Technology

For a long time, the tracker fight has been very one-sided, with Apple's Find My network reliably using other Apple devices as a mesh network. That only really caught on with Android recently, and now, the Moto Tag has just become probably the most accurate Android tracker out there.

Meta has struck out against a popular app used to produce AI-generated nonconsensual intimate images — commonly referred to as "nudify" or "undress" apps — as the company selectively cracks down on advertisers.

In a new lawsuit filed in Hong Kong against the makers behind a commonly-used app known as Crush AI, the tech giant claims parent company Joy Timeline HK intentionally bypassed Meta's ad review process using new domain names and networks of advertiser accounts in order to promote the app's AI-powered deepfake services.

"This legal action underscores both the seriousness with which we take this abuse and our commitment to doing all we can to protect our community from it. We’ll continue to take the necessary steps — which could include legal action — against those who abuse our platforms like this," Meta wrote in a press release.

SEE ALSO: FDA wants to use AI to speed up drug approval process

Meta has previously been under fire for failing to curb nudify apps from advertising on its platform, including allowing ads featuring explicit deepfake images of celebrities to appear repeatedly on the platform — in addition to its advertising policies, Meta prohibits the spread of non-consensual intimate imagery and blocks the search terms "nudify," "undress" and "delete clothing." According to an analysis by Cornell researcher Alexios Mantzarlis, Crush AI allegedly ran more than 8,000 ads across Meta platforms between the fall of 2024 and January 2025, with 90 percent of its traffic coming from Meta platforms. Broadly, AI-generated ad content has plagued users, as the company has relaxed its content moderation policies in favor of automated review processes and community-generated fact-checking.

Victims of AI-generated nonconsensual intimate imagery have spent years fighting for greater industry regulation and legal pathways for recourse. In May, the Trump Administration signed the Take It Down Act, a law that criminalizes nonconsensual intimate imagery and sets mandatory takedown policies for online platforms. AI-generated child sexual abuse material (CSAM) has also proliferated across the internet in recent years, prompting widespread concern about the safety and regulation of generative AI tools.

In addition to taking legal action against Crush AI, Meta announced it was developing a new detection technology to more accurately flag and remove ads for nudify apps. The company is also stepping up its work with the Tech Coalition’s Lantern program, an industry initiative to coalesce information on child online safety, and will continue sharing information on violating companies and products. Since March, Meta has reported more than 3,800 unique URLs related to nudify apps and websites and discovered four separate networks trying to promote their services, according to the company.

Despite being one of gaming's most accessible genres, visual novels are still fairly niche. Some people don't have the time to sit through 50 hours of reading, or have been turned off by the countless dating sims that make up much of the genre. However, there's a lot more to visual novels than you may realize.

UPDATE: June 13, 2025, 11:15 a.m. ET The major disruption to Google Cloud services has been fully resolved, the company said in a statement to Mashable. Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian wrote on X that the company regretted "the disruption this caused our customers." Read more about the possible cause of the outage in our latest report on the event.

On Thursday, a representative for the popular IT provider Cloudflare told Mashable that a Google Cloud outage was responsible for its issues. The company apologized for the interruption of its services, while still hinting that the ultimate blame lay elsewhere.

"We’re deeply sorry for this outage: this was a failure on our part, and while the proximate cause (or trigger) for this outage was a third-party vendor failure, we are ultimately responsible for our chosen dependencies and how we choose to architect around them," it wrote in a blog post.

UPDATE: June 12, 2025, 9:30 p.m. ET Google Cloud reports "All the services are fully recovered from the service issue." An update from the company states: "We will publish analysis of this incident once we have completed our internal investigation."

UPDATE: June 12, 2025, 7:30 p.m. ET A representative with hosting platform Cloudflare claimed that the disruptions to its services were the result of "a Google Cloud outage." Google did not respond to a request for comment.

UPDATE: June 12, 2025, 5:33 p.m. ET The Google Cloud service page has posted another update saying, "most of the Google Cloud products have confirmed full service recovery."

UPDATE: June 12, 2025, 5:12 p.m. ET The Google Cloud service page says engineers "have implemented mitigation for the issue" and are "seeing signs of recovery" in multiple regions. The status update says Google Cloud expects the recovery to complete in "less than an hour."

Today, Google Cloud Platform (GCP) reported disruptions to its services across the globe, while users reported problems accessing Google services such as Google Meet. So far, Google has not provided an explanation for the GCP outages.

And if you noticed some of your favorite sites and apps also stopped working this afternoon, you're not alone. It seems like practically the entire internet went down, including Google Cloud, OpenAI, Twitch, Discord, Nintendo, and Spotify.

Down Detector, a platform where users can report errors and other problems, showed a widespread spike in problems starting around 2 p.m. ET. (Disclosure: Down Detector is owned by Mashable's parent company, Ziff Davis.) And on social media platforms like X, users also shared their frustration.

What happened to Google Cloud?

On the Google Cloud status page, the service admitted to "service issues" at 2:46 p.m. ET. According to updates at 3:41 p.m. ET and 4:16 p.m. ET, engineers “have identified the root cause and have applied appropriate mitigations.” However, the company also noted that they didn't have an ETA for full recovery.

Meanwhile, a Google Cloud representative told Mashable, "We are currently investigating a service disruption to some Google Cloud services."

The Google Cloud status page states that affected areas include regions all across Asia, Australia, Europe, the Middle East, and North and South America.

What is Google Cloud?

Google Cloud is a popular cloud hosting service. Because it provides hosting for a variety of other services, websites, and apps, a GCP outage could cause major ripple effects across the digital ecosystem.

What Google services were affected?

At the same time as the GCP outages, a variety of Google services were also experiencing problems, according to Down Detector. Users reported problems with Google Meet, Gmail, Google Drive, and Google Maps.

Users reported errors on a variety of websites Thursday afternoon. Credit: Courtesy of Down Detector What was the cause of the Google Cloud outage?

At this time, we don't know the cause of the Google Cloud issues or the more widespread problems reported across the web.

An update posted to the Google Cloud status page at 4:16 p.m. ET stated: "We have identified the root cause and applied appropriate mitigations. Our infrastructure has recovered in all regions except us-central1. Google Cloud products that rely on the affected infrastructure are seeing recovery in multiple locations. Our engineers are aware of the customers still experiencing issues on us-central1 and multi-region/us and are actively working on full recovery."

This story is developing and we'll update it with more information...

Update: June 13, 2025, 12:44 p.m. ET — Read our latest report on the possible causes of Thursday's internet outages.

UPDATE: June 13, 2025, 9:45 a.m. ET — Google Cloud reported that all services had "been fully restored" following the large-scale disruption on Thursday. The company pointed to a statement from Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian on X.

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Popular IT provider Cloudflare, meanwhile, reported it was fully recovered and that the outage on Thursday lasted a total of 2 hours and 28 minutes.

"We’re deeply sorry for this outage: this was a failure on our part, and while the proximate cause (or trigger) for this outage was a third-party vendor failure, we are ultimately responsible for our chosen dependencies and how we choose to architect around them," it wrote in a blog post.

UPDATE: June 12, 2025, 9:30 p.m. ET — At 9:27 p.m. ET, Google Cloud reported that "All the services are fully recovered from the service issue." An update from the company stated: "We will publish analysis of this incident once we have completed our internal investigation."

UPDATE: June 12, 2025, 6:50 p.m. ET — As of this writing, error reports at Down Detector have dwindled, and hosting platforms like Google Cloud and Cloudflare report that known issues were resolved. As for the cause of the widespread internet outages, a Cloudflare representative claimed that Google Cloud was responsible for the disruption. Read our original story below.

Is the entire internet down?

Around 2:30 p.m. ET on Thursday, June 12, users started reporting widespread service disruptions at popular websites and apps, including Twitch, Gmail, Discord, Nintendo Switch Online, Spotify, and dozens of other platforms. By 3:30 p.m., some services were restored, although ongoing outages continued.

The service Down Detector showed a spike in error messages across the internet, and users took to social media to complain of problems at their favorite websites. (Disclosure: Ziff Davis owns both Mashable and Down Detector.) Mashable reporters experienced problems accessing some Google services, such as Google Meet, when the outage first occurred.

Credit: Down Detector

Cloudflare, a popular IT management company that provides hosting services, is among the services disrupted by the massive internet outage. Cloudflare reported "Broad Cloudflare service outages" on its website on Thursday afternoon. The company initially reported that they are "continuing to investigate this issue." However, a more recent message stated, "We are starting to see services recover. We still expect to see intermittent errors across the impacted services as systems handle retried and caches are filled."

At the same time, a Google Cloud status page stated, "Multiple GCP products are experiencing Service issues."

According to Down Detector, the following sites are experiencing a spike in user error reports:

• Discord

• Google (Google Cloud, Gmail, Google Meet, and others)

• Spotify

• Twitch

• character.ai

• Rocket league

• Cloudflare

• Etsy

• Pokémon Trading card game

• Snapchat

• fuboTV

• Anthropic (maker of Claude)

• Shopify

• Gemini

• MLB.tv

• Doordash

• Ikea

• Equifax

• Marvel

• Vimeo

• Nintendo Switch Online

• Gitlan

• Calendly

Disruptions to services like Cloudflare, Google Cloud, and Shopify could cause ripple effects across the internet. And because the disruption occurred during work hours, frustrated workers are complaining of problems accessing tools like Google Meet. As of 3:35 p.m., many of the impacted websites appeared to be recovering, according to user reports on Down Detector.

On social media sites like X, confused users reacted in real-time to the widespread service disruptions across the internet.

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This is a developing story and will be updated as new details emerge.

UPDATE: Jun. 12, 2025, 4:40 p.m. EDT This story has been updated with additional details about the widespread internet service disruption. An earlier version of this story stated that Amazon Web Services (AWS) was impacted by the outages; however, an Amazon representative told Mashable this is not the case. An AWS spokesperson said, "Currently there are no board service issues with AWS."

UPDATE: Jun. 12, 2025, 5:06 p.m. EDT According to the Cloudflare status page, the service issues have been fully resolved. "All Cloudflare services have been restored and are now fully operational," the company wrote. "We are moving the incident to Monitoring while we watch platform metrics to confirm sustained stability."

Large swaths of the internet went down on Thursday afternoon, affecting a wide variety of services, including Cloudflare.

Down Detector showed a spike of user-reported issues for the popular IT tool, but it was far from alone. User-reported issues for major sites and services flooded in. Sites like Spotify, Google, Snapchat, Discord, Nintendo, Character.ai, and more all saw spikes on Down Detector. (Disclosure: Ziff Davis owns both Mashable and Down Detector.)

Cloudflare has provided regular updates on the issues on its status page. Most recently, it wrote: "Cloudflare’s critical Workers KV service went offline due to an outage of a 3rd party service that is a key dependency." That update was posted online at about 4 p.m. ET, indicating the problems persisted, to some degree, hours after it was first identified.

"Cloudflare engineers are working to restore services immediately," the company added. "We are aware of the deep impact this outage has caused and are working with all hands on deck to restore all services as quickly as possible."

The large spike on Down Detector has begun to trend downward and, in an earlier update at about 3:15 p.m. ET, the company noted it was "starting to see services recover" but still expected "intermittent errors." According to the most recent updates, the service issues have been resolved.

What is Cloudflare?

Cloudflare, in short, supplies IT management for lots of businesses. The idea is it improves website security, hosting, and functionality and, apparently, works with many of the sites you might come across daily.

"Cloudflare powers Internet requests for millions of websites and serves 78 million HTTP requests per second on average," its site reads.

So, a disruption to Cloudflare could cause ripple effects across the digital world.

This is a developing story and will be updated as new details emerge.

Amazon and other major online retailers' websites are still working amid this afternoon's massive internet outage, but they're taking their time to load.

The outage appears to be affecting dozens of online services, including the ecommerce platform Shopify. Walmart and Target rely on Shopify to support their third-party marketplace sellers.

SEE ALSO: Massive internet outage: Google services, Cloudflare, Spotify all down, users report

Mashable reporters were able to add products to their cart and get through the checkout process on Amazon, Best Buy, Target, Walmart, and eBay as well as several online stores that use Shopify (Sennheiser, Good American, Allbirds, Brooklinen, and Netflix). However, all sites we tried were very slow to load.

It's still unclear what exactly caused today's outage.

This story is developing.

Apple will release macOS 26 Tahoe later in 2025, bringing with it a fresh new “Liquid Glass” aesthetic, improved Spotlight search, a more capable Apple Intelligence, and some brand new apps.

UPDATE: June 13, 2025, 10:45 a.m ET — The massive internet outage that struck Thursday afternoon appeared to be fully resolved. Read more about the possible cause of the disruption.

Google Cloud wrote that all services had "been fully restored" in its latest statement. Google Cloud CEO Thomas Kurian also wrote on X that the company regretted "the disruption this caused our customers."

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Cloudflare, a popular IT provider, meanwhile, reported it was fully recovered after an outage that lasted about 2.5 hours.

"We’re deeply sorry for this outage: this was a failure on our part, and while the proximate cause (or trigger) for this outage was a third-party vendor failure, we are ultimately responsible for our chosen dependencies and how we choose to architect around them," it wrote in a blog post.

On Thursday afternoon, a massive list of popular internet services all started experiencing outages at the same time.

Thousands of confused internet users took to Google and social media to ask why they couldn't log into their favorite websites and apps. The front page of Down Detector was a menagerie of spiking orange line graphs, starting around 2 p.m. ET on Thursday, June 12. (Disclosure: Ziff Davis owns both Mashable and Down Detector.)

So, what caused the outage?

Here's what we know so far.

What's causing the service outage?

In a statement to Mashable, a representative for hosting platform Cloudflare pointed the blame at Google Cloud. In addition, the Cloudflare status page attributed the service to "an outage of a 3rd party service that is a key dependency" for Cloudflare services.

Initial speculation focused on internet hosting platforms like Cloudflare and Google Cloud, as both companies reported problems Thursday. An initial update on the Cloudflare status page stated, "We are seeing a number of services suffer intermittent failures. We are continuing to investigate this and we will update this list as we assess the impact on a per-service level." And at the Google Cloud status page, the company reported that "Multiple GCP products are experiencing Service issues."

On Friday, a Google Cloud spokesperson provided this statement to Mashable: "Following a disruption to a number of Google Cloud services, all products have now been fully restored."

What's happening at Google Cloud?

By 5:15 p.m. ET on Thursday, the Google Cloud status page stated, "Most of the Google Cloud products are fully recovered," though some "residual impacts" continued. By Thursday evening, service had been fully restored, ending the Google Cloud outage.

A previous update on the page said: "We have identified the root cause and applied appropriate mitigations. Our infrastructure has recovered in all regions except us-central1. Google Cloud products that rely on the affected infrastructure are seeing recovery in multiple locations. Our engineers are aware of the customers still experiencing issues on us-central1 and multi-region/us and are actively working on full recovery. We do not have an ETA for full recovery."

What does Down Detector say?

Starting around 2 p.m. ET on Thursday, June 12, Down Detector, a platform where users can report issues with popular websites and apps, received an avalanche of user reports, with Google Services, popular AI platforms, and e-commerce websites all affected. Social apps like Twitch, Nintendo Switch Online, and Discord all received a spike in error reports as well.

Even more services. Credit: Screenshot: Downdetector Some impacted services. Credit: Screenshot: Downdetector More services. Credit: Screenshot: Downdetector

The spike in outage reports started to calm down by 3:30 p.m., and after a few hours, most platforms seemed to be operating normally again.

Is Google down?

During the initial outage, Down Detector users reported problems to a variety of Google services, although Google Search and Gmail appeared to be working for most users. Multiple Mashable reporters also experienced problems accessing services such as Google Meet. Google Cloud experienced issues, which would help explain why so many Google services were struggling.

What websites, apps, and platforms were affected?

As of 3:20 p.m. ET on Thursday, dozens of popular platforms were down or experiencing disruptions. According to Down Detector, the following sites reported a surge in error messages:

• Discord

• Google and all related services (e.g. YouTube, Google Meet)

• Spotify

• Twitch

• Character.ai

• Rocket League

• Cloudflare

• Etsy

• Pokémon Trading Card Game

• Snapchat

• fuboTV

• Anthropic

• Shopify

• Gemini

• MLB.tv

• Doordash

• Ikea

• Equifax

• Marvel

• Vimeo

• Nintendo Switch Online

• Gitlab

• Calendly

• Bluesky

• Grok

• Fortnite

• Apple Music

• Netflix

• Disney Plus

• Prime Video

This story is developing...

UPDATE: Jun. 12, 2025, 6:30 p.m. EDT This story has been updated with additional details about the widespread internet service disruption. An earlier version of this story stated that Amazon Web Services (AWS) was impacted by the outages; however, an Amazon representative told Mashable this is not the case. An AWS spokesperson said, "Currently there are no board service issues with AWS."

Countless sites and services — stalwarts like Twitch, Gmail, Discord, Nintendo, and more — went down on Thursday afternoon, eastern time. The internet, even as large swaths of it went down, was quick to react on social media. And, in short, people were freaking out.

People posted screenshots of Down Detector, which showed, well, just about everything was out. It's worth noting that Down Detector registers user-reported issues, so you still may have access to sites experiencing spikes. (Disclosure: Ziff Davis owns both Mashable and Down Detector.)

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The memes and jokes flowed in, too, of course.

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Almost all of the internet may be down, but the internet still has jokes about it.

This story is developing and will be updated as needed...

If you're having trouble with Google right now, you're not alone.

On Downdetector, users started reporting outages with Google around 1:30 p.m. EST — so you're not the only person experiencing tech issues today. (Disclosure: Ziff Davis owns both Mashable and Downdetector.)

SEE ALSO: Massive internet outage reported: Google services, Cloudflare, Character.AI are all down

And Google Search isn't the only thing on the internet struggling right now. Mashable editors are experiencing service disruptions to Google Meet in particular.

"We are currently investigating a service disruption to some Google Cloud services. Please view our public status dashboard for the latest updates," a Google Cloud spokesperson told Mashable over email. As of this writing, Google's status dashboard reports that "multiple [Google Cloud Platform] products are experiencing Service issues."

This Tweet is currently unavailable. It might be loading or has been removed.

And, on Downdetector, users are also reporting outages with Google Cloud, Discord, Spotify, Amazon Web Services, CharacterAI, Snapchat, Cloudfare, Rocket League, Pokemon TCG, Google Nest, FuboTV, Box, HighLevel, Etsy, Vimeo, OpenAI, Google Drive, Mailchimp, Shopify, UPS, Microsoft Azure, Google Maps, Anthropic, cursor, reCAPtcha, Dialpad, Verizon, YouTube, Gmail, NPM, AT&T, T-Mobile, Gemini, Twitch, Pokemon GO, Dragon Ball, Phasmophobia, DoorDash, and more.

So, basically, the entire internet is having issues.

SEE ALSO: Much of the internet is down and social media is not taking it well

This is a developing story.

USB-C is one of the greatest additions to modern computers. We’ve gone for 10 cables that might do 5 jobs to 1 that can do at least 10. However, not every PC comes with a USB-C port, or if it does, it may be a little older. Here’s how I added an extra USB-C port to my PC.

SAVE 20%: Through Aug. 10, you can slash 20% off a Ninja Thirsti Max bundle and Dirty Soda pack when you use the code JEN20, DEMI20, TAYLOR20, or MAYCI20 at Ninja Kitchen's website. Add the Ninja Thirsti Max bundle and your choice of Dirty Soda pack to your cart to redeem the codes.

Opens in a new window Credit: Ninja Ninja Thirsti Max bundle + Dirty Soda flavor pack Get 20% off with codes JEN20, DEMI20, TAYLOR20, or MAYCI20 Get Deal

Dirty soda — aka soda spiked with cream and flavored syrup — is a TikTok favorite, thanks greatly in part to MomTok creators Taylor Frankie Paul, Jen Affleck, Demi Engemann, and Mayci Neeley. So, Ninja decided to tap into the viral drink trend by joining forces with the beloved Utah-based influencers to create four hand-crafted Dirty Soda bundles for fans.

No need to head to a drive-thru. Ninja's collab with the MomTok ladies makes it easy for fans to craft the unique drinks at home at the touch of a button using the Ninja Thirsti. And for a limited time, you can get the drink maker and exclusive Dirty Soda packs for 20% off.

Through Aug. 10, shoppers and MomTok fans can save 20% when purchasing the Ninja Thirsti Max bundle and a Dirty Soda pack at the Ninja Kitchen website with the code JEN20, DEMI20, TAYLOR20, or MAYCI20. That knocks the cost of the Ninja Thirsti Max drink system bundle down to $143.99 from $179.99 and the Dirty Soda pack of your choice down to $16.78 from $20.97 — a grand total of $160.77.

In order to redeem the discount, you'll first need to add the Build Your Own Ninja Thirsti Max bundle to your cart. Then choose one of the Dirty Soda packs and add it to your cart. When you're ready to check out, enter the code of the MomTok creator that matches your Dirty Soda pack — JEN20, DEMI20, TAYLOR20, or MAYCI20 — and hit "apply." The price should go from $200.96 to just $160.77.

One of our favorite Ninja appliances, we're big fans of the Ninja Thirsti. Mashable Sam Mangino calls it "a fantastic carbonated drink maker, best for the flavored water devotee."

I think we all have days when we have little to no free time, but still want to game. I know I often find myself in the unfortunate situation of wanting to play, but not having the time to commit to some of my favorites.

If you have an older car or stereo head unit and wish you had wireless Android Auto, we have a deal for you. While many newer cars support wired Android Auto, or you upgraded your stereo and have it, only newer options have wireless Android Auto. The easiest way to solve that problem is with a wireless adapter, and right now the Motorola MA1 is over 50% off at Best Buy.

More and more people are activating dark mode on their devices, especially on apps like Excel that display a lot of white elements. If your eyes are sensitive to light, you spend a lot of time in Excel, or you're working at night, switching to dark mode can help reduce your visual discomfort.

One of the biggest problems with electric vehicle ownership is long charging times. Few people want to sit around for an hour or more to be able to drive their car. However, a global push and huge investment in EVs has forced improvements in battery technology and charging speeds. Now, many cars can charge up to 80% in 25 minutes or less. These ten electric cars prove that owning one doesn't need to be an inconvenience. In fact, one charges faster than filling a tank with fuel.

Picking up a new hobby or skill can involve a lot of effort and time, but it doesn't necessarily mean your wallet needs to take a huge hit. Free or cheap resources are easily accessible, be it YouTube videos, websites, or apps that you can download for free.

TL;DR: Upgrade your PC for just A$23 with this Microsoft Windows 11 Pro lifetime license, on sale through 20 July.

Opens in a new window Credit: Windows Microsoft Windows 11 Pro AU$23
AU$307 Save AU$284 Get Deal

Do you have an old computer that could use a refresh? Upgrade its operating system and give it new life with a lifetime license to Windows 11 Pro, now just A$23 (reg. A$307) through 20 July.

If you’ve got an older device lying around, you don’t need to shell out hundreds of dollars for a brand-new laptop. Just give it a new lease on life with a Windows 11 Pro upgrade. This new operating system is filled with features that can help you tackle both work and play.

What’s new in Windows 11 Pro?

Microsoft Windows 11 Pro was created with modern professionals in mind, but you don’t have to be tackling work to appreciate the new features. It offers a seamless interface that’s easy to navigate, snap layouts, improved voice typing, and a more powerful search experience everyone can benefit from.

We should all be taking our cybersecurity more seriously, and Windows 11 Pro offers advanced security measures like a biometric login, encrypted authentication, and advanced antivirus defenses to beef up your protection.

Need to get work done? Windows 11 Pro includes Microsoft Teams, and also offers some unique professional features. Azure AD lets you manage logins and permissions for employees, while Hyper-V makes it possible to create and run virtual machines to test things. You’ll also get Windows Sandbox, a way to test files safely without risking your computer.

If you’d like to ditch the mouse and keyboard, Microsoft Windows 11 Pro gives you the option to go touchscreen. And it also puts Copilot, Microsoft’s AI-powered assistant, right on your desktop.

Once you tackle all your responsibilities, it’s time to start gaming. Windows 11 Pro includes DirectX 12 Ultimate, with graphics that make you feel like you’re right there in the game.

Note: You’ll need 4GB RAM and 40GB of hard drive space to run Windows 11 Pro, and if you’re running Windows 11 but can’t install upgrades via Windows Update, you won’t be able to install this version either.

Elevate your PC experience with this lifetime license to Microsoft Windows 11 Pro, now just A$23 (reg. A$307) through 20 July.

StackSocial prices subject to change.

Picasso? Don't know him. Rolex? Don't care. The hottest item on the collectibles market right now is a mischievous, sharp-toothed, gremlin-like little girl named Labubu. And yes, someone just paid $150,000 for one.

That’s not a typo. As reported by CNN, at a recent auction in Beijing, a mint green, first-generation Labubu figure measuring a whopping 131 centimeters tall (that’s over four feet!) sold for 1.08 million yuan, or about $150,325.

Let’s pause for effect: $150K. For a toy figure with a devilish grin and bunny ears. If you weren't convinced by now, Labubu is an icon, a legend — and she is the moment.

SEE ALSO: The cult and community of Labubu What makes this $150K Labubu so special?

This wasn’t your everyday Labubu plush keychain from Pop Mart (which typically retails anywhere from $27.99 to $39.99). This Labubu figure was the only one of its kind, auctioned at the prestigious Yongle International Auction House, which normally deals in fine jewelry and modern art. So when the auctioneer banged the gavel and congratulated the anonymous online bidder, it wasn’t just a win; it was a moment in collectible toy history.

The minty mischief-maker stood tall like a playful art statue, and it wasn’t alone. The auction featured 48 rare Labubus, including a 160 cm brown version that went for a cool $114,000. Only 15 of those exist, but even that couldn’t top the green figure's jaw-dropping price tag.

So, why are people paying Range Rover money for a Labubu?

Thank the global Labubu craze.

Created by Hong Kong illustrator Kasing Lung and mass-produced by Chinese toy powerhouse Pop Mart, Labubu isn’t your average cuddle toy. It’s part art, part misfit charm, part collector goldmine. Think of it as the lovechild of a Nordic folklore creature and a TikTok star, with a resale value much higher than its price tag. It's not uncommon for people to pay double or triple retail price for a Labubu keychain, and limited-edition drops and collabs can go for hundreds of dollars on sites like StockX.

Toothy, trendy, and now worth $150K. Credit: VCG/VCG via Getty Images

The demand is there. Pop Mart stores regularly see long lines and sold-out releases for Labubu drops. Blind boxes, where you don’t know which character you’re getting, are snapped up instantly, and $28 toys are being flipped online for over $270. Labubu isn’t just trending — she's a pop culture phenomenon.

Celebrities like BLACKPINK's Lisa, Rihanna, Dua Lipa, and even basketball star Dillon Brooks have sported Labubus clipped to their handbags and belt loops. Labubu is fashion's most playful accessory, a toothy vehicle for self-expression and the ultimate symbol of consumer culture.

As Mashable previously reported, business is booming for Pop Mart. "Labubu is currently Pop Mart's top-selling IP in the U.S. and one of the strongest globally," Emily Brough, Pop Mart's head of IP licensing for the Americas, told Mashable. In 2024 alone, Labubu generated more than $419 million, outperforming all other IPs in the company’s catalog. And the company's revenue in China alone topped $1.09 billion, up 34 percent from the previous year, reports CNN. Globally, Pop Mart profits shot up 125 percent, driven largely by Labubu-mania.