ICT news

• Startups are Using GPUs to Simulate Quantum Computers

  23-04-2023 16:34 via slashdot.org
  
  Lacking quantum computers, some startups "are developing a new breed of software inspired by algorithms used in quantum physics..." reports Reuters.
  "Once too big for conventional computers, these algorithms are finally being put to work thanks to today's powerful artificial intelligence chips, industry executives told Reuters."QC Ware, a software startup that has raised more than $33 million and initially focused only on software that could run on quantum computers, said it needed to change tac
  
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• Android Phones Are Getting More Anti-Theft Features

  27-01-2026 20:22 via it.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader shares a report: Google on Tuesday announced an expanded set of Android theft-protection features, designed to make its mobile devices less of a target for criminals. Building on existing tools like Theft Detection Lock, Offline Device Lock, and others introduced in 2024, the newly launched updates include stronger authentication safeguards and enhanced recovery tools, the company said.
  [...] With the new features, users of Android devices running Android 16 or higher will ha
  
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• France To Ditch US Platforms Microsoft Teams, Zoom For 'Sovereign Platform' Amid Security Concerns

  27-01-2026 19:45 via tech.slashdot.org
  France will replace the American platforms Microsoft Teams and Zoom with its own domestically developed video conferencing platform, which will be used in all government departments by 2027, the country said. From a report: The move is part of France's strategy to stop using foreign software vendors, especially those from the United States, and regain control over critical digital infrastructure. It comes at a crucial moment as France, like Europe, reaches a turning point regarding digital sover
  
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• Microsoft Was Routing Example-Domain Traffic To a Japanese Cable Company for Five Years

  27-01-2026 19:01 via it.slashdot.org
  Microsoft has quietly suppressed an unexplained anomaly on its network that was routing traffic destined for example.com -- a domain reserved under RFC2606 specifically for testing purposes and not obtainable by any party -- to sei.co.jp, a domain belonging to Japanese electronics cable maker Sumitomo Electric.
  The misconfiguration meant anyone attempting to set up an Outlook account using an example.com email address could have inadvertently sent test credentials to Sumitomo Electric's servers.
  
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• Doomsday Clock Ticks To 85 Seconds Before Midnight, Its Closest Ever

  27-01-2026 18:21 via science.slashdot.org
  The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists on Tuesday set their symbolic Doomsday Clock to 85 seconds before midnight -- the closest the timepiece has ever been to the theoretical point of annihilation since scientists created it during the Cold War in 1947.
  The clock now stands four seconds nearer than last year's setting, and this marks the third time in four years that the Bulletin has moved it closer to midnight. The Chicago-based nonprofit pointed to aggressive behavior by nuclear powers Russia,
  
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• Amazon To Shut Down All Amazon Go and Amazon Fresh Stores

  27-01-2026 17:40 via slashdot.org
  Amazon is closing all of its Amazon Go and Amazon Fresh physical stores in a shift to focus on its online same-day delivery service and new big-box retail stores. From a report: The e-commerce giant said Tuesday that some of its shuttered Amazon-branded brick-and-mortar stores would be converted into Whole Foods Market locations. Amazon said its branded stores failed to deliver the right economic model and distinctive customer experience necessary for large-scale expansion.
  Amazon's same-day del
  
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• OpenAI's Science Chief Says LLMs Aren't Ready For Novel Discoveries and That's Fine

  27-01-2026 17:02 via science.slashdot.org
  OpenAI launched a dedicated team in October called OpenAI for Science, led by vice president Kevin Weil, that aims to make scientists more productive -- but Weil admitted in an interview with MIT Technology Review that the LLM cannot yet produce novel discoveries and says that's not currently the mission.
  UC Berkeley statistician Nikita Zhivotovskiy, who has used LLMs since the first ChatGPT, told the publication: "So far, they seem to mainly combine existing results, sometimes incorrectly, rath
  
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• Pinterest Cuts Up To 15% Jobs To Redirect Resources To AI

  27-01-2026 16:22 via slashdot.org
  Pinterest said on Tuesday it would trim its workforce by less than 15% and reduce office space, as the social media company looks to reallocate resources to AI-focused roles and initiatives. From a report: The announcement comes as the company competes with TikTok and Meta-owned Facebook and Instagram for digital advertising budgets, as these platforms continue to draw marketers with their extensive user base.
  Pinterest had 5,205 full-time employees as of September 2025. The latest job cut would
  
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• Samsung Galaxy Z Trifold Will Cost $2,900 in the US

  27-01-2026 15:45 via mobile.slashdot.org
  Samsung said today that its Galaxy Z TriFold, the first tri-fold smartphone to ship in the U.S., will be available starting January 30 at a price point of $2,899 -- substantially more expensive than any other phone on the U.S. market, including Samsung's own $2,000 Galaxy Z Fold 7 and a fully loaded 2TB iPhone 17 Pro Max.
  The company will only sell the device through its website and Samsung Experience Stores; mobile carrier partners including Verizon, T-Mobile, and AT&T won't be offering it
  
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• How Anthropic Built Claude: Buy Books, Slice Spines, Scan Pages, Recycle the Remains

  27-01-2026 15:06 via news.slashdot.org
  Court documents unsealed last week in a copyright lawsuit against Anthropic reveal that the AI company ran an operation called "Project Panama" to buy millions of physical books, slice off their spines, scan the pages to train its Claude chatbot, and then send the remains to recycling companies.
  The company spent tens of millions of dollars on the effort and hired Tom Turvey, a Google executive who had worked on the legally contested Google Books project two decades earlier. Anthropic bought boo
  
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• Microsoft Is Refreshing the Xbox Cloud Gaming Web Experience

  27-01-2026 14:00 via games.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from Thurrott: Microsoft is testing a refresh of the Xbox Cloud Gaming web experience in public preview. "This preview is a first look at our new web interface on your browser and lets you try the updated design and product flow before it is rolled out broadly," Microsoft's Patrick Siu explains. "Players who opt in to this preview will see some changes to their experience including updated navigation features and a refreshed look and feel. As this is a preview
  
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• ReactOS Celebrates 30 Years

  27-01-2026 11:00 via news.slashdot.org
  jeditobe writes: ReactOS, the open-source operating system aimed at binary compatibility with Windows, recently marked its 30th anniversary. Launched in 1996, ReactOS has focused on providing a free alternative to Windows, with compatibility for Windows applications and drivers. Though still in development, it has made significant progress in recent years, including improvements to USB support, better hardware compatibility, and enhanced performance with the release of version 0.4.15. The upcomi
  
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• Lawsuit Alleges That WhatsApp Has No End-to-End Encryption

  27-01-2026 08:00 via it.slashdot.org
  Longtime Slashdot reader schwit1 shares a report from PCMag: A lawsuit claims that WhatsApp's end-to-end encryption is a sham, and is demanding damages, but the app's parent company, Meta, calls the claims "false and absurd." The lawsuit was filed in a San Francisco US district court on Friday and comes from a group of users based in countries such as Australia, Mexico, and South Africa, according to Bloomberg.As evidence, the lawsuit cites unnamed "courageous whistleblowers" who allege that Wha
  
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• China Hacked Downing Street Phones For Years

  27-01-2026 04:30 via news.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from The Telegraph: China hacked the mobile phones of senior officials in Downing Street for several years, The Telegraph can disclose. The spying operation is understood to have compromised senior members of the government, exposing their private communications to Beijing. State-sponsored hackers are known to have targeted the phones of some of the closest aides to Boris Johnson, Liz Truss and Rishi Sunak between 2021 and 2024. It is unclear whether the hack
  
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• Reddit Lawyers Force Founder to Redact 'WallStreetBets' From Miami Event

  27-01-2026 02:50 via tech.slashdot.org
  Reddit has forced Jaime Rogozinski, the founder of infamous r/WallStreetBets, to strip the WallStreetBets name from an upcoming Miami conference after legal threats citing trademark rights. According to a press release, it's the "first known case of a social media company enforcing trademark control over a user-created community." From the report: After years of litigation, courts ultimately sided with Reddit in a decision now referred to as the "Rogozinski Ruling," a precedent that grants platf
  
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• Apple Launches AirTag 2 With Improved Range, Louder Speaker

  27-01-2026 02:20 via apple.slashdot.org
  Apple has launched a new AirTag 2 that features improved range, a speaker that's 50% louder, and expanded Apple Watch-based tracking. Pricing stays the same at $29 (or $99 for four). 9to5Mac reports: The new AirTag comes with an upgraded second-generation Ultra Wideband chip for improved range, including when using Precision Finding. From Apple Newsroom: "Apple's second-generation Ultra Wideband chip -- the same chip found in the iPhone 17 lineup, iPhone Air, Apple Watch Ultra 3, and Apple Watch
  
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• TikTok Alternative 'Skylight' Soars To 380K+ Users After TikTok US Deal Finalized

  27-01-2026 02:00 via tech.slashdot.org
  Skylight, an open-source, TikTok-style video app built on the AT Protocol, surged past 380,000 users after last week's shake-up around TikTok's U.S. ownership and privacy concerns. TechCrunch reports: Launched last year and backed by Mark Cuban and other investors, Skylight's mobile app is built on the AT Protocol, the technology that also powers the decentralized X rival Bluesky, which now has north of 42 million users. Skylight, co-founded by CEO Tori White and CTO Reed Harmeyer, offers a buil
  
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• Microsoft's Latest AI Chip Claims Performance Edge Over Amazon and Google

  27-01-2026 01:20 via hardware.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from GeekWire: Microsoft on Monday announced Maia 200, the second generation of its custom AI chip, claiming it's the most powerful first-party silicon from any major cloud provider. The company says Maia 200 delivers three times the performance of Amazon's latest Trainium chip on certain benchmarks, and exceeds Google's most recent tensor processing unit (TPU) on others. The chip is already running workloads at Microsoft's data center near Des Moines, Iowa. M
  
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• California Tech CEO and EV Pioneer Arrested, Accused of Murder

  27-01-2026 00:40 via yro.slashdot.org
  California tech executive Gordon Abas Goodarzi has been arrested and charged with murder in the death of his estranged wife, Aryan Papoli, whose body was found last November down an embankment off Highway 138 in San Bernardino County. Authorities initially believed the injuries were consistent with a fall, but the case was later ruled a homicide following a months-long investigation by the San Bernardino County Sheriff's Department. "Arrest records show that Goodarzi is currently in custody with
  
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• Gemini In Google Calendar Now Helps You Find the Best Meeting Time For All Attendees

  27-01-2026 00:00 via tech.slashdot.org
  Google is adding Gemini-powered "Suggested times" to Google Calendar, automatically scanning attendees' calendars to surface the best meeting slots based on availability, work hours, and conflicts. The feature also streamlines rescheduling with one-click alternatives when invitees decline. Digital Trends reports: According to a recent post on the Workspace Updates blog, Gemini in Google Calendar can now help you quickly identify optimal meeting times when creating an event, as long as you have a
  
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• Google Settles $68 Million Lawsuit Claiming It Recorded Private Conversations

  26-01-2026 23:25 via yro.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader quotes a report from the BBC: Google has agreed to pay $68 million to settle a lawsuit claiming it secretly listened to people's private conversations through their phones. [...] the lawsuit claimed Google Assistant would sometimes turn on by mistake -- the phone thinking someone had said its activation phrase when they had not -- and recorded conversations intended to be private. They alleged the recordings were then sent to advertisers for the purpose of creating targeted a
  
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• DOT Plans To Use Google Gemini AI To Write Regulations

  26-01-2026 22:22 via news.slashdot.org
  The Trump administration is planning to use AI to write federal transportation regulations, ProPublica reported on Monday, citing the U.S. Department of Transportation records and interviews with six agency staffers. From the report: The plan was presented to DOT staff last month at a demonstration of AI's "potential to revolutionize the way we draft rulemakings," agency attorney Daniel Cohen wrote to colleagues. The demonstration, Cohen wrote, would showcase "exciting new AI tools available to
  
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• Valve Facing UK Lawsuit Over Pricing and Commissions

  26-01-2026 21:45 via news.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader shares a report: Video game developer and distributor Valve must face a 656 million-pound ($897.7 million) lawsuit in Britain, which alleges it charged publishers excessive commissions for its Steam online store, after a tribunal ruled on Monday the case could continue. Valve was sued in 2024 on behalf of up to 14 million people in the United Kingdom who bought games or additional content through Steam or other platforms since 2018.
  Lawyers representing children's welfare adv
  
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• New California Law Means Big Changes For Photos of Homes in Real Estate Listings

  26-01-2026 21:05 via news.slashdot.org
  California house hunters now have legal protection against the kind of real estate photo trickery that has long plagued the home-buying process, as a new state law requiring disclosure of digitally altered listing images took effect on January 1.
  Assembly Bill 723 mandates that real estate agents and brokers include a "reasonably conspicuous" statement whenever photos have been altered using editing software or AI to add, remove, or change elements like furniture, appliances, flooring, views or
  
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• GTA 6's Physical Release Could Be Delayed To 2027 Because of Leaks

  26-01-2026 20:28 via games.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader shares a report: An insider who correctly leaked information about Oblivion: Remastered and other titles is warning that GTA 6's physical release could be pushed back. GTA 6 is set to finally launch on November 19, 2026, but fans hoping to get their hands on a physical copy could be stuck waiting even longer.
  According to a report from Polish site PPE, insider Graczdari says Rockstar's parent company, Take-Two, isn't planning to release a physical edition of GTA 6 at launch.
  
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• Nike Says It's Investigating Possible Data Breach

  26-01-2026 19:53 via it.slashdot.org
  Nike says it is investigating a potential data breach, after a group known for cyber attacks reportedly claimed to have leaked a trove of data related to its business operations. From a report: "We always take consumer privacy and data security very seriously," Nike said in a statement. "We are investigating a potential cyber security incident and are actively assessing the situation."
  The ransomware group World Leaks said on its website that it had published 1.4 terabytes of data from Nike.Read
  
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• Television Turns 100

  26-01-2026 19:10 via entertainment.slashdot.org
  Television marks its centenary today, exactly 100 years after Scottish inventor John Logie Baird first demonstrated his electro-mechanical system to journalists and members of the Royal Institution in a cramped attic workshop above what is now Bar Italia in London's Soho.
  On January 26, 1926, small groups of visitors climbed to 22 Frith Street and watched fuzzy images of a ventriloquist's dummy called Stooky Bill appear on screen, followed by each other's faces transmitted from a separate room.
  
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• How a 15,000-Person Island Stumbled Into a $70 Million AI Windfall

  26-01-2026 18:30 via tech.slashdot.org
  An anonymous reader shares a report: From Sandisk shareholders to vibe coders, AI is making -- and breaking -- fortunes at a rapid pace. One unlikely beneficiary has been the British Overseas Territory of Anguilla, which lucked into a future fortune when ICANN, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, gave the island the ".ai" top-level domain in the mid-1990s. Indeed, since ChatGPT's launch at the end of 2022, the gold rush for websites to associate themselves with the burgeonin
  
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• Fixing Retail With Land Value Capture

  26-01-2026 17:50 via slashdot.org
  The independent coffee shops and quirky boutiques that make neighborhoods like Hayes Valley in San Francisco or Williamsburg in Brooklyn desirable are caught in a frustrating economic trap: they create value that ends up in the pockets of nearby homeowners rather than their own cash registers.
  An essay in Works in Progress magazine argues that when an interesting new store or restaurant opens, commercial and residential property values rise in the surrounding area, but the retailer itself captur
  
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• World Not Ready For Rise In Extreme Heat, Scientists Say

  26-01-2026 17:12 via news.slashdot.org
  Nearly 3.8 billion people could face extreme heat by 2050 and while tropical countries will bear the brunt cooler regions will also need to adapt, scientists said Monday. From a report: Demand for cooling will "drastically" increase in giant countries like Brazil, Indonesia and Nigeria, where hundreds of millions of people lack air conditioning or other means of beating the heat. But even a moderate increase in hotter days could have a "severe impact" in nations not used to such conditions like
  
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