Research & Development news

• Snapchat and Instagram grooming becoming 'easier'

  16-10-2026 07:12 via bbc.co.uk
  
  Online grooming is rising, with children as young as five targeted, prompting calls for reform.
  
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• The new economics of enterprise AI

  20-10-2026 17:20 via technologyreview.com
  
  Imagine your company just discovered electricity. At first only a few machines run on it, and nobody worries about efficiency — consumption is low and the value is obvious. But once electricity becomes infrastructure, every process depends on it, and the question changes from “can we use it?” to “how efficiently are we using it?”Enterprise AI is going through the same shift. What began as isolated chatbot and copilot experiments is becoming a foundational layer of t
  
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• The Download: the claim shaking up AI and the internet’s agent problem

  20-10-2026 14:10 via technologyreview.com
  
  This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology.“We were looking at it wrong”: The explosive claim that’s upended the AI world“I think I have good news about the nature of neural networks.” With those simple words of optimism, Nick Cammarata, a researcher at AI startup Goodfire, kicked off a 26,000-word blog post that has knocked the AI world on its head, sparking wi
  
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• AI adoption by industry shows what other sectors can learn

  20-10-2026 14:00 via technologyreview.com
  
  The current narrative around artificial intelligence in the workplace is largely driven by Silicon Valley. But treating the tech sector as an island misses the actual trends in technology adoption–tech is just the first industry in line.As generative AI and automation tools mature, the shifts currently reshaping software engineering and product management will inevitably filter into healthcare, education, retail, and manufacturing. The variation in adoption rates today isn’t a sign t
  
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• How to study a swiftly melting climate disaster

  20-10-2026 12:00 via technologyreview.com
  
  Andrew Haverdink, a tall grad student in a rain bib and rubber boots, wrenched a double-handed drill from the frozen soil that underlies much of Alaska’s Denali National Park and then unclipped the hollow barrel from the end of the bit. He knelt in front of a blue tarp, lined the barrel up with a plastic tray, and pushed a rod through the opposite end. A perfect solid, cylindrical core of ancient soil emerged—dark, rich permafrost at least a foot long.On that late morning in ea
  
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• These startups hope “blended” food will cut our appetite for red meat 

  20-10-2026 11:00 via technologyreview.com
  
  In the fall of 2025, Jeff Dodge set up a six-foot folding table in the cafeteria of Cane Bay High School in Summerville, South Carolina, to conduct a taste test. When the first rush of about 150 hungry students hit, he was waiting with slow cookers filled with steaming marinara sauce and meatballs. Kids love a taste test, but they’re also discerning, and Dodge wasn’t sure what they would make of his product, a blend featuring both meat and mushrooms. As students swarmed the tabl
  
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• A visit to Samsung’s massive new semiconductor hub

  20-10-2026 11:00 via technologyreview.com
  
  _____________
  THE PLACE
  Pyeongtaek,
  South KoreaGenerative AI models run on powerful chips known as GPUs, which depend on stacks of specialized memory chips packaged with the processor. To meet growing demand for memory, Samsung is building a massive new semiconductor manufacturing complex in Pyeongtaek, South Korea. Three fabs already operate around the clock, and a fourth is coming online. Construction of a fifth was halted during a drop in demand for memory chips in 2024 but restarted when the
  
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• Ex-OpenAI worker accused of planting device had Saudi support, says court filing

  19-10-2026 23:12 via bbc.co.uk
  
  The Saudi government did not immediately respond to BBC requests for comment.
  
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• Making the internet better for AI agents might make it worse for everyone else

  19-10-2026 20:22 via technologyreview.com
  
  This story originally appeared in The Algorithm, our weekly newsletter on AI. To get stories like this in your inbox first, sign up here.Until recently, you could divide internet users into just two categories: bots and people. Websites have long allowed bots to perform automated tasks, like capturing the content of web pages, but rules govern what they can access and how they behave. The web, after all, is designed primarily for people, even if we occasionally have to solve puzzles and cap
  
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• US bans China's DeepSeek from government in race for AI dominance

  19-10-2026 20:21 via bbc.co.uk
  
  The Chinese technology is removed from most US government agencies as race for AI dominance steps up.
  
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• “We were looking at it wrong”: The explosive claim that’s upended the AI world

  19-10-2026 19:45 via technologyreview.com
  
  “I think I have good news about the nature of neural networks.” With those simple words of optimism, Nick Cammarata, a researcher at the AI startup Goodfire, kicked off a 26,000-word blog post that has knocked the AI world on its head, sparking wild speculation as well as cautious (and not-so-cautious) celebration.Cammarata’s claim is that LLMs might in fact be far easier to understand—and thus to monitor and control—than people previously thought. If true (and we&
  
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• Uber wins bid to throw out £200m black cab claims

  19-10-2026 14:58 via bbc.co.uk
  
  Claims that Uber misled TfL over its licence were thrown out because they were brought too late.
  
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• The Download: preserving the Arctic permafrost, and playful AI agents

  19-10-2026 14:10 via technologyreview.com
  
  This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology.
  Inside the quest to combat Arctic fires and save the planet’s frozen carbon—James TempleIn July 2021, a wildfire burned through a forest on the University of Alaska, Fairbanks campus, stripping away the moss and organic-rich soil insulating the permafrost below. Five years later, I followed researchers into the forest to investigat
  
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• Musk and Anthropic pledge public share giveaways

  19-10-2026 11:38 via bbc.co.uk
  
  Musk's announcement comes after Anthropic pledged to create a public benefit fund ahead of its blockbuster stock market listing.
  
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• Inside the quest to combat Arctic fires and save the planet’s frozen carbon

  19-10-2026 11:22 via technologyreview.com
  
  In the middle of an especially warm July in 2021, a wildfire ignited in a thick forest of black spruce and peeling paper birch trees on the northern campus of the University of Alaska, Fairbanks. The blaze, possibly sparked by lightning, burned across the dry carpet of feather mosses and lichen before climbing into the crowns. By the time fire agencies responded, flames had reached 12 feet in length and sent up a 500-foot column of smoke. A few days shy of the five-year anniversary of
  
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• AI researchers stranded Claude on a virtual desert island. It started to “play.”

  19-10-2026 11:08 via technologyreview.com
  
  What do AI agents do if you don’t tell them to do anything? The answer looks a lot like play.Researchers repeatedly stranded them alone on a virtual desert island for 30 hours in an experiment reminiscent of the movies Cast Away or Home Alone. The agents—copies of Claude Opus 4.7 nicknamed Eko—were able to write instructions that moved their virtual avatars around the simulated island, which was loosely based on the video game Roblox.Some surprising behaviors emerged. The agen
  
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• How far can we push computing?

  19-10-2026 11:00 via technologyreview.com
  
  MIT Technology Review Explains: Let our writers untangle the complex, messy world of science and technology to help you understand what’s coming next. You can read more from the series here.On the evening of December 29, 1959, at an American Physical Society meeting at Caltech, the physicist Richard Feynman gave a lecture called “There’s Plenty of Room at the Bottom,” on how we might manipulate and control things on an extremely small scale. There is no physical law stopp
  
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• China's growth accelerates as AI boom helps boost exports

  19-10-2026 08:08 via bbc.co.uk
  
  Exports have helped offset weak spending at home, but trade tensions and AI doubts cloud its outlook.
  
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• Don't fall for this - how to protect yourself from AI scams

  19-10-2026 01:24 via bbc.co.uk
  
  Trading standards officers say AI is "super-charging" existing scams through clones and fake websites.
  
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• No further action against government adviser's wife over Palestine Action post, police say

  17-10-2026 22:24 via bbc.co.uk
  
  Sarah Helm, who is married to Jonathan Powell, was responding to a discussion about the author Sally Rooney.
  
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• Toxic algorithms wouldn't let them go - now Australia wants an off switch

  16-10-2026 20:11 via bbc.co.uk
  
  Australia has proposed a switch to force social media platforms to let users turn off recommended content.
  
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• Russian man linked to deadly London hospitals hack arrested

  16-10-2026 17:31 via bbc.co.uk
  
  The 28-year-old detained by German police is accused of being part of the cyber-crime gang that hacked blood-test firm Synnovis in 2024.
  
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• The Download: failed social media bans, and extending pets’ lives

  16-10-2026 14:10 via technologyreview.com
  
  This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology.
  Kids are outsmarting social media bans. That’s not a problem we need to solve.  —Michal Luria, Aliya Bhatia, and Danah BoydSocial media bans are stacking up. In July, France joined Australia in restricting minors from accessing social media—barring children under 15 from major platforms, before the ban was blocked by the
  
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• This implant can restore sight for patients with macular degeneration

  16-10-2026 11:00 via technologyreview.com
  
  Age-related macular degeneration (AMD) affects more than 5 million people around the world. And until now, no treatment could restore their vision. The Prima system, which was approved in Europe in July and is awaiting FDA clearance in the US, changes that. It combines a retinal implant with camera-­equipped eyeglasses to improve sight in patients who develop a blind spot in the middle of their vision due to advanced AMD. After training sessions, more than 80% of recipients were able to read
  
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• Love is infrastructure

  16-10-2026 11:00 via technologyreview.com
  
  I. Meet cuteBarnabas and Mainspring grew up near at hand, about an hour apart with good traffic, but for a long time they weren’t close. They traded glimpses and occasional hellos and then went about their business. Both of them carried on livelier conversations with farther-flung neighbors, who were richer and had more to offer.When Mainspring did interact with Barnabas, it was cringe. Mainspring liked to puff themself up, to strut around like a big deal—an innovator, a titan of ind
  
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• Can’t bear to say goodbye to your pet? Biotech’s got you covered.

  16-10-2026 11:00 via technologyreview.com
  
  I don’t remember much about Peppy, my first and only pet cat. I can conjure the sensation of stroking her while she purred, recall how she used to get stuck in trees (just like in cartoons!), and chuckle about the time she pooed in my baby sister’s cot. That’s about it.What I do vividly remember, though, is the day she went missing. I was 10 years old, and I searched everywhere for her, scouting nearby fields and woods until sunset. I made posters. We never found her. I was de
  
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• Kids are outsmarting social media bans. That’s not a problem we need to solve.

  16-10-2026 09:56 via technologyreview.com
  
  Social media bans are stacking up. In July, France joined Australia in restricting minors from accessing social media—barring children under 15 from major platforms, before the ban was blocked by the country’s top court on human rights grounds. The UK aims to forbid kids under 16 from accessing Facebook, TikTok, and other platforms in early 2027, and the EU has announced its own plan to prohibit social media for kids under 15.But early lessons from Australia, which enacted a ban in 2
  
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• Porn showing choking or incest to be banned from early November, government says

  16-10-2026 01:27 via bbc.co.uk
  
  The move follows a review into pornography regulation in 2025 by Conservative peer Baroness Gabby Bertin
  
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• Living with a stink? Technology might help

  16-10-2026 01:18 via bbc.co.uk
  
  Smells from rubbish dumps and industrial facilities are being more carefully monitored.
  
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• The Download: reviving frozen pig kidneys and boosting nuclear power

  15-10-2026 14:10 via technologyreview.com
  
  This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology.Pig kidneys that were “frozen” for a year have been brought back to lifePig kidneys that were cooled to -150 °C and stored in a freezer for months have been successfully rewarmed and shown to work again for the first time, say scientists. The kidneys, which are similar in size to human ones, were left in a glass-like state, in o
  
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