Sci-Tech news

• Microsoft 365 calendars become spy drop boxes in HOLLOWGRAPH campaign

  20-07-2026 16:59 via theregister.com
  
  Microsoft 365 calendars have become the latest hiding place for espionage malware, with attackers stashing commands and stolen files inside appointments dated 24 years into the future. Researchers at Group-IB say they've uncovered a malware component they call HOLLOWGRAPH that swaps the usual command-and-control server for something rather less conspicuous – a compromised Microsoft 365 calendar. Instead of reaching out to attacker-controlled infrastructure for instructions, the implant rum
  
  Read more

• Firefox 153 contains itself while Thunderbird 153 fixes almost everything

  23-07-2026 13:14 via theregister.com
  
  Mozilla released Firefox 153 on Tuesday, closely followed by MZLA with Thunderbird 153 – codenamed "Meadow" for reasons that remain obscure for now. Firefox 153 is Mozilla's new Extended Support Release (ESR), so it will receive security updates until some time after the next ESR in mid-2027. We covered the highlights of what's new in this version last week. Firefox 153 will be good news if you used the Multi-Account Containers extension: a preview version of the functionality is now built
  
  Read more

• Stats watchdog prescribes stronger caveats for NHS Palantir claims

  23-07-2026 12:34 via theregister.com
  
  The UK's statistical regulator has told NHS England to ensure ministers are briefed accurately following a row over data used to promote the purported benefits of a Palantir-run platform. The Office for Statistics Regulation (OSR) said the health quango had accepted that it needed to communicate more clearly about data purporting to measure the benefits of the NHS Federated Data Platform (FDP), which is based on the US spy-tech firm's technology under a £330 million contract. "We expect NH
  
  Read more

• Firm hacked by rogue AI calls the attack 'a wake-up call' after ChatGPT maker OpenAI admits advanced bot broke containment during a security test

  23-07-2026 12:28 via dailymail.com
  
  The firm hacked by ChatGPT maker OpenAI's rogue artificial intelligence (AI) has called the attack 'a wake-up call'.
  
  Read more

• Advertisement

• Amazon's AGI department finds humans are optional

  23-07-2026 11:59 via theregister.com
  
  Amazon may be spending billions on AI, but that hasn't stopped it from cutting jobs inside the very organization building it. The megacorp confirmed to The Register on Thursday that it has eliminated an undisclosed number of roles across parts of its Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) biz, even as it insists AI remains a key priority. The cuts are the latest in a restructuring that has seen Amazon shed more than 30,000 employees since October – including 16,000 announced in January &nda
  
  Read more

• UK pumps £708 million into its future fighter jet

  23-07-2026 11:15 via theregister.com
  
  Britain has found £708 million ($946m) to fund the development of advanced technologies for the Royal Air Force’s next-gen fighter, codenamed Tempest. Announced to coincide with the Farnborough International Airshow in Hampshire, southwest of London, the news was accompanied by a £20 million ($27m) contract for a hypersonic target used to test air defenses and a “loyal wingman” drone prototype from BAE Systems. The £708m extends an existing contract with BAE S
  
  Read more

• Scientists claim parents need to potty train their children EARLIER - because nappies are bad for the environment

  23-07-2026 11:08 via dailymail.com
  
  Parents need to start potty training their children earlier because nappies are bad for the environment, scientists have claimed.
  
  Read more

• Britain isn't considering datacenters' thirst for water in its 'AI superpower' ambitions

  23-07-2026 10:30 via theregister.com
  
  The UK government's blueprint for turning Britain into an AI superpower largely ignore the water datacenters need, prompting warnings that these facilities could end up competing with homes and businesses for supply. The warning comes as parts of southern, central, and eastern England move closer to drought, putting the pressure on water availability firmly on the agenda. MPs were told earlier this year that official forecasts of England's future water needs excluded datacenters, despite governm
  
  Read more

• Advertisement

• Talking smack about a doctor got him access to private medical files

  23-07-2026 09:00 via theregister.com
  
  PWNED Welcome back to PWNED, the weekly column where we focus on security own-goals so you can avoid them. This week’s topic involves serious problems in the healthcare sector, specifically the very human problem of compromised gatekeepers. Have a story about someone leaving a gaping hole in their network? Share it with us at [email protected]. Anonymity is available upon request. Our legend of lameness comes courtesy of red teamer Dahvid Schloss, who shared so many great stories with us th
  
  Read more

• Living up to their 'killer' reputation: The moment orcas smash a two-tonne fish into bite-sized baby food

  23-07-2026 08:32 via dailymail.com
  
  Orcas have once again proven they deserve their 'killer' reputation, as scientists capture a brutal never-before-seen behaviour.
  
  Read more

• Senior White House official claims China’s K3 model stolen from Anthropic

  23-07-2026 07:05 via theregister.com
  
  Donald Trump’s Assistant for Science and Technology, Michael Kratsios, has accused China’s Moonshot AI of creating its head-turning Kimi K3 model distilling Anthropic’s Fable. Kimi K3 is 2.8-trillion-parameter open-weights model of such impressive quality that its mere existence suggests Chinese AI researchers aren’t far behind their US rivals. Moonshot AI released it on July 16, and not long afterwards the value of US AI stocks sank as investors worried the model could d
  
  Read more

• Living up to their 'killer' reputation: Orcas are filmed ramming into one of the world's heaviest fish so hard it EXPLODES

  23-07-2026 06:00 via dailymail.com
  
  Orcas have once again proven they deserve their 'killer' reputation, as scientists capture a brutal never-before-seen behaviour.
  
  Read more

• Google is hoarding TPUs to develop Artificial General Intelligence

  23-07-2026 03:45 via theregister.com
  
  Google’s parent company Alphabet is managing its fleet of AI accelerators to prioritize research on artificial general intelligence, rather than renting them all to customers. CEO Sundar Pichai revealed the company’s priorities during its second quarter earnings call, during which the company confirmed it has delivered on its plan to sell its tensor processing units (TPUs) to some customers. In response to news of those sales, Goldman Sachs analyst Eric Sheridan asked how Alphabet ba
  
  Read more

• Google is hoarding TPUs to chase artificial general intelligence

  23-07-2026 03:45 via theregister.com
  
  Google’s parent company Alphabet is managing its fleet of AI accelerators to prioritize research on artificial general intelligence, rather than renting them all to customers. CEO Sundar Pichai revealed the company’s priorities during its second quarter earnings call, during which the company confirmed it has delivered on its plan to sell its tensor processing units (TPUs) to some customers. In response to news of those sales, Goldman Sachs analyst Eric Sheridan asked how Alphabet ba
  
  Read more

• OpenAI scored an own goal with HuggingFace attack, showing how open Chinese models are winning

  23-07-2026 01:37 via theregister.com
  
  OPINION OpenAI has acknowledged its models powered the autonomous agents that compromised HuggingFace infrastructure. It might be taken as a convoluted marketing stunt, were it not the perfect advertisement for China-based competition. The company's AI-culpa fits the narrative spun by US rival Anthropic about its Mythos models, which it deemed too dangerous to release except to totally trustworthy corporations and governments. OpenAI says: "The incident makes clear that advanced models can disco
  
  Read more

• Google Cloud is killing it

  22-07-2026 23:01 via theregister.com
  
  Since the beginning of the year, several people have remarked to me off the cuff, apropos of nothing in particular: "Google Cloud is killing it." Parent company Alphabet reported Q2 earnings [PDF] after the bell on Wednesday and the numbers speak for themselves. Let's go to the tape:Google Cloud revenue was up 82 percent from the same quarter last year, increasing from $13.6 billion to $24.8 billion.Google Cloud operating income more than tripled during the same period, going from $2.8 billion t
  
  Read more

• Ancient Greek statue holding a 'laptop' fuels surge in claims that time travel is real

  22-07-2026 23:01 via dailymail.com
  
  Wild theories about a mysterious statue suggest time travelers journeyed back to Ancient Greece and were seen using modern technology 2,000 years ago.
  
  Read more

• Web app turns your old phone into a new smart display

  22-07-2026 22:15 via theregister.com
  
  HANDS ON If you've got a drawer full of old phones, unloved tablets, or even an ancient monitor, you can now give those devices new life in your home by turning them into wall-mounted status boards, clocks, weather stations, or photo frames. ScreenWall is a web platform developed by German software engineer Tuan Anh Bui that’ll turn any compatible device with an internet connection into a widget display without the need to install anything. If you can scan a QR code, you can have that old
  
  Read more

• Sovereign AI is 'nonsense,' says Doctorow

  22-07-2026 21:48 via theregister.com
  
  OPINION Cory Doctorow, tech gadfly and coiner of the eminently relevant term "enshittification," posted a useful argument on Wednesday related to Trump's dismantling of the US-led world order and the need or lack thereof for other countries to control their own AI destinies. Doctorow has positioned himself as an AI skeptic in his writings, including his recent book, The Reverse Centaur's Guide to Life After AI – the name comes from the visualization of a human body (you and me, humble user
  
  Read more

• Bertha slams into US coast as multiple states feel impact of life-threatening tropical storm

  22-07-2026 21:47 via dailymail.com
  
  Tropical Storm Bertha is expected to slam into the US coast before nightfall as millions prepare for potentially life-threatening conditions across multiple states.
  
  Read more

• Fresh off AI layoffs, Block now wants to whack Slack with agent-human collab tool

  22-07-2026 20:57 via theregister.com
  
  After cutting over 4,000 jobs due to AI, fintech biz Block is back with Buzz, a shared workspace where humans and bots can collaborate in ways that are more auditable, sovereign, and secure than what you can do in chat tools such as Slack. Block's human-bot co-op is built upon a turducken of tech jargon: The platform is free and open source. It's based on the decentralized Nostr protocol, so there's cryptographic identity. It's "sovereign," a naively optimistic term readers of Neal Stephenson's
  
  Read more

• Bertha slams into US coast as forecasters fear tropical storm may gain strength soon

  22-07-2026 19:59 via dailymail.com
  
  Tropical Storm Bertha is expected to slam into the US coast before nightfall as millions prepare for potentially life-threatening conditions across multiple states.
  
  Read more

• NASA whistleblowers claim 'alien presence' is hidden in altered moon photos

  22-07-2026 19:06 via dailymail.com
  
  Claims have emerged that NASA pilots were told to destroy photos that may have contained images of UFOs, as other astronauts alleged aliens warned them to stay away from the moon.
  
  Read more

• Linux kernel team publishes 432 CVEs in two days

  22-07-2026 18:58 via theregister.com
  
  If you're responsible for Linux security, someone just dumped a pile of work onto your desk: 432 Linux kernel CVEs were published across Sunday and Monday this week. Linux watchers at nixCraft pointed out the volume on Monday morning, and it didn’t take long for seasoned sysadmins to start expressing concerns. Jan Schaumann, chief information security architect at Akamai Technologies, took to the OSS-SEC mailing list Tuesday to express concerns over the sheer volume of Linux kernel CVEs pu
  
  Read more

• Astronomers spot exomoon candidate that's almost as massive as Jupiter

  22-07-2026 17:47 via theregister.com
  
  Scientists may have found the first moon outside our Solar System – depending on what astronomers ultimately decide counts as one. Either way, the groundbreaking research, published in Nature this week, promises a path to clearer sightings of so-called exomoons. Kevin Hoy, a PhD student affiliated with Universidad Diego Portales and the European Southern Observatory in Chile, has found an object orbiting a brown dwarf, which in turn orbits a host star, which sits about 73 light-years from
  
  Read more

• World's most narcissistic countries revealed... and America's shock ranking

  22-07-2026 17:24 via dailymail.com
  
  A global study examined 53 countries to find the most narcissistic, with results finding a shocking ranking for America.
  
  Read more

• Scientists blame Gen Alpha for climate change! Research reveals teen diets drive the highest climate emissions

  22-07-2026 17:00 via dailymail.com
  
  Younger generations might like to think of themselves as eco-warriors, but a new study suggests they have some of the biggest food-related carbon footprints.
  
  Read more

• Millions brace as Tropical Storm Bertha is set to smash US in just hours

  22-07-2026 17:00 via dailymail.com
  
  Tropical Storm Bertha is expected to slam into the US coast before nightfall as millions prepare for potentially life-threatening conditions across multiple states.
  
  Read more

• Latest Musk merch drop runs entirely on child labor

  22-07-2026 17:00 via theregister.com
  
  Tesla's latest vehicle has two wheels, no motor, and a target market still mastering walking: the $225 Balance Bike for Kids. The contraption, designed for children aged two to five, "features a lightweight magnesium frame, adjustable seat and futuristic design," and can handle up to 35 kg. The price tag puts it at the higher end of such devices. Cycling Weekly recommends the Hornit Airo at £139, although there are plenty of alternatives aimed at introducing children to two wheels. Althoug
  
  Read more

• Grok muscles into Excel with an AI add-in of its own

  22-07-2026 16:00 via theregister.com
  
  You've got an idea for an Excel spreadsheet, but building it is another matter. Microsoft's Copilot can help, and now SpaceXAI is offering an alternative: the Grok add-in for Excel. Available on the Microsoft Marketplace, the add-in places a sidebar in Excel that can "search the web, update spreadsheets, or build powerful financial models," according to the product description It isn't without cost. The add-in is currently available for SuperGrok, Heavy, Business, and Enterprise plans, although,
  
  Read more

Follow @scitech_UK on Twitter!