The Register

Zuckerberg makes good on headcount threats he issued last month Meta will carry out a backdoor layoff by asking line managers to select staff to cull ostensibly on performance grounds.…

Think ML is hard to implement? That excuse is getting harder to make as you avoid the rush Intel and IT consultancy Accenture are hoping to help businesses adopt AI applications quicker with bundles of open-source software designed to speed performance and lower development costs.…

Speculative execution side-channels continue to haunt silicon world Older AMD and Intel chips are vulnerable to yet another Spectre-based speculative-execution attack that exposes secrets within kernel memory despite defenses already in place. Mitigating this side channel is expected to take a toll on performance.…

Space oddity definitely not a metaphor for a corporate takeover going down the tubes Space fans bored of waiting for the James Webb Space Telescope briefing were treated to fireworks of a very different nature after SpaceX's latest Starship prototype suffered an explosive anomaly during testing.…

Count down begins on cameras, sensors no longer working Home automation platform Hive plans to terminate key products in its line, including the Hive View cameras, HomeShield, and Leak products.…

It's the end of the world as we know it, and you'll be fine Ever the optimist, New York has reminded its citizens of what they should do in the event of a nuclear attack. And not just any nuclear attack either, but the "big one."…

Big Blue chases data-intensive and business-critical workloads, with pay-as-you-go consumption options IBM has expanded its Power10 server line-up with mid-range and scale-out systems aimed at data-intensive and business-critical workloads, with new pay-as-you-go consumption options.…

Redmond characterizes job losses as an annual clean-up rather than a sign of anything serious Microsoft has laid off more than a thousand staff, classifying this as a sort of summer clean-up following closure of the latest financial year.…

Nothing shiny about US Chromebook sales anymore, plus war in Ukraine and inflation hits EMEA shipments A collapse in Chromebook demand along with conflict in Europe and a worrying rise in inflation have led to the steepest decline in PC shipments in nine years.…

By then you won't be able to install the suite on Windows 8.1 Microsoft has warned users clinging to Windows 7 and Windows 8.1 that the end really is nigh.…

Japanese giant working with Icelandic startup Atmonia to develop sustainable process for production Fujitsu says it is making progress on a cleaner method of producing ammonia, which it believes is a strong candidate for an alternative power source for datacenters. The company said it envisions the machinery to produce the clean ammonia fitting into a shipping container.…

Red Hat dropped the file system in 7.4 but Big Red's own kernel has kept hold Oracle Linux 9 is out and has some interesting differences from the other Red Hat relatives.…

Renesas factory experienced worst voltage drop in decade – shutting down production lines A factory belonging to Japanese semiconductor manufacturer Renesas is back online after a lightning strike forced it to shut down for a week.…

The party's over, especially for stablecoins, due to intrinsic volatility and structural vulnerabilities The Financial Stability Board – the organisation charged with recommending useful changes to the global financial system – has signaled it will soon propose regulations for cryptocurrencies and other digital assets that make them subject to the same rules applied to traditional financial instruments.…

Contract seeks 'support with the renewal and running of Microsoft Enterprise Agreement' The UK's Ministry of Defence has awarded reseller Boxxe a contract worth up to £291 million for the renewal of Microsoft licenses for three years.…

Sure, stuff got done fast – but personal information was put at risk The UK Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) on Monday issued a reprimand and called for a review of how and whether messaging services should be used for government business practices, after finding widespread and potentially dangerous use of private email, WhatsApp and other messaging tools by officials at the Department of Health and Social Care (DHSC).…

Unless you're Hunter Biden, that compromising pic isn't real Cybercriminals are taking an old trick to newer places: Twitter and Discord.…

But first, there's a whole lot of AD and Intune prep to be done Microsoft's promised service to enable automatic patching of Windows has gone live.…

Partnership with Tencent is the latest sign automaker sees Middle Kingdom innovation as key to its success Autonomous driving research in China is getting a boost from Mercedes-Benz and Tencent, who on Monday announced a partnership that will include construction of a joint autonomous driving research lab. …

But Kingsoft has admitted to blocking access to some material and Chinese creative types are worried Chinese productivity software vendor Kingsoft has denied that it deletes documents that contain content that might displease Beijing.…

Tesla chief seemingly responds with ... a Chuck Norris meme that shows all the brilliance of the CEO mindset Twitter has fired back at Elon Musk's allegations the microblogging network is in breach of its agreement to be acquired, claiming the billionaire is the one at fault and vowing to see the deal through to a conclusion.…

When identity thieves strike your identity theft monitor Experian customers are reportedly at risk of having their accounts hijacked by fraudsters who only need a victim's personal information and a different email address to recreate an account in their name.…

Decades in the making, billions of dollars, all so we can say together: My god, it's full of stars! Pic On Monday, NASA released its first image from the James Webb Space Telescope, or JWST, providing the sharpest and deepest glimpse yet of distant galaxies from the very early universe.…

ACLU hits back at 'unprecedented power grab' San Francisco lawmakers are mulling a proposed law that would allow police to use private security cameras – think: those in residential doorbells, medical clinics, and retail shops – in real time for surveillance purposes.…

x86 giant wants to manufacture more of the world’s chips, regardless of whether it designs them Intel wants to build a contract chip manufacturing business that will rival Asian foundry giants TSMC and Samsung, so the x86 giant has been hiring away executives and senior employees from competing chipmakers with the goal of manufacturing a larger share of the world's chips.…

Don't believe everything you read on the internet Meta has open-sourced a machine-learning resource that could one day supplant Wikipedia as the world's biggest publicly available knowledge-verification database.…

No biggie, it was only supposed to help fund a big manufacturing expansion Analysis Intel's ambitious plan to become the leading chip manufacturer again has hit another speed bump as the planned initial public offering for its Mobileye business has been postponed.…

Former Aerojet Rocketdyne employee cites failure to meet minimums for NASA, Pentagon Aerojet Rocketdyne, which makes propulsion and power systems for launch vehicles, missiles and satellites for NASA and the US military, has agreed to pay $9 million to settle charges it misrepresented its products' compliance with cybersecurity requirements in federal government contracts.…

Chip giant takes an add Hock approach Updated Broadcom CEO Hock Tan will personally oversee his company’s burgeoning software portfolio following the departure of Thomas Krause, the masterminded behind the $61 billion VMware acquisition, later this week.…

Adding assumptions about objects better than learning from scratch, claims researcher DeepMind has looked to developmental psychology to help AI gain a basic understanding of the physical world.…

Telco giant chosen to lead 6G-ANNA, a German-funded project to drive 6G research, standardization Nokia is leading 6G-ANNA, a German-funded project intended to drive research and standardization efforts into 6G network technology.…

Difficult to detect, hiding its window by using the ShowWindow function in Windows A new ransomware family is being delivered as a bogus Google Software Update, using Microsoft functionality as part of its attack.…

What the powers that be have disabled in the BIOS, you must enable once more Lenovo's laptops caused a disturbance last week after a security engineer found himself unable to boot up a copy of Linux due to restrictions that are apparently insisted upon by Microsoft.…

Operating profit crashed 28% in Big Red's fiscal 2022 Oracle executives are reportedly eyeing up a $1 billion cost reduction program that includes revamping the organization and making thousands of employees redundant.…

Windows Phone is dead, long live Windows on a Phone More progress is being made in the effort to get Windows 11 running on Microsoft's Surface Duo smartphone.…

Tech expected to provide coverage anywhere and everywhere, but smartphones are not yet compatible Wireless chipmaker Qualcomm is working with Ericsson and Thales on technology that could deliver a 5G telecommunications service from low Earth orbit satellites.…

PC market is resting, not dead despite Shanghai lockdown, fears of global recession A combination of factors including lockdowns, geopolitical tensions and falling discretionary household spending trashed PC demand in calendar Q2, forcing the market to shrink by double digits.…

Biden blacklist a stumbling block for any possible deal US security technology provider L3Harris has courted controversial Israeli spyware firm NSO with an aim to buy it, according to reports.…

Only a short-term solution to prevent the OS interfering with email results Microsoft has identified Windows Indexing as the culprit for broken Outlook Search results in Windows 11.…

Google gets its way after meeting with internet company and Korea Communications Commission Kakao has backed down from what appeared to be a standoff with Google regarding external payment methods following the suspension of updates to its popular messaging app KakaoTalk this month.…

The OS Formerly Known As Raspbian isn't just for the diminutive computer The Raspberry Pi Foundation has updated its lightweight Linux for 32-bit PCs.…

Just because it's Microsoft doesn't mean it's wrong Opinion If the soap opera of Microsoft's relationship with open source had a theme tune, it'd be "The Long and Winding Goad".…

That time Exchange said "it's a fair cop, guv" before the disks tumbled down the stairs Who, Me? The long arm of the law is unexpectedly severed by the antics of Microsoft Exchange this week as another reader explains why some of Her Majesty's finest were once bereft of festive email. Welcome to Who, Me?…

US and Swiss companies to receive 'significant' French investment While the US continues to debate how and whether to subsidize its semiconductor manufacturing industry, one of its leading lights – GlobalFoundries – has announced a joint venture to build a wafer fab with Swiss concern STMicroelectronics and "significant financial support from the State of France".…

Staff told to tell cops that the IT team was in San Francisco, asleep, and couldn't restore systems A data leak from ride-sharing app Uber revealed activities allegedly geared to avoid regulation and law enforcement – including a "kill switch" that would remotely cut computer access to servers at its headquarters in San Francisco in case of a raid – according to weekend media.…

Working outside power blocs, without policy, leaves Blighty a likely rule-taker says Foreign Affairs Committee The UK's response to China's well-publicized efforts to use technology standards to shape the world in its image has been "incoherent and muted" according to report by the House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee.…

Claims he got less access to data than paying customers and was forced to endure the indignity of a PDF A dispute over API rate limits lies at the heart of Elon Musk’s decision to bail out of his planned acquisition of Twitter.…

Plus: Chinese chips supported in key management spec; Singapore/UK digital services pact; Fujitsu's vision for oldies; and more Asia In Brief Australia's government has scrapped an app that had been intended to replace paperwork for incoming visitors to the country.…

Record-breaking dump thanks to password-less Kibana endpoint? Details have emerged on how more than a billion personal records were stolen in China and put up for sale on the dark web, and it all boils down to a unprotected online dashboard that left the data open to anyone who could find it.…

Regardless, we're looking forward to a shake-up in server architecture Compute express link (CXL) is often touted as the holy grail of composable infrastructure for its ability to disaggregate system memory from the processor. With the first compatible processors just months away, one has to wonder: what will happen to the likes of GigaIO, Fungible, or Liqid when CXL finally arrives?…