Submission + - Palantir wins £9M contract to run UK firearms licensing (theregister.com)

Submitted by Shakes Fist
Shakes Fist writes: "The US spy-tech biz will also handle Home Office licensing for explosives, explosive precursors, and poisons. The contract covers a replacement for the National Firearms Licensing Management System (NFLMS), which has been in use since the mid-2000s."

Palantir crawls further under the skin of the UK State.

Submission + - Code.org Rebrands to CodeAI, Disbands Its K-12 CS Education Advocacy Coalition

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes: "The Code.org Advocacy Coalition is growing the movement to make Computer Science a fundamental part of the K-12 education," explained tech-backed nonprofit Code.org in 2018. Eight years later, that mission — which began in 2013 — has changed. On Monday, Code.org rebranded as CodeAI (press release), solidifying its shift to AI education. And on Tuesday, members of the Code.org Advocacy Coalition were rounded up for a conference call and informed that their 100+ organization group was being disbanded and from here on in it'll be the AI Way or the Highway for current members.

From the transcript: "We're now at a crossroads. AI is completely transforming all of society, including education and especially computer science. In the past, the focus of computer science was coding. Today, the focus is AI. [...] Preparing every student for the age of AI requires a broader vision. Starting today, Code.org is CodeAI. [...] We're moving into the next chapter. So, just to be clear, we are sunsetting the Code.org Advocacy Coalition. This will be our last meeting of the Code.org advocacy coalition. We will be standing up the CodeAI advocacy coalition. [...] [Expect an email] giving you a chance to say 'Our organization is in line with the direction that Code AI is heading and we want to be part of those advocacy efforts. But it also gives your organization a chance to say, 'You know what? We're not in line with the direction that CodeAI is heading, so we're not going to be part of the new advocacy coalition.' [...] We are also going to be focused on bringing in new AI focused entities that will help us advance this mission."

Or, to paraphrase Ken Kesey, "You're either on the K-12 AI literacy bus or off the K-12 AI literacy bus."

Submission + - Google Ordered to Put Clearer Links In AI Search, Let UK Publishers Opt Out (arstechnica.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: UK regulators today ordered (PDF) Google to put clearer attributions and links to publishers’ content in its AI-generated search features. The UK’s Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) also said Google must give publishers a way to opt out of AI features in search. “In a world first, publishers will now have effective tools to prevent their content being used to power AI features in search, such as AI Overviews,” the CMA said today. “This will put publishers, like news organizations, in a stronger position to negotiate content deals with Google. To boost consumer trust, Google is also now required to make sure that publisher content is properly attributed, using clear links, in AIgenerated search results.”

The CMA ruled that Google may not penalize publishers for opting out of AI, meaning that Google can’t downrank opted-out publishers in general search results. The CMA said Google will have nine months to comply with all requirements but that the agency “expects important parts of the controls to become available to publishers well before that deadline. Google will also be required to submit and publish compliance reports, supported by key data and metrics, explaining changes it has made and how it has complied.” [...] The CMA applied the rules to Google after determining that it has “strategic market status” in general search services, and has ongoing investigations into Apple and Microsoft. Google today said it will comply with the CMA decision.

Submission + - Amazon's New Stargate Series Is Officially Dead (screenrant.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Amazon cancelled the new Stargate show.

The rumor is that the show writer, Martin Gero, would not budge on compromising lore or elements within the show for a "wider modern audience" as they did with Rings of Power for LoTR lore.

Martin Gero wanted to create a show that maintained continuity in the story and lore of the old shows, including the mythology and tech, while respecting the 17 seasons of history.

Amazon instead wanted something new for the "modern audience" that's more accessible, reimagined, with more modern casual sensibilities.

Because the showrunners wanted to maintain integrity rather than turn Stargate into another "modern audience slop" like Rings of Power, Amazon leadership canceled it. The franchise heavyweight, like Joseph Mallozzi, was very excited for the fresh stories Gero worked on. Amazon says they are still open to Stargate, just not "this" version... yes they wanted to Rings of Powerify Stargate.

We really can't hate these people enough.

Submission + - EU working to abandon US tech (politico.eu)

Submitted by whitroth
whitroth writes: Shutting down Office for the ICC was clearly a wake-up call.
"The EU is moving to counter American dominance in technology by reaching for one of the oldest tools in its arsenal: industrial strategy.

As the European Commission unveiled a plan Wednesday to reduce Europeâ(TM)s reliance on the foreign technology providers that underpin the modern economy, it was careful to stress that it was not picking a fight with U.S. digital giants.

Instead, the tech sovereignty package â" motivated in no small part by U.S. President Donald Trumpâ(TM)s weaponization of Europeâ(TM)s dependence on American firms â" takes a longer-term view: boost the continentâ(TM)s players so they can eventually challenge their U.S. rivals."

Submission + - Big Tech hide data centres' environmental toll

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: How Big Tech wrote secrecy into EU law to hide data centres’ environmental toll

“DATA CENTRE OPERATORS successfully lobbied the European Commission to amend legislation intended to bring transparency to the continent’s booming data centre industry, a new investigation has revealed.”

“The investigation, led by Investigate Europe, has uncovered how Microsoft and DigitalEurope, a lobby group whose members include Amazon, Apple, Google and Meta, led the charge to amend these new transparency rules.”

‘A Microsoft spokesperson said they “support greater transparency around data centres”, adding that they are “taking further steps to increase openness, while protecting confidential business information.”’

Submission + - AI security's cost bottleneck isn't tokens – it's validation (scworld.com)

Submitted by spatwei
spatwei writes: A recent report by Axios claims a company accidentally spent $500 million in one month on Claude usage after failing to implement usage limits for employees. This extreme anecdote punctuates growing uncertainty about how token usage and API bills could become a major bottleneck for companies seeking to reap the productivity benefits of AI tools.

Even major tech companies are reportedly seeking to reel in their AI spending, with The Verge reporting that Microsoft is canceling its Claude Code licenses to steer employees toward its own GitHub Copilot and Uber CTO Praveen Neppalli Naga telling The Information the company used up its entire AI coding budget for 2026 within four months.

How does this fit into cybersecurity? With the landmark moment of Anthropic’s Claude Mythos’ release under Project Glasswing, AI-driven code review and vulnerability discovery are gaining interest, but an analysis by Contrast Security offers a sobering look at the “hidden cost of AI security scanners.”

Contrast’s research found that the biggest spend for organizations seeking to use AI to scan their code for vulnerabilities isn’t the API bill, but the cost of triaging and validating thousands of findings, including a huge number of false positives and inconsistent findings between runs and models.
For example, a simple scan of 1.8 million lines of code using Claude Sonnet 4.6 surfaced 3,560 findings and cost just $315 in token usage, but those 3,560 findings don’t triage and validate themselves. Contrast calculated that if a security engineer making $150,000 per year spent half an hour triaging each finding, the labor cost would come out to $128,000.

Submission + - Trump Signs AI Executive Order Asking Companies To Give Government Early Access (cnbc.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: President Donald Trump on Tuesday signed an executive order asking artificial intelligence companies to provide models to the federal government to assess their capabilities ahead of a full release. The order asks companies, on a voluntary basis, to participate in a benchmarking process to assess a model’s “advanced cyber capabilities” and determine whether it should be considered a “covered frontier model.” It then asks for access to those models up to 30 days before the companies plan to release them more broadly, and enables the government to help select the “trusted partners” that will receive early access.

“Nothing in this section shall be construed to authorize the creation of a mandatory governmental licensing, preclearance, or permitting requirement for the development, publication, release, or distribution of new AI models, including frontier models,” the order said. Trump signed the order in private, just weeks after he postponed a signing ceremony with prominent tech CEOs because he “didn’t like certain aspects of it,” he told reporters at the time. [...] Trump’s AI order outlines several timeframes to develop directives and other guidance, specifically calling on the Department of Defense to prioritize the cyber defense of its information systems.

Submission + - Teachers' Union Urges Schools to Curb AI Chatbots and Screen Time

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes: The New York Times reports the $22.5 million AI partnership to 'bring AI into the classroom' struck last July between the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) union, Microsoft, and OpenAI has hit a bump in the road as the AFT urges schools to curb AI chatbots and screen time, recommending 'no screens' at all for those in second grade or younger, and no AI chatbots for students in elementary school.

The union’s effort reflects a backlash among parents and educators against heavy use of school-issued laptops and apps. Some parents and nonprofit children’s groups are also pushing back against campaigns by tech giants like Google and OpenAI to spread their AI products in schools.

This week, AFT president Randi Weingarten said that the union was negotiating safety and privacy standards for AI use in schools with 'our partners in the AI academy,' and that Microsoft, OpenAI and Anthropic had agreed in principle to those standards. “We’re being transparent,” Weingarten said, adding that "We’re willing to walk away from the funding that we receive here if we don’t get the safety and privacy."

Submission + - Maryland Governor Signs K-12 AI Bill Under Microsoft's Watchful Eye

Submitted by theodp
theodp writes: "Thank you, Gov. Wes Moore, for signing SB 720 into law yesterday!" exclaimed Microsoft Sr. Director of Education and Workforce Policy Allyson Knox in a LinkedIn post celebrating the passage of the Artificial Intelligence Ready Schools Act. "Microsoft was proud to support this legislation, and I was honored to represent the company at yesterday’s bill signing at the Maryland State House. This law accomplishes the following: 1) Establishes statewide AI guidance for schools ... 2) Requires every district to have an AI plan ... 3) Builds teacher capacity and professional learning ... 4) Promotes AI literacy for students ... 5) Creates tools to evaluate AI technologies ... 6) Establishes a statewide AI Education Collaborative." At the same bill-signing ceremony, Gov. Moore paradoxically also signed into law the Phone-Free Schools Act, "prohibiting the use of certain electronic communication devices by a student during the academic school day."

Knox reports up to Microsoft President Brad Smith, who last July told Code.org CEO Hadi Partovi it was time for the tech-backed K-12 CS education nonprofit to "switch hats" from coding to AI as Microsoft announced its new $4 billion Microsoft Elevate initiative to advance AI education. The Maryland State Department of Education is one of many government agencies that are participating in Code.org's Microsoft-advised TeachAI initiative. Code.org also took to social media to celebrate the Maryland win, proclaiming that "Maryland just made AI and CS Education the law."

Interestingly, Maryland's commitment to K-12 AI comes in the same week as the NY Times reports a $22.5 million AI partnership to 'bring AI into the classroom' struck last July between the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) union, Microsoft, and OpenAI has hit a bump in the road as the AFT urges schools to curb AI chatbots and screen time, recommending 'no screens' at all for those in second grade or younger, and no AI chatbots for students in elementary school. AFT president Randi Weingarten said that the union was negotiating safety and privacy standards for AI use in schools with 'our partners in the AI academy,' and that Microsoft, OpenAI and Anthropic had agreed in principle to those standards. "We’re willing to walk away from the funding that we receive here if we don’t get the safety and privacy," Weingarten said.

Submission + - Researchers identify people through ordinary Wi-Fi with 99 percent-accuracy (tomshardware.com)

Submitted by Baron_Yam
Baron_Yam writes: Security researchers at the Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) in Germany have published a paper demonstrating that unencrypted beamforming data broadcast by Wi-Fi devices during normal operation can be used to identify individuals walking through a room with 99.5% accuracy, regardless of whether the individuals are carrying Wi-Fi devices. The tactic leverages the router's beamforming tech to identify individuals with up to 99.5% accuracy, and it works with existing routers, too.

The system, called BFId, requires no specialized hardware, no access to the target Wi-Fi network, and works even if the person being tracked isn't carrying a wireless device. The team tested the attack on 197 participants, the largest dataset ever used in Wi-Fi-based identification works, and plans to present its findings at the ACM Conference on Computer and Communications Security (CCS) in Taipei.

See GitHub — https://github.com/ruvnet/RuVi... — for your own personal implementation requiring a couple of APs and a couple of ESP32 nodes. You can get full-home per-zone motion and occupancy detection fairly reliably, with the potential for pose detection and in optimal areas even respiration rate. With the right hardware and configuration, you can theoretically get heart rate too.

Submission + - Occupy Wall Street Co-Founder Built an AI App to Help Activists (gizmodo.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: In an era where Silicon Valley’s conservatism is both expressed openly and becoming more intense by the day, it’s strange to think that tech was once seen as a hive of liberalism. The right-wing nature of today’s tech industry means that its products tend to also be seen as serving right-wing interests, either in their actual operation (like X’s openly and unrepentantly right-wing chatbot Grok) or by the simple fact that their existence serves to enrich a small group of very powerful, very conservative people.

But does it have to be this way? Can LLMs and AI agents find a place in the toolkit of progressive activist groups? The conviction that they can is the idea behind a new app called Outcry, which provides a chatbot designed specifically as a “private, on-device AI mentor for activists, organizers and movement builders.” (There’s also a web version, although it obviously lacks the privacy benefits of being entirely offline.) It’s the brainchild of Occupy Wall Street co-creator Micah White, who recently wrote a blog post about the thinking behind the project.

[...] Outcry’s other distinguishing feature is that its dataset is entirely offline—it’s included with the download. According to the readme, the entire dataset is downloaded to your device at first launch, and stored in your library’s Application Support directory.

Submission + - Microsoft Allegedly Leaked Dutch Civil Servants' Data To the US (cybernews.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: The technology giant Microsoft has been accused of leaking the data of civil servants working for the Netherlands' regulatory agencies to the US House of Representatives. The civil servants affected by the leak work at the Authority for Consumers and Markets (ACM) and the Dutch Data Protection Authority (AP), according to the NL Times. They are involved in implementing the Digital Services Act (DSA), the European Union regulation on online services, aimed at combating illegal content and protecting user rights.

NL Times reports that Microsoft shared emails, minutes, and invitations sent by the civil servants without redacting their names in the documents. Willemijn Aerdts, Dutch State Secretary for Digital Economy and Sovereignty, said she discussed the allegations with US Ambassador to the Netherlands Joe Popolo.

Slashdot Top Deals