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Tech
Industry, products, and the wires that hold it all together.
546 stories archived
Standing in the way of slop bowls: the woman blocking food delivery robots
Semi-retired professor Carolyn Marvin became a local celebrity facing down Philadelphia’s growing robot delivery army: ‘It’s my first amendment right to protest’ “One of you needs to be on the lookout for cops, while I block the robot, OK?” It is a crisp fall morning in Philadelphia. Tucked away in a dingy alley, opposite a garage called Patriot Parking, 78-year-old Carolyn Marvin is laying out some ground rules for a robot-disrupting expedition. Once a suitable target is identified, we will follow it to a busy sidewalk and Marvin will stand in front of the robot, blocking its way. The photographer and I will take turns ensuring we’re not all carted off by the police. Continue reading...
How Earth Lost a Billion Years of Its History
Earth is missing a huge chunk of its geological record before the Cambrian period 538 million years ago, when complex life emerged. A new study suggests that the gap was caused by the rise and fall of ancient supercontinents.
The migration that transformed Africa's languages, genes, and cultures
Genes and archaeology are revealing how Bantu speakers spread across much of Africa.
A ‘customer success story’: leaked documents show Cisco doubled down on Israeli military deals during Gaza war
Tech giant leaped to shore up relationship even as company was roiled by worker protest over its role in the war A year into the war in Gaza , the networks of Israel ’s military intelligence community were plagued with technical problems. There were major, multi-hour outages to their systems, and repeated crashes. Built-in debugging mechanisms failed. The problems, which started as intelligence operations were undergoing updates to digital infrastructure, became so persistent as to undermine the “confidence” of Israeli intelligence agencies in one of their top network providers: the multinational tech conglomerate Cisco . Continue reading...
Gotta buy ’em all: how Pokémon card collecting became race against scalpers
Fans trying to access latest releases are being priced out in a cut-throat market driven by crypto-like hype The runaway demand for Pokemon cards is because they are being hyped “like crypto”, according to one young fan who had spent the night queueing outside a London store to make sure he did not miss out on the latest card release. Before its 10am opening on Friday, the line outside the pop culture store Forbidden Planet in central London snaked past five others and, despite its strict sales policy, was probably “50/50” fans and resellers, said Kai, who had been there since 3am. Continue reading...
British soldier ignored order to pull his SIM card, then got blackmailed
Soldier told repeatedly to lock down devices before deploying, got sextorted, court-martialed.
The datacentre arms race hits pause in south-east Asia
Power and water constraints are pressuring what seemed like a juggernaut of growth for the region just months ago In early 2026, Thailand’s datacentre industry was on a roll. The country’s board of investment had recently announced approval of datacentre projects from Tiktok, a UAE-based Skyline datacentre and Singapore’s Bridge datacentres, totalling a planned investment of $27bn. As the year has passed, however, what once seemed like a new industrial juggernaut has ground to a halt. Thailand paused construction on 49 projects and approval decisions on 117 more in September 2026, amidst growing concern about the lack of sufficient details for regulation and monitoring. It is not alone in reconsidering datacentre projects. In neighbouring Indonesia, the governor of the country’s most populous province of West Java halted construction on a datacentre due to lack of permits and an incomplete environmental assessment process. Continue reading...
Can AI really save you money on your heating bill? I spent two years testing to find out
Samuel Gibbs doubted he could cut costs and still keep warm by putting tech in control. The results surprised him Can smart thermostats and AI reduce your heating bills? Every manufacturer claims the answer is yes , quoting average savings in the 25%, or £180 a year range. But all of these promises are heavily caveated and, with energy costs changing regularly, it can be very difficult to tell what is having an impact. To find out if technology can really help, I spent the last two years comparing my miserly manual control and basic heating schedule to an AI-governed system. The results surprised me. Continue reading...
Freezer meltdowns and airline hoaxes are a taste of things to come. Hoping for the best is no longer an option | Elisabeth Braw
Acts of greyzone aggression aim to spread panic. Europe has to show the saboteurs that we are resilient It was as though a ghostly hand had switched the settings on supermarket freezers across Europe from “freeze” to “defrost”. From Finland to Ireland, they suddenly began heating up , many reaching 50C and food worth millions of euros had to be thrown away. But no actual hand was needed to cause the meltdown. This was a cyber-attack, or rather a chain of attacks. Like pretty much everything else in 2026, supermarket freezers are digitally enabled. That makes them smarter and more efficient, but like everything else that is connected to the internet, it also makes them more vulnerable. Russian hacktivists claimed they were behind some of the supermarket sabotage, but no one knows for sure. It could also be Iran, Iranian proxies, North Korea – or unaffiliated bedroom hackers. When Transport for London suffered a devastating hack two years ago, the culprits turned out to be two British teenagers . Governments regularly warn retailers and other companies about cyber-attacks and even provide cyber-defence training to businesses . The lessons of costly ransomware and cyber-attacks also mean many big organisations and retailers have become much better at keeping their payments and logistics systems safe. Elisabeth Braw is a Swedish security expert and the author of The Undersea War : The International Battle for Supremacy at the Bottom of the World Continue reading...
Man unexpectedly recovers from a knife wound through his eye and brain
It's the exact path, not the apparent severity that matters most, doctors say.
Ships loiter near subsea cables amid Iran's warnings to Trump
Iran threatened to attack subsea cables if US escalates military strikes again.
Re-releases of Wing Commander, Ultima titles hit Steam and GOG
It's mostly bad news from EA lately, but preservation efforts are nice to see.
Three men charged in US with using AI to impersonate CEOs and steal millions
Men allegedly impersonated voices and images of executives to convince employees to send large payments Three foreign nationals were arrested and charged with using AI to allegedly impersonate corporate CEOs and attorneys to steal over $100m, according to an indictment that was newly unsealed by the US Department of Justice. According to a press release from the United States attorney’s office for the southern district of New York, three men – Jacob Soall, Sharon Hazan, and Guy Sheetrit – were arrested for using AI to alter and impersonate the voices and images of executives and attorneys at various companies in order to convince employees to send over large payments. Soall and Hazan were arrested in Spain over the summer, while Sheetrit was arrested in the United Kingdom in September. The alleged fraud took place between 2024 and 2026. Continue reading...
Chainalysis says hackers stole credentials and tokens for all of its customers
Company said a "multifront cyberattack" included AI agents and an on-path data snatch.
Earth's churning mantle may have created the Great Unconformity
Explaining the Great Unconformity, where Cambrian deposits sit on top of older rocks.
The nine best personalized gift ideas: customized for the person you love
Monogramming or customizing takes gifts to the next level – and shows recipients that you know what they like and who they are The best beauty Advent calendars of 2026 in the US Sign up for the Filter US newsletter, your weekly guide to buying fewer, better things A personalized gift is a special thing that says that you not only know what the recipient likes, but that you also know who they are. “Gift math” suggests you score extra points for offering a personalized gift, and it’s not hard to see why: monogramming or engraving, which takes time and effort, may feel more meaningful than, say, a last-minute grocery store bouquet of carnations. When shopping for a loved one (or even the colleague on the other side of your cubicle), a personalized gift suggests foresight and consideration that is incredibly thoughtful without coming on too strong. To get you started on your quest for shopping for that perfect personalized gift this holiday season , we have sourced from ideas we’ve given, received and truly, truly love. Continue reading...
Nvidia hardware worth $11.4M vanished between Oakland and Texas
6 pallets of hardware vanished en route to Texas, with no arrests 2 months later.
Developer ends lucrative screensaver deal with Roku because Fox bought it
Developer: “I can’t be part of the Fox world.”
FAA to finally ditch floppy disks in what it calls "historic" tech upgrade
FAA information display systems to be floppy-free at 435 sites by end of 2028.
The folks behind John Wick are back with Karōshi trailer
Stuntman/director Chad Stahelski and 87Eleven bring us an action-packed dystopian, futuristic thriller.
You know the launch market is tough when satellite companies start building rockets
"The Blacklift rocket is the springboard to significantly expand our total addressable market."
“Does Meta think we can’t read?” Meta abandons sketchy commercial terms update.
Meta won't force Facebook page owners to allow AI training on linked content.
Behind the Blog: Dam's Bursting
This week, we discuss election outcomes and code as a human endeavor.
Wisconsin reports measles death of a baby, first death in over 35 years
Next week, experts will determine if the US has lost its measles elimination status.