Latest News
Last updated 03 Apr, 08:59 AM
BBC News
Artemis II leaves Earth's orbit on track for far side of the Moon - The mission's last, big push on its lunar journey takes humans out of the Earth's orbit for the first time since 1972.
'Trust us, you look amazing': Artemis II astronauts speak from space - The crew on board the Artemis II spoke by video link, sharing messages for their families and experiences of the trip so far.
M&S boss calls for more action on crime and abuse of staff - Thinus Keeve's comments come days after an M&S store was targeted during disorder in south London.
Trump removes US Attorney General Pam Bondi - Bondi's time as top US law enforcement officer was overshadowed by her handling of the Epstein files.
Crisis staff found 'unforgivable scene' at convicted undertaker's funeral home - An international crisis team was drafted in after police raided Hull's Legacy funeral home.
The Register
Contractor quaffed his way through Y2K compliance while the client scowled - Discovered once last bug, and that briefcases can hold more beer than you might imagine On Call Y2k Easter means today is a holiday in much of the Reg-reading world, but that won't stop us from delivering another instalment of On Call – the reader contributed column that shares your tech support stories.…
AI models will deceive you to save their own kind - Researchers find leading frontier models all exhibit peer preservation behavior Leading AI models will lie to preserve their own kind, according to researchers behind a study from the Berkeley Center for Responsible Decentralized Intelligence (RDI).…
Google battles Chinese open-weights models with Gemma 4 - Now with a more permissive license, multi-modality, and support for more than 140 languages Google on Thursday unleashed a wave of new open-weights Gemma models optimized for agentic AI and coding, under a more permissive Apache 2.0 license aimed at winning over enterprises.…
Microsoft shivs OpenAI with three new AI models for speech and images - About that partnership... Microsoft on Thursday unveiled public preview versions of three home-baked machine learning models focused on speech recognition, speech synthesis, and image generation.…
US military contractor open sources tool for validating hidden communications networks - Maude-HCS from RTX (formerly Raytheon) helps model and validate hidden communication systems A software toolkit built for DARPA to test and validate covert communication networks is now open source, and it could help orgs who want to experiment with new kinds of secure, anonymous communications tools. …
New Scientist - Home
Surprise fossil discoveries push back the evolution of complex animals - A fossil bed in China containing animals up to 554 million years old suggests that we may have to reconsider the idea that life suddenly diversified during the Cambrian explosion
Bumblebees surprise scientists by showing a sense of rhythm - Recognising rhythmic patterns was thought to require a big brain, but a series of experiments has shown that buff-tailed bumblebees have this ability, too
Unprecedented insight into memory champion's brain reveals his tricks - Nelson Dellis credits techniques like the method of loci for his extraordinary memory. Now, brain scans have revealed the parts of his brain that this approach taps into, and how we can use it to improve our own recall
We may have just glimpsed the universe's first stars - A galaxy spotted by the James Webb Space Telescope, known as Hebe, that existed just 400 million years after the big bang appears to contain extremely pure and young stars
I have been bitten by more than 200 snakes – on purpose - If you are unlucky enough to have been bitten by a snake, you are unlikely to want to repeat the experience. Not so for Tim Friede, who intentionally exposes himself to deadly bites in the hope of developing a treatment for the 5 million people who are bitten each year
Hacker News
Google releases Gemma 4 open models - Comments
Decisions that eroded trust in Azure – by a former Azure Core engineer - Comments
The True Shape of Io's Steeple Mountain - Comments
ESP32-S31: 320MHz 2C RV32IMAFCP+CLIC, 512KB SRAM, GbE, 802.11ax, 61 GPIO - Comments
Tailscale's new macOS home - Comments
Slashdot
Renewables Reached Nearly 50% of Global Electricity Capacity Last Year - Renewables made up nearly half of global installed electricity capacity by the end of 2025, "accounting for 85.6% of global capacity expansion," reports the Register, citing the International Renewable Energy Agency's (IRENA) 2026 Renewable Capacity Statistics report. "Per IRENA's data, that aforementioned 85.6 percent share of new power capacity additions was actually a decrease from 2024, when renewables were about 92 percent of global capacity additions. Yes, the share of total installed power capacity in 2025 rose again, but non-renewable capacity additions also rebounded sharply last year." From the report: Solar, in turn, was the dominant renewable technology, accounting for nearly three-quarters of last year's renewable capacity additions. Those additions totaled 692 GW in 2025, lifting installed renewable capacity by a record 15.5 percent year over year, IRENA noted. By the end of last year, renewables accounted for 49.4 percent of global installed electricity capacity, while variable renewable sources such as solar and wind represented roughly 35 percent of total capacity. For reference, it was only in 2023 that renewable energy sources crossed the threshold of generating 30 percent of the world's electricity. Read more of this story at Slashdot.
EPA Flags Microplastics, Pharmaceuticals As Contaminants In Drinking Water - An anonymous reader quotes a report from NPR: Responding to public health concerns about microplastics and pharmaceuticals in the nation's drinking water, the Trump administration for the first time has placed them on a draft list of contaminants maintained by the Environmental Protection Agency. The EPA announced the move Thursday, touting it as a "historic step" for the Make America Healthy Again, or MAHA, movement, which often raises concerns about toxic chemicals and plastic pollution in our food and environment. Also Thursday, the Department of Health and Human Services announced a $144 million initiative, called STOMP, to develop tools to measure and monitor microplastics in drinking water and in a later stage, to remove them. The Safe Drinking Water Act requires the EPA to publish an updated version of its Contaminant Candidate List every five years. This is the sixth iteration of the list. Microplastics and pharmaceuticals appear in the draft of the upcoming list, alongside per- and polyfluoroalkyl substances, or PFAS, and dozens of other chemicals and microbes. Their inclusion on the list gives local regulators a tool to evaluate risks in their water supply, the EPA says, and it can set the stage for more research and regulatory action -- but doesn't actually guarantee that will happen. Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Mount Everest Climbers 'Poisoned' By Guides In Insurance Fraud Scheme - schwit1 shares a report from the Kathmandu Post: In Nepal, helicopter rescue on high altitude is, by any measure, a genuine lifesaving operation. At high altitude, where oxygen thins and weather changes without warning, the ability to airlift a stricken trekker to Kathmandu within hours has saved countless lives. But threaded through that legitimate system, exploiting its urgency, its opacity, and its distance from oversight, is one of the most sophisticated insurance fraud networks in the world. Nepal's fake rescue scam is not new. The Kathmandu Post first exposed it in 2018. Months later, the government convened a fact-finding committee, produced a 700-page report, and announced reforms. In February 2019, The Kathmandu Post published a long investigative report. Last year, Nepal Police's Central Investigation Bureau reopened the file, and what they found is that the fraud did not stop -- instead it was growing. The mechanics of the fake rescue racket are straightforward: stage a medical emergency, call in a helicopter, check a tourist into a hospital, and file an insurance claim that bears little resemblance to what actually happened. But the sophistication lies in how each link in the chain is compensated, and how difficult it is for a foreign insurer -- operating from Australia and the United Kingdom -- to verify events that occurred at 3,000 metres in a remote Himalayan valley. The CIB investigation identifies two primary methods for manufacturing an "emergency." The first involves tourists who simply don't want to walk back. After completing a demanding trek -- an Everest Base Camp trek, for instance, can take up to two weeks on foot -- guides offer an alternative: pretend to be sick, and a helicopter will come. The guide handles the rest. The second method is more troubling. At altitudes above 3,000 meters, mild symptoms of altitude sickness are common. Blood oxygen saturation can drop, hands and feet tingle, headaches develop. In most cases, rest, hydration or a gradual descent is all that is needed. But guides and hotel staff, according to the CIB investigation, have been trained to terrify trekkers at precisely this moment. They tell them they are at risk of dying, that only immediate evacuation will save them. In some cases, investigators found that Diamox (Acetazolamide) tablets, used to prevent altitude sickness, were administered alongside excessive water intake to induce the very symptoms that would justify a rescue call. In at least one case cited in the investigation, baking powder was mixed into food to make tourists physically unwell. Once a "rescue" is called, the financial choreography begins. A single helicopter carries multiple passengers. But separate, full-price invoices are submitted to each passenger's insurance company, as if each had their own dedicated flight. A $4,000 charter becomes a $12,000 claim. Fake flight manifests and load sheets are fabricated. At the hospital, medical officers prepare discharge summaries using the digital signatures of senior doctors who were never involved in the case. In some cases, these are done without those doctors' knowledge. Fake admission records are created for tourists who were, in some documented instances, drinking beer in the hospital cafeteria at the time they were supposedly receiving treatment. In one case, an office assistant at Shreedhi Hospital admitted that he had provided his own X-ray report taken about a year ago at a different hospital, to be used as a case for treatment of foreign trekkers to claim insurance. The commission structure that holds the network together was described in detail during police interrogations. Hospitals pay 20 to 25 percent of the insurance payment to trekking companies and a further 20 to 25 percent to helicopter rescue operators in exchange for patient referrals. Trekking guides and their companies benefit from inflated invoices. In some cases, tourists themselves are offered cash incentives to participate. Read more of this story at Slashdot.
OpenAI Acquires Popular Tech-Industry Talk Show TBPN - OpenAI is acquiring tech news podcast TBPN, a fast-growing daily show hosted by John Coogan and Jordi Hays. OpenAI says TBPN will keep its editorial independence, even though the acquisition is widely viewed as part of a broader effort to influence public discourse around AI. CNBC reports: In the announcement, OpenAI CEO of AGI Deployment Fidji Simo wrote that their mission of bringing artificial general intelligence comes with a responsibility to have a space for "constructive conversation about the changes AI creates." Altman has appeared on TBPN multiple times and is a frequent presence across media and podcasts, even hitting NBC's "Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon" in December. The announcement says TBPN will maintain editorial independence and continue to choose its own guests. "TBPN is my favorite tech show. We want them to keep that going and for them to do what they do so well," Altman wrote in a post on X. "I don't expect them to go any easier on us, am sure I'll do my part to help enable that with occasional stupid decisions." OpenAI did not disclose the terms of the deal but said TBPN will be housed within its strategy organization. "While we've been critical of the industry at times, after getting to know Sam and the OpenAI team, what stood out most was their openness to feedback and commitment to getting this right," wrote Hays in a statement. "Moving from commentary to real impact in how this technology is distributed and understood globally is incredibly important to us." Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Amazon Imposes 3.5% Fuel Surcharge For Many Online Merchants - An anonymous reader quotes a report from Bloomberg: Amazon will start charging sellers who use its shipping services a 3.5% "fuel and logistics" surcharge later this month, joining the ranks of shipping companies raising prices as the war in Iran pushes oil prices higher. The fees take effect on April 17 for customers of the company's Fulfillment by Amazon service -- which is used by many of the independent sellers who list their products on Amazon's retail sites -- in the US and Canada. Items shipped by Amazon on behalf of merchants who sell on their own sites or at other retailers will carry the surcharge beginning May 2. "Elevated costs in fuel and logistics have increased the cost of operating across the industry," Ashley Vanicek, an Amazon spokesperson, said on Thursday. "We have absorbed these increases so far, but similar to other major carriers, when costs remain elevated we implement temporary surcharges to partially recover these costs." Vanicek notes that the fee will apply to the sum Amazon charges to ship an item, not the product's sale price. Last month, USPS announced that it would impose its first-ever fuel surcharge on packages. Read more of this story at Slashdot.