As SpaceX impacts Ukraine and AI-generated music divides artists and fans, critics are asking what happens when technology has too much control over our livesThis was originally published in TechScape, a newsletter about how technology shapes our lives. Sign up to receive it hereHello, and welcome to TechScape. I’m Blake Montgomery, US tech editor at the Guardian, writing to you while sitting in front of Roy Lichtenstein’s monumental Drowning Girl, on view in New York City. Today in tech, we’re discussing the perils of Elon Musk’s one-man global infrastructure, AI-generated music and a Guardian AI conference in Paris. Continue reading...
Google runs a single UK cloud region, so when one London zone lost power, there was nowhere to failover – most services recovered by late afternoon, but courts are still down
Use of tools ‘may result in the transfer of sensitive data’ to China, defense department saysThe US government on Monday ordered its agencies to stop using artificial intelligence (AI) tools from the Chinese startup DeepSeek, as the countries race for dominance in the fast-moving sector.A notice from the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) announced the ban on products developed by DeepSeek – and tools created using DeepSeek by third parties – saying they must be removed from IT devices. Continue reading...
Pharmaceutical company is working with Oracle to advance the use of AI and data analytics in medicine
Services restored for most users, but power fault stalled hearings and left Revolut, Lloyds and HSBC customers unable to pay or move moneyAn outage at Google’s cloud services in the UK has caused widespread disruption, hitting courts and leaving millions of customers unable to access or send cash at banks including Lloyds, HSBC and Revolut.Google blamed a “power event” for the failure at its London-based Cloud computing operations on Tuesday, which affected its “europe-west2-b zone”. Continue reading...
Great hardware let down by software flaws on these pricey machines that combine ChromeOS with AndroidGoogle’s attempt to create a new type of laptop to compete with Windows and macOS machines is finally here, combining the best of ChromeOS and Android into the new Googlebook. With advanced links to Android phones and the best of Google built in, can these Googlebooks really compete with a MacBook Air or Surface Laptop? I took two for a spin to find out.For years, Chromebooks have been the boss of budget laptops, but Googlebooks take a different, far more premium approach. Made by a range of traditional PC makers, including Acer, Asus, Dell, HP and Lenovo, they start at £999 (€1,099/$899/A$2,299) – a far cry from the £160 Chromebooks. Continue reading...
The financial services regulator is looking for senior staff to lead its agentic AI and data science operations
The government is currently deciding what to do with two failed pension outsourcing contracts as members of a third brace for upcoming switchover
In his annual speech on threats to the nation, Sir Ken McCallum, the head of the UK’s intelligence service, MI5, warned that AI had the potential to ‘change the stakes’ on existing and even new bioweapons. To find out why, and how, Ian Sample speaks to Dr Tom Inglesby, director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Health Security and the Bloomberg School of Public Health. He explains what has governments so worried and what measures could be put in place to reduce the risksCould AI ‘change the stakes’ in the development of bioweapons?Support the Guardian: theguardian.com/sciencepod Continue reading...
After a wobble on the tech-heavy Nasdaq, some AI market observers think a reassessment of the potential value of various businesses may be under wayGet our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastThe world is holding its breath as it waits to find out whether this year’s estimated $US1tn investment in artificial intelligence is resting on a castle made of sand.Last week, the Nasdaq 100 – an index of the 100 biggest non-financial stocks on the American tech-heavy Nasdaq exchange – dropped by 5.5%, triggering the usual angst that the AI boom is about to go bust. Continue reading...
The deep integration within the organisation makes it increasingly difficult for IT departments to select alternative enterprise IT systems, says survey
System can estimate a person’s biological age and predict chances of cancer survival from a single photographDoctors have developed an artificial intelligence tool that can predict a cancer patient’s chances of survival from a single photograph of their face.The AI system was custom-built by experts at Mass General Brigham, a nonprofit, integrated academic healthcare system in Massachusetts, to estimate biological age and directly predict survival outcomes in patients diagnosed with cancer. Continue reading...
The Security Think Tank explores the intersection of GDPR and artificial intelligence, considering how data protection standards in the UK and Europe are changing in this new paradigm.
The $48bn giveaway comes amid concerns about the tech and as the company prepares for a stock market listingAnthropic has said it will commit 5% of its shares to a fund for the “public good”, as the AI developer behind the Claude chatbot seeks to bolster its appeal before its stock market listing.The company announced it would commit the shares, worth around $48bn (£36bn) at its latest valuation in May, subject to shareholder approval. It will add a further 2% of its stock to the fund for every 50% increase in its value above an undisclosed baseline. Continue reading...
Datacentres are in the public crosshairs, but AI models could be next. Greenpixie’s John Ridd explains why companies must embrace sustainability data to ensure AI adoption lasts
Public authorities to get standing permit to process personal data with artificial intelligence, but critics say it plays too loosely with rights against government intrusion