Technology | The Guardian

We spell out the key terms behind the AI revolution – and why they matter. Plus, this week’s top tech stories

I started playing a video game about cleaning for a laugh – now it’s all gotten out of hand and I’m going for the Guinness World RecordAre video games better than sex? That’s the sort of ludicrous question that is only posed by someone who has never had sex, or is searching for an attention-grabbing way to open an article about a cleaning simulator. However, I will say this: last week I had the opportunity to have it off but I played PowerWash Simulator instead, and honestly I’m not sure I had a worse time.Maybe it’s to do with age. Like every middle-aged female gamer I know, I love Lara Croft. Back in my younger days I lost entire evenings, weekends, and the best part of an English literature degree to Tomb Raider. But now I’m 45 and, for the most part, I have swapped late-night gaming sessions for going to bed after I’ve read the kids stories. I’ll still be awake at 2am, but only because I’ve woken up in a cold sweat trying to remember where I put my Nectar card. Continue reading...

Feature-packed superphone has stylus, serious speed, longer battery life and unrivalled camera zoomThe Galaxy S23 Ultra is Samsung’s latest and greatest power-house smartphone with a more impressive chip, battery and camera than its predecessors. But do the improvements justify such a steep price?At £1,249 ($1,199/A$1,949), which is £100 more than last year’s model, it is one of the most expensive non-folding smartphones available. Continue reading...

They may be digital natives, but young workers were raised on user-friendly apps – and office devices are far less intuitiveGarrett Bemiller, a 25-year-old New Yorker, has spent his entire life online. He grew up in front of screens, swiping from one app to the next. But there’s one skill set Bemiller admits he’s less comfortable with: the humble office printer.“Things like scanners and copy machines are complicated,” says Bemiller, who works as a publicist. The first time he had to copy something in the office didn’t exactly go well. “It kept coming out as a blank page, and took me a couple times to realize that I had to place the paper upside-down in the machine for it to work.” Continue reading...

Tesla and Twitter chief tweets that ‘the media is racist’ after hundreds of newspapers drop Adams’s comic stripElon Musk has deployed his 130 million-follower Twitter bullhorn to come to the rescue of a beleaguered cartoonist dumped by hundreds of newspapers across America for having delivered a virulent racist tirade.The Twitter and Tesla chief responded with his own controversial thought stream over the weekend after the mass termination of the Dilbert comic strip from US newspaper titles. Its creator, Scott Adams, recently denigrated Black people as a “hate group”, advising white people to “just get the hell away” from them. Continue reading...

According to the New York Times, the executive behind paid-for premium service revamp is among those affectedElon Musk has fired another 200 staff at Twitter including the executive behind the revamp of its paid-for premium service, according to a report.The latest round of job cuts equates to about 10% of Twitter’s vastly reduced workforce, which stood at 7,500 people before Musk bought the company in October. Continue reading...

Content created by chatbot must be treated like any other source and attributed when used, says IBSchoolchildren are allowed to quote from content created by ChatGPT in their essays, the International Baccalaureate has said.The IB, which offers an alternative qualification to A-levels and Highers, said students could use the chatbot but must be clear when they were quoting its responses. Continue reading...

Asked to generate a story from an English translation of a letter in Welsh published in the Guardian, the AI chatbot came up with a lot of twaddle, reports Fiona CollinsIan Watson (Letters, 17 February) asks for a translation of my letter in Welsh (13 February). I did include an English translation in my letter, but only the Welsh was published. I sent a second letter asking the Guardian to publish the translation, as I was having a lot of stick from a certain friend who couldn’t read it, but with no luck. Hopefully Ian’s letter will change the letters editor’s mind.The English version was as follows: “Thank you very much for the excellent editorial article which sang the praises of the Welsh language … Since you are now so enthusiastic about Welsh, may I, from now on, write to you in the language of heaven?” Continue reading...

Research suggests traumatic childhood experiences embed themselves in our brains and put us at risk of mental illness, but epigenetic editing may offer us hope of removing themThe way depression manifested itself in mice in the laboratory of the psychiatrist and neuroscientist Eric Nestler was hauntingly relatable. When put in an enclosure with an unknown mouse, they sat in the corner and showed little interest. When presented with the treat of a sugary drink, they hardly seemed to notice. And when put into water, they did not swim – they just lay there, drifting about.These mice had been exposed to “social defeat stress”, meaning that older, bigger mice had repeatedly asserted their dominance over them. It is a protocol designed to induce depression in mice, but in Nestler’s lab, it affected some more than others: those with a history of early trauma. Continue reading...

Chris Smalls, who set up the retailer’s first union in New York, came to Coventry to back its workers in their pay disputeThe leader of Amazon’s first union has made his first trip outside the United States to support striking workers at the online retail giant’s Coventry warehouse.Chris Smalls, who helped coordinate a successful unionisation drive at an Amazon warehouse in Staten Island, New York, in April 2022, travelled to the UK last week to provide advice to British workers as they try to gain recognition from the company. Continue reading...

From fresh produce to medicines and computer chips, a cocktail of problems is playing havoc with supply chainsEarly on Saturday morning, as Paul Crane, a trader at London’s renowned Borough market, was arranging blood oranges from Valencia on his stall, he admitted that his industry is facing some of the toughest conditions in a quarter of a century.The wholesale price of tomatoes, peppers and aubergines has quadrupled, and English cauliflowers are up too. Some stallholders are not even selling vine tomatoes because they are just too expensive. Continue reading...

The government’s consultation document on cryptocurrency highlights the challenges that must be faced in the regulatory processFor my sins, I have been reading Future financial services regulatory regime for cryptoassets, 82 pages of prime Whitehall verbiage that was published recently, setting out HM Treasury’s plans to govern the clouds and hold back the tides.It opens with the statutory ringing endorsement by Andrew Griffith, economic secretary to the Treasury. He reminds readers that the government’s “firm ambition is for the UK to be home to the most open, well-regulated and technologically advanced capital markets in the world” – which “means taking proactive steps to harness the opportunities of new financial technologies”. He further believes that “crypto technologies” can have a profound impact across financial services and that “by capitalising on the potential benefits offered by crypto we can strengthen our position as a world leader in fintech, unlock growth and boost innovation”. Cont’d p94, as they say in Private Eye. Continue reading...

Nokia G22 has removable back and standard screws allowing battery swap in less than five minutes at homeNokia has announced one of the first budget Android smartphones designed to be repaired at home allowing users to swap out the battery in under five minutes in partnership with iFixit.Launched before Mobile World Congress in Barcelona on Saturday, the Nokia G22 has a removable back and internal design that allows components to be easily unscrewed and swapped out including the battery, screen and charging port. Continue reading...

A lack of tourism in Thailand post-pandemic has cast the Bangkok-based photographer’s 2017 plane image in a new lightJoined by his wife Mai and daughter Milan, street photographer Tavepong Pratoomwong was on holiday in Phuket, a 90-minute flight from their home town of Bangkok, when he took this photo. He’d heard that the nearby Mai Khao beach – the longest on the island – was a great place to watch planes landing and taking off from the airport close by, so the trio set off from their hotel.“Milan was only five and we found out pretty quickly that the plane noises scared her, so Mai took her back to the hotel while I took some shots.” Continue reading...

Boss of messaging app says users’ trust at risk from powers in online safety bill to impose monitoringThe head of the messaging app Signal has warned that it will quit the UK if the forthcoming online safety bill weakens end-to-end encryption.Signal’s president said the organisation would “absolutely, 100% walk” if the legislation undermined its encryption service. Continue reading...

Uncrewed combat aerial vehicles, or attack drones, have become a common feature of the modern battlefield. Russia has deployed them to terrorise civilians in Ukraine and disable essential infrastructure, and Ukraine has also relied heavily on drones for attack, reconnaissance and surveillance. But these aren't the only 'killer robots' that armies are utilising. Josh Toussaint-Strauss explores how the weaponisation of general-purpose robots and the developments of a wider array of advanced mobile robotics and AI powered machine are changing the dynamics of modern warfare in ways that have prompted leading robotics companies and the UN to raise the alarm and call for greater restrictions

Low-cost device launched to solve mobile blackspots with SOS and two-way texting for Android and iPhoneThe Defy Satellite link gives any Android or iPhone an instant upgrade with the ability to send and receive text messages via satellite, solving the problem of mobile dead zones for emergencies and wilderness adventures.Announced ahead of the Mobile World Congress in Barcelona and produced by the British phone manufacturer Bullitt under the Motorola brand, the Satellite link connects to a normal smartphone via Bluetooth and uses an app to send not only SOS messages but general two-way chat via texts. Continue reading...

Interest groups have poured about £250,000 into all-party parliamentary groups in past five years• Crypto firm with links to parliamentary groups appears to have vanishedFor more than a decade, those worried about the reputation of parliament have warned that all-party parliamentary groups (APPGs) can be a problem.Their supporters say they are a place for like-minded parliamentarians to discuss topics of special interest. But despite their unofficial nature, and with no formal role in the legislative process, APPGs can be a magnet for those who want to get close to MPs and peers – or to pretend that they are for the sake of polishing their reputations. Continue reading...

With its frequent dismemberments, repulsive creatures and total immersion, Dead Space spliced horror and sci-fi to make a truly classic video game – even though it initially tankedIt’s one of the more memorable intros in video game history: as part of a five-person team sent to investigate a communications blackout aboard the mining ship USG Ishimura, engineer Isaac Clarke boots up the vessel’s computer while his colleagues pace around nervously. Suddenly, the lights go out, and shadowy monstrosities appear from the walls, spearing two of the team as Clarke watches helplessly before they turn on him, chasing him unarmed into the bowels of the Ishimura, where even more horrors await.Fifteen years, two sequels and countless books, comics and spin-offs later, and Dead Space has become synonymous with video game sci-fi horror. Its enemies, the zombie-like Necromorphs, are hideously metamorphosed humans, perverted by the machinations of the Marker, a strange alien artefact that has engendered a worryingly familiar religion known as Unitology. It’s an experience that few players forget, and is being discovered by new fans this year thanks to Motive’s remake – but it almost didn’t get made. Continue reading...

Mark Read says artificial intelligence is helping firm win clients keen to tap into technology’s potentialFrom Serena Williams playing against incarnations of her younger self to millions of personalised messages from a Bollywood superstar to support small businesses in India, artificial intelligence and machine learning is driving a revolution in the global advertising industry.Mark Read, the chief executive of London-listed WPP, the world’s largest marketing services company, said AI-led advertising practices were helping it win clients hungry to embrace the potential of a new technology. Continue reading...

Nintendo Switch; Hal Laboratories/ Nintendo

Parent company, ByteDance, says action is ‘misguided’ and has contacted commission to ‘set the record straight’The EU’s executive body has banned its thousands of staff from using TikTok over cybersecurity concerns, a decision the Chinese-owned social video app has criticised as “misguided” and based on “fundamental misconceptions”.The European Commission sent an email to employees ordering them to delete the app from all work phones and devices, and any personally owned ones that use the commission’s apps and email. Employees have until 15 March to comply. Continue reading...

Leading tech firms reportedly ordered to remove workarounds allowing access to US-based serviceChinese regulators have reportedly clamped down on access to ChatGPT, as Chinese tech firms and universities push forward with developing domestic artificial intelligence bots.ChatGPT, the popular discussion bot created by US-based OpenAI, is not officially available in China, where the government operates a comprehensive firewall and strict internet censorship. But many had been accessing it via VPNs, and some third-party developers had produced programs that gave some access to the service. Continue reading...

In this week’s newsletter: Reporter Kim Barker explores an unsolved murder in her ‘mean’ hometown, in The Coldest Case in Laramie. Plus: five of the best podcasts about friendship

The tech giant has taken billions from game developers but failed to reinvest it, leaving the App Store a confusing mess for mobile gamersIn the 15 years since it launched the App Store, Apple has proved again and again that it cares very little about games – though it is happy to make billions from them. I should know: I was an App Store games editor for seven years.It all started so well. When the iPhone and iPad arrived, those devices transformed games almost as much as they upended the rest of the tech world. Suddenly everyone had powerful games machines in their pockets, and it was amazing. Some wonderful developers broke through. Zach Gage kickstarted his career with the artsy Tetris-meets-wordsearch game SpellTower; Adam Saltsman’s Canabalt turned platforming tropes into a desperate post-apocalyptic dash; ingenious gothic puzzler Helsing’s Fire gave us our first glimpse into the mind of Lucas Pope, later the creator of Papers, Please. Continue reading...

Chores such as shopping likely to have most automation, while caring for young or old least likely to be affected, says reportA revolution in artificial intelligence could slash the amount of time people spend on household chores and caring, with robots able to perform about 39% of domestic tasks within a decade, according to experts.Tasks such as shopping for groceries were likely to have the most automation, while caring for the young or old was the least likely to be affected by AI, according to a large survey of 65 artificial intelligence (AI) experts in the UK and Japan, who were asked to predict the impact of robots on household chores. Continue reading...

Algorithm-based sources lead to more polarised and conflicting views in society, as people are exposed to a less diverse diet of current affairs, writes Ollie DaviesYour editorial on disinformation (17 February) highlights a great challenge, but of arguably greater importance are the sources of news young people use. In a 2022 study, the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism at Oxford provided quantitative evidence on the growth of social media as a news source for 18- to 24-year-olds. TikTok as a source had increased fivefold between 2020 and 2022, and YouTube stabilised its share of young readers in Asia, the fastest growing populace in the world.Combined with Facebook and Twitter, these sources supply 66% of young people their main news source, and all rely on algorithms. To increase views, clicks and advertising revenues, they show stories that viewers want to see – and slant viewpoints further. The result? Increasingly polarised and conflicting views in society, as people are exposed to a less diverse diet of actual current affairs. Continue reading...

In this week’s newsletter: Though costly, the PSVR2 is the most usable virtual gaming device yet – even for sceptics like me

How an undercover investigation revealed a team of Israeli contractors who claim to have manipulated more than 30 elections around the world using hacking, sabotage and automated disinformation on social mediaLast year, coordinated by the French media organisation Forbidden Stories, a group of journalists from around the world, including from the Guardian, embarked on a project: to get inside the murky world of disinformation and expose those who profit from it.Among the reporters were Gur Megiddo, an Israeli investigative journalist for the business newspaper TheMarker. With him was Omer Benjakob, a reporter with the Israeli daily paper Haaretz, and Frédéric Métézeau, a journalist with Radio France. As part of an undercover investigation, they held meetings with a secretive team of Israeli contractors selling “black op” influence campaigns to those with the means to pay for them. Continue reading...

Lawsuits brought by families of terrorist attack victims will consider whether companies are responsible for users’ contentA pair of cases going before the US supreme court this week could drastically upend the rules of the internet, putting a powerful, decades-old statute in the crosshairs.At stake is a question that has been foundational to the rise of big tech: should companies be legally responsible for the content their users post? Thus far they have evaded liability, but some US lawmakers and others want to change that. And new lawsuits are bringing the statute before the supreme court for the first time. Continue reading...

Computer programmer Cassius John-Adams explains how he mashed up Crazy Taxi and The Fifth Element during an obsessive three-year period, single-handedly creating the game he’d always dreamed ofOver lunch one day at work, Cassius John-Adams, a computer programmer for a Canadian TV network, was moaning to his co-workers that things aren’t as good as they used to be. “We got on to how everything, from video games to science-fiction films, was better in the late 90s and early 00s when we were all much younger,” explains the 45-year-old from his house in Toronto. Someone mentioned The Fifth Element, Luc Besson’s wildly inventive 1997 sci-fi film. John-Adams brought up Crazy Taxi, Sega’s cartoonishly energetic driving game. And then, “I was like: ‘Man, I wish there was a mix between the two.’ Everyone around the table went, ‘Yeah, that would be the perfect mix.’”It was the spark for one of the great passion projects in recent video-gaming history. Doing nearly all of the work himself, fitting it around his day job, John-Adams has made that very hybrid, a new game called Mile High Taxi that splices the vibe of Besson’s movie and the hurtling mayhem of Crazy Taxi into a heady compound of millennial nostalgia. Continue reading...

Receiving login codes via text message is much easier to compromise. Using authenticator apps or even a USB are preferred alternativesOn the weekend, Twitter announced that from 20 March, people who haven’t subscribed to Twitter Blue will have two-factor authentication via SMS disabled.Twitter has recommended people use third-party apps or a security key instead, but for the overwhelming majority (74.4%) of the 2.6% of active Twitter users who use SMS as their method of authentication, it will mean they have a month to switch or potentially lose protection. Continue reading...

Creators and influencers on Meta’s platforms are an obvious market for verified users’ monthly feesMark Zuckerberg’s social media empire is built on billions of users – and the advertisers who pay vast sums to grab their attention.But that business model is under pressure on several fronts. It is against this backdrop that Meta, the owner of Facebook and Instagram, said on Sunday it is trialling subscriptions for both social media platforms. Continue reading...

Amid boarded up shops in Wearside, The Gaming Hideaway is thriving – and shows how tired retail districts can be reimaginedOn Bishop Auckland’s increasingly desolate high street, shops have steadily closed over the years as a retail park has lured local people away. Dozens of shopfronts lie empty, and the businesses that cling on are mostly discount retailers, the odd vape shop and a few charity shops. Even Poundland has gone. But a few doors down from where Boots used to be, next to the HSBC branch that closed last August, you can now find yourself at the starting grid of a Formula One race, then hurled down a towering rollercoaster.On average, 47 shops shut down every day last year across the UK – up nearly 50% on 2021 – as retailers faced ever-increasing competition from online stores along with rising costs and damage from the pandemic. The future for these streets is not retail but entertainment, and The Gaming Hideaway in Bishop Auckland, a virtual reality arcade, is a prime example. Continue reading...

AI-generated clues are often bizarre and sometimes flat-out wrong – but, setters agree, that may not be a bad thing. Plus: a podcast returnsThis week, some Things of Interest to Puzzlers That You Might Otherwise Miss.Did your school mention crossword compiling in career discussions?

Updated chips give already great 14in model a boost but the hefty price hike stingsApple’s M2 Pro chip upgrade for the MacBook Pro boosts performance and battery life in an already extremely capable machine – but it comes with a sizable price increase, making it particularly expensive outside the US.The starting price is £2,149 ($1,999/A$3,199), which is £250 (A$200) more than its predecessor despite being the same price in the US, which is partly down to weak currency rates. It is not as if the 2021 model was cheap, but pushing beyond the £2,000 mark for the new version significantly raises the barrier to entry.Screen: 14.2in mini LED (3024x1964; 254 ppi) ProMotion (120Hz)Processor: Apple M2 Pro or M2 MaxRAM: 16, 32, 64 or 96GBStorage: 512GB, 1, 2, 4 or 8TB SSDOperating system: macOS 13.2 VenturaCamera: 1080p FaceTime HD cameraConnectivity: wifi 6E, Bluetooth 5.3, 3x USB 4/Thunderbolt 4, HDMI 2.1, SD card, headphonesDimensions: 221.2 x 312.6 x 15.5mmWeight: 1.6kg Continue reading...

The UK’s would-be ‘Amazon of banking’ run by Nikolay Storonsky has raised alarm over delayed accounts, EU regulatory fines, its co-founder’s Russian ties and issues with staffMinutes after Jeremy Hunt had finished speaking, Nikolay Storonsky collared the chancellor backstage. The 38-year-old co-founder of British financial technology company Revolut, wearing a tech bro’s uniform of jeans and a sweater, had been listening to Hunt set out his vision of the UK as “the world’s next Silicon Valley”, in a speech last month at the media group Bloomberg’s London headquarters.The chancellor had praised Revolut as a “shining” success, saying the government was willing to back innovative companies “to the hilt”. After a quick introduction, the pair posed for a photo – which was swiftly posted by Storonsky’s team to one of Revolut’s Twitter accounts. Continue reading...

Mark Zuckerberg follows Elon Musk’s lead in introducing fee for blue ticks, while Twitter to restrict 2FA via SMS to paid users

Delivery of rental cars using remote driving could be outlawed after Law Commission recommendationsThe remote driving of vehicles from overseas, such as for the delivery of rental cars, could be banned following a government-commissioned review.The review was carried out by the Law Commission of England and Wales, which recommended ministers regulate the technology. Continue reading...

When lockdown hit, walking her dog gave the photographer some welcome respite. But on this occasion, she left him behind …Lobo the Norfolk terrier is the perfect walking companion, but not around sheep. Mariko Klug, who lives in Bavaria, Germany, left him at home to take this photo. “He barks to protect us from the ‘evil sheep’,” Klug laughs.She’s grateful for him, though, as dog owners were allowed to leave the house at any time of day during Covid lockdowns. “I work part-time for an airline at Munich airport, but back then I was at home so much more. It was an unreal time, but we made the most of it by being outside as much as possible.” Continue reading...

PC, Playstation 5; Luminous Productions

Strategist says he noticed ‘increased activity’, after revelations about activities of a disinformation unitA senior strategist with close links to Kenya’s president, William Ruto, has publicly acknowledged that his Telegram account was infiltrated in the lead-up to last year’s election.Dennis Itumbi told the Star newspaper that he had noticed “increased activity” on his Telegram last year but called it “inconsequential”. Continue reading...

Nissan’s ServCity project shows how far autonomous vehicles have come and difficulties they still faceThe journey in a self-driving Nissan across Woolwich in south-east London begins smoothly enough: fitted with cameras and sensors, the electric car confidently handles pedestrian crossings, vans cutting into its lane without warning and even scurrying jaywalkers.Then comes an unexpected obstacle: a football-sized rock, fallen from the back of a lorry on to the middle of the road. The specially trained safety driver hastily grabs the steering wheel, taking back control to avoid a nasty crunch. Continue reading...

One of Google’s earliest employees, she rented out her garage to Larry Page and Sergey Brin when they founded the companyThe CEO of YouTube, Susan Wojcicki, will be stepping down after nine years at the helm of the world’s largest online video platform, she said in a blog post on Thursday.YouTube’s chief product officer, Neal Mohan, will be the new head of YouTube, she said. Wojcicki, 54, was previously a senior vice-president for ad products at Google and became CEO of YouTube in 2014. Before Google, Wojcicki worked at Intel and Bain & Company. Continue reading...

Playstation 5, Xbox Series, PC; EA/Omega Force

Leaked messages show failed plan to discredit Muhammadu Buhari and get Goodluck Jonathan re-elected in 2015Four weeks before a pivotal presidential election in Nigeria, an Israeli private operative specialising in political “black ops” was preparing his trip to the country. On 17 January 2015 the man, who used the alias “Jorge”, emailed Cambridge Analytica, the political consultancy he was coordinating with on a covert plan to manipulate Africa’s largest democracy.“Friends, hi, I will be on the ground tomorrow for couple days … Who is best to meet there[?]” he asked. “Low profile as we came in on a special visa and we are watched closely (which is part of our plan :) anyway we need better understanding of the current status, improve communication and coordinate plans, we want to run by you a couple things that we might execute if the stars align. so plz, in very limited circulation, who is best to meet, and whats his/her position, and contact info.” Continue reading...

In this week’s newsletter: Meet six people who claim to have made contact with extraterrestrials – or even be one themselves – in Alien Kidnap Club. Plus: five podcasts to listen to with your kids

A tweet from Joe Biden got triple the impressions than Musk’s game time post, sending engineers scrambling to boost their bossTwitter chief executive Elon Musk rallied a team of roughly 80 engineers to reconfigure the platform’s algorithm so his tweets would be more widely viewed, tech news site Platformer has reported.A disgruntled Musk called for an emergency effort after a tweet he sent during Sunday’s Super Bowl game failed to achieve as much engagement as a tweet from Joe Biden, interviews and internal documents reviewed by Platformer have revealed. Continue reading...

In this week’s newsletter: From Street Fighter parties with friends to Minecraft with my kids, there’s something special about playing together that’s hard to recreate online

Social media content creators are increasingly advising followers against expensive purchasesMore and more content creators on social media are rejecting traditional influencer culture and becoming “deinfluencers” instead, according to social media experts.Influencers have historically sold something to users. Whether that is the newest trending lipgloss or the viral “it” dress, the products – often available at a discount using influencers’ special codes – are perceived to provide a certain lifestyle, one that is aesthetically pleasing and on trend. Continue reading...