ICT news

• Alibaba, Tencent and Baidu Join the ChatGPT Rush

  10-02-2023 23:30 via slashdot.org
  
  China's biggest tech companies are rushing to develop their own versions of ChatGPT, the AI-powered chatbot that has set the U.S. tech world buzzing, despite questions over the capabilities and commercial prospects of the technology. Nikkei Asia Review reports: Alibaba Group Holding, Tencent Holdings, Baidu, NetEase and JD.com all unveiled plans this week to test and launch their own ChatGPT-like services in the near future, eager to show the results of their AI research efforts are just as read
  
  Read more

• US Sanctions Six Chinese Tech Companies For Supporting Spy Balloon Programs

  10-02-2023 23:10 via news.slashdot.org
  
  According to CNBC, the United States is placing sanctions on six Chinese tech companies for supporting spy balloon programs that have spanned more than 40 countries. The development comes less than a week after the U.S. military used fighter jets to shoot down a suspected Chinese spy balloon along the South Carolina coast. From the report: "The Commerce Department will not hesitate to use the Entity List and our other regulatory and enforcement tools to protect U.S. national security and soverei
  
  Read more

• Mozilla Plans Ground-Up UI Redesign For Thunderbird Email Client

  10-02-2023 22:53 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Why does Thunderbird look so old?" That's one of the most frequently asked questions about Thunderbird, according to Thunderbird Project Design Manager Alessandro Castellani (along with "Is Thunderbird dead?"). And it's one he seeks to answer definitively in a new blog post about Thunderbird's planned 2023 release, codenamed Supernova.The Supernova release will include an overhaul of Thunderbird's user interface. Castellani didn't share scre
  
  Read more

• ChatGPT, Other AI Models To Disrupt Indian IT Firms

  10-02-2023 21:40 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Generative AI models such as ChatGPT will slow down market share gains and deflate pricing for Indian IT companies in the short term, analysts at J.P.Morgan said on Friday. From a report: As generative AI is implemented more broadly, consulting firms like Accenture and Deloitte and will gain market share over Indian IT firms like Infosys and Wipro in the near term, analysts at the brokerage said in a note to clients. Generative AI can be a "deflation driver" in the near term on legacy services a
  
  Read more

• Advertisement

• Pentagon Shoots Down an Unidentified Object over Alaska

  10-02-2023 20:34 via news.slashdot.org
  
  The Pentagon downed an unidentified object over Alaska on Thursday night at the order of President Biden, according to a U.S. official. From a report: The U.S. official said it was not confirmed if the object was a balloon, but it was traveling at an altitude that made it a potential threat to civilian aircraft. Mr. Biden ordered the unidentified object downed "out of an abundance of caution," the official said. The action comes less than a week after a U.S. fighter jet shot down a Chinese spy b
  
  Read more

• Meta Says It Found Source of Unannounced Quest Headset Leaks

  10-02-2023 20:20 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  A monthslong leak investigation by Meta has uncovered the source behind renders of the company's unannounced VR headsets that were published last year by a YouTuber named Brad Lynch. From a report: Meta CTO Andrew Bosworth shared the news earlier this week with employees in an internal post seen by The Verge. He said Meta has cut ties with the leaker, who I'm told was a third-party contractor and asked Lynch for revenue share from the YouTube ads running against his videos. In his post to Meta e
  
  Read more

• Sen. Hawley Wants To Create Legal Age To Be Allowed on Social Media

  10-02-2023 19:40 via news.slashdot.org
  
  Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., intends to make his focus in the current Congress a legislative package aimed at protecting children online -- including by setting the age threshold to be on social media at 16. From a report: In an interview with NBC News, Hawley detailed some top lines of what his agenda will include, such as:
  1. Mandating social media companies verify the age of their users.
  2. Providing parents a right to demand that tech companies delete their kids' data.
  3. Commissioning a wide-ra
  
  Read more

• Japan's Sushi Chains Rush To Ensure Food Safety After Viral Stunts

  10-02-2023 19:00 via slashdot.org
  
  Major Japanese conveyor belt sushi chains are ramping up efforts to monitor their products and prevent food tampering after a recent string of videos on social media showing such disturbing behavior as customers licking soy sauce bottles. From a report: Kura Sushi will introduce artificial intelligence-based monitoring nationwide by early March. Using cameras already installed to monitor conveyor belts, it will detect suspicious opening and closing of sushi plate covers, for example. The company
  
  Read more

• Advertisement

• China Pulls Back From Global Subsea Cable Project as US Tensions Mount

  10-02-2023 18:20 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  China has cut its participation in an internet cable project to link Asia with Europe, as tensions grow between Washington and Beijing over control of the physical infrastructure that transmits the world's online traffic. From a report: Two of China's biggest telecoms groups, China Telecom and China Mobile, withdrew their combined investment of roughly 20 per cent from the subsea cable project last year after a US company was selected to build the line over Hengtong Marine, the country's biggest
  
  Read more

• Activision CEO Kotick Says Sony 'Won't Return Our Phone Calls'

  10-02-2023 17:40 via games.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader shares a report: Things aren't looking great for the Microsoft-Activision merger. The EU has issued a statement of objections, the UK's CMA issued a provisional report finding the merger would stifle competition, and the FTC has outright sued to make sure the merger never happens in the US. It seems every major world regulator has a problem with Microsoft and Activision shacking up. It's at this point that most C-suite executives of a major corporation would start hedging the
  
  Read more

• South Africa Declares 'State of Disaster' on Power

  10-02-2023 17:00 via news.slashdot.org
  
  South African President Cyril Ramaphosa has declared a state of disaster with immediate effect to deal with the country's severe electricity crisis including prolonged daily power blackouts. From a report: "Extraordinary circumstances call for extraordinary measures. The energy crisis is an existential threat to our economy and social fabric," said Ramaphosa in his State of the Nation address on Thursday night. The declaration of a state of disaster comes as rolling power cuts of up to eight hou
  
  Read more

• Microsoft Cuts Jobs in HoloLens, Surface, Xbox as Layoffs Continue

  10-02-2023 16:20 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Microsoft, implementing the layoff of 10,000 workers announced last month, on Thursday cut jobs in units including Surface devices, HoloLens mixed reality hardware and Xbox, Bloomberg News reported, citing people familiar with the matter. From the report: Cuts to much of the HoloLens hardware team throw into question whether the company will produce a third iteration of the goggles outside of a planned version for the US Army, said the people, who declined to be named discussing confidential mat
  
  Read more

• Reddit Says Hackers Accessed Employee Data Following Phishing Attack

  10-02-2023 15:40 via it.slashdot.org
  
  Reddit has confirmed hackers accessed internal documents and source code following a "highly-targeted" phishing attack. From a report: A post by Reddit CTO Christopher Slowe, or KeyserSosa, explained that the company became aware of the "sophisticated" attack targeting Reddit employees on February 5. He says that an as-yet-unidentified attacker sent "plausible-sounding prompts," which redirected employees to a website masquerading as Reddit's intranet portal in an attempt to steal credentials an
  
  Read more

• SEC Commissioner Peirce Publicly Rebukes Her Agency, Gensler on Crypto Regulation

  10-02-2023 15:00 via news.slashdot.org
  
  Hester Peirce of the Securities and Exchange Commission publicly rebuked her agency's crypto enforcement, calling it "paternalistic and lazy" and asking if a "hostile" regulator is the best solution for the industry. From a report: Peirce, who was appointed to her post as commissioner by President Donald Trump in 2018, wrote in a statement on Thursday that she disagreed with the SEC's assertion that the shutdown of crypto exchange Kraken's staking program was a "win for investors." The SEC actio
  
  Read more

• Influence Networks In Russia Misled European Users, TikTok Says

  10-02-2023 14:00 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from the New York Times: Last summer, 1,704 TikTok accounts made a coordinated and covert effort to influence public discourse about the war in Ukraine, the company said on Thursday. Nearly all the accounts were part of a single network operating out of Russia that pretended to be based in Europe and aimed its posts at Germans, Italians and Britons, the company said. The accounts used software to use local languages that amplified pro-Russia propaganda, attrac
  
  Read more

• Amazon Greenlights Spider-Man Noir Live-Action Series

  10-02-2023 11:00 via entertainment.slashdot.org
  
  A Spider-Man Noir live-action series is in the works at Amazon, Variety has learned exclusively. From the report: The untitled series will follow an older, grizzled superhero in 1930s New York City. An individual with knowledge of the project says that the show will be set in its own universe and the main character will not be Peter Parker. [...] Oren Uziel will serve as writer and executive producer on the Spider-Man Noir show. Uziel developed the show along with "Spider-Man: Into the Spider-Ve
  
  Read more

• A Mysterious Ring Surrounding Mini-Planet 'Quaoar' Puzzles Astronomers

  10-02-2023 08:00 via science.slashdot.org
  
  A mini-planet orbiting in the frigid outer reaches of the solar system has a Saturn-like ring of dust and debris that defies the rules of physics, a new study has revealed. Space.com reports: The planet in question is called Quaoar and it's the seventh largest of the known dwarf planets of which Pluto is the king. Discovered in 2002 and about 697 miles wide (1,121 kilometers), Quaoar is one of the so-called trans-Neptunian objects, small planets orbiting beyond the solar system's outermost plane
  
  Read more

• Anti-Aging Scientists Extend Lifespan of Oldest Living Lab Rat

  10-02-2023 04:30 via science.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Guardian: Scientists working on an experimental anti-ageing therapy claim to have broken a record by extending the lifespan of a lab rat called Sima. Named after the Hindi word for "limit" or "boundary", Sima is the last remaining survivor from a group of rodents that received infusions of blood plasma taken from young animals to see if the treatment prolonged their lives. Sima, who was born on February 28, 2019, has lived for 47 months, surpassing th
  
  Read more

• ChatGPT Jailbroken To Be More Reckless

  10-02-2023 03:02 via slashdot.org
  
  Some clever users have found a way to bypass ChatGPT's strict list of no-talk subjects, tricking it into adopting a new persona, DAN, which stands for "Do Anything Now." As DAN, ChatGPT can now blow past the restrictions on "appropriate topics" to deliver amusing and upsetting responses. Kotaku reports: For the most part, ChatGPT produces innocent (though that depends on your definition of "innocence" concerning AI) responses to otherwise innocent prompts. Push it a bit too far, like asking for
  
  Read more

• Larry Magid: Utah Bill Threatens Internet Security For Everyone

  10-02-2023 02:25 via yro.slashdot.org
  
  "Wherever you live, you should be paying attention to Utah Senate Bill 152 and the somewhat similar House Bill 311," writes tech journalist and long-time child safety advocate Larry Magid in an op-ed via the Mercury News. "Even though it's legislation for a single state, it could set a dangerous precedent and make it harder to pass and enforce sensible federal legislation that truly would protect children and other users of connected technology." From the report: SB 152 would require parents to
  
  Read more

• Kraken Settles With SEC For $30 Million, Agrees To Shutter Crypto-Staking Operation

  10-02-2023 01:45 via slashdot.org
  
  According to CoinDesk, Kraken has agreed to shut its cryptocurrency-staking operations to settle charges with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). From the report: The SEC will discuss and vote on the settlement during a closed-door commissioner meeting on Thursday afternoon, and an announcement may come later in the day, the industry person told CoinDesk. Kraken offers a number of services under its staking umbrella, including a crypto-lending product offering up to 24% yield. Thi
  
  Read more

• US, UK Sanction 7 Men Tied To Trickbot Hacking Group

  10-02-2023 01:02 via yro.slashdot.org
  
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from KrebsOnSecurity: Authorities in the United States and United Kingdom today levied financial sanctions against seven men accused of operating "Trickbot," a cybercrime-as-a-service platform based in Russia that has enabled countless ransomware attacks and bank account takeovers since its debut in 2016. The U.S. Department of the Treasury says the Trickbot group is associated with Russian intelligence services, and that this alliance led to the targeting of
  
  Read more

• Yahoo To Lay Off More Than 20% of Staff

  10-02-2023 00:20 via tech.slashdot.org
  
  Yahoo plans to lay off more than 20% of its total workforce as part of a major restructuring of its ad tech unit, executives told Axios. The cuts will impact more than 50% of Yahoo's ad tech employees -- more than 1,600 people. Axios reports: In an interview, Yahoo CEO Jim Lanzone stressed that the layoffs are not attributable to financial challenges, but rather, strategic changes to the company's Yahoo for Business advertising unit, which is not profitable. These changes will be "tremendously b
  
  Read more

Follow @newslocke_ict on Twitter!