Have We Reached Peak Human Life Span?

The oldest human on record, Jeanne Calment of France, lived to the age of 122. What are the odds that the rest of us get there, too? Not high, barring a transformative medical breakthrough, according to research published this week in the journal Nature Aging. From a report: The study looked at data on life… Read More »

European Govt Air-Gapped Systems Breached Using Custom Malware

An APT hacking group known as GoldenJackal has successfully breached air-gapped government systems in Europe using two custom toolsets to steal sensitive data, like emails, encryption keys, images, archives, and documents. From a report: According to an ESET report, this happened at least two times, one against the embassy of a South Asian country in… Read More »

Ukraine Arrests VPN Operator Facilitating Access to Russian Internet

penciling_in writes: Ukrainian authorities have arrested a 28-year-old man in Khmelnytskyi for running an illegal VPN service that allowed users to bypass Ukrainian sanctions and access the Russian internet (Runet). The VPN, active since Russia’s invasion, enabled Russian sympathizers and people in occupied territories to reach blocked Russian government sites, social media, and news. Handling… Read More »

Former Google Chief Urges AI Investment Over Climate Targets

Former Google CEO Eric Schmidt urged prioritizing AI infrastructure over climate goals at a Washington AI summit this week. Schmidt, who led Google until 2011, argued that AI’s rapid growth will outpace environmental mitigation efforts. “We’re not going to hit the climate goals anyway because we’re not organized to do it,” Schmidt told attendees, addressing… Read More »

The Editors Protecting Wikipedia from AI Hoaxes

A group of Wikipedia editors have formed WikiProject AI Cleanup, “a collaboration to combat the increasing problem of unsourced, poorly-written AI-generated content on Wikipedia.” From a report: The group’s goal is to protect one of the world’s largest repositories of information from the same kind of misleading AI-generated information that has plagued Google search results,… Read More »

Microsoft To Sell Xbox Games Directly Through Android App

Microsoft will offer direct game purchases through its Xbox app for Android starting November, following a U.S. court ruling against Google’s app store monopoly. The move allows Microsoft to circumvent Google’s revenue cut on in-app purchases and signals renewed focus on mobile gaming, bolstered by its recent $75.4 billion Activision Blizzard acquisition. Read more of… Read More »

US Officials Race To Understand Severity of China’s Salt Typhoon Hacks

U.S. officials are racing to understand the full scope of a China-linked hack of major U.S. broadband providers, as concerns mount from members of Congress that the breach could amount to a devastating counterintelligence failure. From a report: Federal authorities and cybersecurity investigators are probing the breaches of Verizon Communications, AT&T and Lumen Technologies. A… Read More »

OpenAI’s GPT Store has Left Some Developers in the Lurch

OpenAI’s GPT Store, launched in January 2024, has failed to deliver on promised revenue-sharing for most small developers. Despite CEO Sam Altman’s earlier statements about paying creators, only a select few have been invited to a pilot program, Wired is reporting. Developers like Josh Brent Villocido, whose Books GPT was featured at launch, remain excluded… Read More »