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Updated 2025-11-30 01:00
WSUS attacks hit 'multiple' orgs as Google and other infosec sleuths ring Redmond’s alarm bell
If at first you don't succeed, patch and patch again More threat intel teams are sounding the alarm about a critical Windows Server Update Services (WSUS) remote code execution vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2025-59287 and now under active exploitation, just days after Microsoft pushed an emergency patch and the US Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency added the bug to its Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog....
Get ready to squint! World's smallest pixel is just 300 nm
How many 1080p screens can you fit on a pinhead? These German physicists reckon about one Micro-OLED displays with 1080p (1920x1080) resolution have been around for a few years now, but a group of German researchers has taken things to the next level. They've engineered an OLED pixel so small that an entire 1080p display could fit into a single square millimeter, potentially changing the game for wearable displays....
Python Foundation goes ride or DEI, rejects government grant with strings attached
Foundation says it won't compromise policy of inclusivity even if that cash would've really helped The Python Software Foundation (PSF) has walked away from a $1.5 million government grant and you can blame the Trump administration's war on woke for effectively weakening some open source security....
Signal president Meredith Whittaker says they had no choice but to use AWS, and that's a problem
'The problem is the concentration of power in the infrastructure space that means there isn't really another choice' Messaging service Signal may be unusual in its deployment of credible end-to-end encryption, but it shares a common availability vulnerability with many other internet services - dependence on Amazon Web Services (AWS)....
Atlas vuln lets crims inject malicious prompts ChatGPT won't forget between sessions
It can do a lot more than just play 'Eye of the Tiger' daily In yet another reminder to be wary of AI browsers, researchers at LayerX uncovered a vulnerability in OpenAI's Atlas that lets attackers inject malicious instructions into ChatGPT's memory using cross-site request forgery....
HPE's Discovery to succeed Frontier supercomputer with next-gen Cray tech
Oak Ridge's $500M system due in 2028, paired with a separate Lux AI cluster arriving two years earlier HPE is set to build a successor to the Frontier exascale system for America's Oak Ridge National Laboratory, based on the next generation of its Cray supercomputer platform, plus a separate AI cluster to advance machine learning with a multi-tenant cloud-like platform....
Iran's school for cyberspies could've used a few more lessons in preventing breaches
Ravin Academy confirms the intrusion on Telegram, says student data was stolen Iran's school for state-sponsored cyberattackers admits it suffered a breach exposing the names and other personal information of its associates and students....
You have one week to opt out or become fodder for LinkedIn AI training
Nations previously exempt from scraping now in the firing line If you thought living in Europe, Canada, or Hong Kong meant you were protected from having LinkedIn scrape your posts to train its AI, think again. You have a week to opt out before the Microsoft subsidiary assumes you're fine with it....
As AI agents join SaaS, AWS tells users to expect more pricing puzzles
Cloud giant says choice and flexibility matter more than standardization - for now Interview As agentic AI solutions flood the market, users will face a complex environment in terms of deployment and commercial models, with standard practices yet to be resolved, says Olawale Oladehin, AWS director, solutions architecture....
EU sovereignty plan accused of helping US cloud giants
Brussels' framework muddies the waters and could hand advantage to foreign hyperscalers, says trade body Europe's efforts to reduce reliance on US hyperscalers is under fire from many of the local cloud providers it is designed to help....
Researchers exploit OpenAI's Atlas by disguising prompts as URLs
NeuralTrust shows how agentic browser can interpret bogus links as trusted user commands Researchers have found more attack vectors for OpenAI's new Atlas web browser - this time by disguising a potentially malicious prompt as an apparently harmless URL....
X says passkey reset isn't about a security issue – it's to finally kill off twitter.com
Social media site dispatches crucial clarification days after curious announcement X (formerly Twitter) sparked security concerns over the weekend when it announced users must re-enroll their security keys by November 10 or face account lockouts - without initially explaining why....
Ex-CISA head thinks AI might fix code so fast we won't need security teams
Jen Easterly says most breaches stem from bad software, and smarter tech could finally clean it up Ex-CISA head Jen Easterly claims AI could spell the end of the cybersecurity industry, as the sloppy software and vulnerabilities that criminals rely on will be tracked down faster than ever....
Everything you know about last week's AWS outage is wrong
AI wasn't the cause, and multi-cloud is for rubes Column AWS put out a hefty analysis of its October 20 outage, and it's apparently written in a continuing stream of consciousness before the Red Bull wore off and the author passed out after 36 straight hours of writing....
Machine learning saves £4.4M in UK.gov work and pensions fraud detection
Poor data standards across government hamper scaling, says Parliament spending watchdog The UK government's Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has saved 4.4 million over three years by using machine learning to tackle fraud, according to the National Audit Office (NAO). However, the public spending watchdog found the department's ability to expand this work is limited by fragmented IT systems and poor cross-government data standards....
The Chinese Box and Turing Test: Is AI really intelligent?
No, it's just good at mass-production copy and paste. And yes, we're correctly applying Betteridge's Law Opinion Remember ELIZA? The 1966 chatbot from MIT's AI Lab convinced countless people it was intelligent using nothing but simple pattern matching and canned responses. Nearly 60 years later, ChatGPT has people making the same mistake. Chatbots don't think - they've just gotten exponentially better at pretending....
The perfect AWS storm has blown over, but the climate is only getting worse
When it rains, it pours - and nobody packed an umbrella Opinion When your cabbie asks you what you do for a living, and you answer "tech journalist," you never get asked about cloud infrastructure in return. Bitcoin, mobile phones, AI, yes. Until last week: "What's this AWS thing, then?" You already knew a lot of people were having a very bad day in Bezosville, but if the news had reached an Edinburgh black cab driver, new adjectives were needed....
Frustrated consultant 'went full Hulk' and started smashing hardware
Four back-to-back weekends of work - and disastrously bad documentation - will do that do a techie Who, Me? Welcome to Monday morning and another installment of Who, Me? For the uninitiated, it's The Register's weekly reader-contributed column that tells tales of your greatest misses, and how you rebuilt a career afterward....
Automattic accuses rival WordPress outfit WP Engine of ‘false advertising, and deceptive business practices’
FOSS feud re-ignites with massive counter-claim The long battle between Automattic and WP Engine has flared again, this time with accusations the latter company issued false advertising", and employed deceptive business practices."...
UN Cybercrime Treaty wins dozens of signatories, to go with its many critics
Allows surveillance and cross-border evidence sharing, which worries human rights groups The United Nations on Saturday staged a signing ceremony for the Convention against Cybercrime, the world's first agreement to combat online crime. And while 72 nations picked up the pen, critics continue to point out the convention's flaws....
Australia sues Microsoft for misleading M365 users about Copilot subscription options
PLUS: China demotes tech self-sufficiency goal; Alibaba Cloud quietly quits VMware; India demands deepfake labels; and more! Asia In Brief Australia's Competition & Consumer Commission on Monday commenced legal proceedings against Microsoft for allegedly misleading users of its Microsoft 365 bundle....
Shaq's new ride gets jaq'ed in haq attaq
PLUS: Judge spanks NSO; Mozilla requires data use disclosures; TARmageddon meets Rust; And more! Infosec In Brief Former basketball star Shaquille O'Neal is 7'1" (215 cm), and therefore uses car customization companies to modify vehicles to fit his frame. But it appears cybercriminals have targeted Shaq's preferred motor-modder....
MPs urge government to stop Britain's phone theft wave through tech
Committee says Apple, Google, and Samsung could render stolen handsets worthless if compelled to act The UK's Home Secretary should use her powers to push the tech industry to deploy stronger technical measures against the surge in phone thefts, according to a House of Commons committee....
Berkeley boffins build better load balancing algo with AI
One way AI can improve on human work Computer scientists at UC Berkeley say that AI models show promise as a way to discover and optimize algorithms....
Everybody's warning about critical Windows Server WSUS bug exploits ... but Microsoft's mum
Critical 9.8-rated vulnerability affects Windows Server 2012 - 2025 Governments and private security sleuths warned that attackers are already exploiting a critical bug in Microsoft Windows Server Update Services, shortly after Redmond pushed an emergency patch for the remote code execution (RCE) vulnerability....
High-stakes poker scam used rigged card shufflers, X-ray tables, and special glasses
31 alleged poker schemers nabbed alongside arrest of separate sports betting ring The feds on Thursday charged alleged mafia associates and current and former National Basketball Association players and coaches with running rigged poker games and illegal sports betting....
Sneaky Mermaid attack in Microsoft 365 Copilot steals data
Redmond says it's fixed this particular indirect prompt injection vuln updated Microsoft fixed a security hole in Microsoft 365 Copilot that allowed attackers to trick the AI assistant into stealing sensitive tenant data - like emails - via indirect prompt injection attacks....
Sora makes slurfect deepfakes of celebs spewing racial epithets
If you listen closely, you'll realize Sam Altman and the others are only saying sound-alike words Guardrails? What guardrails? Naughty netizens found a way to trick the Sora 2 video generator into producing deepfakes of public figures, including OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and billionaire Mark Cuban, that make it sound as though they're spewing racial slurs. The trick works despite Sora's built-in filters meant to block hateful language....
Uncle Sam's new power plan will plug AI farms into the grid faster
Proposal would fast-track hookups for the megawatt-hungry datacenters driving US electricity demand The US Energy Secretary wants to see datacenters connected to the grid faster, and has directed the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to implement new rules that speed the process....
OpenAI goes after Microsoft 365 Copilot's lunch with 'company knowledge' feature
ChatGPT can now rummage through corporate files via connectors, though Redmond still has the deeper hooks OpenAI is chalenging Microsoft 365 Copilot with "company knowledge," a new ChatGPT feature that connects to organizational data to generate business-specific answers....
Apple faces £1.5B payout after losing UK App Store case
iPhone maker overcharged devs and users, says competition court Apple could face claims estimated at around 1.5 billion after it lost a collective case in the UK arguing that its closed systems for apps resulted in overcharging businesses and consumers....
AI investment is the only thing keeping the US out of recession
Datacenter infrastructure and model development spending offset high borrowing costs AI spending is keeping the US economy out of recession, with datacenter infrastructure and model development providing the only significant growth amid trade turmoil, tariff shocks, and high borrowing costs....
Microsoft drops surprise Windows Server patch before weekend downtime
You didn't have plans, did you? Microsoft has released an out-of-band update to patch a critical vulnerability in Windows Server Update Services (WSUS)....
Alaska Airlines grounded by mystery IT meltdown
Failure at primary datacenter leaves planes parked and passengers angry, second incident since July Updated Timing is everything - except when it isn't. US carrier Alaska Airlines has grounded its fleet once again due to a mystery IT issue....
Digital ID is now less about illegal working, more about rummaging through drawers
Starmer rebrands unpopular scheme as convenience tool after backlash UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer has relaunched his digital ID scheme as something that will make people's lives easier, less than four weeks after announcing it as a measure to tackle illegal working....
Windows Insiders get special anniversary desktop wallpaper
11 years of filing feedback and all we got was a bloody... not even a T-shirt? Microsoft is celebrating 11 years of the Windows Insider Program with custom desktops and maybe a secret hint for users wondering which operating system to consider....
BBC probe finds AI chatbots mangle nearly half of news summaries
Google Gemini worst offender with 76% error rate Four of the most popular AI chatbots routinely serve up inaccurate or misleading news content to users, according to a wide-reaching investigation....
How do you solve a problem like Discovery?
Request For Ideas: How would you move a retired orbiter across the US? The White House's Office of Management and Budget is grappling with how to transport Space Shuttle Discovery from the Smithsonian Museum in Virginia to Space Center Houston. How would you do it?...
Shield AI shows off not-at-all-terrifying autonomous VTOL combat drone
Runways? Where we're going, we don't need runways US defense technology biz Shield AI claims it can build a jet-powered vertical take-off and landing (VTOL) autonomous fighter drone that doesn't need a runway to operate....
Britain's Ministry of Justice just signed up to ChatGPT Enterprise
OpenAI sweetens the deal with data residency OpenAI has signed up the UK's Ministry of Justice as the latest public sector customer for ChatGPT Enterprise....
New boss took charge of project code and sent two billion unwanted emails
Techie summoned at 02:00 AM to sort things out sent another 2 billion trying to fix it On Call Welcome to another instalment of On Call, The Register's weekly wander through your tales of tech support....
Iran's MuddyWater wades into 100+ government networks in latest spying spree
Group-IB says Tehran-linked crew used hijacked mailbox and VPN to sling phishing emails across Middle East Iran's favorite muddy-footed cyberespionage crew is at it again, this time breaching more than 100 government entities across the Middle East and North Africa, according to researchers at Group-IB....
Supermicro warns it will miss revenue forecast by a lazy billion bucks or more
Mystery customer wants an upgrade that will take some time Supermicro has revised its revenue forecast downwards by a couple of billion dollars, but insisted it's nothing to worry about....
Intel says server CPUs will be hot again – in a good way, to power AI workloads – any year now
Chipzilla returns to profit and suggests customers are primed to sign for foundry services once it nails 18A process Intel has returned to profitability, grown revenue, and suggested demand for AI will ensure its struggling foundry business wins customers and boosts its datacenter CPU business....
Cyber exec with lavish lifestyle charged with selling secrets to Russia
The 0-days have left the building Federal prosecutors have charged a former general manager of US government defense contractor L3Harris's cyber arm Trenchant with selling secrets to an unidentified Russian buyer for $1.3 million....
Clippy rises from the dead in major update to Copilot and its voice interface
The new Microsoft assistant is a blob named Mico, but you can turn it into everyone's favorite paper clip. Hands On Microsoft's Clippy was an anthropomorphic assistant ahead of his time, offering to help you with your Office 97 tasks when all you could do was type and click in response. Today, as part of a massive Copilot Fall Release, Redmond is bringing Clippy back - at least as an avatar for its new AI helper named Mico"....
Google and Anthropic wave hands about mega TPU deal worth 'tens of billions'
But AWS is still the AI upstart's primary partner Google and Anthropic have struck a deal that will see the AI upstart gain access to up to a million of the web giant's tensor processing units (TPUs) and involve tens of billions of dollars."...
Don't take AI to Thanksgiving: Bots have hidden biases
It's not a bug, it's a feature Large language models, or LLMs, are biased in one way or another - often many. And there may be no way around that....
Playtime’s over: Crooks swipe Toys R Us Canada customer data and dump it online
What?! No complimentary credit monitoring? The Canadian outpost of retailer Toys R Us on Thursday notified customers that attackers accessed a database, stole some of their personal information, then posted the data online....
Excel is three sheets to the window on iOS as update borks everything
iPhone and iPad users vexed by denial of spreadsheets Microsoft Excel for the past week has been hanging or crashing on iOS and iPadOS devices, to customers' great annoyance....
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