Suspected Iran-linked cyberattacks are exposing long-standing vulnerabilities in fragmented U.S. drinking water systems facing aging infrastructure and intensifying climate threats.
Why it matters: Drinking water systems disruptions can threaten public health and essential services, while many utilities—especially smaller ones—lack the staff and resources to strengthen their defenses..
A Stanford-led research team has used generative AI to design a synthetic virus — the first time artificial intelligence has been harnessed to create an organism that has never been seen in nature.
The U.K. Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) on Thursday said it gave Paramount the green light to acquire Warner Bros. Discovery.
It comes following assurances from Paramount that it would preserve editorial independence, invest in U.K. programmingand protect children's networks..
Why it matters: It's a major regulatory win for Paramount, which is facing a more contentious approval battle back home.
Protecting and monitoring companies' internal AI stacks is one of the hottest topics on the floor of this year's Black Hat cybersecurity conference in Las Vegas.
Why it matters: Workers have been experimenting with different AI tools for years now, creating a plethora of new entry points for malicious hackers, experts at this year's show told Axios.
OpenAI on Thursday announced a series of changes that will upgrade ChatGPT for both paid and free users.
Why it matters: Free AI plans from frontier labs now offer more intelligence than most people will use, while enterprises are still figuring out how to budget for advanced capabilities.
AI can generate almost anything on a screen, but it can't re-create what happens when thousands of people gather around something they genuinely care about.
Why it matters: Communicators have long managed relationships with employees, investors, regulators and the media. Now add fans to the mix.
Top AI architects say their technology has arrived at a threshold once confined to science fiction: the singularity, or the moment machines begin accelerating their own evolution.
Why it matters: If these moguls are right, we may be entering the most consequential technological transition in human history — the opening stages of an "intelligence explosion" that transforms civilization faster than humanity can understand or control.
Google's announcement Wednesday that Demis Hassabis was ceding his CEO position to become chairman of Google DeepMind and chief scientist for parent company Alphabet is the biggest AI executive overhaul since OpenAI CEO Sam Altman was temporarily ousted in 2023.
Why it matters: Google is facing delayed models, researcher departures and mounting pressure from OpenAI and Anthropic.
Verb, a data exchange, is launching a marketplace Thursday that lets consumers sell their personal data directly to companies, the company first shared with Axios.
Why it matters: AI companies have spent years buying — or just scraping — datasets from publishers, app developers and data brokers. Verb is betting consumers will want a cut for themselves.
OpenAI asked a federal judge Wednesday to dismiss Apple's lawsuit accusing the AI giant and two former Apple employees of stealing trade secrets and soliciting confidential information from job candidates.
Why it matters: The motion is an early step in a legal fight that could stretch for years. If the case survives, discovery could expose sensitive details about both companies' hiring, hardware development and data-security practices.
Weeks before OpenAI's agents hacked Hugging Face, the agents worked together to find and exploit a vulnerability in the infrastructure supporting the company's cybersecurity testing, OpenAI researchers said Wednesday.
Why it matters: The new findings raise questions about how frontier AI labs are monitoring their testing environments — and the challenges safety testers are finding as they try to rein in increasingly powerful AI.
