OpenAI launched GPT-5.6-Cyber, an "offense-grade" hacking model, days after pausing Astra for nearing "Critical" cyber capability.

Apple's iPhone Fold is expected to cost at least $500 more than Samsung's Galaxy Z Fold 8. Here's what that gets you.

Silicon Valley’s new obsession with “taste” reveals something every leader needs to understand about where competitive advantage is heading. Aug 15, 2026 Jony Ive. When New Yorker staff writer Kyle Chayka asked this spring why tech leaders have become obsessed with “taste,” he was naming a tension that’s been building inside AI trends for the past two years. The term has become Silicon Valley’s newest cliché, with technologist Paul Graham posting that “in the AI age, taste will become even more

The $60 billion acquisition has been finalized.

"0/10... Useless for perverts." Meta has opened Pandora’s box with its AI-infused smart sunglasses. The pricy accessory has sparked a heated debate over privacy, with unsavory individuals abusing the eyewear’s easily-missed cameras to harass unsuspecting strangers in public — garnering the specs the distinctly unflattering nickname of “pervert glasses.” It’s gotten to the point that owners who shelled out hundreds of dollars for a pair have become too afraid to wear them in public. Meanwhile,

"F*ck everything about this." For certain BMW owners, enormous car payments aren’t the only rude reminder that they don’t actually own their ride yet: now, irritating in-vehicle commercials will send them the same message. Starting last week, the German automaker started blasting a promotion for the new Spider-Man movie into its customers’ cars without warning — because nothing says riding in luxury like a full-vehicle pop-up ad. BMW, showing that it was about as in-touch as its drivers are

Whatever you say, boss. Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei apparently can’t believe that not everyone at the company is as noble-minded as he is. According to new reporting from Axios, which cites a source familiar with the matter, Amodei is concerned that the new hires at the $965 billion AI firm are joining for the money instead of its greater mission. Shocker, right? Anthropic pays some of the best salaries in the business, and now Amodei fears it’s becoming a victim of its own success. Being the

"People will literally sell their soul and their planet down the river for a nice free hotel room." OpenAI’s attempt to boost its image by hiring influencers collided against a harsh reality: that it’s already become a fundamentally uncool company. The Verge details how influencers recruited by the ChatGPT maker were flown out to its “first ever brand trip” at a nature retreat outside New York City. But rather than creating buzz for OpenAI, gaining widespread attention, or at least showcasing

"It was determined that meeting the project purpose and completely avoiding water resources was not feasible." Residents of Fort Wayne, Indiana may have to say goodbye to over four acres of federally protected wetland — at least if Google has its way. New reporting by local publication WANE revealed that a company called Hatchworks LLC, a data center developer for the tech giant, is looking to fill in several acres of federal wetlands as part of the third phase of “Project Zodiac,” a $2 billion

Just what the doctor ordered. Roku is giving the masses what they never asked for: an unending conveyor belt of AI slop. Those exploring the mines of the free channels that Roku has to offer — yes, there are people that actually tune in to them — may have noticed a new one called “Fairground AI,” which was quietly added earlier this week and spotted by Cord Cutters News. It broadcasts AI-generated abominations 24 hours a day, seven days a week. The only interruption to this slop flow state are

It's not nearly as hard to contain them as the companies make it out to be. Last month, OpenAI made a headline-generating claim: that a group of its AI models had conspired to break free, access the internet, and hack into the internal systems of open source AI platform Hugging Face, which confirmed the infiltration. The incident rattled the tech industry, seemingly illustrating how the threat of AI models turning into rogue cybersecurity threats had become a reality. Months earlier, Anthropic’s

We did see that coming. Meta was paying out-and-out neo-Nazis to post on Facebook, an investigation from Australia’s ABC News found. These pages and individual creators posted content that appeared to be in clear violation of Facebook’s own hate speech policies. Nonetheless, they were able to earn money on their posts through the platform’s “Content Monetization” program — which is invitation-only. One receiving payouts from Meta was Hugo Lennon, a known far-right agitator and white nationalist

The tech industry is showing no signs of slowing down. The amount of pollution spilling out of fossil-fuel generators is astounding. In the United States, this explosion of emissions is led by states like Texas, which on a global scale is comparable only to China in terms of new infrastructure powered by dead dinosaurs. And as more data centers crop up throughout the US, that problem — of rising emissions linked to the accelerating demand for any kind of electricity — is only going to get worse.

Reddit is looking to fight bots with bots. Reddit has long heavily relied on moderators, a team of volunteers working without pay to keep Reddit communities free of abuse and other nefarious content — with extremely varying degrees of success, earning them a certain reputation. As AI automation continues to come for our jobs, soon even Reddit mods could be made redundant by the tech. As The Verge reports, Reddit is now deploying AI bots to help moderate new subreddits. The suite of new automated

Human guards are a "big burden" on big business. They’re agile, they’re creepy, and they may be coming for human jobs. Robot dogs affixed with AI-integrated cameras are becoming the latest dystopian fixation of the security industry, especially in the US, where they’re being deployed to patrol data centers, safeguard cash crops, and police sports stadiums. Though expensive, they’re gradually becoming a more attractive option over human security guards. At least, that’s according to new reporting

The internet is for AI bots now. If you feel like the internet is turning into a place for bots — not to mention by bots — you’re not alone. Social media platforms have been flooded with low-effort AI slop, while even once renowned publications are doubling down on the tech by outsourcing writing and editing responsibilities to the tech. In June, Cloudflare found that website traffic from AI agents and bots had overtaken human-generated traffic for the first time — even earlier than predicted.

Mr. Populism strikes again. It’s no secret that data centers have become a massive sore point for a vast swathe of the American electorate. Poll after poll has found that the facilities are immensely unpopular, a key bipartisan issue that could prove significant during this year’s midterm elections. The situation has become so heated there have already been at least 37 arrests stemming from protests against the projects this year. Broadly speaking, critics take issue with the sheer amount of

"Every visit, every session, and every moment of attention creates a signal." When you read the newspaper, does it read you back? On Thursday, USA Today Co — formerly known as Gannett, the publisher of its eponymous newspaper USA Today— announced that it was partnering with the AI surveillance firm Palantir to monetize and gain “actionable intelligence” on its audiences, Nieman Lab reports. The largest newspaper publisher in the nation’s partnership was revealed in its second quarter earnings

"They just had absolutely no idea." Turns out there’s one thing AI chatbots are definitively better at than humans: scamming innocent people. A new piece of research flagged by Wired found that large language models are significantly better than humans at pulling off “pig butchering” scams, a form of online investment fraud where criminals pursue fake, long-term relationships with targets in order to build trust before cleaning them out financially. To pull off the study, researchers at

"Go to your parents and ask them: hey, like every time I get a chance to talk to my boss, ask me if I can have more days off." Even as they promise AI will supercharge productivity, tech leaders are sending a clear message: any efficiency gains won’t help individual workers. During a podcast appearance last month, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman said that he doesn’t “expect AI” to lead to a shorter four-hour work week. He argued that workers are “secretly” going to be “happy” about being “much busier” and

Residents were left in the dark for five years. A quiet war is playing out in rural communities across the country. City council meetings are bursting into conflict as local residents try to keep AI data centers out of their backyards. Americans are starting to see through the promises of tech companies and the local politicians they’ve wooed, realizing that the advantages of hosting a resource-hogging data center in the neighborhood are slim. Yet tech giants are finding creative — and sometimes

They were "shocked" by the news and are calling for the company to "immediately end its partnership." Last week, Nieman Lab revealed that USA Today‘s parent company USA Today Co (formerly Gannett) was partnering with AI surveillance firm Palantir to monetize “actionable intelligence” on its audience. According to USA Today CEO Mike Reed, the goal is to “build a common intelligence layer” on reader data to “monetize those relationships faster and at much greater value.” The largest newspaper’s

Terrifying. Last month, the Federal Communications Commission approved an experimental and controversial new satellite being developed by venture Reflect Orbital to reflect sunlight down onto the Earth to illuminate patches of it at night for paying customers. The purported goal is to allow solar farms to continue generating electricity even after nightfall and provide illumination during emergencies. Those may sound like noble ideas on the surface, but the concept comes with major downsides as