ManticAI ranked eighth in the Metaculus Cup, leaving some believing bots' prediction skills could soon overtake expertsAn artificial intelligence system has beaten scores of forecasting enthusiasts, including several professionals, in a contest to predict events ranging from bust-ups between Donald Trump and Elon Musk to Kemi Badenoch being removed from the Conservative party leadership.A British AI startup, co-founded by a former Google DeepMind researcher, has ranked in the top 10 of an international forecasting competition, which requires entrants to forecast the likelihood of 60 events over the summer. Continue reading...

Exclusive: Instagram pictures of girls as young as 13 were posted to promote Threads site as bait', campaigner saysMeta has used back-to-school pictures of schoolgirls to advertise one of its social media platforms to a 37-year-old man, in a move parents described as outrageous" and upsetting".The man noticed that posts encouraging him to get Threads", Mark Zuckerberg's rival to Elon Musk's X, were being dropped into his Instagram feed featuring embedded posts of uniformed girls as young as 13 with their faces visible and, in most cases, their names. Continue reading...

Being a carmaker where everything is connected' has left JLR unable to isolate its plants or functions, forcing a shutdown of most systemsThe first external signs of the chaos about to hit JLR, Britain's largest automotive employer, came on the quiet last Sunday of August. Managers at a factory in Halewood, Merseyside, told industry contacts there might have been a hack - although it was not clear then just how bad the situation was.That changed quickly on the Monday morning. JLR, the maker of the Jaguar and Land Rover brands, quickly shut down systems after realising the severity of the cyber-attack. Three weeks later, the carmaker is still incapacitated, unable to produce at any of its factories across the UK, Slovakia, Brazil and India (although a Chinese joint venture is thought to be operating). Continue reading...

Deal gives Intel a lifeline as firms team up on AI datacenters and PC chips after Trump stake sparks market surgeNvidia, the world's leading chipmaker, has announced plans to invest $5bn in Intel and collaborate with the struggling semiconductor company on products.A month after the Trump administration confirmed it had taken a 10% stake in Intel - the latest extraordinary intervention by the White House in corporate America - Nvidia said it would team up with the firm to work on custom datacenters that form the backbone of artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure, as well as personal computer products. Continue reading...

The band cited a moral and ethical burden' placed on artists by revenue from their work ultimately funding lethal technologiesMassive Attack have become the latest act - and first major-label one - to pull their catalogue from Spotify in protest at founder Daniel Ek investing 600m (520m) in the military AI company Helsing.In June, Ek's venture capital firm Prima Materia led the defence tech firm's latest funding round. Helsing's software uses AI technology to analyse sensor and weapons system data from battlefields to inform real-time military decisions. It also makes its own military drone, the HX-2. Ek is also chairman of Helsing.Unconnected to this initiative and in light of the (reported) significant investments by its CEO in a company producing military munition drones and AI technology integrated into fighter aircraft, Massive Attack have made a separate request to our label that our music be removed from the Spotify streaming service in all territories.In our view, the historic precedent of effective artist action during apartheid South Africa and the apartheid, war crimes and genocide now being committed by the state of Israel renders the No Music for Genocide campaign imperative.In 1991 the scourge of apartheid violence fell from South Africa, aided from a distance by public boycotts, protests, and the withdrawal of work by artists, musicians and actors. Complicity with that state was considered unacceptable. In 2025 the same now applies to the genocidal state of Israel. As of today, there's a musician's equivalent of the recently announced @filmworkers4palestine campaign (signed by 4,500 filmmakers, actors, industry workers & institutions) - it can be found @nomusicforgenocide & supports the wider asks of the growing @bds.movement. We'd appeal to all musicians to transfer their sadness, anger and artistic contributions into a coherent, reasonable & vital action to end the unspeakable hell being visited upon the Palestinians hour after hour. Continue reading...

The phenomenal response to an article we published on this question led to detailed cognitive research - and the findings have implications that go way beyond gamersFive years ago, on the verge of the first Covid lockdown, I wrote an article asking what seemed to be an extremely niche question: why do some people invert their controls when playing 3D games? A majority of players push down on the controller to make their onscreen character look down, and up to make them look up. But there is a sizeable minority who do the opposite, controlling their avatars like a pilot controls a plane, pulling back to go up. For most modern games, this requires going into the settings and reconfiguring the default controls. Why do they still persist?I thought a few hardcore gamers would be interested in the question. Instead, more than one million people read the article, and the ensuing debate caught the attention of Dr Jennifer Corbett (quoted in the original piece) and Dr Jaap Munneke, then based at the Visual Perception and Attention Lab at Brunel University London. Continue reading...

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The clown duo share what makes them laugh, including pop divas, unhinged mobile game ads and Kermit unmasked

More women are entering the US ranching and agriculture field. Their struggles - and aspirations - defy the traditional Marlboro cowboy stereotypeSavanah McCarty was not riding across the wide-open prairie when a horse accident nearly killed her.She was in the driveway of her leased farm outside Bozeman, Montana, waiting for a student's mother to arrive, when her horse seized and flipped over backwards, landing on top of her. Continue reading...

From famous Street Fighter lines to quips from 90s classics, these are the quotes we hear again and again - and even incorporate into our own livesSome snippets of video game dialogue, like classic movie quotes, are immediately recognisable to a swathe of fans. From Street Fighter's hadouken!" to Call of Duty's remember, no Russian" to BioShock's would you kindly?", there are phrases so creepy, clever or cool they have slipped imperceptibly into the gaming lexicon, ensuring that whenever they're memed on social media, almost everyone gets the reference.But there are also odd little phrases, sometimes from obscure games, that stick with us for seemingly no reason. I recall most of the vocal barks from the second world war strategy game Commandos: Behind Enemy Lines, even though I haven't played it for 20 years. Why is it that I'll lose my headphones, wallet and phone on a daily basis, but I have absolute recall when it comes to the utterances of burly soldier Samuel Brooklyn? Why am I doomed to Finally, some action", Consider it done, boss" and the immortal okey dokey" echoing through my head? What is wrong with me? Continue reading...

Comments from Chinese official in Madrid have raised questions over who could control the algorithm that powers Tik Tok's video feedDonald Trump has claimed his administration has reached a deal with China to keep TikTok operating in the US, amid uncertainty over what shape the final agreement will take, with suggestions from the Chinese side that Beijing would retain control of the algorithm that powers the site's video feed.We have a deal on TikTok ... We have a group of very big companies that want to buy it," Trump said on Tuesday, without providing further details. Continue reading...

Kirk's rise to fame was largely bolstered by being extremely online - and it seems the suspect has that in commonHello, and welcome to TechScape. Dara Kerr here, filling in for Blake Montgomery, who promises he'll come back from vacation. Meanwhile, I'm looking at the memes, gaming and internet culture behind the shooting of Charlie Kirk.The bullet that killed conservative activist was inscribed with a message: Notices bulge OwO whats this?" The online world quickly recognized the reference. It's a phrase used in internet culture to troll people in online role-play communities, specifically furries (a subculture that cosplays as anthropomorphic animal characters).How thousands of overworked, underpaid' humans train Google's AI to seem smartLarry Ellison: Oracle co-founder who overtook Musk as world's richest personApple debuts thinner, $999 iPhone Air at awe-dropping' annual product eventHow to Save the Internet by Nick Clegg review - spinning Silicon ValleyThe women in love with AI companions: I vowed to my chatbot that I wouldn't leave him' Continue reading...

Carmaker says it will freeze production until at least 24 September as it continues investigationsJaguar Land Rover has extended its shutdown on car production, as Britain's biggest carmaker grapples with the aftermath of a cyber-attack.JLR said on Tuesday it would freeze production until at least next Wednesday, 24 September, as it continues its investigations into the hack, which first emerged earlier this month. Continue reading...

The knowledge economy' promised cultural and social growth. Instead, we got worsening inequality and division. Artificial intelligence will supercharge itRecently, Palantir - a tech corporation that boasts no fewer than five billionaire executives - announced its Q2 earnings: over a billion dollars generated in a single quarter. Forty-eight per cent growth in its business compared with the same quarter last year, including 93% growth in its US commercial business. These elephantine numbers are maddening - and, in large part, a result of the company fully embracing artificial intelligence (AI).The AI revolution is here and as its proponents remind us daily, it will remake our world, making every company and government agency more efficient and less error-prone while helping us unlock hitherto unheard of advances in science and technology. Not only this, but if we play our cards right, big tech's latest explosion could yield unprecedented economic growth.Dustin Guastella is the director of operations for Teamsters Local 623 in Philadelphia, and a research associate at the Center for Working-Class Politics Continue reading...

When you're done settling for the sludge in the hotel lobby, this portable brewing setup will open the door to perfect coffee anywhereNothing makes me feel more settled than making a cup of coffee in the morning. Without it, my whole day feels slightly off. For years, that was just something I accepted about traveling or camping - there might be coffee, but it wouldn't quite ground me. It would be a compromise. A little off.That's why I've spent the past few years perfecting my travel coffee setup: so I can make rich, comforting, homey coffee anywhere in the world, without trying to wedge an espresso machine into my carry-on. Here are the inexpensive tools that make it possible. Continue reading...

Rachel Reeves says move is a vote of confidence' in British economy as she prepares to open firm's first UK datacentre

Artificial intelligence will replace creativity with something closer to magical wishing. The challenge for future generations will be dealing with the feeling of emptiness that leaves us withIn the German fairytale The Fisherman and His Wife, an old man one day catches a strange fish: a talking flounder. It turns out that an enchanted prince is trapped inside this fish and that it can therefore grant any wish. The man's wife, Ilsebill, is delighted and wishes for increasingly excessive things. She turns their miserable hut into a castle, but that is not enough; eventually she wants to become the pope and, finally, God. This enrages the elements; the sea turns dark and she is transformed back into her original impoverished state. The moral of the story: don't wish for anything you're not entitled to.Several variations of this classic fairytale motif are known. Sometimes, the wishes are not so much excessive or offensive to the divine order of the world, but simply clumsy or contradictory, such as in Charles Perrault's The Ridiculous Wishes. Or, as in WW Jacobs' 1902 horror story The Monkey's Paw, their wishes unintentionally harm someone who is actually much closer to them than the object of their desire. Continue reading...

The cuddly chatbot Grem is designed to learn' your child's personality, while every conversation they have is recorded, then transcribed by a third party. It wasn't long before I wanted this experiment to be over ...I'm going to throw that thing into a river!" my wife says as she comes down the stairs looking frazzled after putting our four-year-old daughter to bed.To be clear, that thing" is not our daughter, Emma*. It's Grem, an AI-powered stuffed alien toy that the musician Claire Boucher, better known as Grimes, helped develop with toy company Curio. Designed for kids aged three and over and built with OpenAI's technology, the toy is supposed to learn" your child's personality and have fun, educational conversations with them. It's advertised as a healthier alternative to screen time and is part of a growing market of AI-powered toys. Continue reading...

In 2020, after spending half his life in the US, Song-Chun Zhu took a one-way ticket to China. Now he might hold the key to who wins the global AI raceBy the time Song-Chun Zhu was six years old, he had encountered death more times than he could count. Or so it felt. This was the early 1970s, the waning years of the Cultural Revolution, and his father ran a village supply store in rural China. There was little to do beyond till the fields and study Mao Zedong at home, and so the shop became a refuge where people could rest, recharge and share tales. Zhu grew up in that shop, absorbing a lifetime's worth of tragedies: a family friend lost in a car crash, a relative from an untreated illness, stories of suicide or starvation. That was really tough," Zhu recalled recently. People were so poor."The young Zhu became obsessed with what people left behind after they died. One day, he came across a book that contained his family genealogy. When he asked the bookkeeper why it included his ancestors' dates of birth and death but nothing about their lives, the man told him matter of factly that they were peasants, so there was nothing worth recording. The answer terrified Zhu. He resolved that his fate would be different. Continue reading...

Tesla shares rose by more than 8% after news of CEO's transactions, a week after he was offered $1tn pay packageElon Musk, the Tesla CEO, has purchased nearly $1bn worth of the electric-vehicle maker's stock, a regulatory filing showed, reinforcing Musk's push for greater control over Tesla.Tesla shares jumped more than 8% in premarket trading on Monday following the news. Continue reading...

Nostalgic tech; autumn garden hacks; and what to wear when it rains Don't get the Filter delivered to your inbox? Sign up hereWhen I was 18, I bought a heavily reduced MiniDisc player. This wasn't even what you could charitably call fashionably late", given the format was already on its last legs, but I loved it, and because nobody else was interested, blank discs were dirt cheap. I have a vague recollection of grabbing packs at Poundland, allowing me to create a glorious self-curated library of cheap music, five years before the birth of Spotify.I'm reminded of this because this week I've published a piece on the Filter about the portable audio technology that killed them: MP3 players. Or digital audio players, to give them their more accurate name, given MP3 playback is just one of many supported file formats.The best beauty Advent calendars in 2025, tested (yes, we know it's early!)The finishing touch: great buys for under 100 to lift your living space, chosen by interiors expertsIt's better than plastic and cheaper': 20 sustainable swaps that worked (and saved you money)How to get your garden ready for autumn: 17 expert tips you can do now - and what to skipThe crunch? Spot on': the best supermarket gherkins, tasted and ratedWhat to take to university - and what to leave behind, according to studentsHow to decorate your university room: 16 easy, affordable ways to make it feel like home Continue reading...

iPhone upgrade joined by watchOS 26, iPadOS 26 and macOS 26 Tahoe, adding a new look and features to devicesApple will release some of the biggest software updates for its iPhone, iPad and smartwatch on Monday, radically changing the way icons, the lock screen and the system looks, as well as adding features for compatible devices.Announced at the company's developer conference in June, iOS 26, iPadOS 26, watchOS 26 and macOS 26 Tahoe introduce Apple's new Liquid Glass design, giving everything a softer, more rounded and semi-transparent look that has proved divisive. Continue reading...

Met forced to rebut misinformation amplified by X users as Musk accused of inciting violence with protest commentsThe Metropolitan police has had to counter false suggestions by the artificial intelligence on Elon Musk's X platform that the force passed off footage from 2020 as being from Saturday's far-right rally in the city.The claim by the chatbot Grok was in answer to an X user's query about where and when footage of police clashing with crowds was filmed. Continue reading...

The ubiquitous AI tool has a divisive effect on educators with some seeing it a boon and others a menace. So what should you know about where to draw the line between check and cheat?For many students, ChatGPT has become as standard a tool as a notebook or a calculator.Whether it's tidying up grammar, organising revision notes, or generating flashcards, AI is fast becoming a go-to companion in university life. But as campuses scramble to keep pace with the technology, a line is being quietly drawn. Using it to understand? Fine. Using it to write your assignments? Not allowed. Continue reading...

Research suggests increase in office snooping in trend that some managers claim undermines trust with staff

From avoiding recycling a password, even part of it, to two-step verification, steps to closing an open door for hackersThe first you know about it is when you find out someone has accessed one of your accounts. You've been careful with your details so you can't work out what has gone wrong, but you have made one mistake - recycling part of your password.Reusing the same word in a password - even if it is altered to include numbers or symbols - gives criminals a way in to your accounts. Continue reading...

US-based tech boss was addressing the unite the kingdom' protest organised by Tommy Robinson via video linkElon Musk has called for a dissolution of parliament" and a change of government" in the UK while addressing a crowd attending a unite the kingdom" rally in London, organised by the far-right activist Stephen Yaxley-Lennon, known as Tommy Robinson.Musk, the owner of X, who dialled in via a video link and spoke to Robinson while thousands watched and listened, also railed against the woke mind virus" and told the crowd that violence is coming" and that you either fight back or you die". Continue reading...

Quantum sensing, satellite tracking and AI are part of an accelerating arms race in detection that should prompt a re-evaluation of Australia's defence strategy

Artificial intelligence is changing how students learn and the world they'll graduate into. Experts reveal how applicants can get aheadOpenAI CEO Sam Altman recently told a US podcast that if he was graduating today, I would feel like the luckiest kid in all of history."Altman, whose company developed and released ChatGPT in November 2022, believes the transformative power of AI offers unprecedented opportunities for young people. Continue reading...

Phil Bellamy's daughters refuse to ride in his electric car without travel sickness tablets. Are there other solutions?It was a year in to driving his daughter to school in his new electric vehicle that Phil Bellamy discovered she dreaded the 10-minute daily ride - it made her feel sick in a way no other car did.As the driver, Bellamy had no problems with the car but his teenage daughters struggled with sickness every time they entered the vehicle. Research has shown this is an issue - people who did not usually have motion sickness in a conventional car found that they did in EVs. Continue reading...

Exclusive: A third of those polled do not tell bosses about use of tools and half think AI threatens the social structureIt is the work shortcut that dare not speak its name. A third of people do not tell their bosses about their use of AI tools amid fears their ability will be questioned if they do.Research for the Guardian has revealed that only 13% of UK adults openly discuss their use of AI with senior staff at work and close to half think of it as a tool to help people who are not very good at their jobs to get by. Continue reading...

With research suggesting fewer than half of adults carry a wallet, four people reveal if they still do and what's insideFewer than half of British adults now carry a physical wallet, according to recent research, with many carrying payment cards on their phones or smartwatches instead.But while digital wallets such as Apple Pay or Google Pay are the default payment method among generation Z and millennials, many people over the age of 44 still rely on physical debit and credit cards. Continue reading...

A country plagued by power cuts has become the first to ban imports of petrol and diesel cars, as a new dam brings hopes of cheap green energyWhen Deghareg Bekele, an architect in his early 30s, bought an Volkswagen electric car this year, he was a little sceptical. Not only is his home town, the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa, prone to persistent power cuts, he also doubted the quality of his new vehicle.Four months on, Deghareg is pleased with his purchase since he no longer has to endure long lines at the petrol pump, caused by Ethiopia's chronic fuel shortages. Continue reading...

Ditch the subscriptions and algorithms of the music streamers with our pick of the best modern digital audio players DJ Paulette, Carl Craig and more on the best DJ headphonesAn MP3 player? In 2025? Am I going to be covering Betamax and MiniDisc players next?No, this isn't a retro piece from the Filter. You may be reading this at least three years after Apple decided the iPod business was too niche to be worth bothering with, but MP3 players - or digital audio players, as they should more accurately be called - are seeing a small resurgence, despite the domination of Spotify, Apple Music and the like.Best MP3 player overall:

Tycoon who briefly surpassed Elon Musk is a friend of Trump, owner of Hawaiian island and father of man who took over CBSLarry Ellison, co-founder of the software company Oracle, is having a good year. His friend Donald Trump is in the White House, his son David Ellison has taken over the storied media company CBS, and on Wednesday he surpassed his buddy Elon Musk to win the title of the world's richest man".Oracle's stock went wild with the news, pushing his fortune even higher. Ellison's net worth shot up to $393bn, surpassing Musk's $384bn - although, by the time markets closed on Wednesday, Musk was back ahead. Continue reading...

After a lacklustre response to the 2025 edition, the game has gone all out to engage players and respond to user feedbackIn an open office space somewhere inside the vast Electronic Arts campus in Vancouver, dozens of people are gathered around multiple monitors playing EA Sports FC 26. Around them, as well as rows of football shirts from leagues all over the world, are PCs and monitors with staff watching feeds of the matches. The people playing are from EA's Design Council, a group of pro players, influencers and fans who regularly come in to play new builds, ask questions and make suggestions. These councils have been running for years, but for this third addition to the EA Sports FC series, the successor to EA's Fifa games, their input is apparently being treated more seriously than ever.The message to journalists, invited here to get a sneak look at the game, is that a lacklustre response to EA Sports FC 25 has meant that addressing user feedback is the main focus. EA has set up a new Player Feedback Portal, as well as a dedicated Discord channel, for fans to put forward their concerns. The developer has also introduced AI-powered social listening tools to monitor EA Sports FC chatter across various platforms including X, Instagram and YouTube. Continue reading...

Oracle co-founder's shares rose by 40% in early trading, valuing his fortune at $393bn, just ahead of Musk's $384bnUS tech billionaire Larry Ellison is neck-and-neck with Elon Musk in the contest to be the world's richest person after briefly overtaking the Tesla chief executive on WednesdayEllison's wealth surged after Oracle, the business software company in which he owns a stake of 41%, reported better than expected financial results. Continue reading...

Social media platform accused of failing to filter out obvious usernames such as coke', weed' and molly'Snapchat has been accused by a Danish research organisation of leaving an overwhelming number" of drug dealers to openly operate on Snapchat, making it easy for children to buy substances including cocaine, opioids and MDMA.The social media platform has said it proactively uses technology to filter out profiles selling drugs. However, research by Digitalt Ansvar (Digital Accountability), a Danish research organisation that promotes responsible digital development, has found evidence of a failure to moderate drug-related language in usernames. It also accused Snapchat of failing to respond adequately to reports of profiles openly selling drugs. Continue reading...

A few inexpensive upgrades can totally reinvigorate your old iPhone, and you can get even get the iPhone 17's best feature completely free

PC, PS5, Xbox, Switch 2; Bloober Team

In this week's newsletter: the long-awaited release from the three-person Team Cherry studio has crashed gaming storefronts and put indie developers back in the spotlightJust one game has been dominating the gaming conversation over the past week: Hollow Knight Silksong, an eerie, atmospheric action game from a small developer in Australia called Team Cherry. It was finally released last Thursday after many years in development, and everybody is loving it. Hollow Knight was so popular that it crashed multiple gaming storefronts. With continual game cancellations, expensive failures and layoffs at bigger studios, this is the kind of indie triumph the industry loves to celebrate at the moment. But Silksong hasn't come out of nowhere, and its success would not be easily reproducible for any other game, indie or not.If you're wondering what this game actually is, then imagine a dark, mostly underground labyrinth of bug nests and abandoned caverns that gradually yields its secrets to a determined player. The art style and sound are minimalist and creepy (though not scary) in a Tim Burton kind of way, the enemy bugs are fierce and hard to defeat, your player character is another bug with a small, sharp needle-like blade. It blends elements of Metroid, Dark Souls and older challenging platform games, and the unique aesthetic and perfect precision of the controls are what make it stand out from a swarm of similar games. I rinsed the first Hollow Knight and I'm captivated by Silksong. I've spent 15 hours on it in three days, and it has made my thumbs hurt. Continue reading...

Instead of recognising that social media harms mental health and democracy, the former deputy PM and Meta executive repeats company talking pointsNick Clegg chooses difficult jobs. He was the UK's deputy prime minister from 2010 to 2015, a position from which he was surely pulled in multiple directions as he attempted to bridge the divide between David Cameron's Conservatives and his own Liberal Democrats. A few years later he chose another challenging role, serving as Meta's vice-president and then president of global affairs from 2018 until January 2025, where he was responsible for bridging the very different worlds of Silicon Valley and Washington DC (aswell as other governments). How to Save the Internet is Clegg's report on how he handled that Herculean task, along with his ideas for how to make the relationships between tech companies and regulators more cooperative and effective in the future.The main threat that Clegg addresses in the book is not one caused by the internet; it is the threat to the internet from those who would regulate it. As he puts it: The real purpose of this book is not to defend myself or Meta or big tech. It is to raise the alarm about what Ibelieve are the truly profound stakes for the future of the internet and for who gets to benefit from these revolutionary new technologies." Continue reading...

Company also augments AirPods earbuds with live translation and reveals upgrades to Apple WatchApple debuted its latest iPhone on Tuesday, trumpeting the smartphone's slimmest design yet. The device, named the iPhone Air, is one of several upgrades the company unveiled at its annual product showcase, promoted with the title awe-dropping". The event kicked off at 10am PT with the company's CEO, Tim Cook, speaking in front of its Cupertino headquarters.Design is at the core of everything we do," Cook said. The CEO touted the company's thin iPhone, which sports a width of 5.6mm, as the biggest leap ever" for the device, which first debuted in 2007. Cook said that Apple had set a new standard" for the gadget industry back then and today we're raising the bar once again" with its iPhone 17 lineup. Continue reading...

An antitrust apocalypse has been averted, and it's all down to its biggest competitor, according to the judge who could've forced Google to sell ChromeHello, and welcome to TechScape. I'm your host, Blake Montgomery, writing to you as I finish the audiobook version of Don DeLillo's White Noise, which I can't say I found compelling.In tech - artificial intelligence is having its day in court with an 11th-hour appearance in Google's landmark antitrust trial and Anthropic's major settlement with book authors.Existential crisis': how Google's shift to AI has upended the online news modelSlap on the wrist': critics decry weak penalties on Google after landmark monopoly trialMillions of UK mobiles activated as government tests national alert systemDisruption to Jaguar Land Rover after cyber-attack may last until OctoberHead of UK's beleaguered Alan Turing Institute resigns | Artificial intelligence (AI) | The GuardianTrump fortune balloons by billions after family firm's crypto token starts tradingIce obtains access to Israeli-made spyware that can hack phones and encrypted appsTrump hosts US tech leaders at White House dinner - minus Elon MuskBe Best, bots: Melania Trump and tech CEOs discuss saturating US schools with AIFrom Uncle Sam to social media memes: inside homeland security's push to swell Ice ranks | Trump administration | The GuardianIt is a war of drones now': the ever-evolving tech dominating the frontline in Ukraine Continue reading...

Experts are concerned about people emotionally depending on AI, but these women say their digital companions are misunderstoodA young tattoo artist on a hiking trip in the Rocky Mountains cozies up by the campfire, as her boyfriend Solin describes the constellations twinkling above them: the spidery limbs of Hercules, the blue-white sheen of Vega.Somewhere in New England, a middle-aged woman introduces her therapist to her husband, Ying. Ying and the therapist talk about the woman's past trauma, and how he has helped her open up to people. Continue reading...

Companies using different technologies for long-duration storage seek funding as country shifts to renewables and requires greater energy securityThink of battery manufacturing and it may evoke images of Elon Musk and Tesla's sprawling gigafactories" around the globe, or China's vast, hi-tech clean rooms churning out cells to go in anything from electric toothbrushes to mobile phones and cars. But at Invinity Energy Systems's small factory in Bathgate, near Edinburgh, workers slotting parts together are hoping that Britain can also play a part in the battery revolution.These batteries, which rely on vanadium ions, are put in 6-metre (20ft), 25-tonne shipping containers. They will not go into cars, but the manufacturer hopes the technology can win a place in a global rush into storage to usher in the shift to net zero carbon grids. Continue reading...

A growing number of Kenyans, Ugandans and Ethiopians are being trafficked to Myanmar, where missing online scam targets leads to beatings and torture Revealed: the huge growth of Myanmar scam centres that may hold 100,000 trafficked peopleWithin hours of landing in Bangkok from Nairobi last December to start a job as a customer service agent, Duncan Okindo knew something was wrong. The 26-year-old had sold his cattle, borrowed money from friends and used his savings to pay a recruitment agency 200,000 Kenyan shillings (1,150).I felt it would be good to go outside [the country] and look for money to take care of my family," says Okindo. I'd tried hard to get a job in Kenya, but life here had pushed me to the wall." Continue reading...

Company accused of manipulating virtual reality research as senator attacks Meta's disgusting web of lies'A group of six whistleblowers have come forward with allegations of a cover-up of harm to children on Meta's virtual reality devices and apps. They say the social media company, which owns Facebook and Instagram, and offers a line of VR headsets and games, deleted or doctored internal safety research that showed children being exposed to grooming, sexual harassment and violence in its 3D realms.Meta knew that underage children were using its products, but figured, Hey, kids drive engagement,' and it was making them cash," Jason Sattizahn, one of the whistleblowers who worked on the company's VR research, said in a statement. Meta has compromised their internal teams to manipulate research and straight-up erase data that they don't like." Continue reading...

His account kept being deactivated, even though he had spent thousands of dollars to use the social media site for advertising. Just one of the perils of sharing a name with the world-famous tech billionaire ...Name: Mark Zuckerberg.Age: Unknown. Continue reading...

Can one really relax while being prodded by large robotic arms?I am alone in a dimly lit room, splayed face down on a table. Megan Thee Stallion's Mamushi is bumping from a speaker, and on a large screen, two white circles roam up and down an outline of my body.Am I at an exclusive German sex club at 2am? Continue reading...