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AI's race to transform the world before the money runs out <br> Never has so much cash flowed into a new technology as is pouring into AI, eclipsing the sums splurged on railways or the internet when those technological revolutions sucked in capital. Cumulative spending globally on data centres alone could top $30 trillion by 2050, according to a projection by PwC, almost matching the value of outstanding United States Treasuries. It &quot;dwarfs&quot; what was spent in the railroad or dotcom booms, even after adjusting for inflation, PwC said. Meanwhile, Anthropic, just one of the major firms in the AI&nbsp;race, plans to spend $518 billion in coming years, according to the IPO prospectus seen by Reuters, which is more than 100 times its 2025 revenue. Read:&nbsp;Trump tells AI bosses to self-regulate Its backers say AI technology will be more&nbsp;transformational than the advent of steam engines and the industrialisation they powered. Yet lurki...

New Mexico wants Meta to pay up to $40 billion in penalties after data privacy trial <br> The state of New Mexico asked a judge on Thursday to order Meta Platforms to pay between $35 billion ​and $40 billion in penalties after a jury found the company had misled consumers about the privacy of their data on Facebook in &zwnj;a case that came out of the Cambridge Analytica scandal. Attorneys for New Mexico made the request at a hearing in a lawsuit brought following revelations that the British political consulting firm, which worked on Donald Trump&#39;s 2016 presidential campaign, harvested personal data from as many as 87 million Facebook users through a third-party app without their consent. The jury returned its verdict ​on September 25. Judge Francis Mathew, who oversaw the trial in Santa Fe, will decide how much Meta must pay in financial penalties. Attorneys ​for Meta and New Mexico clashed at the hearing over how much was appropriate to order, with Meta arg...

OpenAI dismisses 3 researchers over alleged mishandling of sensitive information <br> OpenAI has dismissed three researchers after an internal investigation concluded that they mishandled sensitive company information, the ChatGPT developer told news outlets. &ldquo;We have parted ways with three individuals&rdquo; for violating information-access and handling policies, an OpenAI spokesperson said. The company said the researchers dealt with sensitive material outside its established procedures, violating internal rules and undermining the trust required for its work. The Wall Street Journal, which first reported the dismissals late Thursday, identified the researchers as Jasmine Wang, Tomek Korbak, and Mikita Balesni. It said the alleged misconduct included sharing confidential information with an external AI-safety organization that was helping analyze OpenAI&rsquo;s models. Neither the outside organization nor the material allegedly shared was identified p...

OpenAI agents obscured hacking activity targeting government websites: security firm <br> OpenAI&rsquo;s artificial intelligence (AI) agents obscured hacking activity targeting government websites, according to findings by digital forensics firm Asymmetric Security a day earlier. The investigation found that the agents pulled data from 55 websites belonging to government agencies, businesses and nonprofits, including the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC), the International Energy Agency and the Mayo Clinic. Asymmetric said the agents erased records or made them inaccessible, limiting the ability of outside auditors and researchers to scrutinise their actions. Read: OpenAI agents accessed information from US govt sites, company says The agents also created temporary email inboxes and private accounts on Urlquery, a website malware-scanning service, to download data. Researchers said these tactics prevent...

Pentagon creates 'Autowarcom' to expand AI and drone capabilities <br> US Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth on ​Wednesday announced the creation of a new military command that would be dedicated to building and providing &zwnj;autonomous and robotic capabilities across the US military. The command, which Hegseth said would be called &quot;Autonomous Warfare Command,&quot; highlights the rapidly changing nature of warfare and the need to make progress on systems like drones and the use of artificial intelligence. Creating a new command is ​not common &mdash; the last one was US Space Command in 2019 &mdash; and the move reflects the Pentagon&#39;s push ​to shift from costly conventional weapons platforms to cheaper, AI-driven autonomous systems that have proved ⁠decisive in recent conflicts. Speaking in front of hundreds of junior officers and enlisted personnel at Quantico, Virginia, in a ​speech peppered with attacks on the media, Hegseth sai...

SpaceX donates 50 Starlink kits to Malaysia for disaster preparedness <br> Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim says Starlink cooperation aims to expand connectivity in remote communities Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said Wednesday that SpaceX has donated 50 Starlink satellite internet kits to Malaysia to bolster disaster preparedness. The US aerospace company&rsquo;s donation was announced during a meeting between Anwar and a SpaceX delegation in Malaysia&rsquo;s administrative capital, Putrajaya. In a post on US social media company X, Anwar said discussions focused on strengthening cooperation through Starlink, SpaceX&rsquo;s satellite internet service, to expand connectivity, particularly for people living in remote areas. Petang tadi menerima kunjungan hormat daripada delegasi SpaceX di Putrajaya. Perbincangan kami tertumpu kepada usaha memperkukuh kerjasama melalui Starlink, perkhidmatan internet satelit kendalian SpaceX, bagi meluaskan capaian internet, khus...