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It’s official: our brains are fried. The is stressful enough in normal times. But this year, to have that normal level of present-buying, cookie-baking, tree-decorating stress, instead of all this , anxiety and exhaustion. It’s enough to make you want to line up a bunch of Netflix and gaze upon them, one after another, with reckless disregard for alleged quality or degree of believability. In fact, the less realistic, the better. A Chicago cupcake baker—who bears an uncanny resemblance to the duchess of a phony European nation—falling in love with a prince? . By no means does on the ; these have been Lifetime and staples for years, and it’s likely that even people you’d never suspect harbor a secret favorite or two. (Hallmark’s from 2014, involves cats and a fireman played by Brandon Routh. Probably only about eight people have seen that one.) But Netflix, in addition to flooding the market with original movies, makes it numbingly simple to watch one of these films after another, with barely a flick at your trackpad. You can stack up (an unsentimental Emma Roberts lines up Australian hottie Luke Bracey as a boyfriend for holidays only), (a lively, if overlong, musical fantasy about an eccentric toy inventor played by ) and —a sequel to the 2018 sensation featuring as the aforementioned duchess-doppelganger baker—all without having to leave the bathtub, unless you need to refill your wine glass. Once you’ve jetted through those, you can shimmy over to or any number of Christmas-themed offerings from earlier years. You could always just watch —or either of its two sequels—again. I know what you’re going to ask next: Aren’t these movies Shouldn’t I be embarrassed about watching them? My answer to the second question is no, because how we respond emotionally to visual information is not an arena for shame or judgment. Does that mean that there are more beautifully made and wonderfully acted Christmas movies beyond these? Of course. I would not trade Ernst Lubitsch’s 1940 —for my money the most beautiful, bittersweet holiday romance—for the lot of them. But then, because of that film’s rare beauty, I don’t expect many other films to measure up, and that sense of discernment is freeing, not restrictive. When you watch movies for a living, people often ask if you can turn your my brain and just watch a movie for fun. The general answer is no, because for me, thinking and watching simultaneously fun. But thinking can be multihued. It’s possible to give yourself over to a movie even when it’s written in lingo you’ve seen many times before—to note how pretty a castle looks when it’s surrounded by snowy trees, to admire a fairy-tale character’s colorful wool coat, to succumb to the unsurprising surprise of two allegedly mismatched characters bumping into each other beneath the mistletoe—without scolding yourself for what gives you pleasure. The line between a cliché and a cherished convention is often so slim it’s almost undetectable. So what awaits you in the Christmas 2020 Netflix queue? works too hard at being raunchy, but I happen to have a soft spot for Emma Roberts and her resolute eyebrows. Plus, you’ve got Luke Bracey as a ridiculously good-looking manly-man golf pro with a surprisingly sensitive side. You may as well be eating ice cream right out of the carton. —a holiday fantasy aimed at kids, but not bad for adults—is quietly radical in its mostly Black cast. It’s a switch from the norm that underscores how misguided those norms are in the first place. Plus, the costumes (by Michael Wilkinson) are a delight, a riot of Victorian and steampunk silhouettes rendered in traditional Kente cloth and African wax prints. But for pure candy-box escapism, the prize goes to movies, with Vanessa Hudgens playing at least two different versions of Vanessa Hudgens. In the first she’s the perky Chicago baker, Stacy De Novo, who, while attending a baking competition in the picturesquely phony European nation of Belgravia, discovers that she’s a dead ringer for svelte and elegant Lady Margaret, a royal denizen of the nearby and equally phony European nation known as Montenaro. Lady Margaret is engaged to be married to the Prince of Belgravia, the kind but seemingly bland Edward (Sam Palladio). Unfortunately, she’s just not that into him. Meanwhile, Stacy’s best friend and business partner, the totally hot and adorable Kevin (Nick Sagar), has a crush on her that’s been unrequited for years; Stacy loves Kevin platonically, but doesn’t feel any sparks. Margaret, bound by her royal duties, longs for more spontaneity; Stacy wouldn’t mind being a fancy royal for a day or so. And so the two switch identities, only to discover that one woman’s rejected beau is the other’s dream match. The movie ends with one royal wedding and a hint at a future engagement. Everybody goes home happy. In Lady Margaret is about to be crowned Queen of Montenaro. Sadly, her acquiescence to royal duty has broken up her romance with Kevin (though you know that’s not going to stick). Enter Margaret’s bad gal cousin Fiona (played by—surprise!—Hudgens again), a party girl with a peroxide tumble of tresses, who favors tacky clubwear and faux furs in tones not found in nature. Fiona hatches a scheme to impersonate Margaret and thus become Montenaro’s monarch. Chaos ensues, though romance prevails. If nothing else, how can you not love the idea of fictional countries with names that sound borrowed from 1960s sportswear companies? and its followup are so indefensibly enjoyable they need no defense. Recently, over socially distanced lunch with a friend, I found myself regaling him with a highly animated summary of the first movie’s plot. “Oh. It’s ,” he said, between bites of sandwich. (It’s also a device put to use in ) Stories of swapped identities, of one character being mistaken for another and causing mischief, or falling in love, are nothing new, and they were invented by people with good instincts for what human beings like. Our consistencies unite us across eras. If you were to break the movies down to their barest elements, they could almost be performance art—big squares, circles and triangles that speak in ways that defy words. These are movies written in flag language, semaphore that can be read clearly from a great distance. ends with (spoiler alert), a wedding, a reconciliation and a coronation, all of which tap out a code that our wilted minds receive gratefully. We may think our brains aren’t working, but they are; they’re experts in the art of the busman’s holiday. Love, forgiveness, the beauty of a sparkly gown: These are oversized signals, easy to read and comprehend from a great distance, reaching out to us as we watch from our respective isolated islands, or bathtubs. If they were good enough for the Elizabethans, they’re good enough for us.Nigerians of all classes should return to farming – SAN

LONDON (AP) — After a sprawling hacking campaign exposed the communications of an unknown number of Americans, U.S. cybersecurity officials are advising people to use encryption in their communications. To safeguard against the risks highlighted by the campaign, which originated in China, federal cybersecurity authorities released an extensive list of security recommendations for U.S. telecom companies — such as Verizon and AT&T — that were targeted. The advice includes one tip we can all put into practice with our phones: “Ensure that traffic is end-to-end encrypted to the maximum extent possible.” End-to-end encryption, also known as E2EE, means that messages are scrambled so that only the sender and recipient can see them. If anyone else intercepts the message, all they will see is a garble that can’t be unscrambled without the key. Law enforcement officials had until now resisted this type of encryption because it means the technology companies themselves won’t be able to look at the messages, nor respond to law enforcement requests to turn the data over. Here’s a look at various ways ordinary consumers can use end-to-end encryption: Officials said the hackers targeted the metadata of a large number of customers, including information on the dates, times and recipients of calls and texts. They also managed to see the content from texts from a much smaller number of victims. If you’re an iPhone user, information in text messages that you send to someone else who also has an iPhone will be encrypted end-to-end. Just look for the blue text bubbles, which indicate that they are encrypted iMessages. The same goes for Android users sending texts through Google Messages. There will be a lock next to the timestamp on each message to indicate the encryption is on. But there’s a weakness. When iPhone and Android users text each other, the messages are encrypted only using Rich Communication Services, an industry standard for instant messaging that replaces the older SMS and MMS standards. Apple has noted that RCS messages “aren’t end-to-end encrypted, which means they’re not protected from a third party reading them while they’re sent between devices.” Samsung, which sells Android smartphones, has also hinted at the issue in a footnote at the bottom of a press release last month on RCS, saying, “Encryption only available for Android to Android communication.” To avoid getting caught out when trading texts, experts recommend using encrypted messaging apps. Privacy advocates are big fans of Signal, which applies end-to-end encryption on all messages and voice calls. The independent nonprofit group behind the app promises never to sell, rent, or lease customer data and has made its source code publicly available so that it can be audited by anyone to examine it “for security and correctness.” Signal’s encryption protocol is so reputable that it has been integrated into rival WhatsApp , so users will enjoy the same level of security protection as Signal, which has a much smaller user base. End-to-end encryption is also the default mode for Facebook Messenger , which like WhatsApp is owned by Meta Platforms. Telegram is an app that can be used for one-on-one conversations, group chats and broadcast “channels” but contrary to popular perception, it doesn’t turn on end-to-end encryption by default. Users have to switch on the option. And it doesn’t work with group chats. Cybersecurity experts have warned people against using Telegram for private communications and pointed out that only its opt-in ‘secret chat’ feature is encrypted from end-to-end. The app also has a reputation for being a haven for scammers and criminal activity, highlighted by founder and CEO Pavel Durov’s arrest in France . Instead of using your phone to make calls through a wireless cellular network, you can make voice calls with Signal and WhatsApp. Both apps encrypt calls with the same technology that they use to encrypt messages. There are other options. If you have an iPhone you can use Facetime for calls, while Android owners can use the Google Fi service, which are both end-to-end encrypted. The only catch with all these options is that, as with using the chat services to send messages, the person on the other end will also have to have the app installed. WhatsApp and Signal users can customize their privacy preferences in the settings, including hiding IP address during calls to prevent your general location from being guessed.