Latest News
Last updated 19 Mar, 05:43 PM
BBC News
Faisal Islam: Iran war is having a dramatic effect on the UK economy - The knock-on effects of the war in the Gulf go beyond a hold on interest rates and are set to reverberate for months.
Are US and Israel aligned on Iran war? Deciphering Trump's post after gas field attacks - What does Trump's Truth Social post after gas field attacks tell us about US-Israeli alignment?
King opens world's longest coastal path around England - The King Charles coastal path will allow walkers right of access to the entire coast for the first time.
Stay at home advice questioned and rules too tough - key findings from Covid report - An NHS close to collapse, patients failed and NHS staff put at risk - what you need to know.
US messageboard 4Chan mocks £520,000 fine for UK online safety breaches - The fine includes £450,000 for lack of age checks to prevent children from seeing pornography.
The Register
Fiber on the surface of the moon could help detect moonquakes - Better than seismometers? Fiber-optic cables could be used to detect moonquakes, offering a simpler way to gather seismic data to support future missions.…
GNOME 50 debuts with X11 axed, Wayland front and center - Most Ubuntu desktop users will be looking at this until at least 2028 GNOME 50 is here, codenamed Tokyo after the location of the GNOME Asia Summit 2025, and the biggest change is in fact more or less invisible, unless you look for an options button on the login screen.…
FBI director leaves open the possibility that it's buying location data again - Kash Patel says the FBI uses all the tools it has to accomplish its mission - even if those tools are questionable It's been three years since an FBI director admitted to purchasing the location data of Americans, potentially in violation of the Constitution. Here we go again.…
Lock down Microsoft Intune, feds warn after Stryker attack - Iran-linked attackers wiped employees' devices using Intune The US government has urged companies to better secure Microsoft Intune, an endpoint management tool that was abused in last week's cyberattack against med-tech firm Stryker.…
PwC will say goodbye to staff who aren't convinced about AI - Professional services giant did not read its own report on lackluster benefits You'll use AI and like it too - if you work for PwC. Paul Griggs, US chief executive of the global professional services giant, has made clear there is no room at the corporation for AI skeptics.…
New Scientist - Home
Mathematician wins 2026 Abel prize for solving 60-year-old mystery - Gerd Faltings shocked mathematicians around the world for his 1983 proof of the Mordell conjecture, which brought together seemingly disparate mathematical fields
Physicists create formula for how many times you can fold a crêpe - When you fold a flexible material such as a pancake or a tortilla, its behaviour depends on a competition between gravity and elasticity
Fluorescent ruby-like gems have been found on Mars for the first time - The Perseverance rover has found tiny crystals that seem to be rubies or sapphires inside pebbles on Mars, where they have never been seen before
How worried should you be about ultra-processed foods? - We are constantly told to watch out for the health risks of eating ultra-processed food, but should you be worried every time you sit down for a meal? Sam Wong takes a look at the evidence
It's time to monetise the moon! Definitely! Maybe? - Feedback discovers an accounting firm has unveiled its latest "lunar market assessment", which predicts huge profits to be had. Suit up, lunar entrepreneurs!
Hacker News
Astral to Join OpenAI - Comments
Show HN: Three new Kitten TTS models – smallest less than 25MB - Comments
OpenBSD: PF queues break the 4 Gbps barrier - Comments
Juggalo Makeup Blocks Facial Recognition Technology (2019) - Comments
World Happiness Report 2026 - Comments
Slashdot
OpenAI Acquires Developer Tooling Startup Astral - OpenAI announced it's acquiring developer tooling startup Astral to strengthen its Codex AI coding assistant, which has over 2 million weekly users and has seen a three-fold increase in user growth since the start of the year. CNBC reports: "Through it all, though, our goal remains the same: to make programming more productive. To build tools that radically change what it feels like to build software," Astral's founder and CEO Charlie Marsh wrote in a blog post. The company's acquisition of Astral is still subject to customary closing conditions, including regulatory approval. Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Walmart Wins Patents To Give Algorithms More Sway Over Prices - Walmart has secured patents for systems that use machine learning to forecast demand and automate pricing decisions, "pushing the U.S. retail behemoth into a debate over the use of algorithms to adjust product costs," reports the Financial Times. From the report: In January Walmart obtained a U.S. patent for a "system and method for dynamically and automatically updating item prices" to carry out markdowns in its ecommerce unit, a rapidly growing division that generated more than $150 billion in sales last year. Last week it received another patent for using machine learning to predict demand and recommend prices for goods. [...] Walmart said that both patents were "unrelated to dynamic pricing," as the patent issued in January was specific to markdowns and last week's patent was designed for merchant teams to make decisions, not the technology. The patent granted in January involves an "end-to-end price markdown system" for ecommerce platforms such as Walmart.com based on data including predicted demand and consumers' price sensitivity. Last week's approved patent outlines ways to forecast demand and set prices at levels that will move stock over periods such as a week, a month or a quarter. "Example categories may include, for example, a food item, outdoor equipment, clothing, housewares, toys, workout equipment, vegetables, spices," according to the filing. The "demand forecasting and price recommendation" tool envisaged in the patent would incorporate sources including purchases, prices, methods of payment and customer ID, such as a passport or driver's license number. "Dynamic pricing or anything that smells like it is playing with fire," said Matt Hamory, a grocery industry consultant at AlixPartners, who cited "the goodwill that you can lose by getting customers to think or suspect or worry even slightly that you are doing things with pricing that are to your benefit and their detriment." Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Microsoft Considers Legal Action Over $50 Billion Amazon-OpenAI Cloud Deal - An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: Microsoft is considering legal action against its partner OpenAI and Amazon over a $50 billion deal that could violate its exclusive cloud agreement with the ChatGPT maker, the Financial Times reported on Wednesday. Last month, Amazon and OpenAI signed several agreements, including one that makes Amazon Web Services the exclusive third-party cloud provider for Frontier, OpenAI's enterprise platform for building and running AI agents. The dispute centers on whether OpenAI can offer Frontier via AWS without violating the Microsoft partnership, which requires the startup's models to be accessed through the Windows maker's Azure cloud platform, the FT report said, citing sources. OpenAI and Microsoft recently stated together that "Azure remains the exclusive cloud provider of stateless OpenAI APIs," a Microsoft spokesperson said in an emailed statement, referring to software interfaces used to access OpenAI's models. "We are confident that OpenAI understands and respects the importance of living up to this legal obligation," the spokesperson added. FT said Microsoft executives believed the approach was not feasible and would violate the spirit, if not the letter, of their agreement, and added that the companies were in talks to resolve the dispute without litigation ahead of Frontier's launch. "We know our contract," a person familiar with Microsoft's position told the newspaper. "We will sue them if they breach it. If Amazon and OpenAI want to take a bet on the creativity of their contractual lawyers, I would back us, not them." Read more of this story at Slashdot.
iPhone Exploit DarkSword Steals Data In Minutes With No Trace - BrianFagioli writes: A new iOS exploit chain called DarkSword shows how attackers can break into certain iPhones, grab sensitive data like messages, credentials, and even crypto wallets, and then disappear without leaving obvious traces. It targets older iOS 18 builds using Safari and WebGPU flaws to escape Apple's sandbox, which is pretty wild on its own, but what really stands out is how fast it works and how financially motivated these attacks have become. The takeaway is simple but important, update your iPhone ASAP and don't assume mobile devices are somehow safer than desktops anymore. Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Pardoned Nikola Fraudster Is Raising Funds For AI-Powered Planes He Claims Will Reshape Aviation - Trevor Milton, the pardoned founder of Nikola, is seeking $1 billion for AI-powered autonomous planes through a new venture called SyberJet. The Tech Buzz reports: "Autonomous planes will be 10 times harder than Nikola ever was," Milton told the Wall Street Journal in a rare interview. It's a remarkable admission from someone whose last venture collapsed under the weight of securities fraud charges after he overstated the capabilities of Nikola's electric and hydrogen-powered trucks. Milton was convicted in 2022 on three counts of fraud for misleading investors about Nikola's technology, including staging a video that made it appear a truck prototype was driving under its own power when it was actually rolling downhill. The conviction sent him to prison and turned Nikola into a cautionary tale about startup hype culture. His pardon, which came earlier this year, sparked immediate controversy in venture capital and legal circles. Now he's betting that AI and autonomous aviation represent a clean slate. SyberJet appears focused on developing artificial intelligence systems capable of piloting aircraft without human intervention - a technical challenge that's stumped even well-funded players like Boeing and Airbus. [...] Milton hasn't detailed SyberJet's technical approach or revealed who's backing the venture. The company's website remains sparse, and aviation industry sources say they haven't seen concrete demonstrations of the technology. That opacity echoes the early days of Nikola, when Milton made sweeping claims about revolutionary trucks that existed mostly in renderings and promotional videos. If you need a quick refresher on the Nikola saga, here's a timeline of key events: June, 2016: Nikola Motor Receives Over 7,000 Preorders Worth Over $2.3 Billion For Its Electric Truck December, 2016: Nikola Motor Company Reveals Hydrogen Fuel Cell Truck With Range of 1,200 Miles February, 2020: Nikola Motors Unveils Hybrid Fuel-Cell Concept Truck With 600-Mile Range June, 2020: Nikola Founder Exaggerated the Capability of His Debut Truck September, 2020: Nikola Motors Accused of Massive Fraud, Ocean of Lies September, 2020: Nikola Admits Prototype Was Rolling Downhill In Promo Video September, 2020: Nikola Founder Trevor Milton Steps Down as Chairman in Battle With Short Seller October, 2020: Nikola Stock Falls 14 Percent After CEO Downplays Badger Truck Plans November, 2020: Nikola Stock Plunges As Company Cancels Badger Pickup Truck July, 2021: Nikola Founder Trevor Milton Indicted on Three Counts of Fraud December, 2021: EV Startup Nikola Agrees To $125 Million Settlement September, 2022: Nikola Founder Lied To Investors About Tech, Prosecutor Says in Fraud Trial Read more of this story at Slashdot.