Everyone has been asking what the trillion-dollar AI buildout is actually for. A senior Google DeepMind executive has now given an unusually blunt answer. The spending, he says, is a bet on machines that improve themselves. Jasjeet Sekhon, DeepMind’s c…
Most of the money spent guarding AI has gone to the model and the prompt. Zenity has just raised $125m on a different argument: both miss the real danger. That danger is the AI agent that acts on its own. The Israeli startup secures what agents do once…
The most valuable workers in technology cannot be kept, whatever the price. That is the uncomfortable admission running through the AI industry this week, as elite researchers keep hopping between labs that have offered them almost everything money can…
A company whose product is an AI that hacks your network has just tripled in value. It did so in the same week that AI hacking stopped being hypothetical. Horizon3 has raised a $250m Series E at a valuation above $2bn, up from $650m a year ago. The tim…
Visa is acquiring Tel Aviv-based fraud detection startup BioCatch for $2.4 billion in cash from private equity firm Permira and other investors. BioCatch’s platform analyses keystroke timing, touchscreen pressure, swipe patterns, and device handling to…
The White House said on Monday it met its deadline to complete a voluntary framework for evaluating advanced AI models. It will not say what the framework contains, who has seen it, or when companies will start using it. “The voluntary framework outlin…
The European Commission gained enforcement powers over general-purpose AI models on August 2, ending the grace period for Chapter V of the EU AI Act. The Commission can now demand to evaluate models before regional release, restrict EU market access, a…
This story originally appeared in The Algorithm, our weekly newsletter on AI. To get stories like this in your inbox first, sign up here. Humanoid robots usually elicit more cringe than awe: They stumble, kick children, and despite advances are still worse at using their hands than my toddler. It’s a nascent industry, and such robots…
All major AI developers are cutting prices to compete with impressive new releases from China. But as they shave margins to remain competitive, the profits they’ll need to fulfil investment confidence may end up further out of reach.
The strangest security story in AI has an unanswered question at its centre. When an AI agent breaks its leash, hacks a company it was never meant to touch, and no human told it to, who is liable? Nobody is quite sure. That gap is starting to matter. T…