Nakedwill News Ep.006 — Hacked Fridges and the STI Test You Skipped

Nakedwill News Ep.006 — Hacked Fridges and the STI Test You Skipped

I do the news naked. Some mornings that's literal — robe open, coffee going cold on the desk — and some mornings it just means I'm not going to dress the facts up for you. Episode 006 ran 10 minutes 28 seconds. This is the written version, plus the part I had to cut for time.

Someone turned 150 supermarket freezers into ovens

In France, refrigeration and freezer equipment at roughly 150 Intermarché stores got compromised remotely. Temperatures were driven up to 50°C and held there for hours. Stores binned the affected fresh and frozen food. Paris prosecutors have opened an investigation into the food losses and the fires that started. The suspected entry point was a service provider that manages those refrigeration systems remotely.

Nobody smashed a window. Nobody carried a crate of steaks out the back. The way in was the same category of remote connection a lot of us use to check a home camera from a train.

Two things I keep repeating on this show. First: anything with an IP address is a computer, and it deserves the same security thinking as your laptop. The fridge, the thermostat, the baby monitor, the building's air conditioning. Default passwords, shared logins, firmware from 2019 that nobody patches — that's the actual attack surface. Second: food safety is a record, not a vibe. Don't sniff the chicken and make a judgment call. Time and temperature logs are how you know whether the cold chain broke. If a supplier can't produce them, that's your answer.

The numbers desk

The IMF's October 2026 World Economic Outlook puts global growth at 3.1%. Up from the 3.0% forecast in July, down from 3.5% last year. Modest, wobbling, not a crash.

Taiwan is a different picture. The IMF raised its 2026 growth forecast for Taiwan from 5.2% in April to 10.7%, and the reason is AI chip demand. Economists are already cautioning about how much of that rides on one industry. A number that big isn't a compliment, it's an exposure.

Two ships in the Black Sea

Two merchant vessels were attacked by drones off the coast of Bulgaria. People are missing. I don't have anything clever to add to that. It's a reminder that shipping lanes are infrastructure, and infrastructure is not abstract.

The vaccine paragraph (the boring one that keeps you out of bed)

Taiwan's flu and COVID vaccination push opened on October 1. So far about 2.27 million flu doses and 781,000 COVID doses have gone into arms. The government is buying another 300,000 flu doses and 174,000 Novavax doses. From October 19, eligible people aged 12 and up can get Novavax. On November 2, the next phase opens for people 50 to 64 with no high-risk conditions.

Check vaxmap.cdc.gov.tw before you go, and call the clinic to confirm they have stock. A map is a plan; a phone call is confirmation.

Quick politics

Taipei's mayoral candidates had a televised debate on October 13. Housing, transport, the usual. I mention it because local government decides things like whether your district has a working sexual health clinic, and that isn't a small thing.

Science of Sex Desk: the test your urine sample won't catch

Here's the segment I care most about this week.

You go for a checkup. You pee in a cup. The results come back clean and you assume you've been screened for everything. You have not. A standard urine test catches a limited set of things, and it misses infections that live in the throat and the rectum — which is where a lot of them actually are, depending on what kind of sex you're having.

The CDC's screening guidance for men who have sex with men is explicit about this: test by site, based on exposure. A throat swab for people who give oral sex, a rectal swab for people who receive anal sex, plus blood for syphilis and HIV, plus urine for urethral infections. Gonorrhea and chlamydia in the throat or rectum are frequently asymptomatic. You will feel fine. You will still be able to pass it on.

So ask. Don't wait to be offered. Say the words: "I'd like a throat swab and a rectal swab, not just a urine test." Some clinicians will do it without blinking. Some will look surprised. Both are fine — the request is legitimate and the guidelines are on your side.

In Taiwan, anonymous screening is available, and there's free HIV self-testing through hiva.cdc.gov.tw/Selftest/. Buy one, keep it in a drawer, use it on a schedule you decide in advance rather than on a night when you're already anxious.

And one thing that isn't a test: asking your partner what they've been up to. That conversation is worth having, but it isn't a lab result. Do both.

I'm not your doctor and this isn't medical advice. I'm the person reminding you that your body is yours to take care of, and that taking care of it isn't shameful.

What I keep thinking about

A hacked fridge is funny until you notice the vulnerable part wasn't the fridge. It was the assumption that some devices don't need protecting. Sexual health works the same way. The gap is rarely the thing you're worried about. It's the test you assumed was already included.