Author: GT

NEW YORK (AP) — If you’re a Microsoft Authenticator user, like me, you’ve probably received at least one notice that the app’s password management features are no longer usable and that your stored passwords will be inaccessible starting Aug. 1 unless you have the Edge browser. Why? Because Microsoft is moving its signature sign-in app to a digital authentication method touted by security experts as an easier and more secure way to log in: passkeys.“Last year (2024), we observed a staggering 7,000 password attacks per second (more than double the rate from 2023),” Microsoft wrote in a blog post. “Although…

Anthropic is in talks to raise between $3 billion and $5 billion in a funding round led by Iconiq Capital that would value the artificial intelligence startup at $170 billion, CNBC has confirmed.The OpenAI competitor has been reeling in billions of dollars at a rapidly increasing valuation reflecting investors’ thirst for a piece in the fastest growing AI companies. In March, Anthropic closed a $3.5 billion round at a $61.5 billion, led by Lightspeed Venture Partners. Bloomberg was first to report on the latest talks, which CNBC confirmed with a person familiar with the matter who asked not to be…

In the summer of 2021, Dimitrios Kottas made a move that would be unfathomable to most Silicon Valley engineers: After leaving his coveted position as an engineering manager at Apple’s Special Projects Group, he packed up his life in California and moved back to Athens to start a defense company. Three and a half years later, his startup, Delian Alliance Industries, has set up solar-powered surveillance towers that monitor some of Greece’s borders around the clock and detect wildfires on remote islands, along with a pipeline of other products, including concealed sea drones designed to keep enemies at bay. But…

TikTok has been making it easier for users to save the songs they hear in video clips on the platform to their choice of music streaming platform. The short-video service today added YouTube Music as an option to this list. The company first introduced this feature in the U.S. and the U.K. with support for Spotify, Apple Music, and Amazon Music in November 2023. In February 2024, it rolled out this feature to more than 160 countries across the globe. Over time, TikTok has added Deezer and SoundCloud as music streaming options as well. Users can now tap the “Add…

The artificial intelligence sector in China has entered a new phase intensifying AI competition with the United States, as Chinese megacities launch massive subsidy programmes. At the same time, domestic firms are hoping to reduce their dependence on US technology. The stakes extend far beyond technological supremacy, with both nations viewing AI dominance as critical to future economic and strategic power.Shanghai’s US$139 million AI investment gambitShanghai has unveiled an ambitious one billion yuan (US$139 million) subsidy programme for its artificial intelligence industry, marking the latest in the technological race as major cities in China engage in fierce AI competition for…

Adobe is bringing more AI-powered image editing and enhancement features to Photoshop using its Firefly models. The company said today that it is rolling out an image upscaling feature, an object blending, and an upgraded object remover to Photoshop. The company said that the Generative Upscale feature will enhance an image up to 8 megapixels. This is useful for restoring details to old photos, upscaling images for prints, or adopting assets for various platforms. In 2024, Adobe teased a feature called Project Perfect Blend, which works on correcting colors, shadows, and lighting for newly added objects to an image. The…

Cash App’s new Pools feature lets users set a group funding goal, name the pool, and invite contributors.Courtesy: Cash AppCash App is going on the offensive in peer-to-peer payments.The Block-owned payments platform on Tuesday unveiled Pools, a new peer-to-peer feature designed to make group payments simple. It’s the company’s first major P2P product launch in nearly two years.”This is the first time we’re going into out-of-network payments with Pools,” said Owen Jennings, Block’s head of business, referring to the feature’s ability to accept contributions via Apple Pay or Google Pay from people who aren’t on Cash App.Pools allows users to…

Julius AI, a startup that describes itself as an AI data analyst, announced it has raised a $10 million seed round led by Bessemer Venture Partners. Horizon VC, 8VC, Y Combinator, and the AI Grant accelerator participated in the round, along with several high-profile angel investors, including Perplexity CEO Aravind Srinivas, Vercel CEO Guillermo Rauch, and Twilio co-founder Jeff Lawson, among others. Founder Rahul Sonwalkar launched Julius after graduating from Y Combinator in 2022 and pivoting away from the logistics startup he’d been building during the accelerator program. Julius is designed to act like a data scientist by analyzing and…

Tea, a dating discussion app that recently suffered a high-profile cybersecurity breach, announced late Monday that some direct messages were also accessed in the incident. The app — designed to let women safely discuss men they date — rocketed to the top of the U.S. Apple App Store last week but then confirmed on Friday that thousands of selfies and photo IDs of registered users were exposed in a digital security breach. 404 Media was the first to report on this second security issue, citing an independent security researcher who found it was possible for hackers to access messages between…

Over the years, Meta has built a reputation for using rivals’ innovations to bolster its technology. But its decision to copy a Chinese artificial intelligence lab in 2025 in an effort to compete with OpenAI backfired, forcing the company to overhaul its AI strategy. In a rush to mimic the techniques developed by Chinese startup DeepSeek, Meta released a new version of its Llama family of AI models that disappointed third-party developers, according to people familiar with the matter. The reaction was so bad that CEO Mark Zuckerberg decided to spend billions of dollars to revamp the company’s AI unit, and…