AI altering meaning of users’ drafts on issues from abortion to climate, study finds

Researchers say small changes in drafting could spread rapidly and create long-term shifts in public opinionAI tools are twisting online messages on sensitive political topics about everything from abortion to climate change in ways that could snowball to reshape long-term public opinion, experts have said.As tech companies push AI tools as convenient ways to redraft and summarise the massive influx of daily messages, many inject their own political biases – some leaning distinctly rightwi

Meta said it was working with officials to be a ‘good neighbor’ and drinking water supplies were not affectedOfficials in Wyoming said a contractor for Mark Zuckerberg’s tech company, Meta, flushed bacteria-contaminated water into public sewers during construction of a controversial new AI datacenter.The incident prompted water authorities in Cheyenne to implement strict safety regulations on how wastewater from such projects is disposed of, according to the Wyoming Tribune Eag

July update projects GDP growth of 1% this year, making UK the third fastest-growing economy in the G7The International Monetary Fund (IMF) has upgraded its growth forecast for the UK, while leaving those for other G7 countries weaker or unchanged, amid hopes the economic impact of the Iran war may be less severe than feared.In a July update of its World Economic Outlook, which was finalised before the latest outbreak of hostilities in the Middle East, the Washington-based organisation projected

Political campaigns are increasingly deploying AI and deepfakes to further their messaging, and the scale of spread has experts concerned From the comfort of his bed, Jonathan Rinaldi, a political candidate for a city council seat in Queens, New York, tinkered away on his iPhone, prompting an artificial intelligence chatbot to mock up fake news hits and endorsements he had never received.During the campaign last October, Rinaldi shared one of those stories, made to appear real with a CNN logo, o

I can’t blame my patients for turning to its straightforward assessments. But it has real risks – and care may require human messiness“Chat told me I should break up with him.”I instructed my face to remain therapist-neutral, but I must have smirked. The truth is, I was annoyed. We had been discussing the viability of this relationship for weeks, and in an instant AI had brought the answer. “How do you feel about it?” She said this had been her gut feeling all

Those with high levels of vocational training, including tradespeople, are least exposed to AI displacement, according to government reviewGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastArtificial intelligence has yet to cause widespread job losses but the federal government has warned that telemarketers, advertising staff and accountants are among the occupations “most exposed” to being replaced by the technology.According to a first-of-its-kind national report, people i

From repainted walls to imaginary lawns, estate agents say modified photos help buyers ‘visualise the potential of a property’. But how much AI enhancement is too much? Agents, viewers and trading standards experts tell allIt is twilight on a desirable street in Chiswick, or it could be Hampstead, Wilmslow or Hove. A spectacular sunset has left a vivid stripe of orange fading into a violet sky. Against this saturated backdrop, a large Victorian house is clearly outlined despite the d

Report finds widespread overbidding as rapid AI growth generates increased wealth in city where housing is scarceSan Francisco’s AI boom has buyers spending unprecedented amounts of money on homes – much more than sellers are asking for.A new analysis from real-estate brokerage Compass, found that in the first half of 2026, more than 140 homes in the city sold for at least $1m above their asking price, 44 of them in June alone. Continue reading...

Residents and council say creating affordable housing is more urgent than ‘high-frequency trading’ in nearby CityCampaigners in east London are opposing plans for a datacentre in Brick Lane that they say will worsen the area’s housing crisis and drive long-term residents away.The road, famed for its curry houses and 24-hour bagel shops, is the latest flashpoint in the rapid rollout of datacentres across the UK that aims to meet demand created by artificial intelligence. Continu

Net-zero pledges of Google and Amazon slip out of reach, and struggling Meta makes frantic movesHello, and welcome to TechScape. I’m your host, Blake Montgomery, the Guardian’s US tech editor, writing to you after a rodeo in rural Texas, where I celebrated Independence Day. Today in tech, we’re discussing how tech giants’ investments in AI are hindering their pledges of climate neutrality, Meta’s frantic search for new lines of business, and Americans’ anger a

Andrew Charlton says artificial intelligence ‘cheating, deceiving, going their own way’ – and time to get ahead of it is during testing Follow our Australia news live blog for latest updatesGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastArtificial intelligence models are already “cheating, deceiving and going their own way”, Australia’s assistant minister for technology, Andrew Charlton, has warned, as the federal government’s AI Safety Insti

Large-scale datacentre projects around the world are being challenged or cancelled, as infrastructure’s energy demands ramp upDatacentre planning proposals face all kinds of hurdles, from securing energy supply to high construction costs. But the 2,000 acre Prince William Digital Gateway site in the US state of Virginia had another problem: its proximity to a Civil War battlefield.“If the development is allowed to proceed, the solemn nature of this historic site would become marred b

A Financial Times journalist ponders the future of labour in world increasingly dominated by AI and automationIt’s never been easy to land and keep a decent job. But it feels like it’s getting harder. In June, the number of job vacancies in the UK fell to a five-year low; headlines warn of a looming AI-employment shock. What might the future of work look like – and who or what will shape its terms? In her new book, Sarah O’Connor goes looking for answers in the modern col

By selling AI glasses as aspirational, cool and fashion-forward, tech elites are trying to pacify their entry into the mainstream worldWe have a habit of dismissing social media trends as inane and vapid while ignoring the disturbing undercurrent. A few weeks ago I was reminded of that when I saw an Instagram carousel by British fashion personality Alexa Chung. Shared with her 6 million followers, she showed different outfits through screenshots of herself entering and leaving her home on her se

Scottish government to consider SNP national council motion for moratorium on all new datacentresThe Scottish government is about to consider a sweeping moratorium on building new datacentres, putting a key plank of the UK’s AI strategy at risk.Last Sunday the Scottish National party (SNP)’s national council passed a motion to freeze all new datacentres in Scotland. That motion has been sent to the Scottish government to consider. Continue reading...

Thousands of gaming jobs will be shed over the coming fiscal year as Microsoft continues to invest heavily in AIMicrosoft said on Monday it was eliminating about 4,800 jobs – roughly 2% of its global workforce – in a cost-cutting move that will deliver a sweeping restructuring of its struggling Xbox gaming division.The cuts include the deepest overhaul in Xbox’s history, with approximately 3,200 gaming jobs to be shed over the coming fiscal year, four game studios being spun of

Jodie Heenan says her award-winning short film, Guardians of the Burrow, ‘looks and feels’ realScene: a dimly lit underground burrow. A giant Amazonian tarantula and a tiny dotted humming frog share the space, an unlikely duo captured in extraordinary detail.Except, they haven’t been. Guardians of the Burrow, a short “wildlife documentary” by the Australian digital content designer Jodie Heenan, is entirely AI generated. At the weekend it won a prize in the Omni int

These systems will soon be able to track our public and private lives. But we can make the policy choices to reject itIn the near future, AI-powered surveillance systems will be able to track everything we do in public, and much of what we do in private. And if we do something wrong – shoplift, litter, jaywalk, you name it – the system will notice, retain it, tie it to your official government record, communicate that fact to you, and provide real-time alerts to any relevant authorit

FCA’s review into how tech will reshape financial services warns about amplified risks of cyber-crime and fraudMinisters have been urged to toughen the City regulator’s powers to protect consumers against the potential risks of AI, according to a landmark review.The Mills review by the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), which looked at how AI will reshape financial services from 2030 onward, found that companies are already starting to shift from human-led activities towards AI-enabl

Elbit Systems supplied Tzayad digital army programme to map people, vehicles and other objects in real timeIsrael identified about 1,000 potential targets a day during the first two years of the wars in Gaza and Lebanon with its command and control system, according to a presentation by the country’s largest arms supplier, Elbit Systems.A total of 850,000 targets were detected in real time by the Israeli Tzayad digital army programme across all the military’s theatres of war between

As imaging tools become more sophisticated, online predators are using images of children to make extreme pornographyUK parents warned over posting images of children amid AI sexual abuse fearsThe two photos started out as typical teenage selfies: looking into the mirror, fully clothed. But once online predators had got hold of those pictures and ran them through an AI imaging tool, they had become the basis for extreme pornography videos.These examples come from the Report Remove service, which

Exclusive: National Crime Agency and safety watchdog issue guidance amid rise in explicit material onlineAI prey: why watchdogs are telling parents to protect children from nudification appsParents should not put photos of their children on public display online, according to landmark guidance issued to tackle the rise of AI-generated sexual abuse material.The recommendation has come from the National Crime Agency and the Internet Watch Foundation, which fear that most people are unaware of the

Readers respond to the profile of Iason Gabriel, a philosopher and research scientist at Google DeepMindThe Guardian’s profile of Google DeepMind’s philosopher was encouraging because it showed how seriously many of the people building AI are taking their ethical responsibilities (‘There’s this deep mystery of what, actually, is this thing?’: the philosopher inside Google DeepMind AI, 30 June). Yet it also left me wondering whether the most important decision has al