Lot 2 of the contract to replace Fujitsu’s controversial Horizon EPOS system has still not been signed off
Celonis claims FTSE 100 firms could save £4.4bn by closing ‘execution gaps’ in workflows through process intelligence software, potentially rising to £50bn with agentic AI
Outsourcing firm’s botched takeover of civil service pension administration has seen scheme members experience financial hardship
The UK planning system is being reworked with artificial intelligence and computer vision to provide data in a consistent format
National Quantum Standards Network will be overseen by the UK’s National Physical Laboratory, with the aim of establishing the rules of the road for quantum computing and accelerating British innovation
UK government plans for a national digital identity scheme risk embedding further inequalities and barriers to public services for the 19 million people currently experiencing digital exclusion
Josh Shapiro, Pennsylvania’s governor, squares off with state lawmakers over the facilities powering an AI boomA controversial haunted house near Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, taps into its dark history every fall to scare tens of thousands of visitors. In 1968, a local news station documented appalling conditions for disabled people in the red brick buildings on the banks of Schuylkill River. Residents were found naked and emaciated at what was then known as the Pennhurst state school and hospital. The institution shut its doors permanently in 1987 after a lawsuit over inhumane conditions.By 2010, a Halloween attraction stood in its place, and Pennhurst asylum’s previous owner suggested during its early years that he wanted to spook guests by repurposing the hospital’s surgical lights and medical cabinets to use as props. Continue reading...
Elon Musk’s firm briefly reached $2.97tn valuation days after its IPO following purchase of AI coding startup CursorSpaceX has overtaken Amazon to become the world’s fifth most valuable company days after its stock market debut.The milestone came as Elon Musk’s company agreed to buy the startup behind the AI-powered coding app Cursor for $60bn (£44bn), in an attempt to capitalise on the technology’s success as a coding tool. Continue reading...
Move to ChapsVision is to avoid ‘strategic dependencies’, says PM amid concern about reliance on US-controlled toolsFrance’s domestic intelligence service is to ditch AI data tools from the US tech company Palantir in favour of a domestic provider in an effort to avoid “strategic dependency”, the prime minister, Sébastien Lecornu, has said.“We must use our own AI models; we cannot accept new strategic dependencies in the digital sphere,” Lecornu posted on social media. “We cannot rely on tools developed by foreign powers. France must have its own tools.” Continue reading...
IPO mints Musk as world’s first trillionaire – now SpaceX is public, it will be harder than ever not to have a stake in its future Hi and welcome to TechScape. Nick Robins-Early here, US tech and power reporter at the Guardian. I’m filling in for your usual host Blake Montgomery, who is out this week on vacation.Today, we’ll be talking about the historic SpaceX IPO and the US government’s surprise order to limit the use of Anthropic’s most advanced AI model over cybersecurity concerns. I’ll also share a dispatch from Web Summit Rio, South America’s largest tech event.SpaceX makes largest ever stock market debut, minting Musk as a trillionaireAfter SpaceX’s huge IPO, Americans’ financial future will be bound to AIHow much money did Elon Musk make in SpaceX’s stock market debut? Continue reading...
The Scottish government has confirmed its intention to ensure police use of facial recognition is lawful before deployments start taking place, unlike in England and Wales where the technology has been rolled out in a ‘legal vacuum’ without any formal scrutiny or debate
Amendment to the UK’s Cyber Security and Resilience Bill calls for the government to publish a ‘digital sovereignty strategy’ to promote domestic technology
No 10 is worried about retaliation from White House over restrictions on under-16s’ internet useMinisters have embarked on a concerted lobbying operation to prevent a backlash from the Trump administration to the under-16s social media ban announced by Keir Starmer.Officials said they had spent weeks trying to reassure senior Trump officials and the US president himself that the restrictions were not specifically aimed at US technology companies. Continue reading...
Tech is helping to identify and save new specimens and could open ‘genomic goldmine’ of fungi dataThe rise of AI and digitisation could be a turning point in the “race against extinction” faced by botanists trying to identify and save vital plants before they vanish, according to a major report from Royal Botanic Gardens, Kew.New technology is enabling scientists to track how flowering times have shifted by weeks around the world, rapidly identify new specimens and even get crucial genetic data from 180-year-old fungus specimens, potentially opening a “genomic goldmine”. Digitisation and online access to millions of specimens that were until now only accessible in archives is also producing new insights, especially in the global south. Continue reading...
State’s attorney general alleges TikTok exposed children to harmful sexual content and addictive featuresFlorida became the latest state to sue TikTok on Monday after the attorney general accused the company of violating a state law that limits social media access for teenagers.In a press conference, Republican James Uthmeier said TikTok exposed children to harmful sexual content and addictive features, such as unlimited scrolling and push notifications. “It’s designed to keep kids stuck on those screens for hours,” Uthmeier said at a press conference. “Our evidence suggests that so many kids are on TikTok for upwards of six, seven, eight or more hours a day. We are going to get our kids their lives back.” Continue reading...
Liberal MP says Australia risks sovereignty and strategic independence being ‘constrained by the AI superpowers reshaping the global order’Get our breaking news email, free app or daily news podcastLiberal MP Andrew Hastie says Australia should dramatically scale up investment in artificial intelligence to preserve strategic independence and warns the country risks being “a supplicant state” tethered to the US in an era of possible hot conflict with China.In a major address to Liberal members in Sydney on Monday night, the shadow minister for industry and sovereign capability likened the development of AI to the nuclear arms race of the cold-war era and proposed Australia position itself as a technology hub in the southern hemisphere. Continue reading...