TheRegister
Economists sceptical over UK Spending Review's partly AI-driven 10% budget cuts
Leading economists have questioned how the UK government's Spending Review can determine exactly 10 percent cuts to admin budgets — partly powered by AI and digital transformation — across central departments when they are starting from different places and have different projects to manage.…
The one thing SME IT can do that the big guys can’t: Change the world
Opinion The smaller the org, the better the jobs. Not universally true, but a good rule of thumb. Small organizations have fewer layers of management, and each individual has much more influence. One voice in 50 is 100 times louder than one in 5,000. You get to say what you want to do and get to do it. Happiness. …
Techie went home rather than fix mistake that caused a massive meltdown
Who, Me? Welcome to another working week and therefore another installment of Who, Me? – The Register's reader-contributed column where you confess to making a mess and somehow find safe egress.…
Huawei chair says the future of comms is fiber-to-the-room, which China has and the rest of us don’t
Huawei’s chairman Xu Zhijun – aka Eric Xu – has called out China’s enormous lead in fiber-to-the-room (FTTR) installations.…
AI-hosted infomercial shifts $7.5 million worth of product in China
Asia In Brief Chinese web giant Baidu last week staged a livestream hosted by an AI version of local influencer Yonghao Luo and scored 13 million hits and $7.5 million of sales.…
Former US Army Sergeant pleads guilty after amateurish attempt at selling secrets to China
Infosec in brief A former US Army sergeant has admitted he attempted to sell classified data to China.…
The AIpocalypse is here for web sites as search referrals plunge
Google AI Overviews and other AI search services appear to be starving the hand that fed them.…
Teens used encrypted chats to recruit for 'violence as a service' murder ring, Europol says
Seven people, including a 14-year-old, have been arrested or surrendered to Danish authorities after allegedly using encrypted messaging apps to hire other teenagers for contract killings in what Europol calls a "violence-as-a-service" operation.…
Netflix, Apple, BofA websites hijacked with fake help-desk numbers
Scammers are hijacking the search results of people needing 24/7 support from Apple, Bank of America, Facebook, HP, Microsoft, Netflix, and PayPal in an attempt to trick victims into handing over personal or financial info, according to Malwarebytes senior director of research Jérôme Segura.…
New GitHub Copilot limits push AI users to pricier tiers
Microsoft's GitHub this week said paying GitHub Copilot customers will now face monthly limits on certain types of high-powered AI requests, and will have to pay more if they want to surpass those limits.…
US patent office wants an AI to scan for prior art, but doesn't want to pay for it
The US Patent and Trademark Office is exploring a plan for using AI at the agency to speed up the process of granting patents - but its initial request for information says that vendors should expect to be paid in exposure rather than cold, hard cash.…
EDB enhances analytics in PostgreSQL with open source add-ons
PostgreSQL exponent EDB has enhanced its new data platform, claiming this will help bring transactional, analytical, and AI workloads into a single environment.…
Looks like Aflac is the latest insurance giant snagged in Scattered Spider’s web
Aflac is the latest insurance company to disclose a security breach following a string of others earlier this week, all of which appear to be part of Scattered Spider's most recent data theft campaign.…
Qilin ransomware top dogs treat their minions to on-call lawyers for fierier negotiations
The latest marketing ploy from the ransomware crooks behind the Qilin operation involves offering affiliates access to a crack team of lawyers to ramp up pressure in ransom negotiations.…
Eutelsat seeks €1.35B to boost LEO network and take the fight to Starlink
Satellite biz Eutelsat is looking to raise €1.35 billion ($1.55 billion) to grow its Low Earth Orbit (LEO) network to take on Starlink and benefit from anticipated growth in demand for connectivity.…
AI gives the sleeping network switch market a good kick
The long-dormant market for datacenter network switches is booming thanks to AI.…
Xlibre fork lights a fire under long-dormant X.org development
Comment Considerable new activity is happening both in the established X.org X11 server and around its new fork, Xlibre.…
OVHcloud chief talks up sovereignty discussions with the European Commision
French cloud business, OVHcloud, claimed yesterday that it is in discussions with the European Commission (EC) regarding a possible migration to a sovereign cloud – in an X post that has since been deleted.…
DHS warns of sharp rise in Chinese-made signal jammers it calls 'tools of terrorism'
The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is concerned about the rate at which outlawed signal-jamming devices are being found across the US.…
Broadcom's answer to VMware pricing outrage: You're using it wrong
Customers dismayed by Broadcom's move to selling costly bundles such as VMware Cloud Foundation (VCF) will realize its value if they'd just use more of the components, the company's CTO says.…