US says Russia used AI-powered bots in disinformation scheme: Bloomberg reports an editor at a Russian state media outlet developed software to create a bot farm as part of a project that was funded by a member of the Federal Security Service, or FSB, according to court documents unsealed Tuesday by the Department of Justice.
US and allies take down Russian ‘bot farm’ powered by AI: WP reports the effort drove nearly a thousand covert accounts on X.
How 'Islamic State' uses AI to spread extremist propaganda: DW reports groups like the "Islamic State" and al-Qaeda are urging followers to use the latest digital tools to spread their extremist message, avoid censorship, and recruit.
Inside the next era of warfare: How tech is reshaping the battlefield Axios
Tech winners from Trump’s 2024 platform: Crypto, AI, and Elon Musk: For a party whose leaders, including former president Donald Trump, have often railed against Big Tech, the Republicans’ new platform has relatively little to say about tech regulation. And what it does say signals a laissez-faire if not outright cozy approach to emerging sectors that have drawn scrutiny from the Biden administration. WP
The Federal Trade Commission just waded into an obscure-seeming arena of AI policy that could nevertheless define the future of research and competition in the field. In a blog post on Wednesday, the agency’s Office of Technology wrote that open-weights AI models can “drive innovation, reduce costs, increase consumer choice, and generally benefit the public.” Read the post here.
FTC bars anonymous messaging app from serving users under age 18: NYT reports the move against the app NGL by the Federal Trade Commission was the first time the agency barred an online service from hosting minors.
CNN to lay off 100 staffers as it preps major revamp of digital efforts: THR reports CNN CEO Mark Thompson told staff Wednesday that its first digital subscription product will launch this year, and that it is exploring a "strategic push into AI."
What is AI? Everyone thinks they know but no one can agree. And that’s a problem. Will Douglas Heaven
Apple TV+ just dropped a show about deadly AI—weeks after debuting Apple Intelligence: FC reports that ‘Sunny,’ starring Rashida Jones, takes an eerie-but-funny look at a near future where people grapple with the dark side of the kind of AI that Apple just introduced.
Defeated by AI, a legend in the board game Go warns: Get ready for what’s next: Lee Saedol was one of the world’s top Go players, and his shocking loss to an AI opponent was a harbinger of a new, unsettling era. “It may not be a happy ending,” he says. NYT
+ “I faced the issues of AI early, but it will happen for others. It may not be a happy ending.” -- Lee Saedol, the legendary Go player who lost to Google DeepMind’s AI program in 2016, warns an audience in Seoul about the risks the technology may pose
Knowledge workers don’t seem to think AI will replace them—but they expect it to save them 4 hours a week in the next year Steve Hasker
Microsoft and Apple drop OpenAI seats amid antitrust scrutiny: FT reports ChatGPT maker plans strategy to engage crucial partners as regulatory scrutiny of sector increases.
Microsoft, Apple will not join OpenAI’s board as regulatory scrutiny grows: Regulators are asking whether tech giants hold too much sway over smaller artificial intelligence companies. WP
xAI is building its own data center from scratch: Semafor reports as part of that push, it has purchased 100,000 Nvidia H100 GPUs, making it what Musk called “the most powerful training cluster in the world by a large margin.”
Advanced Micro Devices said on Wednesday it will acquire Finnish artificial intelligence startup Silo AI for about $665 million.
Reuters: Samsung bolsters AI in foldable phones, health monitoring in smartwatch, ring
Reuters: Intuit to cut about 1,800 jobs as it looks to increase AI investments
AI investors are starting to wonder: Is this just a bubble? John Herrman
In constant battle with insurers, doctors reach for a cudgel: AI: NYT reports as health plans increasingly rely on technology to deny treatment, physicians are fighting back with chatbots that synthesize research and make the case.
Bloomberg: Elon Musk says second Neuralink brain implant about a week away
Amazon says it reached a climate goal seven years early: NYT reports the company said it effectively got all of the electricity it used last year from sources that did not produce greenhouse gas emissions. Some experts have faulted the company’s calculations.
Surging AI energy needs could bring Three Mile Island back online: The Pennsylvania plant, site of a partial meltdown in 1979, is part of a burst of fresh activity at mothballed plants as tech companies, manufacturers and energy regulators scramble to find enough zero emissions electricity. WP
Enjoy the ride + plan accordingly.
-Marc
