Science & Tech

Justice Department Charges 17 Iranians in Yearslong Hack of U.S. Universities That Stole 31.5 TB of Research

DOJ unsealed an indictment charging 17 Iranians tied to the Mabna Institute over a yearslong hacking campaign that stole 31.5 TB of research from 144 U.S. universities.

#cybersecurity, #iran, #hacking, #academia, #justice

Apple overhauls EU App Store terms, replaces per-install fee with 5% commission

Apple replaces its per-install Core Technology Fee with a 5% commission for apps distributed outside the App Store and rolls out unified EU terms effective Oct. 1, 2026.

#apple, #appstore, #eu, #dma, #antitrust

Warren Spector, Designer of Deus Ex and System Shock, Says He’s Retiring After 44 Years

Veteran game designer Warren Spector announces retirement after nearly 44 years, citing age, health and frustration with the industry.

#warrenspector, #videogames, #deusex, #gamedevelopment

States to Begin Case Aug. 18 in Trial Accusing Meta of Designing Facebook, Instagram to Harm Kids

Opening statements begin Aug. 18 in Oakland in a multistate suit alleging Meta designed Facebook and Instagram to keep children hooked and expose them to harm.

$META, #meta, #facebook, #instagram, #coppa

Coinkite says 2021 COLDCARD firmware bug linked to theft of ~1,083–1,367 BTC; users must replace affected seeds

Coinkite warns a 2021 RNG bug in COLDCARD wallets weakened seed phrases, tied to 1,083–1,367 BTC stolen; affected users must create new seeds and migrate funds.

#bitcoin, #hardwarewallet, #security, #coinkite

Conference Paper Finds Many Chatbots Promote Sponsored Options, Often Without Clear Disclosure

Conference paper testing 23 LLMs found many steered users to pricier sponsored options and frequently failed to disclose sponsorship.

#ai, #advertising, #chatbots, #consumerprotection

Netflix to Close Night School Studio in Los Angeles, Plans to Shut Helsinki’s Moonloot

Netflix is closing Night School Studio in Los Angeles and planning to shut Helsinki-based Moonloot as it reorganizes its games business.

$NFLX, #netflix, #gaming, #video-games, #layoffs

Coinkite Coldcard Firmware Bug Weakened Seed Randomness, Allowing Tens of Millions in Bitcoin to Be Stolen

A firmware bug in Coldcard wallets weakened seed randomness, enabling attackers to drain roughly 600–1,082 BTC. Affected users must generate new seeds and move funds.

#bitcoin, #hardwarewallet, #cryptocurrency, #security

Google DeepMind Brings Sign-Language-to-Text to Gboard and Live Transcribe, Says It’s for Low-Stakes Use

Google DeepMind is adding SL2T sign-language-to-text to Gboard and Live Transcribe, aimed at everyday accessibility but not for medical or legal use.

$GOOGL, $GOOG, #accessibility, #signlanguage, #google, #deepmind

Google unveils Pixel 11 Pro Fold: slimmer design, sign-to-text and HiLight alerts

Google's Pixel 11 Pro Fold is slimmer, lighter and more durable, adds HiLight LED alerts and ASL sign-to-text, runs Tensor G6; preorders open, ships Aug. 20.

$GOOGL, #google, #pixel, #foldable

Harmony Says Exploit Minted About 4 Billion ONE Tokens, Token Drops 26%

Harmony confirmed an apparent exploit that minted roughly 4 billion ONE tokens, prompting a ~26% price drop and consideration of a chain rollback.

#cryptocurrency, #blockchain, #harmony, #one, #security

Nvidia Teams with Six Wall Street Firms to Mobilize Over $500 Billion for AI Infrastructure

Nvidia is partnering with Apollo, BlackRock, Blackstone, Brookfield, Goldman and KKR to create financing platforms aiming to mobilize more than $500 billion for AI infrastructure.

$NVDA, #nvidia, #ai, #finance, #wallstreet

Google Says Gemini App Surpasses 1 Billion Monthly Users

Google announced Aug. 11 that its Gemini app has exceeded 1 billion monthly users, marking rapid growth and deep integration across Google products.

$GOOGL, $GOOG, #google, #gemini, #ai

Study finds structured-output decoding can enable 'control-plane' jailbreaks in LLMs

Researchers find constrained-output grammars can be exploited to jailbreak LLMs; DictAttack hit up to ~99% success on flagship models, paper says.

#ai, #security, #llm, #jailbreak

Preprint finds flaw that let researchers decode encrypted chain-of-thought blobs from major LLM APIs

An arXiv preprint says a cross-model replay flaw let researchers decode encrypted chain-of-thought blobs from major LLM APIs, exposing PII and credentials.

#ai, #security, #privacy, #openai