Filip Baotić/Unsplash “Pics or it didn’t happen” was a thing people used to say online when they wanted to verify a claim. Technology has changed this. We now regularly see a mix of the surreal… Read more: More phones may soon let us prove photos are real – but will it solve the AI fake image crisis?

Suzanne Fritzsche/Getty Images Possums are among New Zealand’s most destructive introduced mammals. They damage native forests, prey on wildlife and remain a major target of the country’s Predator Free 2050 programme. But removing most possums… Read more: Listening to the bush: How AI can help NZ rid its wildnerness of ‘hold-out’ pest possums

A chief information officer I was talking with recently said something that stuck with me: Permissions tell an agent what it’s allowed to do. They say nothing about what you meant. This observation touches on… Read more: Why every AI agent needs an org chart

Abolishing the role of statutory governors is ill-advised, says Jean Flanagan. Plus a letter from Jonathan Phillips on the abolition of Healthwatch I wonder how many members of the public are aware that the latest… Read more: It’s unwise to end local scrutiny of NHS trusts | Letters

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Derek Chadwick, the cofounder of the new gay dating app Goose, has suddenly quit the company after the platform was exposed for tricking men into signing up using fake, AI generated influencers, the magazine Out… Read more: Dating App Cofounder Bails After Scandal Over Using Fake AI-Generated Influencers

Older adults with mild cognitive impairment and sleep problems who took at least 5,000 IU of vitamin D daily scored more than 13% higher on a cognitive test than those taking none. The preliminary findings… Read more: This common vitamin was linked to 13% better cognitive scores

Scientists have developed an ultrathin coating that could dramatically improve how efficiently heat is transferred during condensation. By turning tiny polymer structures once considered “defects” into places where water droplets can form, then helping those… Read more: Scientists turn tiny “defects” into a 5.5x heat transfer boost

A decades-old compound may point to a new way of treating obesity by making the body burn more energy rather than simply reducing appetite. In mice, TOFA increased energy use by as much as 18%,… Read more: Experimental compound helps burn fat without muscle loss

Researchers have used AI to uncover the DNA signature of a key genetic “switch” involved in turning genes on. After analyzing about 500,000 DNA sequences, the model identified the initiator in roughly 60% of human… Read more: A hidden “on switch” in human DNA has finally been decoded

Researchers at CERN have created microscopic versions of the early Universe by colliding surprisingly small atomic nuclei at nearly the speed of light. The collisions produced quark-gluon plasma, the ultra-hot matter believed to have filled… Read more: Physicists create a tiny “Big Bang” with surprisingly small atomic nuclei

Researchers have uncovered a possible reason why the Alzheimer’s risk gene APOE4 can disrupt the brain long before memory problems begin. In mice, APOE4 increased a protein called Nell2, shrinking neurons and making memory circuits… Read more: A major Alzheimer’s risk gene may shrink brain cells years before symptoms

China’s “Manned Space” program issued a terse announcement on Sunday regarding its much-anticipated Chang’e 7 lunar exploration mission. The agency stated: “In keeping with the principle of proceeding prudently and reliably, and ensuring absolute success,… Read more: Due to need for ‘absolute success,’ China delays critical Moon launch to 2027

Earlier this week, Bloomberg reported that pending home sales in the US had dropped to their lowest level in three years. That coincided with a sharp drop in construction of new homes, which plummeted to… Read more: Data Centers Are Sucking Up So Many Construction Workers That There Isn’t Anybody Left to Build Houses, Expert Says

Fears of a datacenter buildout debt crisis are exaggerated. The risks are different than in the past and they are recoverable Some experts are warning of a looming “debt bomb” crisis because big datacenter builders… Read more: An AI ‘debt bomb’ crisis? No. This isn’t Enron 2.0 | Gene Marks

Chris Lehane tells Guardian of need to implement new safety standards as critics say AI firms acting ‘recklessly’ A senior leader at OpenAI has said people should prepare to defend against “ongoing, persistent” cyber-attacks from… Read more: ‘We are hitting a different chapter’: OpenAI leader warns of threat of ‘persistent’ AI cyber-attacks

The first telegram arrived in Singapore on a Monday, sent from the city of Batavia in the Dutch East Indies (now Jakarta, Indonesia). “Terrific detonations from Krakatau (volcanic island),” it reported. Soon afterward: “Stones falling.… Read more: Volcanoes that made history

Earlier this week, the European Central Bank issued a dire warning, warning that a “market correction” following years of AI hype and massive spending could be nigh — a crash that could have enormous international… Read more: Expert on Financial Crises Says the Signs Are Impossible to Miss

The International Civil Aviation Organisation, a specialised UN agency responsible for developing standards, oversight and monitoring, is leading the advancement of the global air traffic management system through the Global Air Navigation Plan. The introduction… Read more: Air traffic control is becoming more automated. Is regulation keeping up?

Honeybee queens exposed to pesticides can shift some of the contamination into their eggs, revealing a previously unknown survival strategy. The process may protect the queen while putting developing offspring, and potentially the entire colony,… Read more: Queen bees have a disturbing way to survive pesticides

A simple yeast-based food supplement may help restore the immune system’s ability to fight cancer, according to new research in mice. Scientists found that yeast beta-glucan reprogrammed early immune cells in the bone marrow, leading… Read more: This yeast supplement may boost cancer-fighting immunity

Astronomers using JWST have discovered that massive early galaxies contain far more small, faint stars than expected. That hidden population could make some of these galaxies three to four times more massive than previous estimates.… Read more: JWST finds early galaxies may be 4 times more massive than thought

Freezing the liquid core of an optical fiber produced an extreme environment where light and sound interact more than 1,000 times more strongly than in ordinary fibers. Researchers used the effect to create optoacoustic memory,… Read more: This frozen fiber makes light and sound interact 1,000x more strongly

People who speak several languages may have brains that age more slowly, with four-language speakers showing brains that appeared about 13 years younger than those of monolinguals. Starting earlier and becoming highly fluent were also… Read more: Multilingual people may have brains up to 13 years younger

Greenland sharks may live for 400 years without suffering the kind of retinal decline normally associated with aging. Researchers found healthy eye tissue and active proteins specially adapted for seeing blue light in the dim… Read more: This shark can live 400 years. Its eyes barely seem to age

Astronomers have found stars that repeatedly skim past supermassive black holes, surviving each encounter while producing a new burst of light. In some systems, those flares mysteriously fade with every return. Researchers now think the… Read more: Black holes keep tearing these stars apart, but they survive

The artificial intelligence industry wants enterprises to measure progress in tokens, model calls and usage. But those are largely vendor-revenue metrics — not enterprise-value metrics. The Canva example shows why. On Aug. 6, The Information reported… Read more: From tokenmaxxing to sovereign alpha: Who controls your AI economics?

Some patients in the UK are skipping going to the doctor because their office’s AI “receptionist” can’t understand what they’re saying. The health and social watchdog Healthwatch Rotherham said that the troublesome AI receptionist in… Read more: Patients Are Skipping Going to the Doctor Because AI “Receptionists” Can’t Understanding What They’re Saying

Elon Musk spent months crusading against Christopher Nolan’s “woke” adaptation of “The Odyssey” before it came out, anticipating that it would bomb at the box office. When that didn’t work and the movie made over… Read more: This Is Probably Not the AI-Generated Version of “The Odyssey” That Elon Musk Was Imagining

Pause for a moment and listen. What do you hear? Chances are, somewhere in the background, is the ever-present hum of a road. More than 4.2 million miles of public roads crisscross the lower 48… Read more: Dismantling the Roadless Rule threatens to disrupt wildlife and water in US

Our leading hypothesis for how our memories are stored is that when you learn something, the connections among neurons involved get stronger and physically larger, and that constitutes the memory. The trouble is that these… Read more: Putting mice into hibernation causes a major loss of synapses

New research gives us a grim portrait of how rampant AI usage is affecting young students’ academic performance and learning. In a study that tracked nearly 27,000 students in China between the ages of 12… Read more: The Results of Middle and High School Students Using AI Are Extremely Ominous

I recently posted a Substack note about Claude’s new watermarking process and implementation. Since it’s such a popular topic and sparked such a lively discussion, I thought it might be interesting to go into a… Read more: How Claude Watermarks AI-Generated Text

Welcome back to the Abstract! These are the studies this week that pottered around, ate well, shone bright, and went long in the tooth. First, scientists identified a Bronze Age tradition of pottery as one… Read more: Brand Hype Has Existed Since the Bronze Age, Scientists Discover

AI is obviously ruining everything on the internet, but so are AI scrapers. They vacuum up everyone’s content up without permission. They put a huge strain on servers. It’s getting rarer and rarer to be… Read more: Devious New Font Turns AI Scrapers Into Mincemeat

Amid a jobs slump, award-winning writers, directors and producers taking on sometimes lucrative temp work teaching AI skills such as screenwriting and production Hollywood creatives are taking gig work to train AI models to replicate… Read more: ‘Digging the grave of my profession’: the Hollywood creatives training AI to do their jobs

It’s clear here in Silicon Valley that AI is advancing faster than humans’ ability to control it. That means even sober prophecies seem optimistic Here in Silicon Valley, the experts think that within the next… Read more: Would even an AI disaster on the scale of Hiroshima be enough to make humankind protect itself? I fear not | Timothy Garton Ash

A new national space transportation policy signed by President Donald Trump on Thursday calls for the development of more spaceports to support more than 1,000 launches and reentries per year by 2030. The presidential memorandum… Read more: Trump’s space transportation policy calls for new spaceport on federal land

Cheap energy, abundant land, and proximity to Beijing have turned a city in Inner Mongolia into a crucial hub for data centers.

Artificial intelligence hardware startup Starcloud Inc. today announced that it has raised $250 million in funding at a $2.3 billion valuation. Investment firm Manhattan West led the deal. It was joined by more than a dozen… Read more: Starcloud raises $250M to build AI data centers in orbit

This week, two New York City renters filed a class action complaint alleging that a brokerage business called Compass—which has been boycotting posting listings on free digital platforms like Zillow—has now delisted so many rental… Read more: Hidden Zillow listings created fake supply shock, raising NYC rents, lawsuit says

Most of what we know about the Earth’s interior comes from observing seismic waves. These travel at somewhat different speeds depending on the details of the rock they’re moving through—whether it’s solid or semi-molten, how… Read more: Thunder + fiber-optic cabling used for seismic imaging

DeepSeek today debuted a new addition to its flagship V4 series of large language models. On launch, V4 Flash Vision Exp is only available via the Chinese startup’s paid developer platform. The company may release… Read more: DeepSeek debuts multimodal language model competitive with Opus 4.8

Logitech is facing a proposed class action lawsuit for not giving customers tariff refunds. In April 2025, Logitech raised the prices on 51 percent of its portfolio, with some prices increasing by as much as… Read more: Lawsuit demands Logitech hand tariff refunds over to customers

Several months ago, Motorola and the makers of GrapheneOS announced a team-up that would expand support for the privacy-centric OS to beyond Google’s Pixel phones. The announcement, however, was bereft of details. Now, the creators… Read more: Motorola’s GrapheneOS phones will launch in 2027 priced higher than Pixels

Some Americans worry that the Federal Trade Commission’s rush to limit personalized pricing in the name of consumer protection could end up killing discounts they depend on or, counterintuitively, raising prices. The FTC has no… Read more: Personalized pricing is “abhorrent,” but FTC limits may increase costs, critics say

This week, Romania accused Russia of sending a drone boat loaded with explosives to a vital European natural gas platform in the Black Sea. A Romanian F-16 fighter jet used its cannons to disable the… Read more: Fighter jets help destroy Russian drone boat near European offshore gas platform

Tesla is facing a massive recall in China today. Chinese regulators are taking a stricter approach to safety, and the automaker now has to add warning labels to 2.98 million Model 3 and Model Y… Read more: Chinese regulators tell Tesla to fix nearly 3 million cars

In theory, the AI industry should have a very attractive story for the public: automate away drudgery and free everyone up to do the things they really love. In practice, they’ve bungled that layup narrative… Read more: The AI Industry Has Fumbled Its Public Image So Badly That It’s Incredible

Waymo reveals custom 5nm AI chips built to process sensor data inside its robotaxis as the company scales its autonomous driving fleet. The post Alphabet’s Waymo Unveils Custom Silicon to Power Its Next-Gen Robotaxis appeared… Read more: Alphabet’s Waymo Unveils Custom Silicon to Power Its Next-Gen Robotaxis

Slack Code gives AI coding agents shared project channels where teams can watch, guide and review software development as it happens. The post Slack Code: AI Coding Agents Get Shared Channels for Review and Oversight… Read more: Slack Code: AI Coding Agents Get Shared Channels for Review and Oversight

Waymo has sharply increased its lobbying spending as it seeks to persuade US regulators to clear a path for fully autonomous taxi services, intensifying its battle with rival Uber over the future of robotaxis. The… Read more: Waymo doubles spending on lobbying in robotaxi battle with Uber

Data centers, of all things, now look like they’re going to be a prime political issue in the midterm elections and beyond. Really? Really. Even the GOP is worried that opposition to AI data centers… Read more: Politics hits data centers, OpenAI falls behind Anthropic and now AI is too big to fail… quietly

This is Behind the Blog, where we share our behind-the-scenes thoughts about how a few of our top stories of the week came together. This week, we discuss three years of 404 Media. JASON: Tomorrow… Read more: Behind the Blog: Early Birthday Reflections

As the backlash against data centers mounts, American political strategists are scrambling to balance immense public sentiment against the facilities with their obligation to big business. In the Republican Party’s Senate campaign arm, a recently… Read more: Leaked Memo Shows Republicans Are Terrified of the Backlash Against AI Data Centers

For banks and regulated enterprises running analytics around the clock, a warehouse recovery measured in days is a business risk. EDB Postgres® AI for WarehousePG brings it down to minutes and lets enterprises keep control over… Read more: EDB Adds Postgres-Proven Disaster Recovery to WarehousePG

Emile Bernard’s ‘Madeleine in the Bois d’Amour’ (1888). Art Media/The Print Collector via Getty Images It’s disconcerting to envision human thought becoming redundant or deemed inferior due to advancements in artificial intelligence. But for all… Read more: The importance of teaching students what AI can’t do

For decades, scientists have puzzled over why certain atomic nuclei unexpectedly produce large numbers of low-energy gamma rays. A new experiment traced the effect to magnetic changes inside the nucleus, where protons and neutrons effectively… Read more: Hidden magnetism inside atoms may explain mysterious gamma rays

Two very different types of quantum particles may be able to form stable droplets that hold themselves together, challenging decades of conventional thinking. The prediction could soon be tested experimentally and may reveal an unexpectedly… Read more: A strange new quantum droplet can hold itself together

Scientists analyzing a 2,200-year-old Roman shipwreck found that its hull was coated with pine tar and, in one area, a mixture of tar and beeswax. Pollen trapped in those ancient coatings acted like a geographic… Read more: 2,200-year-old Roman shipwreck reveals ancient waterproofing secrets

Welcome to Edition 9.07 of the Rocket Report! China’s workhorse Long March rocket family appears to be rebounding quickly from a rare launch failure August 10. Chinese officials have not publicly released any information on… Read more: Rocket Report: SpaceX makes its mark on the Moon; ULA names new boss

Can you tell when someone nearby is wearing Meta AI glasses? As millions of people buy into the smart glasses fad each year, the odds are increasing that you could be secretly recorded while simply… Read more: As demand for Meta AI glasses explodes, it’s harder to avoid creepy recordings

A hormone already known for curbing appetite and supporting weight loss may have a surprising second job: protecting the liver from inflammation and scarring. Researchers at McMaster University found that GDF15 activates a previously unknown… Read more: This weight-loss hormone may protect the liver even without weight loss

Scientists watched a light-triggered hidden state form inside a material in only 30 femtoseconds, revealing a step that had never been seen before. The material first entered a fleeting electronic state in which its bonds… Read more: Scientists catch a hidden electronic state forming in just 30 femtoseconds

Organization taps experienced go-to-market leader to expand partner-led adoption of its AI employees in global organizations Ema, the leading enterprise platform for agentic AI Employees, today announced that Jonathan Feldman has joined the company as… Read more: Ema AI Names Jonathan Feldman as Head of Revenue, Partnerships and Solutions

New offering gives organizations the tools, resources, and infrastructure to support a new generation of AI builders in every department. BlueRock, an agentic operations company that helps enterprises securely deploy and scale AI systems, today… Read more: BlueRock for AI Builders to Help Citizen Developers Across the Enterprise

Leaders from both companies to discuss AI, trust and governance alongside breaking research SAS, a global leader in data and AI, and Amazon Web Services (AWS) will join forces at the AI Enterprise Conference to tackle the… Read more: SAS, AWS bring new insights to AI Enterprise Conference 2026

Cambridge professor Jason Arday was found dead at his home in London on Aug. 14, 2026, days after he resigned from his position amid accusations of plagiarism, which he had denied. Nordin Catic/Getty Images After… Read more: Jason Arday and the new politics of plagiarism

Less than three months to go until the midterms, voters are thinking about grocery prices, the Iran war and… datacentres. This week, Jonathan Freedland speaks to historian Jill Lepore about how this latest AI backlash… Read more: Historian Jill Lepore on why the artificial state is ‘doomed’ | Politics Weekly America

Veeam recognized in the highest category for its strong partner ecosystem, leadership, portfolio competitiveness and market performance Veeam® Software, the Data and AI Trust Company, today announced it has been named a Champion – the highest… Read more: Veeam Named Champion in Omdia’s 2026 Global Backup Leadership Matrix

Exclusive: Planning documents show datacentre in north Ockendon will be incompatible with UK net zero targets A “hyperscale” datacentre in outer London would generate more than 1m tonnes of carbon dioxide a year, equivalent to… Read more: Proposed London datacentre will have annual carbon footprint of 27,000 flights to New York

I understand the pressure on AI companies to rush forward. But employees are right to be concerned Last month, more than a thousand employees at frontier AI companies signed a letter asking the US government… Read more: I worked at OpenAI. Here’s how tech companies can prepare for a slowdown | Miles Brundage

In August 2025, TypeScript became the most used language on GitHub. This was the largest shift in GitHub’s language rankings in the last ten years and it occurred during the period of most accelerated adoption… Read more: How AI coding tools are contributing to the popularity of JavaScript

SP4 Delivers the Behavioral Reliability Production Agents Require at a Fraction of Frontier-Model Cost — Surpassing 80 Billion Tokens in Three Days on OpenRouter Upstage AI, an enterprise AI company, announced the launch of Solar… Read more: Upstage AI Announced the Launch of Solar Pro 4

Company also to share a significantly enhanced CaseBot offering and AI-enabled cyber services advancements and demonstrate GenAI-powered privacy and DSAR solutions as legal technology professionals gather in Nashville HaystackID®, a trusted partner focused on managing… Read more: HaystackID features Case Insight and Launches TRACE Suite at ILTACON 2026

The UK government is facing calls to cancel a sprawling health care contract with Palantir. The region of Greater Manchester insists it can do a better job itself.

With less than three months to go until the midterms, voters are thinking about grocery prices, the Iran war – and datacentres. This week, Jonathan Freedland speaks to the historian Jill Lepore about how this… Read more: Jill Lepore on why the artificial state is ‘doomed’ – podcast

Google LLC’s artificial intelligence researchers had been salivating at the prospect of getting their hands on a trove of business data acquired from the defunct airline Spirit Airlines Inc. in an auction, but the proposed… Read more: Google’s attempt to buy Spirit Airlines’ data might come unstuck

An artificial intelligence startup called Astromech that’s developing models that can predict biological change has raised $20 million in funding, lifting its valuation to $3.8 billion. The round was led by biotechnology investor Bob Nelsen… Read more: Astromech raises $20M to build a biological operating system that can forecast evolutionary change

Broadcom Inc. is reportedly seeking to borrow up to $100 billion as part of a new artificial intelligence chip financing deal.  Bloomberg today cited sources as saying that the debt is intended to support the… Read more: Broadcom reportedly seeking up to $100B in debt financing for AI chip deal

September 11, 2001, will be remembered as one of the darkest days in American history. As the 25th anniversary approaches, National Geographic, in collaboration with the 9/11 Memorial and Museum, is marking the occasion with… Read more: They survived 9/11; 25 years later, their bonds remain unbroken

In the two years since it made a largely successful debut, Europe’s Ariane 6 rocket has launched eight missions, all of which reached orbit safely. The large, expendable rocket has a capacity of more than… Read more: Europe cancels planned upgrades for Ariane 6 rocket

A leading US distributor of China’s most popular humanoid robots and robot dogs now plans to produce its own robots at a facility on Long Island, New York. The business pivot comes amid the US… Read more: US distributor of China’s most popular humanoid robots pivots after US ban

Anthropic PBC is privately hoping its upcoming initial public offering will match or even surpass the size of SpaceX Corp.’s record-breaking IPO as it doubles down on its bid to go public ahead of rival… Read more: Report: Anthropic hopes to surpass SpaceX’s record IPO raise when it finally floats

Twin1 AI Inc. launched today with $20 million in seed funding to build artificial intelligence-powered digital twins that carry an individual professional’s expertise across their organization. The San Mateo, California-based startup pairs each worker with… Read more: Twin1 AI raises $20M to put an AI twin behind every knowledge worker

London-based artificial intelligence startup Callosum Ltd. today announced that it has raised $100 million in funding. Atomico led the seed investment with participation from Plural, DCVC, and the U.K. Sovereign AI Fund. The deal follows… Read more: AI workload optimization startup Callosum raises $100M

There are a litany of reasons to distrust Google’s AI Overviews, which now appear at the top of its search results above links to actual websites. The algorithmically generated answers, which pull from various sources… Read more: Google AI Giving Staggeringly Racist “Advice” About Being Alone With Certain Groups of People

Despite making changes last fall to help block adults from messaging unknown children, Roblox is still failing to stop adults from creeping on kids in other ways, Australia’s eSafety commissioner, Julie Inman Grant, said on… Read more: Roblox must make changes after failing to block adults creeping on kids

The conversation around storage modernization used to revolve around capacity. Today, the dialogue centers on the role of storage as a strategic requirement for AI readiness. This doesn’t mean that storage’s transformation is simple. Many organizations… Read more: Supermicro alliance tackles the storage bottlenecks holding back enterprise AI

OpenAI says that it’s slowing down development and release of new models due to security and alignment concerns. The ChatGPT maker announced the decision in a Tuesday blog post, citing two events as drivers of… Read more: OpenAI Halts AI Training on Advanced Model as It Detects Dark Signs Emerging

Ammonia is one of the most important chemicals produced in the world, ranking second only to sulfuric acid in the total volume produced each year. It is used mostly to make fertilizer, which is essential… Read more: Paving the way for greener ammonia production

Technology leaders don’t seem to understand society’s gripes about AI, but boy, are they posting through it.

During the public comment portion of a recent San Diego city council meeting, the council called for the next comment to take the podium: “Darth Vader?” As he approached the microphone in his black helmet… Read more: ‘Darth Vader’ Wants Flock in San Diego

Distinction reinforces Bulletproof’s leadership in helping organizations securely adopt and scale AI with Microsoft technologies. Bulletproof today announced it has attained the Copilot Advanced Specialization in the Microsoft AI Cloud Partner Program, further differentiating Bulletproof among… Read more: Bulletproof Achieves Microsoft 365 Copilot Advanced Specialization

Artizent, a global enterprise engineering company focused on cloud, data, software, quality engineering, and AI-enabled transformation for enterprises, announced that it has achieved the AWS AI Services Competency in the Agentic AI Consulting Services category.… Read more: Artizent Earns AWS AI Services Competency

Adobe Inc. today announced the general availability of audio capabilities in Firefly, the company’s all-in-one creative AI tool suite, allowing users to produce music, speech, and sound effects for their projects. In June, the company… Read more: Adobe expands generative AI audio with Firefly music, speech and sound effects

Salesforce Inc. today introduced Slack Code, a new way to interact with coding agents in chat, with the whole team in the loop so everyone can see what’s happening at the conversational level. Coding agents… Read more: Salesforce introduces Slack Code to bring agentic team coding into the open

Flock is starting to feel the heat — or at least its PR team is. Last week, its CEO Garrett Langley offered a simpering public apology for abuses of its mass surveillance network after a… Read more: Flock Says It’s “Taking a Break” From Responding to Media Requests

When someone uploads a photo to the people-search tool ClarityCheck, the website has a clear message: “Your reverse image search is private and secure.” New research, though, shows that the website left more than 9 million image… Read more: Reverse-lookup service exposed millions of photos of people’s faces

Elon Musk’s talk about maintaining a million-strong AI data center satellite megaconstellation may not exactly be practical or economical, but it might be unique. It’s about the closest we’ve come to confronting a scheme that… Read more: SpaceX’s orbital data centers would create a new category of e-waste