☕️ ISIS-linked families to arrive in Australia

And happy World Password Day. The most common password in the world?

123456

Now if you’ll excuse me, I have to go remember my first pet’s favourite toy’s name.

P.S. It was Monkey. We loved it.

P.S.S. ^I think that’s exactly what you’re not meant to do on World Password Day.

The quote: “There is absolutely no place in our school system for works authored by someone who has admitted to such serious crimes”. WA Education Minister Sabine Winton in an emailed statement to TDA confirming Craig Silvey’s books will be permanently banned from schools in the state after the WA-based author pleaded guilty to possessing and distributing child exploitation material this week.

The stat: 75%. The percentage of Australians who believe it is good for society to be made up of different cultures, according to a 2025 Australian Bureau of Statistics survey. The result is down from 85% in 2020.

The big question:

Yesterday’s results: 66% of you told TDA that you always see the same GP. 19% of you said “no” while 15% of you said “only sometimes”. Thanks for voting - your responses inform TDA's journalism and research. [2,180 votes].

2 in 3 Australian kids have little or no access to music education

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Italy’s Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni has condemned an AI-generated deepfake image of herself as a deliberate political attack.

The fake image showed her posed in bed in lingerie. It was one of several manipulated images shared across social media in recent weeks in an attempt to publicly shame her.

Meloni reshared the image herself, labelling it as fake, and encouraging users to “think before sharing”.

Here’s what you need to know.

Deepfakes are realistic fabricated or manipulated videos and/or images designed to mislead viewers, often created using AI.

A 2023 study from online privacy group Security Hero estimated 98% of deepfake content online is sexually explicit, with 99% of victims being women.

Women in politics are also disproportionately targeted, with pornographic deepfakes often created to discredit female politicians.

In recent weeks, sexually explicit AI-generated images of Meloni began circulating online.

One image showed her posed in bed in lingerie. The post, shared by a social media user, claimed she should be “ashamed” of herself.

Meloni reshared the image on X:

In a statement, she said: “Several fake photos of me have been circulating these days, generated with artificial intelligence and passed off as real by some eager opponents.

I must admit that whoever created them, at least in the case attached, has also improved me considerably. But the fact remains that, in order to attack and invent falsehoods, people are using anything and everything these days.

The point, however, goes beyond me. Deepfakes are a dangerous tool because they can deceive, manipulate, and harm anyone. I can defend myself. Many others cannot.

This is why one rule should always apply: verify before believing, and believe before sharing. Because today it happens to me, tomorrow it could happen to anyone.”

Reporting by Elliot Lawry.

🎧 On today’s TDA podcast, Zara explains how the AFL is responding to a club that allowed a team member to play during a mental health episode.

🎬 How did Australia lose the rights to Bluey? Read TDA Culture at 5pm today to learn more.

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The Australian Federal Police is preparing to arrest family members of jailed or dead ISIS fighters as they return to Australia.

On Wednesday, the Government confirmed that a group of Australian women who married ISIS fighters, and their children, are landing today. The group has been held in camps in Syria for seven years.

Earlier this year, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said: “We have a very firm view that we won’t be providing assistance or repatriation”.

Australia listed ISIS (also known as IS or Daesh) as a terrorist organisation in 2005.

The group occupied one-third of Syria from 2014 to 2017, forming a ‘Caliphate’ governed under a fundamentalist interpretation of Islamic law.

The Australian National Imams Council (ANIC) says ISIS “does not represent Islam or the Muslim world in any way”.

ISIS lost all of its territory by 2019, and many of its fighters and their families were placed in detention camps across Syria, Libya, and Iraq. This included dozens of Australian citizens.

In 2022, the Federal Government assisted four Australian women, dubbed ‘ISIS brides’, and their 13 children from a Syrian camp.

At least 34 Australians remained in the camps, the majority of whom were children.

In 2023, Save the Children Australia (STCA) unsuccessfully took the Government to court in a bid to force the repatriation of the women and children. The court ruled Australia had no legal obligation to assist because it did not control the circumstances of their detention.

In February, multiple media outlets reported the group had made an attempt to return to Australia.

Around 50km into their journey from Al-Roj, a detention camp in north-east Syria, the group was told to go back.

The Sydney Morning Herald spoke with a camp official, who said the group’s departure to the capital, Damascus, had been “postponed”.

The unsuccessful attempt was put down to Syrian Government permissions.

The Federal Government and STCA confirmed to the Herald they were not involved with the attempted return.

At a press conference on Wednesday, authorities confirmed part of the group is expected to return to Australia this week.

AFP Commissioner Krissy Barrett said some of the returning women will be arrested and charged, while others remain under investigation.

Potential charges include terrorism offences and crimes against humanity, including allegations of slave trading.

Police have not yet revealed how many people will be charged.

The children will undergo community integration programs, receive mental health support, and be enrolled in programs countering violent extremism.

One person in the group has an active exclusion order against them, prohibiting their return to Australia.

Home Affairs Minister Tony Burke said the lack of Government support for the group reflects “the decisions that they made”.

“These individuals travelled to join one of the most horrific terrorist organisations we’ve seen in recent history,” he said.

Shadow Home Affairs Minister Jonno Duniam called on the Government to “stop them before they get here”.

“Labor is rolling out the welcome mat by providing passports and not applying the temporary exclusion orders at their disposal,” Duniam said.

He accused the Government of “putting our community safety at risk”.

Reporting by Achol Arok.

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The lost copy of Caedmon’s Hymn, which was written by a British farmer over 1,300 years ago, was found hidden in a library in Rome. Dating from between 800 and 830, it is the third oldest surviving copy of the poem and the only version where Old English – the form of English used in the early Middle Ages – appears in the main body of the text. Trinity College Medievalist Dr Mark Faulkner said: “As the oldest known poem in Old English [the work] is today celebrated as the beginning of English literature.”

Reporting by Emma Gillespie.

PSA: Hold on to your Diet Cokes.

India is throwing Diet Coke parties as the US-Iran war disrupts supplies of the drink. A venue in New Delhi is hosting one on 9 May, complete with Diet Coke cocktails, music and craft-style activities.

Organisers said: “In light of the great Diet Coke shortage of 2026… We’re turning our space into a full-blown Diet Coke experience built for people who just get it”.

Guests can even customise their drinks with jalapenos and honey.

Australia has never responded this creatively to a wartime shortage. Fuel party anyone?

Reporting by Pavitra Ravi.