Iran and China Create First-of-Their-Kind Autonomous A.I. Influence Campaigns

New York Times - Sep 18, 2026

The countries, along with Israeli firms, combined Chinese open-source A.I. models and A.I. agents for the campaigns, foreshadowing future online manipulation.

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New cat species identified for the 1st time in a century

Sep 18, 2026

New cat species identified for the 1st time in a century

A diminutive wild cat that inhabits Bolivia's cloud forest has been identified as a previously unknown species, marking the first time a new living cat species has been formally named and described in more than a century.

NASA Telescope Helps Scientists Find a New Type of X-ray Object

Sep 18, 2026

NASA Telescope Helps Scientists Find a New Type of X-ray Object

The discovery of “hypersoft” X-ray beacons could help solve some mysteries about the universe.

Have we all been wearing our AirPods wrong? Apple fans claim sporting the wireless earphones upside down and in the opposite ears results in better sound quality

Sep 18, 2026

Have we all been wearing our AirPods wrong? Apple fans claim sporting the wireless earphones upside down and in the opposite ears results in better sound quality

They're some of the most popular earphones in the world. But if you use AirPods, you might want to rethink how you wear them.

An Abandoned CDN Domain Was Re-Registered. Thousands of Sites Still Call It.

Sep 18, 2026

An Abandoned CDN Domain Was Re-Registered. Thousands of Sites Still Call It.

In July 2025, someone registered a domain that used to belong to a content delivery network.  The CDN had been wound down years earlier, and the domain it served assets from was allowed to expire. What it had not lost were its callers. Thousands of websites, code repositories, and documentation pages still carry hard-coded references to hostnames beneath it.  The new owner holds

Plugin4Shell Lets Repository Owners Swap Pinned Plugin Code Across Four AI Coding Agents

Sep 18, 2026

Plugin4Shell Lets Repository Owners Swap Pinned Plugin Code Across Four AI Coding Agents

A flaw in four widely used AI coding agents lets someone who controls a plugin's code repository swap the plugin an agent installs for a malicious one, even when the agent locked that plugin to a specific reviewed version, security firm Air Security said on Thursday. The firm said Anthropic has patched the flaw in Claude Code 2.1.179 and OpenAI in Codex 0.146.0, that GitHub Copilot has no

A.I. Safety Goes Mainstream + a ‘Hard Fork’ Exit AMA

Sep 18, 2026

A.I. Safety Goes Mainstream + a ‘Hard Fork’ Exit AMA

“It has been one of the fastest, most sudden shifts I’ve experienced.”

WeaselBiscuit Stealer Spreads via 13 npm Packages to Harvest Chrome Extension Storage

Sep 18, 2026

WeaselBiscuit Stealer Spreads via 13 npm Packages to Harvest Chrome Extension Storage

Cybersecurity researchers have discovered a cluster of 13 npm packages that have been found to deliver a previously undocumented JavaScript stealer codenamed WeaselBiscuit. The new malware family, per OpenSourceMalware, exhibits functional overlaps with two malware strains associated with the Democratic People's Republic of Korea's (DPRK) Contagious Interview campaign: BeaverTail and

Move faster to solve climate challenges, Prince William says

Sep 18, 2026

Move faster to solve climate challenges, Prince William says

The Prince of Wales tells the BBC we need to "accelerate" in finding solutions to climate challenges as Earthshot nominees are unveiled.

Is the 6pm eating rule a total myth? Nutritionist reveals the truth about late-night dinners and weight loss

Sep 18, 2026

Is the 6pm eating rule a total myth? Nutritionist reveals the truth about late-night dinners and weight loss

Nutrition expert Emma Bardwell insists that this on-trend belief deserves a reality check.

Claimed Bug Bounty Hunter Likely Used LLM to Build PhantomRaven npm Stealer

Sep 18, 2026

Claimed Bug Bounty Hunter Likely Used LLM to Build PhantomRaven npm Stealer

A financially motivated threat actor has been linked to the development and distribution of a JavaScript (JS)-based information stealer known as PhantomRaven via the npm package registry. "The developer likely wrote the malware using a large language model (LLM), an assessment made with high confidence based on verbose comments, placeholder code, and statistical token-analysis patterns,"

Will A.I. Kill Us? Can It Hack My Bank Account? Your A.I. Questions Answered

Sep 18, 2026

Will A.I. Kill Us? Can It Hack My Bank Account? Your A.I. Questions Answered

Nearly 1,000 readers sent us their questions about artificial intelligence, its potential and its potential risks.

Top Chinese AI models make 10% of OpenAI, Anthropic revenue despite high valuations: report

Sep 18, 2026

Top Chinese AI models make 10% of OpenAI, Anthropic revenue despite high valuations: report

Chinese artificial intelligence models from seven major developers combined generate only about 10 per cent of the revenue reported for OpenAI and Anthropic, even as investor enthusiasm remains intense, according to US-based research firm Rhodium Group. The Chinese AI models earned an estimated US$10.7 billion in annual recurring revenue (ARR) from March to August, a fraction of the more than US$100 billion combined for OpenAI and Anthropic, according to the Rhodium report published on...

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