The Register

Our model took mere hours to suggest 40,000 potentially lethal compounds, says startup AI algorithms designed to generate therapeutic drugs can be easily repurposed to invent lethal biochemical weapons, a US startup has warned.…

As some nations turn a blind eye, defense becomes life-or-death matter With not just ransomware gangs raiding network after network, but nation states consciously turning a blind eye to it, today's chief information security officers are caught in a "perfect storm," says Cybereason CSO Sam Curry.…

Scammers exploit global supply-chain crunch Counterfeiters are making the most of the ongoing electronics supply crunch by peddling sham semiconductors to desperate buyers – and it's caught the attention of governments.…

Database dump accessible via the OData protocol, but software giant says it's working as intended A website for SAP's Customer Influence programs is exposing member data, creating the possibility for targeted social-engineering attacks.…

Won't reveal how much of that is actually being spent on data centers, though Amazon Web Services claims it is to invest upwards of £1.8bn ($2.36bn) over the next two years in building and operating data centers in the UK, meet the ever growing demand for cloudy tech.…

Procurement comes as Manchester City Council looks for SAP next steps Greater Manchester Combined Authority has launched a £31m tender to find a single supplier to provide a software-as-a-service HR system for all its member and partner organizations.…

Don't fret, we're just having a technical Something for the Weekend? Please accept our apologies. We had a technical which slowed down our response times.…

DNS means Do Not Shove under desk On Call Welcome to a continent-trotting edition of On Call, in which a Register reader takes a trip to sunnier climes only to be let down by a clown in windswept Blighty.…

A reminder: ML absolutely wipes the floor with humans at ancient game The Chinese Go Association – the body that oversees professional and high-level amateur play of the board game – has suspended a player for apparently using artificial intelligence during a tournament.…

Using tiny samples, too, a claim we're sure you haven't heard before Could the light detection and ranging (lidar) sensors in your future smartphone take the place of laboratory equipment in health and food safety applications? It's looking like a possibility.…

Xi's vision for once-in-a-lifetime transformation includes singular identity cards, shared data, and huge clouds China's president Xi Jinping has declared "there can be no modernization without informatization,” and outlined a strategy for how the world's most populous nation will use information technology to transform society and government.…

The mid-range A-Series matches top-end models for software updates Samsung has updated its Galaxy A smartphone range – a midrange collection of handsets that quietly outsells its premium Galaxy S series and is one of just three non-iPhone units to crack top ten global sales charts.…

Silicon engineers, you are now in the PRIME of your life Googlers and UC Berkeley academics say they have devised a way to use artificial intelligence to design faster and smaller chips that accelerate artificial intelligence.…

Watchdog claims Facebook parent sat on its hands as fake ads fleeced netizens The Australian Competition & Consumer Commission (ACCC) has filed suit against The Artist Formerly Known As Facebook over its publication of ads allegedly featuring celebrities peddling a supposedly surefire-route to cryptocurrency riches.…

Package used by big apps now drops anti-war text files on desktops The developer of JavaScript library node-ipc, which is used by the popular vue.js framework, deliberately introduced a critical security vulnerability that, for some netizens, would destroy their computers' files.…

Strap in for a wild ride of forks, trademarks, and licensing Last year, the Graph Foundation had to rethink how it develops and distributes its Open Native Graph Database (ONgDB) after it settled a trademark and copyright claim by database biz Neo4j.…

Get ready for machine-made decisions, whether you're shopping, banking, reading, working Corporate funding splurged on AI technology is expected to grow to $120bn by 2025 in the US, a yearly increase of 26 percent over the next four financial years, according to IDC.…

Thanks... Micro... soft... OK, there, we said it Microsoft has published a tool that scans for and detects MikroTik-powered Internet-of-Things devices that have been hijacked by the Trickbot gang.…

@zverok asks dev world for support as Russia's invasion of Ukraine continues Interview Victor Shepelev, known as @zverok on Twitter and GitHub, is a Ruby developer and software architect who lives in Kharkiv, Ukraine. Since Russia invaded his country on February 24, 2022, he's had more pressing concerns than writing code, such as keeping his family safe and helping his fellow citizens survive.…

Turns out the internet is a set of tubes after all Microsoft and Finland's largest energy company have partnered to build a new datacenter near Helsinki that will heat homes as it cools servers.…

Bold moves to create a 'semi' literate pool of factory workers Intel plans to spend $100m on improving semiconductor engineering education and research in the US.…

Plus granting powers to undo previous takeovers A pair of law bills before the US House and Senate would give watchdogs stronger powers to block big mergers, and allow regulators to reach back into the past to dismantle previous M&As deemed to be harmful. …

Several companies 'taking action to ensure a level playing field among cloud services providers' in Europe Microsoft is facing an antitrust complaint in Europe from France's OVHcloud.…

ESA will need to source a different rocket, lander, and descent stage in time for next window in 2024 The European Space Agency (ESA) has slammed the brakes on its ExoMars rover, Rosalind Franklin.…

Policy via social media: It's a thing now. Even though Russia won't be able to read it... Chipmaker Qualcomm is the latest tech firm to stop doing business with Russia following the invasion of Ukraine.…

Who benefits from changes to the Partner Network? Well, it's not partners... or even their customers Microsoft has "evolved" its Partner Network, but changing the name to the Microsoft Cloud Partner Program has done little to dispel concerns over the company's New Commerce Experience (NCE).…

Shutdowns in factories put crunch on weakened supply chain Wednesday's 7.3 magnitude earthquake off the coast of Fukushima, Japan, caused the temporary shutdown of some major manufacturers, including chip and component-makers Murata, Renesas and Kioxia, in addition to broader manufacturing companies in the area.…

Tribunal finds evidence of 'irregularly concluded software, support agreements' Global application giant SAP is being ordered to pay South Africa's Department of Water and Sanitation ZAR 345m ($23.1m) after a couple of contracts between the two parties were set aside by the courts.…

Agency signals more actions targeting Chinese companies to come in the name of national security Chinese telco Pacific Networks and its subsidiary ComNet must cease all services within the United States within 60 days from Wednesday March 16 following an order issued by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).…

Homespun companion Linux system distro gets an update, but stays small – and 1.0 Microsoft has released the March-2022 update for CBL-Mariner, but the version number hasn't budged from 1.0.…

Select all images of you being duped into providing your credentials CAPTCHA puzzles, designed to distinguish people from computer code, are being used to separate people from their login credentials.…

Verified third-party tools do not guarantee compliance position Oracle customers can only use its licensing tools after the company has started to talk to them about software audits or offered license advice. Meanwhile, third-party tools that have been verified by Oracle do not help users in terms of license compliance.…

Businesses targeted elderly, made 750,000 calls to people on Telephone Preference System Five British companies are collectively nursing a £405,000 fine from the UK's data watchdog for making a combined total of 750,000 unsolicited marketing calls targeting vulnerable elderly people.…

An accidental glimpse of things to come or somebody hitting the wrong button? Comment Microsoft's hurried backpedal over advertisements in File Explorer has industry watchers concerned.…

The move follows lack of progress in equality and two resignations, campaign group says A group of activist investors is targeting Salesforce in an effort to force the SaaS CRM giant to become the subject of an independent investigation into its practices regarding racial equality.…

Brit rocketeers get ever closer to that first launch from UK soil A space race of a sort in the UK has picked up pace in recent weeks, as aerospace company Orbex showed off its Kinloss launchpad in February and Skyrora this week opened its Midlothian rocket engine testing facility.…

US biz's license to operate in London up for renewal this month Gig workers have urged London Mayor Sadiq Khan to force Uber to pay drivers at least minimum wage as the ride-hailing biz seeks to renew its license to operate in the British capital.…

Hitting big targets, untouchable, technically proficient. Who will it inspire next? Analysis The Lapsus$ cyber-crime gang, believed to be based in Brazil, until recently was best known for attacks on that country's Ministry of Health and Portuguese media outlets SIC Noticias and Expresso.…

When this baby hits 88 GHz, you're going to see some serious stuff AI hardware slinger SambaNova and software biz DeLorean AI have teamed up to provide smart predictive tools to help clinicians hopefully better care for patients suffering kidney problems.…

$10,000 and Efabless may be what you're looking for Interview The likes of Google, Facebook, and Microsoft can design custom chips and have them manufactured using their billions of dollars in the bank.…

If you want your own custom SmartNIC, knock yourself out, says x86 giant Intel is discontinuing its original lineup of Programmable Acceleration Cards as it turns to an "ecosystem first" strategy that helps customers create their own FPGA-based products, including SmartNICs.…

Watchdog demands $500,000 after millions of people's info stolen and sold The FTC wants the former owner of CafePress to cough up $500,000 after the customizable merch bazaar not only tried to cover up a major computer security breach involving millions of netizens, it failed to safeguard customers' personal information.…

Features aimed at industrial, IoT, autonomous needs MathWorks, maker of the long-standing MATLAB suite, is focusing its latest software updates on reaching beyond its traditional scientific base – and eyeing up autonomous vehicle developers, makers of devices with wireless communications, and others.…

BlackBerry says extortionists erase documents if ransom unpaid BlackBerry security researchers have identified a ransomware family targeting English-speaking victims that is capable of erasing all non-system files from infected Windows PCs.…

IBM's Linux distro giant unable to wrestle domain name from owner IBM's Red Hat cannot prevent Daniel Pocock and his Software Freedom Institute SA from using the domain name WeMakeFedora.org, according to a ruling on Monday.…

An all-FOSS, direct-to-binary compiler for the 63-year-old programming language The newly announced gcobol compiler is a fresh front end for GCC, and builds native binary executables.…

Doing all it can to catch up with AWS and Microsoft Azure for enterprise users Google Cloud is joining VMware's Cloud Universal program, the aim being to make it easier for enterprises to migrate VMware-based workloads to the cloud while allowing them to re-use on-premises license investments.…

Even the sharpest of models fail to melt ice or build a circuit Think your AI agents are actually learning to solve problems? A new benchmark sheds light on what is real when it comes to sophisticated AI.…

On a plus side, their code's not very good A new Linux botnet is using the infamous Log4j vulnerability to install rootkits and steal data.…

Mike Burrows exits Chipzilla to lead advanced graphics at Radeon biz Intel has hired a lot of top graphics talent from rival AMD to build out its discrete GPU business, though apparently it's now AMD's turn to take from the semiconductor giant.…