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Suborbital space tourism finally arrives | FCC prepares to run public C-band auction | The big four in the U.S. launch industry — United Launch Alliance, SpaceX, Blue Origin and Northrop Grumman — hope to be one of two providers that will receive five-year contracts later this year to launch national security payloads starting in 2022. | China’s launch rate stays high | The International Space Station is the largest ever crewed object in space.

 
Nancy Pelosi’s replacement is ready to regulate...
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY As a California state senator, Scott Wiener authored legislation aimed at curbing the risks of advanced AI. Now, after winning a tight congressional race for former Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi’s open San Francisco seat, he could play a key role in setting federal AI policy.  I spoke with Wiener on Friday, only a few hours after he had been declared the victor. But he was already thinking about AI risk. The previous day, the AI...

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The Download: empty AI climate claims, and...
This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. Opinion: The climate case for AI has not been made  —By Mary Nichols, distinguished counsel at the UCLA School of Law and the former chair of the California Air Resources Board, and Jeremy Tamanini, the founder of Dual Citizen, a sustainability research and advisory firm This week, as countries meet in Antalya, Turkey for the...

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Innovating with AI in the special chemicals...
In partnership withInfosys As companies look to accelerate innovation with artificial intelligence, cloud computing, and advanced modeling, the primary challenge is connecting new technologies to reliable data, scientific expertise, and the practical realities of bringing products to market. For specialty chemicals manufacturer Lubrizol, digital transformation is all about giving researchers the tools to test ideas faster, make better-informed decisions, and develop more sustainable materials without compromising performance. Girish Rao, vice president of information technology at Lubrizol, says...

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The climate case for AI has not...
This week, as countries meet in Antalya, Turkey for the United Nations climate conference, one topic likely to dominate the conversation is artificial intelligence. The host has already called on countries to commit to ensuring that AI is designed, powered, and deployed in ways that support climate action. But so far, industries around the world aren’t doing nearly enough to harness the technology to actually drive down the greenhouse-gas emissions heating up the planet, despite some very optimistic claims...

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DHS Has Used This Controversial Investigative Tool...
Homeland Security Investigations, the investigative wing of Immigration and Customs Enforcement that normally takes on transnational crime, estimates it has sent out at least 185,000 administrative subpoenas since the start of the Trump administration, according to a recent court filing. The figure shows how HSI has increasingly relied on this warrantless authority to conduct investigations. To put HSI’s estimate into perspective, a previous WIRED analysis found that in the more than six and a half years from the start...

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The Fridge-Hacking Spree Is an Internet-of-Things Wake-Up...
Welcome to Kernel Panic, a weekly newsletter by Lily Hay Newman and Matt Burgess from inside the new world of privacy and digital security. To receive this newsletter in your inbox each week, sign up here. Amid an onslaught of AI vulnerability discovery and AI-assisted hacking, some of the most consequential critical infrastructure attacks this year may have little to do with the technology at all—instead providing a stark reminder that cybersecurity fundamentals are still key to digital defense....

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Free Chinese AI Models Are Getting Scary...
Open-weight artificial intelligence models are now almost as capable of hacking into computer networks as the best closed ones, according to new research that heralds a much-anticipated turning point in the cybersecurity landscape. Vals, a company that measures AI capabilities, set out to test how well different AI models could carry out complex, multi-step network instructions on mock corporate networks. “The best frontier models, locked up inside the labs and available only through trusted access programs, are now starting...

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The Download: a humanoid cleans house and...
This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. I watched a humanoid robot clean my apartment. It felt like a taste of the future. —Grace Huckins When I saw an X post about a new humanoid-robot cleaning service in San Francisco, I immediately signed up for the waitlist. I wanted my apartment to feel like The Jetsons, even if just for an hour....

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Can Jollibee Beat American Fast Food at...
“Jolly morning!” is a weird way to be greeted, no matter the context. But it rang out, like birdsong, from behind the counter of a fast-food joint I visited in the Los Angeles suburbs in May. Although the restaurant’s bright overhead lighting and giant menus suggested a typical American chain, something was a little off. Along one wall, a floor-to-ceiling mural depicted a cartoon bee in a chef’s hat demonstrating the dance steps of the twist. The bee is...

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A Strategy That Ignores the Real Threats
Listen−1.0x+ 0:0012:17 Listen to more stories on the Noa app. Donald Trump’s new National Security Strategy reveals an administration that is preparing for the wrong dangers and in denial about genuine threats. What the White House presented on Friday as a hardheaded, realistic assessment of the geopolitical landscape more closely resembles France’s Maginot Line—a massive fortress built before World War II to stop a German attack that never came while failing to anticipate the one that did. The document...

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A Double Agent in Tehran
Listen−1.0x+ 0:0031:00 Listen to more stories on hark I. THE GAME In December 2011, the CIA lost control of a stealth drone near the Iranian city of Kashmar, about 140 miles from the Afghanistan border, and it wound up in the regime’s possession. On state television, the Iranian military displayed the boomerang-shaped craft like a trophy. Triumphant banners beneath its 30-foot wings said, in Farsi, THE US CAN’T MESS WITH US and WE’LL CRUSH AMERICA UNDERFOOT. The cause of...

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Trumpian Corruption Is Worse Than Ukrainian Corruption
A few days ago I called Oleksandr Abakumov, a senior detective at the National Anti-Corruption Bureau of Ukraine. I wanted to ask him about his investigation into a kickback scheme in his country’s energy industry. While we were talking, I got interested in Abakumov himself. As he was explaining his motivations, I was struck by the surprising contrast between people like him—the Ukrainian civil servants and civil-society activists who have been demanding transparency from their leaders for two decades—and...

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Putin Lives by a Code Trump Doesn’t...
Donald Trump still doesn’t seem to have learned a thing about the Russian dictator he calls a friend. He’s tried all kinds of contradictory gambits in pursuit of peace in Ukraine: welcoming Vladimir Putin in Alaska, helping Kyiv blow up Russian oil refineries, offering Russia land it hasn’t been able to acquire militarily. None seems to have had much effect. The Kremlin is holding the line, and Trump can’t get through. On Thursday, Putin said that parts of the...

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I'm Tracking 95+ Early Black Friday Deals...
The holidays may not be here quite yet, but the deals sure are. Although official Black Friday falls on Nov. 28 this year, deals are already out and ready be shopped at Amazon, Best Buy, Walmart and more. With thousands of items to shop at some of the best prices we have seen all year, and we’ve gathered the best early Black Friday sales now live right here. Beat the Black Friday rush and enjoy your Thanksgiving weekend, and...

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22 of the Best Fitness Gifts You...
If you’re shopping for someone who has been eyeing a smartwatch and has an Android phone, they’ll appreciate the Samsung Galaxy Watch 8. This smartwatch is durable, with a long battery life and a big, bright display. This time around, the Galaxy Watch 8 offers a first-of-its-kind health sensor that can measure antioxidant levels in the skin. It also has a sensor configuration that reads your heart rate, skin temperature and bioimpedance (to measure body composition). Another great feature...

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