Author: GT

Pavlo Gonchar | SOPA Images | Lightrocket | Getty ImagesU.S. cybersecurity company F5 fell 12% on Thursday after disclosing a system breach in which a “highly sophisticated nation-state threat actor” gained long-term access to some systems.F5 shares were pacing for the worst day since April 27, 2022, when the stock fell 12.8%.The company disclosed the breach in a Securities and Exchange Commission filing on Wednesday and said the hack affected its BIG-IP product development environment. F5 said the attacker infiltrated files containing some source code and information on “undisclosed vulnerabilities” in BIG-IP.The breach was later attributed to state-backed hackers from…

Andrew Lissimore has been running the audio apparel site Headphones.com for nearly a decade now. While audiophiles have a high affinity toward their gear and want to try out new gadgets, Lissimore wasn’t satisfied with continuously spending money on platforms like Meta and Google to acquire new customers; he wanted to find a way to better retain the customers he already had. The founder started to look for solutions within the Shopify ecosystem that would help the business with loyalty programs. But most of what he found offered only spend and tier-based solutions. So he decided to build his own…

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Department of Energy said Thursday it has finalized a $1.6 billion loan guarantee to a subsidiary of one of the nation’s largest power companies to upgrade nearly 5,000 miles of transmission lines across five states, mostly in the Midwest, for largely fossil fuel-run energy. AEP Transmission will upgrade power lines in Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, Oklahoma and West Virginia, primarily to enhance enhance grid reliability and capacity, the Energy Department said. The project by AEP Transmission, a subsidiary of Ohio-based American Electric Power, is meant to help meet surging electricity demand from data centers and artificial intelligence.AEP…

As entertaining as it’s been for the tech industry to watch rival payroll decacorns Deel and Rippling sue each other over a corporate spying scandal, top-tier VCs are apparently not terribly scared off. Deel on Thursday announced that it has raised a $300 million Series E round co-led by A-list fintech VC firm Ribbit Capital and Andreessen Horowitz, with participation from existing investors like Coatue Management and General Catalyst. Deel says it’s been profitable for three years and surpassed $1 billion in ARR, including having a month — September — that hit $100 million in revenue. Deel’s business model focuses…

China on Thursday accused the U.S. of creating “panic” over Beijing’s controls on rare earth minerals, but indicated it is open to trade talks to resolve a dispute that has threatened to reignite a trade war between the world’s two largest economies.”The US interpretation seriously distorts and exaggerates China’s measures, deliberately creating unnecessary misunderstanding and panic,” Ministry of Commerce spokesperson He Yongqian told a press conference, according to the state newspaper Global Times.Beijing last week announced sweeping controls on rare earth exports ahead of an expected meeting between President Donald Trump and President Xi Jinping in South Korea. Trump has…

Zehra Naqvi recalls the magical days of the early social internet.   She grew up in the One  Direction and Marvel fandoms in the early 2010s. This was back when people posted photos of lattes using the Valencia filter on Instagram, and Twitter was still Twitter, a place where people came together to exchange jokes and cultural analysis.   But now Instagram is full of influencers, and Twitter is X, a digital town hall with a  fierce political divide.  “The platforms that won were the ones that kept people scrolling the longest, not the ones that made them feel the most connected,”  Naqvi told TechCrunch. “Now there is an abundance…

WASHINGTON (AP) — Russia, China, Iran and North Korea have sharply increased their use of artificial intelligence to deceive people online and mount cyberattacks against the United States, according to new research from Microsoft.This July, the company identified more than 200 instances of foreign adversaries using AI to create fake content online, more than double the number from July 2024 and more than ten times the number seen in 2023.The findings, published Thursday in Microsoft’s annual digital threats report, show how foreign adversaries are adopting new and innovative tactics in their efforts to weaponize the internet as a tool for…

Coinbase has increased its investment in India’s CoinDCX, valuing the exchange at $2.45 billion post-money, as the U.S. crypto giant bets on the country’s digital-asset potential even as regulation remains unclear. The investment is an extension of CoinDCX’s previous funding round and is subject to regulatory approvals and customary closing conditions, the companies said on Wednesday. They did not disclose the amount invested or the size of Coinbase’s stake, but noted that the new round increased the Indian exchange’s valuation from $2.15 billion in its last raise in April 2022. CoinDCX confirmed to TechCrunch that the latest funding is an…

Microsoft is encouraging people to talk to their laptops as it rolls out new artificial intelligence updates to Windows 11 and pushes users to phase out its predecessor, Windows 10.Microsoft ended free security support for Windows 10 this week, though millions of people still use personal computers running the older operating system.To entice people to upgrade, the software giant on Thursday announced new Windows 11 features, most of them further integrating the company’s AI chatbot, Copilot, into the experience of using a laptop.Among the features is a voice mode that enables users to dictate “Hey, Copilot” to start chatting with…

Healthcare regulator MHRA is fast-tracking new AI tools that promise to dramatically improve patient care. The wait for medical test results can stretch from days, to weeks, or even months. That wait period is often filled with worry and it always feels like an eternity. But what if that wait could be cut from weeks down to just a few minutes?In the next phase of its ‘AI Airlock’ programme, the Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency (MHRA) is evaluating seven new technologies designed to tackle some of healthcare’s most pressing challenges.The innovations being trialled could slash the time for bowel cancer…