news aggregator

Plan would embed location verification in advanced semiconductors to combat black market exports

The Trump administration wants better ways to track the location of chips, as part of attempts to prevent advanced AI accelerator hardware from getting into Chinese hands.…

OneWeb constellation may be smaller, but it's suddenly looking like a safer bet for some

Paris-based Eutelsat is reporting rocketing revenues in Low Earth Orbit (LEO) satellite services, driven partly by an uptick in interest from governments seeking to reduce reliance on US providers.…

You can build your own robot CHILD for under $1,000

Before humanoid robots walk among us, they'll be operated remotely, in part to gather the training data to develop Vision-Language-Action Models for autonomous, nonlethal bipedal ambulation.…

These are the conference events to keep an eye on. You can even stream a few

The security industry is hitting Vegas hard this week with three conferences in Sin City that bring the world's largest collection of security pros together for the annual summer camp.…

Chipmaker said it caught the ‘unauthorized activity’ early

Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) has launched legal proceedings against an unknown number of employees as it investigates a potential breach of trade secrets.…

BrianFagioli shares a report from NERDS.xyz: Synchron has just released a public demo showing something that used to feel impossible. A man with ALS is now using his iPad with nothing but his brain. No hands. No voice. No eye-tracking. Just thought. The man in the video is named Mark. He's part of Synchron's COMMAND clinical study and has an implant called the Stentrode. It sits inside his brain's blood vessels and picks up his motor intention. Those signals get sent wirelessly to an external decoder, which then tells the iPad what to do. It's all made possible by Apple's new Brain-Computer Interface Human Interface Device protocol, which lets iPadOS treat brain activity like an actual input method. Apple's built-in Switch Control feature makes the whole thing work on the software side. The iPad even sends back screen context to the BCI decoder to make everything run more smoothly and accurately. [...] Synchron was the first company to start clinical trials with a permanently implanted BCI. The big difference here is that it doesn't require open brain surgery. The device is implanted through the blood vessels, which makes it way more practical for real-world use.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Developer community skeptical following 'long silent stagnation' of the framework and accompanying SDK

Microsoft lead software engineer Beth Pan has stated that WinUI, the modern user interface framework for Windows, will be made "truly open source," though no date is yet set because of deep entanglements with proprietary code in the operating system.…

Launch license issued for suborbital Skylark L

The UK's Civil Aviation Authority (CAA) has granted British rocketeer Skyrora a launch operator license.…

Bot built by Airbus and IBM recognized astronaut’s voice and issued instructions to camera drone

Japanese space agency JAXA and Germany’s DLR have conducted what they say is the first collaboration between independently developed robots on the International Space Station.…

NASA's Lunar Trailblazer mission ended prematurely after losing contact with the satellite just one day post-launch, the agency announced today. Engadget reports: The NASA satellite was part of the IM-2 mission by Intuitive Machines, which took off from a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Kennedy Space Center on February 26 at 7:16PM ET. The Lunar Trailblazer successfully separated from the rocket as planned about 48 minutes after launch. Operators in Pasadena, CA established communication with the satellite at 8:13PM ET, but two-way communication was lost the next day and the team was unable to recover the connection. From the limited data ground teams received before the satellite went dark, the craft's solar arrays were not correctly positioned toward the sun, which caused its batteries to drain. "While it was not the outcome we had hoped for, mission experiences like Lunar Trailblazer help us to learn and reduce the risk for future, low-cost small satellites to do innovative science as we prepare for a sustained human presence on the Moon," said Nicky Fox, associate administrator at NASA Headquarters' Science Mission Directorate. "Thank you to the Lunar Trailblazer team for their dedication in working on and learning from this mission through to the end."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Using the Apollo vehicles that already offer autonomous rides across China

Rideshare challenger Lyft and China’s Baidu plan to bring robo-cabs to the UK and Europe next year.…

We know this because it just won a big client – Australia – which says that’s when it will start selling connections

Amazon’s Project Kuiper space broadband service will be ready for commercial services “from the middle of 2026” according to NBN Co, the operator of Australia’s National Broadband Network.…

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Politico: Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy will announce expedited plans this week to build a nuclear reactor on the moon, the first major action by the former Fox News host as the interim NASA administrator. NASA has discussed building a reactor on the lunar surface, but this would set a more definitive timeline -- according to documents obtained by POLITICO -- and come just as the agency faces a massive budget cut. [...] The reactor directive orders the agency to solicit industry proposals for a 100 kilowatt nuclear reactor to launch by 2030, a key consideration for astronauts' return to the lunar surface. NASA previously funded research into a 40 kilowatt reactor for use on the moon, with plans to have a reactor ready for launch by the early 2030s. The first country to have a reactor could "declare a keep-out zone which would significantly inhibit the United States," the directive states, a sign of the agency's concern about a joint project China and Russia have launched. The directive also orders NASA to designate a leader for the effort and to get industry input within 60 days. The agency is seeking companies able to launch a reactor by 2030 since that's around the time China intends to land its first astronaut on the moon. The nuclear initiative means that NASA will continue to have a hand in nuclear development even after the Pentagon's recent cancellation of a joint program on nuclear-powered rocket engines. "While the budget did not prioritize nuclear propulsion, that wasn't because nuclear propulsion is seen as a non-worthy technology," the NASA official said.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Cites low demand and overcapacity for electric cars on the same day Tesla gives Elon Musk $29 billion for similar reasons

Taiwanese contract manufacturing giant Foxconn has sold its US electric vehicle factory and will use the land to make AI servers instead.…

Google will pause non-essential AI workloads to protect power grids, the advertising giant announced on Monday. From a report: The web giant already does this sort of thing for non-essential workloads like processing YouTube vids, which it moves to datacenters where power is available rather than continuing to run them in places demand for energy strains the grid. Under an agreement with Indiana Michigan Power (I&M) and the Tennessee Valley Authority (TVA), Google will use the same techniques for AI workloads. The announcement comes as states served by the power companies brace for a heat wave that will likely strain the grid as residents use air conditioners and increase demand for energy. Amid debate about datacenters' consumption of power and water, the last thing that the Chocolate Factory needs is folks blaming its AI Mode search function for a power outage when temperatures top 100F (37.7C). Under the agreement, if energy demand surges or there's a disruption in the grid due to extreme weather, I&M and TVA can now request that Google reduce its power use by rescheduling workloads or limiting non-urgent tasks until the issue is resolved.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

Disney scrapped plans to use a deepfake of Dwayne Johnson in Moana and an AI-generated character in Tron: Ares due to concerns over bad publicity and legal ownership. Ultimately, the studio decided the potential PR and copyright risks weren't worth the convenience. Deadline reports: Disney is working on a live-action remake of Moana, where Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson will reprise his role of Maui. In a recent report from The Wall Street Journal, the studio came up with the idea to digitally clone Johnson and use a body double for some shots. "Disney would work with AI company Metaphysic to create deepfakes of Johnson's face that could be layered on top of Reed's performance in the footage -- a 'digital double' that effectively allowed Johnson to be in two places at once," WSJ said (paywalled). Although the Black Adam star approved the idea, the studio "worried" that they "ultimately couldn't claim ownership over every element of the film if AI generated parts of it." The film studio and the AI company were seemingly unable to come to terms, and the footage was scrapped. Disney's upcoming Tron: Ares revolves around AI and the real-world implications of it. According to WSJ sources, "executives pitched the idea of actually incorporating AI into one of the characters in the sequel to the 1980s hit movie Tron as a buzzy marketing strategy." The AI-generated character would be a sidekick to Jeff Bridges' character, but the idea was ultimately scrapped because "executives internally were told that the company couldn't risk the bad publicity."

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

'Plague' malware has been around for months without tripping alarms

Researchers at German infosec services company Nextron Threat have spotted malware that creates a highly-persistent Linux backdoor and say antivirus engines do not flag the code as malicious.…

Rivian has filed a federal lawsuit in Ohio to challenge a state law preventing it from selling electric vehicles directly to consumers, arguing the rule is anti-competitive and outdated. The law currently protects legacy dealerships while allowing Tesla a special carve-out, and Rivian wants similar rights to apply for a direct-sales license in the state. TechCrunch reports: "Ohio's prohibition of Rivian's direct-sales-only business model is irrational in the extreme: it reduces competition, decreases consumer choice, and drives up consumer costs and inconvenience -- all of which harm consumers -- with literally no countervailing benefit," lawyers for the company wrote in the complaint. Rivian is asking the court to allow the company to apply for a dealership license so it can sell vehicles directly. Ohio customers have to buy from Rivian vehicles from locations in other states where direct sales are allowed. The cars are then shipped to Rivian service centers within Ohio. Allowing Rivian to sell directly would not be treading new legal ground, the company argues in its complaint. Tesla has had a license to sell in Ohio since 2013 and can sell directly to consumers. What's stopping Rivian is a 2014 law passed by the state's legislature. That law, which Rivian says came after an intense lobbying effort by the Ohio Automobile Dealers Association (OADA), effectively gave Tesla a carve-out and blocked any future manufacturers from acquiring the necessary dealership licenses. "Consumer choice is a bedrock principle of America's economy. Ohio's archaic prohibition against the direct-sales of vehicles is unconstitutional, irrational, and harms Ohioans by reducing competition and choice and driving up costs and inconvenience," Mike Callahan, Rivian's chief administrative officer, said in a statement.

Read more of this story at Slashdot.

On hot summer days, air conditioning is rather more important than search summaries

Google will pause non-essential AI workloads to protect power grids, the advertising giant announced on Monday.…

Fermi America is planning to build a colossal AI datacenter complex in Amarillo, Texas, powered by up to six gigawatts of nuclear energy. According to The Register, the company has selected Hyundai to support the deployment of the "HyperGrid," describing it as the "world's largest advanced energy campus." From the report: The project is backed by Rick Perry, who served as Texas governor and US Energy Secretary, and investor Toby Neugebauer, and aims to establish Texas as the US's largest energy and intelligence campus. Construction of the first of four Westinghouse AP1000 reactors is set to begin next year in Amarillo with the plant funneling behind-the-meter power to GPU bit barns by 2032, at least that's according to a memorandum of understanding (MoU). In other words, there is no guarantee the 23 million square meter project (1.1 MilliWales) will actually be built in its entirety, but if it is, Hyundai will oversee it. "This agreement is significant in that it allows us to participate from the early stages of this project and contribute to the creation of the world's largest integrated energy and artificial intelligence campus, which leverages a diverse range of energy infrastructure," Hyundai said in a canned statement. At the very least, Hyundai knows what it's doing when it comes to nuclear developments. The industrial giant has led the deployment of some 22 reactors. Ambitious as the project may be, it won't be cheap. A single AP1000 reactor was estimated to cost $6.8 billion two years ago. That's a lot of money, but nothing compared to what the hyperscalers and neo-clouds are pumping into datacenters these days. Meta, for reference, expects to spend $66-72 billion on bit barns this year. [...] How exactly Fermi America or its founders Perry and Neugebauer expect to pay for one AP1000 reactor, let alone four, isn't clear. [...]

Read more of this story at Slashdot.