By Chris Snellgrove
| Published 30 seconds ago

Be honest: Have you ever been in a job interview, and when asked what your biggest weakness is, you want to say, “I just work too hard?” It’s the kind of thing that makes an interviewer want to kill you, but in Hollywood, veteran director Paul Verhoeven can get away with such a wild claim. That’s because he worked incredibly hard to create the stone-faced satire that transformed Starship Troopers into history’s most misunderstood sci-fi movie, and it’s available to stream on Netflix for audiences who are finally ready to get in on the joke.

Verhoeven Is A Master Of Satire

Before you start watching Starship Troopers, though, you might need a bit of context about its director. He’s made plenty of great films over the years, including Total Recall and Basic Instinct, but he is arguably best known for RoboCop.

That movie (which featured a corporate-controlled police department as a statement on the militarization of cops and the dangers of exploitative executives) was once considered the finest film satire ever made, and fittingly enough, the film that took its satirical crown away was Verhoeven’s own Starship Troopers.

Structured Like A Propaganda Video

What is Starship Troopers about, though, and where does the satire come into play with this sci-fi blockbuster? On paper, this is a pretty straightforward tale of teenagers who enthusiastically join humanity’s war effort against the alien “Arachnids,” leading to one cool action scene after another.

Look closely, though, and you’ll see the seams tearing in this easy narrative … humanity is deeply racist, and frequent propaganda spots help harness that racism into jingoistic praise of a military that can do no wrong, despite the implication that Earth actually started this devastating war. 

Interestingly, even the casting emphasized this satire: for example, Casper Van Dien, Denise Richards, and Neil Patrick Harris are all good-looking young actors, so nobody thinks twice about their casting as carefree teens turned into bloodthirsty soldiers. However, the movie itself is presented like a propaganda film … the kind of thing that would be shown in-universe to help recruit more kids into the military.

The more you see the creeping fascism of our main characters and this universe as a whole, the more you realize these are the exact kinds of pretty people you’d cast to make evil stop looking so banal and start looking so sexy.

Appreciated Today As Smart Satire

Now that audiences are generally more media-literate, it’s easy enough to appreciate how smart Starship Troopers really is. But when it was first released, many editors of mainstream publications didn’t clock the satire and were extremely angry at Verhoeven for releasing a film celebrating fascism. 

Other critics thought the satire was functionally indistinguishable from an endorsement of these ideas, and countless fans didn’t care about these themes at all … they just wanted to see some “hoo-RAH” humans killing some evil aliens. There’s no wrong way to enjoy this cult hit, of course, but being able to appreciate the great action and fierce satire helps you get the most out of a movie that is always firing on all cylinders.

Destined To Be A Cult Classic

When Starship Troopers was first released in 1997, it wasn’t exactly a bomb, but not exactly a hit either … the movie had a budget between $100-110 million and earned $121 million worldwide which, after marketing, means it was likely a loss for the studio.

It resonated more with critics, though: on Rotten Tomatoes, it currently has a critical rating of 72 percent. Critics called the movie “fun” but complained about “the excessive gore and wooden acting,” both of which are part and parcel of the satire (though in a world where every other movie is Marvel-style slop, satire is increasingly hard to notice).

As for me, I contended that Starship Troopers is the rare literary adaptation that is far superior to the book it was based on. Robert Heinlein’s novel of the same name is a genuine sci-fi classic, but the author was so close to this universe that he never seemed to notice or care how fash-friendly slogans like “service guarantees citizenship” really are.

By contrast, Verhoeven’s adaptation serves as a commentary on the author and his work, all while delivering a killer action film that manages to be much smarter than most people watching it.

Now, I’m not saying that Starship Troopers is smarter than you, but I am saying you won’t know until you stream it on Netflix. Will you enjoy all of the knife-sharp (watch that hand, Jake Busey!) satire or just enjoy quoting great lines like “the only good bug is a dead bug?” Either way, this is one misunderstood sci-fi movie that you’ll never forget.

The year is only halfway through, yet 2026 has already been filled with data breaches, hacks, and cybersecurity incidents.

So let’s take a look back at the biggest cybersecurity breaches of 2026 so far. Mashable has picked the six most impactful incidents. There’s likely lessons to be learned in order to protect yourself for the rest of the year.

Here they are, in no particular order.

Grand Theft Auto VI fans and Rockstar Games

GTA 6, the most anticipated video game for the past decade, will finally be released this year. And malicious actors are already targeting its fans and even the game’s developer.

Fake GTA 6 pre-order websites, fake GTA 6 mobile apps, and even fake sites that copy legitimate game download platforms have been popping up since developer Rockstar Games confirmed a late 2026 launch for the game.

It’s unclear just how many users have already been affected, but it’s obviously growing, as hackers will continue to target Grand Theft Auto gamers up until the game’s release and likely well beyond.

Not even Rockstar Games is safe. Earlier this year, the now-infamous hacker collective ShinyHunters announced that it had breached the game developer’s networks. ShinyHackers sought out a ransom in exchange for not releasing the data it had stolen.

Rockstar downplayed the severity of the data breach, saying the breach occurred at a third-party provider. It also appeared that the data comprised corporate assets rather than private user information.

Instructure data breach

Edtech giant Instructure, the company behind the popular Learning Management System (LMS) Canvas, was a victim of what was easily one of the biggest breaches of the year so far.

The Instructure breach was also carried out by ShinyHunters, the hacking collective that is becoming quite notorious as the likely culprit behind so many data breaches. The stolen data in this breach included users’ names, email addresses, student IDs, and private messages exchanged on the platform, which was used by a whopping 275 million users at nearly 9,000 schools around the world. These users included students, teachers, and school staff.

To make matters even worse, ShinyHunters breached Instructure’s platforms again just one week after the company claimed it had fixed the security issues associated with the original data breach. This time, however, ShinyHunters defaced the login pages of specific schools.

The data breaches forced some schools to postpone final exams and assignments, as Instructure took its platforms offline to address the cybersecurity incidents.

ShinyHunters is well known for carrying out breaches and demanding a ransom in return for not releasing the data. It appears that Instructure struck a deal with ShinyHunters to prevent its users’ data from being disseminated. It’s certainly a worrying outcome that doesn’t bode well for how future data breaches may pan out.

Conduent data breach

Conduent is a data management company whose clients include many major corporations, healthcare providers, and state agencies. So, when there’s a data breach at an organization that handles sensitive data belonging to Humana and Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Texas, just to name a few, there is cause for concern.

Earlier this year, at least 25 million people in just two states were affected by a data breach at Conduent. A reported 15 million people were affected in Texas, which is just shy of half of the state’s more than 31 million residents. Reports state that more than 10 million people were affected in Oregon.

According to Conduent, the unauthorized parties “obtained some files that contained individuals’ personal information, which came into our possession due to the services that we provide to your current and former health plan.”

This data included users’ names, Social Security numbers, medical information, and health insurance information.

That’s a big cybersecurity incident involving some of the most sensitive user data that can be obtained.

Meta AI supports Instagram vulnerability

The most recent incident on this list perfectly encapsulates many of the unresolved cybersecurity issues with AI.

Meta rolled out an AI-powered support chatbot for Instagram. Hackers figured out they could simply request that the AI chatbot send a password reset link for any Instagram account to the hacker’s email address. Meta AI support complied with the requests simply because the hacker told them they were the account owner and needed the chatbot to send the password reset link to a new email address.

Malicious actors were stealing highly followed Instagram accounts through this method and then selling them on online black markets.

Meta did eventually fix the issue, but affected users were still locked out of their accounts for a time.

This may not have been the biggest, most widespread hack on our list. But the method used to steal these Instagram accounts is certainly the fastest-growing tool in hackers’ arsenal. We’ll be seeing many more bad actors tricking easy-to-fool AI-powered systems in the very near future.

DarkSword spyware

What if a hacker could steal a smartphone’s data with nothing more than their target visiting a website?

DarkSword spyware, which could do just that, had Google and numerous cybersecurity firms ringing the alarm bells earlier this year.

Google Threat Intelligence Group and cybersecurity companies Lookout and iVerify laid out their findings in March, showing how malicious actors were exploiting vulnerabilities in Apple’s iPhone to siphon data from a device after the target visited an infected website.

Call logs, contacts, iMessage and WhatsApp data, email, calendars, notes, photos, screenshots, location history, web browser history, signed-in account identities, device keychains, SIM card info, Find My Phone settings, WiFi passwords, iCloud content, and more were all able to be pulled from a malicious actor using DarkSword.

Nearly 25 percent of all iPhones are still running some version of iOS 18, the iPhone operating system that was susceptible to the attack. This meant that there were potentially hundreds of millions of iOS devices on which DarkSword could be deployed.

According to the reports, Russian hacker groups were already deploying the spyware “to fully compromise devices.”

To make matters worse, DarkSword was soon released into the wild shortly after the cybersecurity firms warned about it.

Apple did release updates and important information for users who were susceptible to the spyware. However, the existence of such an exploit shows just how easy it’s becoming for bad actors to carry out an attack.

WeedHack

Speaking of how easy it is to get hacked, WeedHack may be the perfect example of how accessible it is to become an attacker, too.

A recent report from McAfee Labs detailed a new hacker tool being offered as a $5 per month service to aspiring attackers who may not have the technical know-how to carry out a campaign themselves. 

WeedHack is a malware that’s deployed under the guise of a Minecraft client or mod. Once a device is infected, an attacker can collect system information, search for files on the infected device, take screenshots of the target’s system, and steal cookies and passwords from the target’s web browser. And that’s just the free version.

For $5 per month, an attacker could also gain webcam access to the infected device, keylogging capabilities, screen sharing with keyboard and mouse access, file management features for uploading and downloading files, and more.

Perhaps the most concerning revelation, however, was just how WeedHack was being used.

McAfee Labs uncovered a Telegram channel for WeedHack’s customer base and found it was largely used by teenagers and young adults who were using the malware to cyberbully other young people, threatening, harassing, and spying on victims. 

Malware-as-a-service has existed before, but WeedHack seems to be ushering in something that goes well beyond just your typical cybersecurity issues.

By Jacob VanGundy
| Published 31 seconds ago

I recently rewatched Hellraiser, one of the best horror movies of the 1980s, and I was struck by how much it resembles a vampire story. Aesthetically, thematically, and even in terms of plot, the story has more in common with Dracula than the supernatural slashers of the era. While elements centered around the Cenobites dominated the sequels, the original movie is more interested in exploring the vampiric antagonist, Frank.

Released in 1987, Hellraiser was written and directed by Clive Barker, who had adapted his novella, The Hellbound Heart. It made $14.6 million at the US box office ($30 million worldwide) on a budget of only $1 million and became a hit with horror fans, though it faced heavy censorship and a ban in Ontario. The movie was so successful it spawned nine sequels and a reboot. 

The Dracula Parallels

Hellraiser begins with the hedonist Frank Cotton using a puzzle box to summon Cenobites, a group of sadomasochistic extradimensional beings who torture him to death and take his soul to their dimension. When Frank’s brother Larry cuts himself in the attic where Frank died, it resurrects him as a skinless monster. Larry’s wife Julia is seduced into luring victims to Frank, who, now a vampire, needs the blood to restore himself. 

While the movie’s heroine, Kirstie, solves the puzzle box and is tormented by Cenobites for it, Frank is the clear antagonist. In his new vampire form, Frank requires the blood of multiple victims, becoming increasingly human in appearance as he feeds on the men Julia seduces and brings to him. He also attempts to seduce and murder Kirstie, making a much more explicit villain than the more mysterious Cenobites. 

Frank’s need to feed on blood is the most obvious way Hellraiser is a vampire story, but his entire character resembles Dracula. His origin, making a deal with demonic beings, is a common origin for the character and similar to the implied origin in Bram Stoker’s novel. The fact that he was resurrected from death by human blood also fits within the mythology. 

Hellraiser’s setting is also reminiscent of classic vampiric folklore. Taking place in a grand but dilapidated family home is similar to the decrepit mansions and castles common in vampire stories. The fact that Frank is confined to the attic of that home by his appearance takes the place of hiding in a crypt to avoid sunlight. 

Thematically, Hellraiser explores ideas that frequently appear in vampire stories. Hedonism, sexual taboos, and corruption are all central themes of the movie that can be found in everything from Interview With the Vampire to Carmilla. Solving the puzzle box also connects to the idea of forbidden knowledge, which is often a central piece of Dracula’s mythology. 

The seductive element of Frank’s character is another central connection to vampire lore, with Julia being Hellraiser’s version of Dracula’s bride. While Frank doesn’t directly turn Julia into a monster, he does lead her to behave monstrously, helping him murder multiple men, including her husband. The sequel would double down on this by making her a central antagonist after her own resurrection. 

Hellraiser Is Misunderstood

Hellraiser has more than earned its place in the pantheon of great horror movies, but it’s also largely misunderstood by those who haven’t seen it as a movie about Pinhead as a supernatural slasher. The movie is much more at home within the vampire genre than the broader oeuvre of 80s horror. Fans of horror, particularly fans of vampire stories, should watch Hellraiser, which is available to stream for free on Tubi, Pluto TV, Plex, and Amazon Prime Video.