’t crush on many people” and added, “She’s hardly ever wrong. When she says she sees something, it’s a real thing.”

Of course, Pelosi’s connection to Newsom isn’t limited to politics. Her brother-in-law was married to Newsom’s aunt, and Pelosi frequently says she knew Newsom before he was born. Politically, they’ve been connected for years, as she’s mentored him since his days as San Francisco mayor, watching him rise through California politics like a puppet master or a kingmaker.

While Pelosi is reportedly focused on helping Democrats retake the House in November and making Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries speaker, she’s clearly looking to the future and sees Newsom as the next leader of the party who will bring Democrats to the White House. This may be a significant vote of confidence for Newsom, but it’s also an undeniable betrayal of another California Democrat, Kamala Harris. 

Pelosi endorsed Harris quickly after Joe Biden dropped out of the 2024 race, reportedly frustrating Barack Obama, who wanted a more open process.

“The Obamas were not happy,” a Pelosi confidant told ABC’s Jonathan Karl for his book Retribution. ‘This person summed up Obama’s message to Pelosi as, essentially, “What the f*** did you just do?”‘ 

Harris lost badly to Trump, spending more than a billion dollars in the process, leaving many major donors deeply disillusioned with her. Pelosi’s support would have gone a long way to repair the damage, but Pelosi appears to have moved on. 

Harris leads the 2028 field with a 27.5 percent national polling average, according to Race to the White House, while Newsom trails at 22.7%. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez sits at 9%, former Transportation Secretary Pete Buttigieg at 8.7%, Pennsylvania Gov. Josh Shapiro at 4.9%, and Illinois Gov. J.B. Pritzker at 3.4%.

Neither Newsom nor Harris has publicly announced their intent to seek the presidency, but both are reportedly considering, which makes Pelosi’s public courtship of Newsom a calculated snub. Pelosi’s endorsements carry weight with the donor class and party elites who decide primaries long before voters cast ballots. By elevating Newsom now, she’s signaling to those constituencies where the smart money should flow.

Whether Pelosi’s bet pays off depends on factors beyond her control. Newsom has baggage from California’s struggles with homelessness, crime, and out-migration on his watch. Harris, meanwhile, carries the weight of a failed campaign but has name recognition and institutional support, and isn’t a white male — a huge plus for a party that has gone all in on identity politics. 

Authored by Chris Summers via The Epoch Times (emphasis ours),

In June 2025, police in Europe shut down a darknet marketplace for drugs called Archetyp Market, which had more than 600,000 users, and the following month the FBI announced that Operation Grayskull had led to the sentencing of 18 offenders to a total of 300 years for offenses relating to child sexual abuse material on the darknet.

The FBI maintains a Joint Criminal Opioid and Darknet Enforcement team, and in May 2025 it announced that 270 people had been arrested globally as part of Operation RapTor and that hundreds of pounds of fentanyl had been seized as part of an operation targeting drug traffickers on darknet websites.

But experts say the darknet—sometimes known as the dark web—keeps growing and is home to millions of megabytes of personal data, which are used by cybercriminals and ransomware gangs.

“You would be amazed how much personal data is drifting around on the darknet just from breach notifications,” Bob Erdman, associate vice president of research and development at cybersecurity company Fortra, based in Eden Prairie, Minnesota, told The Epoch Times.

“It seems like every month you get a new breach notification from some company or website you’ve interacted with, and all those little pieces keep getting assembled to build a profile of you, and then get resold to someone who’s either going to try [to] attack you or try and use you to attack somebody else,” Erdman said.

Darknet Generation Gap

“When I speak with older Americans, many are shocked by the types of data on the darknet and how often it’s exposed or traded,” Chris Nyhuis, CEO at Vigilant, an Ohio-based cybersecurity firm and a human trafficking investigator, told The Epoch Times in an email.

“For younger more technical generations there is … often a sense of resignation,” Nyhuis said. “They’ve grown up with breaches, so data exposure feels almost inevitable to them.”

“Data released on the darknet is not a darknet problem, it just makes distributing data easier,” Nyhuis said.

He said he believes that companies are still not protecting data well enough.

Erdman said criminals were always trying to get access to logins and passwords, bitcoin addresses, and other data, which they would sell in darknet marketplaces that trade in stolen identities and compromised databases.

So how does the darknet work?

Nyhuis said the darknet is almost a “mirror image” of the internet most of us know, and that it even has its own search engines.

But it can only be accessed through the Tor browser, which provides secrecy and anonymity by passing messages through a network of connected Tor relays, which are specially configured computers.

Nyhuis said a simple way of understanding the darknet is imagining each Tor node as a house with numerous doors opening off of it, which are not visible.

“So if you walk in that house, and if someone’s monitoring that first door and you walk out a different one, then they’re not going to see you,” he said.

Silk Road Showed the Way

In the early days of the darknet, sites such as Silk Road began to operate and enable illicit marketplaces for narcotics and other illegal products and services.

Silk Road operated between January 2011 and October 2013. In May 2015, its 31-year-old founder, Ross Ulbricht, aka “Dread Pirate Roberts,” was jailed for life and ordered to forfeit $183 million.

Ulbricht created the blueprint that made such darknet marketplaces so successful, Brian Townsend, a retired Drug Enforcement Administration special agent who runs courses on the darknet, told The Epoch Times by email.

There is a myth that the darknet is hard to use, according to Missouri-based Townsend.

“In reality, the learning curve is very low, and it is quite easy to get on the dark web,” Townsend said. “With relative ease, people can buy and sell drugs, stolen credit cards, fake identities, child pornography, or pretty much anything else you can think of.”

In September 2022, Reed Churchill, 27, from Fayetteville, Arkansas, became a victim of the darknet when he took pills containing fentanyl that he had bought from a darknet website, thinking that they were oxycodone.

Since then, Churchill’s father, David Churchill, has been attempting to warn others.

“These are not good people you’re talking to on the darknet, whether it’s about drugs or pornography or whatever is on there,” he told the FBI. “Nobody on that side of the computer has any good intentions for you.”

In October 2024. Rajiv Srinivasan, 37, from Houston was jailed for 19 years and Michael Ta, 25, from Westminster, California, was jailed for 21 years for supplying the counterfeit M30 oxycodone pills containing fentanyl that killed Reed on a darknet website called Dark0de.

Nyhuis said there are people using the darknet for good reasons such as investigative journalism or the exposure of human rights abuses in totalitarian states.

“On the [darknet] there are people who say ‘I’m trying to be anonymous because I’m trying to fight evil’ and then there are the bad parts where ‘I’m trying to be anonymous because I want to do evil,’” he said. “Those are the two paths.”

‘Fighting Evil, or Doing Evil’

“The majority [of] uses of it are either fighting evil, or doing evil,” said Nyhuis, who said more darknet users have bad motives than have good ones.

Nyhuis said he has a theory that a lot of people who had time on their hands during the COVID-19 pandemic learned a lot about the darknet.

“Now people are setting up nodes left and right, and you have a much more anonymous environment,” he said.

According to him, it is now possible to use ChatGPT to create a Tor node.

“It will walk you through the exact steps to do that, even give you the code that you need to copy and paste, and you can turn up a Tor node,” Nyhuis said.

There are an estimated 1.3 billion websites in the world. Delaware-based cybersecurity company DeepStrike estimates that only 0.01 percent of those are on the darknet but that Tor traffic rose to 3 million users per day in 2025.

So why can we not just ban Tor browsers and switch off the darknet?

China has tried to use its Great Firewall to block the darknet, but with limited success.

“China has tried blocking known Tor nodes to try to throttle traffic,” Nyhuis said. “But it’s really a cat-and-mouse game. There’s no main kill switch.”

So rather than try to kill off the darknet—which appears to be impossible—intelligence services and law enforcement are learning to live with it and deal with the threats within it.

“I can assure you that law enforcement is active on these [darknet] marketplaces,” Townsend said. “We aren’t just watching from the sidelines.”

“Investigators are embedded in these communities, often operating undercover to identify the players behind the screen,” he said.

“The international law enforcement community also works incredibly well together, sharing intelligence across borders to combat these global criminal networks,” Townsend said. “Because the darknet doesn’t recognize national boundaries, our response has to be just as seamless.”

Last year, ransomware negotiator Mark Lance told The Epoch Times that attackers usually leave ransom notes within a targeted information technology system, which will usually advise the victim to download a Tor browser, go to a website on the darknet, and initiate communications with the attackers.

But even when law enforcement learns about these darknet websites, closing them down is not necessarily the solution.

“Shutting down one darknet communication channel rarely solves the problem because hackers can quickly bring another one online, either from backups or [by] simply moving to another platform,” Nyhuis said.

“The darknet is just a tool and even if a specific site is taken offline criminals can spin up another one quickly.”

Erdman said he does not see the darknet going away as long as there is a market for drugs, stolen data, and child sexual abuse images.

“Even if Tor was ripped down tomorrow, something would be built back up in its place,” he said.

“It’s a lot of work for governments to crack down,” Erdman said. “You can try and limit it, you can try and block the traffic … but users will find a way to get around it.”

Authored by Autumn Spredemann via The Epoch Times,

Across the artificial intelligence (AI) supply chain, insiders describe a precarious, high-turnover workforce with limited support and stability.

This “invisible” human labor that labels data, evaluates outputs, and filters harmful material has become a revolving door of talent that navigates high-pressure gigs and burnout. Moreover, workers and industry experts say this talent churn can degrade the very AI models workers are paid to improve.

Across the board, workers who are hired to support, evaluate, or operationalize AI systems face similar challenges: high-stress environments that often involve complex tasks, unrealistic timelines, job instability, and low wages.

It’s no secret that the tech industry has long suffered from high turnover rates. Numbers vary, but many studies put the average rate of talent churn in the tech sector at between 13 percent and 18 percent.

This becomes clear when considering the cost of replacing tech talent, which can be up to 150 percent of a worker’s salary, including recruitment expenses, onboarding time, productivity losses, and impacts on customer relationships.

Some believe that the loss of institutional knowledge alone makes worker retention critical.

“People love to talk about the ‘magic’ of AI, but the work culture behind it is a meat grinder. I’ve seen talent turnover in model evaluation hit record highs because the work is repetitive and psychologically draining,” Barry Kunst, vice president of marketing at Solix Technologies, told The Epoch Times.

“When you lose a lead researcher to churn, you don’t just lose a body; you lose the ‘why’ behind the model’s safety guardrails,” Kunst said.

This is why he’s adamant about AI workforce stability, which he said correlates directly with model reliability: “If you’re rotating contractors every six months to keep labor costs low, your data governance will fail, period.”

Sovic Chakrabarti, the director of digital marketing agency Icy Tales, said, “Team turnover is more common than people expect.

“In some groups, especially those tied to model training, evaluation, or data labeling pipelines, churn can happen every few months. Short contracts, project-based funding, and constant reorganization mean people cycle in and out quickly,” he told The Epoch Times.

A technician works at an Amazon Web Services AI data center in New Carlisle, Ind., on Oct. 2, 2025. Noah Berger for AWS/Reuters

Chakrabarti has worked on the development and support side of AI systems long enough to see patterns that, as he put it, “rarely make it into public discussions.”

“That [workforce] churn absolutely leads to lost knowledge,” he said. “Important context about why a dataset was filtered a certain way, why a safety rule exists, or why a model behaved oddly in testing often lives in someone’s head.”

When that person leaves, documentation rarely captures the full story, according to Chakrabarti.  “New hires inherit systems without understanding the original tradeoffs, which can quietly introduce risks,” he said.

The Human Cost

Burnout rates among information technology (IT) workers are high. LeadDev’s Engineering Leadership Report 2025 found that 22 percent of the 617 polled engineering leaders and developers felt critically burned out at work.

An additional 24 percent of respondents reported feeling “moderately” burned out, while 33 percent reported low levels of burnout.

Some of this is driven by job-security fears after two years of layoffs at big tech companies, but the pay for many of the workers fueling the AI revolution is often low.

The Alphabet Workers Union (AWU), Communications Workers of America (CWA), and TechEquity led a study on the working conditions of U.S.-based data workers and found conditions similar to those of tech contractors in developing countries.

In a survey of 160 U.S. data workers, 86 percent worried about being able to pay their bills, and 25 percent relied on public assistance to get by. The same group reported a median hourly wage of $15, with a median annual salary of $22,620.

Eighty-five percent of the study group said they’re expected to be “on call” for work, but only 30 percent reported being paid for this time. More than a quarter of respondents reported spending more than 8 hours per week on call.

“If there’s anything I wanted the general public to know, it is that there are low paid people [in the United States] who are not even treated as humans—just little more than employee ID numbers —out there making the 1 billion dollar, trillion dollar AI systems that are supposed to lead our entire society and civilization into the future,” Kirn Gill II, a search quality rater working on Google products at Telus, told the CWA.

Chakrabarti said the work culture behind AI fuels these challenges.

“There is real pressure to keep labor costs low. I have seen unrealistic timelines, understaffed teams, and expectations to ‘do more with less’ while the stakes keep rising. That tension creates stress, especially when the systems affect millions of users,” he said.

Chat GPT app icon is seen on a smartphone screen, in Chicago, on Aug. 4, 2025. AP Photo/Kiichiro Sato, File

He added that being part of the shadow workforce behind AI can also be psychologically demanding.

“You carry responsibility without always having authority or time to do things properly. … As tools evolve, roles shift fast, and many people feel replaceable even while being essential,” Chakrabarti said.

Nicky Zhu, an AI Interaction Product Manager at Dymesty, agrees that the cost-containment pressure on data workers is “unrealistic” and is fueling the burnout phenomenon.

“Companies employ contractors instead of using permanent staff, mandate 60-hour crunch weeks, and expect rapid learning of intricate systems. I have witnessed multiple capable engineers exit the field of AI completely because of the high levels of instability and the unmanageable workload,” Zhu told The Epoch Times.

Zhu said the mental strain associated with data work is often unacknowledged.

“Staff are regularly exposed to disturbing material during safety testing, including assessing harmful content. Knowing that your work impacts millions of users increases the stress. The combination of rapid AI development, job uncertainty, and high turnover is mentally overwhelming,” she said.

In the data worker conditions analysis, respondents reported limited or no access to mental health benefits, despite being what the study authors called a “first line of defense, protecting millions of people from harmful content and imperfect AI systems.”

Only 23 percent of data workers surveyed reported having employer-provided health benefits.

The International Labor Organization noted that large language AI models such as ChatGPT and Claude still require “invisible workers” who fine-tune AI responses, mitigate biases, and eliminate toxic or disturbing content behind the scenes.

“As a result, workers are routinely exposed to graphic violence, hate speech, child exploitation, and other objectionable material. Such constant exposure can take a toll on their mental health and trigger post-traumatic stress disorder, depression, and reduced ability to feel empathy,” the International Labor Organization stated.

Revolving Door Risks

A knock-on effect of AI’s constant labor change is an increase in cybersecurity risks.

“Labor turnover literally impacts the quality, safety, and reliability of models,” Janero Washington, education director at ACSMI Cybersecurity Certification, told The Epoch Times.

“Large turnover interferes with domain knowledge, delays in the iteration process, and the probability of missing key details in the development.”

Washington said this could have a “direct influence on the accuracy and strength of [AI] models, particularly during deployment phases.”

He added that low labor costs are the primary pressure point in AI projects, which tend to prioritize cost-efficiency over balanced investment in skilled labor.

“It may result in corners being cut, including overworking teams, unrealistic deadlines, or having to use less experienced hires to keep budgets,” he said.

Zhu has seen firsthand how workforce churn affects the efficiency of AI tools: “Knowledge is lost faster than it is documented. Important information about model edge cases, limitations, safety procedures, and related details is lost when contractors leave after six or 12 months.”

When she started her current position, Zhu found that three teams had attempted to resolve the same set of problems using an AI feature that had already been built.

“Still, no one had documented the rationale for the different design decisions. Ultimately, we had to remake previously developed design solutions for problems that had already been solved. This is an all-too-common reality for the industry,” she said.

The data security platform Cyberhaven observed that 24 hours before a layoff or employee resignation, organizations can experience a 720 percent surge in data exfiltration. This includes everything from downloading sensitive files to forwarding emails or copying customer lists, all of which can have significant consequences.

Washington said that critical knowledge or details can be easily lost when a data team is reliant on a short-term contract or experiencing a high talent turnover.

“This affects continuity of knowledge of datasets, edge cases, or versioning issues, causing inefficiencies and possibly a rework of the same issue,” he said.

Chakrabarti agreed. “When teams are stretched thin or constantly rebuilding, issues get patched instead of deeply solved,” he said.

Remember Obama’s 2012 Colombian prostitution scandal? Turns out, Jeffrey Epstein was involved…

Newly released Department of Justice documents from the Epstein files have exposed a previously unknown connection between a 2012 White House advance-team scandal in Cartagena, Colombia, and Kathryn Ruemmler – the former Obama White House counsel who later became Goldman Sachs’ top lawyer.

Ruemmler resigned from Goldman late last week, after the latest Epstein document dump revealed her extensive, affectionate, and years-long correspondence with the convicted sex offender. The emails show she called him “Uncle Jeffrey,” accepted expensive gifts, and turned to him for advice on sensitive legal and reputational matters – including how to respond to a 2014 Washington Post report that accused her of helping suppress evidence of prostitution involving a rich kid White House aide whose daddy was a huge Obama donor. 

The WaPo report, by all accounts, cost Ruemmler a job as Obama’s Attorney General. 

The 2012 Cartagena Prostitution Scandal

In April 2012, ahead of President Obama’s trip to the Summit of the Americas in Cartagena, Colombia, at least 20 Secret Service agents, military personnel, and others were involved in hiring prostitutes. The scandal led to multiple firings and disciplinary actions.

A lesser-known element involved Jonathan Dach, a 25-year-old Yale Law student and unpaid White House advance-team volunteer (son of prominent Democratic donor Leslie Dach). Hotel records obtained by investigators showed a prostitute was checked into Dach’s room at the Hilton Cartagena shortly after midnight on April 3, 2012.

Secret Service Director Mark Sullivan briefed White House counsel Kathryn Ruemmler on the evidence. The White House conducted a review, interviewed advance-team members (including Dach), and publicly declared “no indication of any misconduct” by White House personnel. Dach was later cleared and went on to work at the State Department.

More recently, Dach was found to have ‘chronically violated state rules’ in his role as former chief of staff to Connecticut Gov. Ned Lamont (D) by using a state vehicle as his personal car for nearly two years “and driving at speeds constituting reckless driving under Connecticut law.”

The 2014 Washington Post Revival and Ruemmler’s Response

In October 2014, while Ruemmler was in private practice at Latham & Watkins and reportedly under consideration to replace Eric Holder as Attorney General – WaPo published new details. Reporters Carol D. Leonnig and David Nakamura revealed that the White House had received specific evidence (hotel records and witness accounts) implicating a White House advance-team member but had not fully investigated or disclosed it.

On October 9, 2014, Epstein emailed Ruemmler: “Doing fine. Was talking to reporters until late in the morning last night. Trying to isolate/contain wapo.”

On October 17, 2014, Ruemmler forwarded Epstein a draft of her response to the Post reporter and asked for his input. In the draft she downplayed the allegations, writing:

“The whole thing is ridiculous – they had to obtain the record ‘under the table’ because the last thing the Hilton wanted to do is to voluntarily give over info implicating the privacy of their guests. The procedure for checking in prostitutes is hardly rigorous.”

Epstein replied with suggestions, including the line: “Important point.”

Ruemmler ultimately withdrew from consideration for Attorney General on October 24, 2014 – one week after the email exchange.

Finally, here is the letter that then-Obama White House Deputy Press Secretary Eric Schultz sent in coordination with Ruemmler, to Carol Leonnig who wrote the WaPo article exposing Jonathan Dach’s prostitution scandal, where they beg her to “from this point forward refrain from using Mr. Dach’s name,” as “He has served his purposes for your reporting—repeating his name in connection with these allegations only deepens the wounds he has already suffered.”

Beyond the obvious questions over the Obama admin prostitution scandal cover-up – which Congress/DOJ should finally ask – the most important question is: why did Obama’s top lawyer summon the help of disgraced pedophile Epstein in planning her defense against the Obama admin’s biggest prostitution scandal?

Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times,

A new coalition composed of 15 groups, including an organization founded by Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr., is taking aim at vaccine and mask mandates across the United States.

Children’s Health Defense, the Kennedy-founded group, and other members of the Medical Freedom Act Coalition say they want every state to introduce and pass medical freedom bills.

“I think it’s the first time we’ve seen this kind of effort in the kind of freedom and health movement,” Leslie Manookian, who founded the Health Freedom Defense Fund, told The Epoch Times.

The model state is Idaho, which in 2025 enacted a law that prohibits businesses and schools from requiring customers, employees, and students receive vaccines or other medical procedures. Manookian helped write the legislation, called the Idaho Medical Freedom Act.

“Because that passed, it really showed what was possible,” Leah Wilson, executive director and co-founder of Stand for Health Freedom, and one of the leaders of the coalition, told The Epoch Times. “Our goal is to take the Medical Freedom Act to as many states as possible across the U.S.”

“Children’s Health Defense finds vaccine mandates and medical mandates reprehensible, and we are honored to be part of a coalition fighting to end forced medical procedures, to end medical mandates and vaccine mandates for all Americans,” Michael Kane, director of advocacy for Children’s Health Defense, told The Epoch Times.

The coalition also includes others linked to Kennedy or his Make America Health Again (MAHA) movement, including the Independent Medical Alliance, several of whose advisers Kennedy has appointed to a vaccine advisory committee; the MAHA Institute, whose president co-founded a political action committee that funded Kennedy’s presidential bid; and MAHA Action, whose leader has published books written by Kennedy and which has held events attended by the health secretary.

People involved in the effort say they are in communication with Kennedy on other matters, but have not discussed the coalition. The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services did not respond to a request for comment by time of publication.

“This state, more than any state in the country, stands for not only medical freedom but a healthy population,” Kennedy said in a briefing with Idaho Gov. Brad Little, a Republican who signed the Idaho Medical Freedom Act a few months prior, on July 23, 2025.

Kennedy recently told reporters in Tennessee that he was not part of efforts to end school vaccine mandates in states. “I believe in freedom of choice,” he also said, describing vaccination as “a personal choice that people should make with their physicians.”

The American Academy of Pediatrics, which partners with vaccine manufacturers, and American Families for Vaccines, among other organizations, oppose rolling back vaccine mandates. The groups did not respond to requests for comment.

Idaho Requirements Still in Place

The Idaho Medical Freedom Act says in part that a school “shall not mandate a medical intervention for any person to attend, enter campus or buildings, or be employed.” It also says that a business “shall not refuse to provide any service, product, admission to a venue, or transportation to a person because that person has or has not received or used a medical intervention.”

But according to the Idaho Department of Health and Welfare (DHW), parents are required to have their children vaccinated against certain diseases for school and daycare attendance in Idaho.

The department points to another law that outlines vaccine requirements for children.

“DHW encourages school districts to consider the Medical Freedom Act … when implementing vaccine requirements at schools,” a spokesperson told The Epoch Times in an email.

Supporters of the act say the Idaho legislation was imperfect. A new Medical Freedom Expansion bill introduced by state Rep. Rob Beiswenger, a Republican who co-sponsored the legislation, seeks to make clear that mandates are unacceptable.

“The Expansion bill will make it abundantly clear to students and parents that vaccination is a voluntary, personal and private choice and not mandatory,” Beiswenger told The Epoch Times in an email.

State Actions So Far

Legislators in about a dozen states this year have released bills that would alter or ban mandates for vaccines or other medical procedures.

Arizona legislators introduced a bill that would ban businesses and schools from requiring “a medical intervention” such as a vaccine for employment or attendance.

“This bill ensures that Arizonans are not forced to choose between their bodily autonomy and their ability to work, learn, travel, or to participate in public life,” Arizona Rep. Lisa Fink, a Republican who sponsored the bill, told a hearing in January.

Lawmakers in two state House committees have cleared the legislation.

Hawaii lawmakers introduced the Hawaii Medical Freedom Act, which outlines a similar ban. It has been referred to state House panels.

Indiana senators introduced a bill that would, among other aspects, bar requiring people “to accept, undergo, or engage in a medical intervention in or on the individual’s body as a condition of employment, entrance, admission, compensation, benefits, or participation.” The bill has been referred to the state Senate Health Committee. 

New Hampshire representatives outlined legislation that would repeal immunization requirements for children. A public hearing on the bill took place on Feb. 4, and a legislative session on Feb. 11.

On the other hand, some lawmakers have been floating bills that would tighten vaccine mandates. South Carolina state Sen. Margie Bright Matthews, for example, recently introduced a bill that would end religious exemptions for measles vaccination amid an outbreak in the state.

“This legislation is about protecting children, protecting classrooms, and protecting communities with clear, medically grounded standards,” Bright Matthews, a Democrat, said in a statement.

Every state in the country requires vaccines for school attendance. Some allow exemptions for religious or philosophical reasons, while all permit medical exemptions.

Florida officials said in 2025 they would be removing all vaccine mandates, but the goal has met resistance in the state legislature, where action is required to remove mandates for some shots. The Medical Freedom Act, introduced in January, would expand exemptions to the mandates but not prohibit the mandates themselves.

The Health Freedom Defense Fund, part of the new coalition, has released model legislation that perfects the Idaho Medical Freedom Act, Manookian said. Lawmakers in other states can use the model legislation to introduce medical freedom bills in their states.

“I don’t think this is a partisan issue,” she said. “I think that Americans in general don’t want to be forced to do something to their children.”

The first and most important thing to understand about multiculturalism is that it is not an end goal.  Rather, it is a vehicle; the median step in a much larger agenda to erase sovereign cultures and strong national identities.  Once a population no longer has a cultural framework and a set of shared principles to hold onto, they are less likely to care when the borders of their nation are erased and their government becomes subservient to foreign (or globalist) interests.

Cultures are made up of specific peoples with standing birthrights, while nations are held together by shared values.  The people of a country have to care about it enough to keep it alive and secure. 

Multicultural ideology is a process for alienating a society, diminishing their shared values and undermining their love of country.  It’s not an accident when liberal political leaders open up borders and saturate the nation with third world migrants who have completely contrary values.  This sabotage is absolutely deliberate.

For the past several decades the populations of the west (and parts of Asia) have been regaled with liberal visions of Utopia; narratives of eternal peace and “brotherhood” achieved through engineered diversity.  But if diversity “is our strength” as the elites claim, then why is it that first world nations only grow more unstable with each new wave of third world migrants?  

If these migrants are a golden economic resource providing invaluable labor and talent, why are all the countries they come from festering in filth and decay and crime and war?  If these cultures are equal to the west (or superior to the west), then there must be some tangible examples of success or wealth or accomplishment or invention that are not drawn directly from the wealth of the west.  We search high and low and find nothing.  

Many national populations are getting wise to the scam.  They can see that their willingness to “adapt” and “tolerate” is slowly killing them. 

Japan’s recent snap elections led by conservative Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi resulted in a brutal smackdown of leftists and the political left.  Takaichi’s “Liberal Democratic Party” (which is not liberal in the modern western sense) has captured around 75% of the government and a undeniable political mandate.  Leftists around the world are enraged and the progressive establishment media is pumping out propaganda demonizing the conservative shift in Japan.

They deny that open immigration supported by the previous government has anything to do with Takaichi’s rise to power.  In fact, the increasing pace of third world immigration dominated political discourse in Japan for at least a year leading up to the elections.  They had seen the horrors of decline in Europe and the struggles of the US to put right the ship.  They have disrupted the agenda before it could do substantial damage.

🇯🇵 Japanese Prime Minister candidate Sanae Takaichi talks about how foreigners who stay illegally must be sent back. She also talks about rejecting people with fake refugee claims who are taking advantage of Japan’s generosity. pic.twitter.com/HOEXXyH65e

— 鈴森はるか 『haruka suzumori』 🇯🇵 (@harukaawake) October 3, 2025

The new Japanese government has announced plans to restrict visa renewals, increase deportations, kick out rule breaking migrants, restrict land purchases by foreigners, higher taxes for international tourists and caps on the number of foreign workers allowed into the country.  Furthermore, the Japanese want tighter controls on Muslim migrants who try to enforce their own religious doctrines as law (Sharia law).  

In the UK, which is nearly lost at this point, opposition to Kier Starmer’s progressive coup is quickly growing.  The Labour Party is desperately trying to delay local elections because they know Nigel Farage’s Reform is going to sweep them without mercy.  But that’s not the end of it.  

Another party called “Restore Britain” is gaining momentum with Rupert Lowe at the helm, and his message is crystal clear:  Remigration is the goal.  The complete expulsion of migrants who do not share British values or western values.  The announcement of the movement has received ample praise.  The age of liberalism is dying.

I am today launching Restore Britain as a national political party.

Join us.https://t.co/RMtEuHopgV pic.twitter.com/jQMAOjQJ5A

— Rupert Lowe MP (@RupertLowe10) February 13, 2026

Combine these trends with the revolt in the US against woke cultism and multiculturalism and it’s beginning to look like the rebellion is going global.  The notion that nations must sacrifice their cultural identities and heritage at the altar of globalism is no longer holding sway over mainstream debate.  People no longer feel “shame” when they oppose migration, and they are considering realities which were considered taboo only a few years ago.

At bottom, some cultures a superior to others.  Superior in economic value.  Superior in technological value.  Superior in moral value.  Superior in their contributions to the world at large.  To dilute successful nations with people from lesser cultures in the name of liberal virtue or economic necessity is not a compelling argument anymore. 

One has to wonder how the political left and the globalist establishment intend to win the public back to their side?  It seems impossible at this stage in the game.  Perhaps they don’t intend to do this at all.  When ideological zealots are faced with potential losses, they tend to dash the chess board to the ground rather than admit defeat.