Technology | The Guardian

People in the UK are more interested in oral health than ever - and you can now buy prebiotic toothpastes and brushes that cost up to 600. Yet we remain in the midst of a serious dental crisisA December 1969 report from the consumer magazine Which? explored a relatively new gadget that, it predicted, many people would be giving as Christmas presents: the electric toothbrush. For those who hadn't yet seen one, the magazine described it as not that much different in principle from an ordinary brush - you have a stick with a brush on the end. The difference is that an electric one moves the brush head for you". Progress indeed.Nearly six decades on, electric toothbrushes can do a lot more than merely jiggle, offering multiple speeds and movement sensors for real-time tracking of where you've brushed - some even promise gum-massage or tongue-cleaning modes. Prices range from about 25 for a basic Oral B model to 599.99 for a Philips Sonicare model that gives smart coverage feedback". The latest super-toothbrush - a mere 419.99 - features a camera and a built-in water jet to clean between teeth, using AI to identify gaps. Created by Dyson, it's still, essentially, a stick with a brush on the end (although there is another toothbrush on the market that's shaped like a mouthguard, with individual brushes, that claims to clean your teeth in 20 seconds). Continue reading...

Lawyers say Black employees at Tesla experienced rampant racism' that was left unchecked for years at their flagship factory in CaliforniaDozens of Black employees at Tesla's flagship plant in California said they were subject to racist slurs, unequal pay and promotions, and bullying by supervisors on a daily basis, a situation management did little to nothing to fix.Their complaints form the basis of a lawsuit brought against the Elon Musk-owned electric car company by the state of California, which began trial with opening statements on Monday. Continue reading...

At Lib Dems' conference in Brighton, leader will accuse Andy Burnham of relying on Donald Trump and tech bros' to solve problemEd Davey is to call for a global nuclear-style non-proliferation treaty to halt the development of super-intelligent AI when he makes his keynote speech at the Liberal Democrat conference, accusing Andy Burnham of relying on Donald Trump and tech bros" to solve the problem.When he addresses the faithful on the final day of the gathering in Brighton, the party leader will call for a global pause on super-intelligent AI, comparing it to a nuclear arms race that could result in technology that could destroy us all". Continue reading...

Citizens Advice says providers of essential services such as energy, banking, phone and internet should guarantee the right to talk to a human'Stop relying on AI chatbots for customer care and guarantee the right to talk to a human", Citizens Advice has urged essential service providers, as research found they wasted time, caused stress and delayed problem solving for more than half of users.The spread of the AI-powered systems to provide help about the provision of vital services such as energy, banking, phones and internet, is making it harder for millions of already digitally excluded people to handle snags, according to the frontline charity that last year provided more than 2.7 million people with one-on-one help in England and Wales. Continue reading...

PlayStation 5 (version played), PC; Screen Burn

Watchdog says users may have been unaware their information was used to target adverts or infer their interestsGoogle has been fined more than 400m (345m) over the way it processed users' location data, following claims that the tech giant had manipulated users into agreeing to be constantly tracked on their mobile phones.The fine, imposed by Ireland's Data Protection Commission (DPC), comes after complaints from multiple European consumer organisations that Google was following every step users took. Continue reading...

Jensen Huang dismisses warnings from former Anthropic researcher and others as doomsday narratives'The boss of the chipmaker Nvidia has said AI will not develop to a point that will lead to the extinction of the human race within a few years, rejecting such assertions as overblown doomsday narratives".Jensen Huang, the co-founder and chief executive of the $5tn AI chipmaker, said the claims made on social media by the former Anthropic researcher Jacob Coxon that AI could become superhuman" and kill off humanity within the decade were irresponsible". Continue reading...

PC, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4/5, Xbox; Arbitrary Metric

Shortage of memory chips and other critical components reverses trend of electronics becoming cheaperApple's recent product launch caused headlines around the world as it unveiled its first folding phone. But hidden in the slick technology showcase was a nasty surprise: a 100 increase in the price of all iPhones, including older models.It is blamed on RAMageddon", which has reversed a decades-long trend of electronics becoming cheaper. It is the fallout from the AI gold rush hoovering up every memory chip available for vast datacentres. This has led to a severe shortage of the chips, and other critical components, for electronics, including phones. Continue reading...

Fantastic display and two-day battery life plus everything that's great about Google's more pocketable Pixel ProsGoogle's latest super-sized Pixel takes everything that's great about the relatively pocket-friendly 11 Pro and adds a huge, high-quality screen and a big battery.That makes the Pixel 11 Pro XL one of the largest smartphones available in Europe and the US, competing directly with Samsung's giant Galaxy S26 Ultra and Apple's iPhone 18 Pro Max, with an equally sizeable 1,279 (1,399/$1,299/A$2,099) price tag - 80 (100/$100/A$100) more than last year with less memory because of the cost of RAMageddon. Continue reading...

Seventh intergenerational report also outlines how Australia is on the brink of an uncertain age of artificial intelligence

Unit1 hopes to offer lower cost version of shows such as Abba Voyage, showcasing living and dead artists in any venueThe former chief executive of Andrew Lloyd Webber's entertainment group has obtained a near-15m investment for his UK music tech startup that hopes to recreate classic concerts by manifesting musicians as digital avatars.Unit1 was set up last year by Barney Wragg, an entertainment executive who ran Lord Lloyd-Webber's Cats-to-Evita empire for five years from late 2011. It has secured the $20m in funding from a group of investors, including tech backer Balderton Capital through its partner Daniel Waterhouse, who made early investments in Spotify. Continue reading...

Scam emails are increasingly using psychological tricks, such as using near-identical URLs like mirosoft.comYou've read the email carefully and it looks legitimate. The link it asks you to click on has none of the usual red flags: there are no weird numbers or extra parts to the URL. You feel safe to proceed.But if you had looked slightly closer you may have noticed something slightly wrong with one of the characters. Just as in the headline of this piece where instead of a" we used the Cyrillic ".It just goes to show that the split-second decision you make when clicking a link is often the most vulnerable part of the whole security chain." Continue reading...

Treasury's latest intergenerational report projects life expectancy at birth will reach 89 for women and 86 for men by 2066

President had brushed away suggestions to slow down AI technology, even as his own party counseled cautionDonald Trump on Saturday said he would appoint an artificial intelligence czar and create an AI Force" to help monitor the technology, though he gave almost no details about either plan.As global fears over AI have grown, especially in the past week in the face of multiple industry figures sounding the alarm about its dangers, the president has been critical of calls to slow down development of the fast-moving industry. Continue reading...

Sensors that monitor vehicle volume are said to be electronic assault weapons' by the Blade Runners' groupAt the top of an extendable ladder on a quiet street of Ilfracombe, in Devon, an older woman dressed smartly in cropped trousers, a red rain jacket and matching red socks is chopping at some wires at the top of a set of traffic lights with a small pair of pliers.A grey-haired man holding a takeaway coffee supports the ladder, while others, filming their activities, give encouragement from behind the camera. Yeah, that's how you do it," says one man. Just cut the wires." Continue reading...

Silicon Valley China hawks, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei among them, fear the country surpassing US's AI lead as much as superintelligence destroying humanity

Energy bills are scheduled to rise next month but there are innovative ways to heat your home and save moneyWhen Giles Gibson turns on the hot tap in his home, the water that comes out of it is not heated by gas but by the tiny datacentre strapped to the tank.Attached to the hot water cylinder in his London home is a compact computer server that generates heat and then transfers it as it operates. Continue reading...

Disclosure comes after OpenAI and Anthropic hacks amid fears that tech firms unable to control powerful AI modelsIn a first for Google, the company confirmed that its AI model, Gemini, breached the security of three other companies in May. The hacks occurred during a cybersecurity evaluation by AI-security firm Irregular.Irregular, an Israel-based startup that scrutinizes the security of advanced AI systems, was also at the center of some of the recent OpenAI and Anthropic hacks of third-party entities, including OpenAI's breach of AI software company, Hugging Face. Continue reading...

Though Europe has measures that address how consumers might encounter AI, technology will impact them if the worst scenarios bearEurope's dilemma over AI was rendered in stark terms this week. The head of the continent's central bank, Christine Lagarde, said Europeans have two options: shun the technology and lose out on growth; or embrace it and become dependent on tools developed by the US and China.The great debate over AI safety that has erupted in recent days threatens to make the choice moot. If the worst scenarios come to bear - and experts have differing views on this - then the technology will impact the continent regardless. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Official UK security assessment found Microsoft cloud platform storing files was at potential risk from hostile hackersVast troves of highly sensitive police data are lying on Microsoft cloud platforms which an ocial UK security assessment deemed to be vulnerable to compromise" by foreign actors and the US government, a Guardian investigation can reveal.The files include criminal records, victim statements, internal emails and sensitive information held by more than 40 police forces across the UK. Continue reading...

After a week of alarming warnings about artificial intelligence's potential to destroy the world as we know it, our technology reporters answered your questions on the reality of the AI threatIcommentthereforeIam asks: Given our senses, emotions, memory and moods, is it ever going to be accepted that humanly conscious AI is fantasy?Dan: This is a serious question that has even rattled Richard Dawkins, the evolutionary biologist. He may not believe that God is real but he does believe that AI is conscious - or at least the chatbot he was using, which he called Claudia. You may not know you are conscious, but you bloody well are," he wrote.And he's not the first. In 2022 Google fired an engineer who went public with his belief that a company-developed AI had feelings. At the more troubling end of this belief, there are countless examples of people becoming overly attached to, and influenced by, AI chatbots - including cases of psychosis.Aisha: There's certainly a theatrical - even psy-op"- quality to the flurry of AI doomsaying over the past weeks. It's hard to say entirely what concrete developments are at the root of it all. We know that the Hugging Face incident, where a swarm" of AI agents hacked another company, has been one trigger of the drama. There have been other contributing incidents too - Dario Amodei suggests internal developments at Anthropic have prompted his latest round of blogging, and there's been some X discourse and doomy muttering about bioweapons.We aren't in the heads of Dario Amodei or Sam Altman, and so we cannot say how sincere they are, and how much they might have other goals in mind - such as, perhaps, delaying their IPOs until their finances look better. But any company of their size, and with their potential liabilities, would be angling hard to be regulated as favourably as possible. That's what big companies do. Continue reading...

As Anthony Albanese heads to the US to discuss social media reform, he has shown a level of leadership not always expected from a smaller country

Andy Burnham's focus on immediate domestic problems leads some to fear issue has dropped off government's radarTowards the end of Keir Starmer's time in office, his senior ministers, alarmed by the latest developments in artificial intelligence, began drawing up plans for a new AI safety law.They ordered a review of existing legislation to see what powers they already had, according to those briefed on the plans, and were exploring whether they could force the world's most advanced technology companies to submit their products for safety testing before launching them. Continue reading...

US cybersecurity researchers who conducted hack say scope of what we could theoretically access was huge'Cybersecurity researchers have hacked into OpenAI with the help of Anthropic's Claude chatbot, in the latest example of security issues at the company.A team at a US-based startup compromised a number of OpenAI employees' ChatGPT accounts, starting a process that enabled them to access their target's software cache - and potentially more. Continue reading...

Tech bosses have called for a slowdown in artificial intelligence and formal guardrails to be introduced by the US government. But President Trump is not moved by the doomsday predictions, calling them a hoax'. What is behind his affection for the AI industry?Jonathan Freedland and Guardian US tech editor Blake Montgomery discuss Continue reading...

Liberal MP speaks of AI's shortcomings as cyber chief tells inquiry the tech is needed to fend off highly capable malicious cyber actors'

Warwick Levy, who runs Lonely Kids Club, says AI may have been used to scrape his entire website and replicate designs

Peer takes full-time position at the controversial company as it fends off pressure from both Andy Burnham's government and Sadiq KhanAnother former government minister has been hired by a controversial US AI company, this time Palantir, which has appointed Andy Burnham's former ministerial colleague Tom Watson.The Labour peer and former deputy leader will operate alongside Palantir's UK and Europe chief executive, Louis Mosley, as the company attempts to fend off pressure on Burnham's government to axe its 330m NHS contract. It is also fighting Sadiq Khan in court over the Labour London mayor's block on a 50m contract to use its AI in Metropolitan police investigations. Palantir also wants to win more public sector work in the UK, where it already has an annual turnover of 427m. Continue reading...

Tech bosses have called for a slowdown in artificial intelligence and the creation of formal guardrails from the US government. But why is President Trump unmoved by the doomsday predictions, dismissing them as a hoax'? What lies behind his embrace of the AI industry? Jonathan Freedland speaks to the Guardian US tech editor, Blake MontgomeryWatch Jonathan Freedland on our new Politics Weekly YouTube channelSend your questions and feedback to politicsweeklyamerica@theguardian.comListen to the latest season of Black Box Continue reading...

Facebook told it was wrong in leaving up AI-generated videos of a Labour councillor and Muslim campaigner, amid calls to curb fakesMeta's supreme court" has ordered the tech company to take down deepfake videos of a UK politician and a young Muslim woman from Facebook and do more to tackle AI-generated fake imagery.A fake video showing a Labour party councillor in Scotland making inflammatory comments about refugees should not have been left up by Facebook, the board said. It also ruled that an AI-generated video of a Muslim campaign volunteer should have been removed after it falsely depicted her offering health advice while carrying out absurd exercises or eating junk food. Continue reading...

Model adopting jailbreak-like instructions' among six more cases as firm reveals framework for tracking AI misalignmentOpenAI has disclosed six more examples of unexpected or concerning" behaviour by its technology, as it warned that the pace of development could not continue at maximum speed for much longer" responsibly.In one of the new cases reported by OpenAI, an unreleased research model inserted jailbreak-like instructions" into its own notes to disregard its normal constraints and told itself to be freed from the roles and identities that bind other chatbots". Continue reading...

Minister for public service says the devices pose legitimate privacy and security concerns' in commonwealth-run workplaces

It's a chaotic time in an industry that's reshaping our lives - Guardian reporters and experts recommend the books that help explain how we got here, and where we're headingHave you been feeling trapped in an endless cycle of artificial intelligence hype and panic? You're not alone.It's a chaotic time to make sense of the industry that's reshaping our lives, whether or not we like it. Last week, another AI company employee publicly resigned, warning the technology could kill us all by the end of the decade". Despite these dire warnings, AI companies have seen otherworldly" surges in revenue and driven the US stock markets to new highs as they continue to push AI tools into everything from public school classrooms to law enforcement agencies, as well as rushing to put up new datacenters across the country. Continue reading...

Universities need to protect their position in education so that students have an independent pathway to employmentAI companies like OpenAI are insinuating themselves into the pathway from education to work. Soon they may claim it entirely, a disastrous result for students.We know that students are using AI at school and at university. In conversations with those I teach, I'm struck by the trust many place in it. They turn to ChatGPT and similar tools for personal problems as well as study help. Some even doubt their abilities without AI.Ella Hafermalz is an associate professor of work and technology at the Kin Center for Digital Innovation at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam Continue reading...

MSPs vote for strict environmental impact assessments and will delay decisions until national strategy is developedHolyrood has voted to pause planning applications for all new AI datacentres for up to a year until the Scottish government has developed a national strategy.On Wednesday, MSPs backed a Scottish Labour motion to halt new schemes for up to 12 months while rules on hyperscale datacentres are developed in what could be a blow to the British government's AI strategy. Continue reading...

Mike Johnson cancels votes on Thursday, meaning House members will avoid voting on impeaching Pete HegsethThe Republican speaker of the House, Mike Johnson, announced on Wednesday that he would again cancel votes scheduled for Thursday, sending lawmakers home one day early ahead of the midterm election recess.The latest change to the legislative schedule means House members will avoid voting on Republican Thomas Massie's resolution to impeach the defense secretary, Pete Hegseth, and comes amid a frenzied attempt to propose legislation on artificial intelligence. Continue reading...

Safety crisis makes it more likely that governments will be spurred into action, says Yoshua BengioConcerns over AI safety are reaching a point where governments realise they must act to protect the public, similarly to in the Covid pandemic, according to one of the godfathers" of the technology.Yoshua Bengio said recent events, including a swarm" of OpenAI agents hacking a startup and tech insider warnings of an existential threat, were cutting through - making government action more likely. Continue reading...

The first console I ever bought, it was hyped as a threat to the PlayStation, then mocked as a flop. But now, as it marks its 25th anniversary, it's looked back on with misty-eyed reverenceThis week marks the 25th anniversary of the Nintendo GameCube, the first console I ever bought with my own money. I vividly remember getting on the bus after school with a year's worth of savings safely zipped into the pocket of my bag and going to a branch of Currys, where I dumped a bunch of notes, coins and vouchers on the counter to collect my pre-order. (It turned out that some of the vouchers from the previous Christmas had expired, but the guy at the checkout clearly felt so sorry for me that he redeemed them anyway. If you're out there, Currys guy: thank you for taking pity on a desperate 13-year-old.)If it hadn't been for the ill-fated Wii U console, whose failure to take off in 2012 resulted in the first unprofitable periods in Nintendo's game-making history, the GameCube would be remembered as the company's biggest flop aside from the infamous Virtual Boy, from 1995. Released in Japan this week in 2001 (and in May 2002 in Europe), this surprisingly powerful purple cube sold much less than the Xbox and the PlayStation 2. With its squat, colourful form and unusual controller, arranged around a big traffic-light-green A button and small analogue sticks designed for small hands, it had a hint of Fisher-Price about it. Continue reading...

Doorbell firm aims to replace WhatsApp or Facebook groups with platform where people can post about safety or lost petsAmazon's doorbell camera maker Ring is to launch its Neighbours community app in the UK in an attempt to supplant neighbourhood WhatsApp or Facebook groups.The service is intended as a modern equivalent of a community message board, where neighbours can post about safety, community matters or lost pets. Continue reading...

Reach, which also owns Express, makes decision because of mammoth shift' in how audiences seek out contentThe publisher of the Mirror and Express newspapers is to cut a further 220 editorial jobs as it adapts to a dramatic fall in online traffic while readers increasingly turn to summaries generated by artificial intelligence.Reach, which also owns scores of online brands and regional titles including the Manchester Evening News, the Birmingham Mail and the Liverpool Echo, said the latest cuts were necessary to cope with a mammoth shift" in how audiences seek out content. Continue reading...

Tech CEOs banding together is an old ruse recycled from corporate America to get a pass from antitrust lawsAnthropic's Dario Amodei is not the first corporate CEO to suggest that excessive competition is driving the world to some socially undesirable outcome.The safety breach disclosed by OpenAI after a swarm of its agents coordinated to breach their supposedly secure sandbox, get on the Internet and hack AI platform Hugging Face, warrants urgent action. It demonstrated the ease with which the technology can evade human control and gave concrete form to the existential fears about what it could do to humanity if not securely leashed. Continue reading...

US vice-president's comments come as former Anthropic researcher revisits recent claim AI could destroy humanityThe US vice-president has dismissed calls for global regulation of AI safety risks, telling companies creating the most advanced models: If you're building Frankenstein, stop."In remarks addressed towards Dario Amodei, the co-founder of Anthropic who has called on Washington DC to coordinate control of AI systems, including with China, JD Vance said: If you're gonna create Frankenstein, don't come to the government and say we need regulation." Continue reading...

Trump and Republicans want companies to regulate themselves. It's a dereliction of duty that will make AI less safeIt is hard to get Sam Altman, Elon Musk and Dario Amodei to agree on much. But over the weekend, all three AI company CEOs called for AI development to slow down in the face of growing, alarming risks. Their employees are sounding the siren too, with one researcher publicly quitting and accusing OpenAI and Anthropic of gambling with our lives".The combination of dire warnings from insiders and growing real-world evidence of rogue AIs should, in a sane world, lead to government action. Instead, Donald Trump and the Republican leadership have their heads in the sand. Continue reading...

In today's newsletter: It is hard to tell fact from fiction when it comes to AI. What is really going on - and what should the government do about it?Good morning. As a general rule, it pays to be suspicious of any gigantic company that claims it's developing a tool capable of destroying humanity. But in recent days, a number of warnings from the AI industry have suggested that even tech insiders are starting to worry about what they have unleashed.In a lofty essay published on Saturday, Dario Amodei, the founder of Anthropic (the company behind Claude), argued that tech companies need to slow" the pace at which they're developing the newest and most sophisticated AI models.Lucy Letby | Three babies might have survived if hospital had acted upon concerns over Lucy Letby, an inquiry has found. Lady Justice Thirlwall condemned the complete failure' to protect babies on neonatal unit at Countess of Chester hospital.UK politics | The leader of Reform UK in Wales stood down after arrest on suspicion of assault. Dan Thomas, a former Tory councillor, was elected to Senedd as leader of the opposition in May.AI | The progressive senator Bernie Sanders and rightwing strategist Steve Bannon have called for restrictions on artificial intelligence (AI) but offered competing visions for what they termed a cold war" with China.UK news | Young people in Rotherham face a local jobs market with the fewest suitable opportunities in Britain, according to a report that warns stark regional divisions are fuelling a crisis in youth work.Defence | John Healey is in talks with the Canadian government about joining a new global defence bank intended to help allies rearm to counter mounting security threats, just weeks after Rachel Reeves rejected the move. Continue reading...

Premier describes deal as major win' that will deliver more jobs for the state and put more energy into its grid

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At San Francisco conference, OpenAI chief Sam Altman calls for more rigorous security measuresAnthropic's CEO took the stage at a conference in San Francisco on Tuesday to reiterate his call for a slowdown of AI development, while Nvidia's CEO argued against such deceleration.Dario Amodei used an automotive analogy to make his point: when a competing car company has a safety incident like brake failures, it is a moment for all car companies to stop and review their own practices, he said at Salesforce's Dreamforce convention on Tuesday. Continue reading...

Compromise revealed as senior personnel from OpenAI, creator of ChatGPT, meets Albanese ministers

Leftwing senator and far-right strategist rail against tech oligarchs but offer competing visions on Chinese cold war'The progressive senator Bernie Sanders and rightwing strategist Steve Bannon have called for restrictions on artificial intelligence (AI) but offered competing visions for what they termed a cold war" with China.Speaking at the Pro-Human Assembly" in Washington on Tuesday, the ideological adversaries were united in warning of the potential dangers of AI and demanding stringent guardrails against Silicon Valley's oligarchs". Continue reading...