Hundreds of tech industry leaders, academics, and others public figures signed an open letter warning that artificial intelligence (AI) evolution could lead to an extinction event and saying that controlling the tech should be a top global priority.

“Mitigating the risk of extinction from AI should be a global priority alongside other societal-scale risks such as pandemics and nuclear war,” read the statement published by San Francisco-based Center for AI Safety.

The brief statement in the letter reads almost like a mea culpa for the technology about which its creators are now joining together to warn the world.

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OpenAI shipped its ChatGPT app for iPads and iPhones just a week ago, but it has already become one of the most popular applications in the last two years, with over half a million downloads in the first six days. That’s a real achievement, but also a challenge — that’s half a million potential data vulnerabilities.

Not to rest on its laurels, this year’s favorite smart assistant (so far) is now also available in 41 additional nations. There’s little doubt that this has been one of the most successful software/service introductions of all time, but that doesn’t change the inherent risk of these technologies.

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Enterprise admins handling fleets of Macs take note: there's a new security management tool from Apple device management firm Addigy.

The MDM Watchdog Utility monitors the MDM framework on devices and automatically forces software patches to be installed if they're not already in place. This is designed to help solve a specific problem in which some (not all) managed Macs do not properly install Apple’s Rapid Security Response updates.

When security isn’t

In today’s fast-moving threat environment, Apple has introduced Rapid Security Response (RSR) as a key front line against new threats. The defense is intended to be distributed and installed across Apple’s platforms as swiftly as possible once new threats are identified. The idea is that by expediting distribution and making installation a quicker process, it will be easier to maintain security across Mac fleets. That’s important as the scale of Apple deployments grows and enterprises move to support employee choice.

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Well, that was fast.

Just under two years after splashing into the world with all sorts of provocative promises, a search startup that was set on convincing people to pay for a privacy-centric Google alternative is shutting its doors.

Neeva, founded by a pair of former Google executives and the subject of intense fascination within the tech universe, quietly announced over the weekend that its service will be winding down next week. From the announcement:

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Leaders of the Group of Seven (G7) nations on Saturday called for the creation of technical standards to keep artificial intelligence (AI) in check, saying AI has outpaced oversight for safety and security.

Meeting in Hiroshima, Japan, the leaders said nations must come together on a common vision and goal of trustworthy AI, even while those solutions may vary. But any solution for digital technologies such as AI should be “in line with our shared democratic values,” they said in a statement.

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The Irish Data Protection Commission has levied a record-breaking fine against Facebook's parent company, Meta, for transferring data to the US without data privacy safeguards.

Apple’s big developer event is approaching, and it looks as if the company will press home its message on privacy as it begins to seed support for the AR operating systems it’s now expected to announce there.

Apple wants to get you updating

As of now, the Worldwide Developer Conference (WWDC) starting June 5 seems set to see Apple introduce its first mixed reality glasses, likely called RealityPro. These will be accompanied by an operating system that recent patent filings suggest will be called xrOS or xrProOS. The event will also see Apple introduce new iterations of its other operating systems, which developers will be able to work with soon after the show.

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A network security review of Micron products sold in China has revealed that these products pose a significant security risk to the country’s key information infrastructure supply chain, according to the Cyberspace Affairs Commission of China.

Micron is a US memory chip giant that produces computer memory and computer data storage including dynamic random-access memory, flash memory, and USB flash drives. The Chinese authorities have not mentioned which Micron products are banned, what kind of security risk they pose, nor what would happen to existing Micron products that are already in use.

“The review found that Micron’s products have more serious cybersecurity problems and pose significant security risks to China’s critical information infrastructure supply chain, affecting China’s national security,” according to a machine translation of a Cyberspace Affairs Commission of China statement.

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The fax — that 1940s technology that exploded in the 1980s and operates by copying an image and transmitting it through squeaks and squawks over a phone line — is still used by a large majority of healthcare providers, insurance payers, and pharmacies.

And it’s simply not going away anytime soon.

As recently as 2019, seven in 10 hospitals were still relying on fax machines and phone lines to transfer and retrieve patient records or order prescriptions, according to the latest figures from the Office of the National Coordinator for Health Information Technology (ONC). The agency believes there's been progress since then, but maintains that fax machines remain the most prevalent form of communication for transmitting care records and prescriptions.

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Reflecting warnings given earlier, Apple is now among the growing number of businesses banning employees from using OpenAI's ChatGPT and other similar cloud-based generative AI services in a bid to protect data confidentiality. The Wall Street Journal reports that Apple has also barred staff from using GitHub’s Copilot tool, which some developers use to help write software.

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You might not know it from all the panic-inducing headlines out there, but Android is actually packed with practical and powerful security options. Some are activated by default and protecting you whether you realize it or not, while others are more out of the way but equally deserving of your attention.

So stop wasting your time worrying about the overhyped Android malware monster du jour and instead take a moment to look through these far more meaningful Android settings — ranging from core system-level elements to some more advanced and easily overlooked options.

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There are vital national interests in advancing artificial intelligence (AI) to streamline public services and automate mundane tasks performed by government employees. But the government lacks in both IT talent and systems to support those efforts.

“The federal government as a whole continues to face barriers in hiring, managing, and retaining staff with advanced technical skills — the very skills needed to design, develop, deploy, and monitor AI systems,” said Taka Ariga, chief data scientist at the US Government Accountability Office.

Daniel Ho, associate director for Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence (HAI) at Stanford University, agreed, saying that by one estimate the federal government would need to hire about 40,000 IT workers to address cybersecurity issues posed by AI.

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With Google's I/O announcement expo now firmly in the rearview mirror, it's time for us to enter the inevitable next phase of any tech-tinted revelation — and that's the careful contemplation of everything we've just experienced.

It's my favorite phase of all, personally, as it lets us really dive in and analyze everything with a fine-toothed comb to uncover all the subtle significance that isn't always apparent on the surface.

And this year, my goodness, is there some splendid stuff to pore over.

Specific to the realm of Android, the sharp-eyed gumshoes over at 9to5Google noticed that this year's under-development new Android version, Android 14, was mentioned by name only one time during the entire 2,000-hour Google I/O keynote.

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In it's May update, Microsoft addressed 51 vulnerabilities in Windows, Microsoft Office, and Visual Studio. And with three zero-day flaws to urgently address in Windows (CVE-2023-24932, CVE-2023-29325 and CVE-2023-29336), the focus this month needs to be on rapidly updating both Windows and Microsoft Office. Both platforms get our “Patch Now” recommendation.

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Apple co-founder Steve Wozniak has been touring the media to discuss the perils of generative artificial intelligence (AI), warning people to be wary of its negative impacts. Speaking to both the BBC and Fox News, he stressed that AI can misuse personal data, and raised concerns it could help scammers generate even more effective scams, from identity fraud to phishing to cracking passwords and beyond.

AI puts a spammer in the works

“We're getting hit with so much spam, things trying to take over our accounts and our passwords, trying to trick us into them,” he said.

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Core business centers in large and small cities throughout the US are suffering the effects of hybrid- and remote-work policies, which has led to a 20% to 40% reduction in office space use, according to global management consulting firm McKinsey & Company.

The switch to primarily remote work at the start of the COVID pandemic in March 2020 left downtowns largely empty. Since then, commercial areas have seen a slow, but steady, return to the office, with average office occupancy hitting 50% of pre-pandemic levels this past March, according to commercial real estate services firm CBRE Group.

But that's enough to offset sizeable drops in the value of office space, and the need to re-think what an "office" now is. In San Francisco, for example, an office building worth $300 million before the pandemic could now be worth just $60 million, an 80% loss in value. Nearly 30% of downtown office space is vacant, according to CBRE.

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Still signing into your Google account by tapping out an actual password? That's, like, so 2022.

Now, don't get me wrong: The tried-and-true password is perfectly fine, especially if you're using it in conjunction with two-factor authentication. But particularly for something as important as your Google account, you want to have the most effective security imaginable to keep all your personal and/or company info safe.

And starting this week, you've got a much better way to go about that.

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The screenshots included an image of a meeting that was held by the company to discuss the response to the recent cybersecurity incident.

Speakers ranging from artificial intelligence (AI) developers to law firms grappled this week with questions about the efficacy and ethics of AI during MIT Technology Review's EmTech Digital conference. Among those who had a somewhat alarmist view of the technology (and regulatory efforts to rein it in) was Tom Siebel, CEO C3 AI and founder of CRM vendor Siebel Systems.

Siebel was on hand to talk about how businesses can prepare for an incoming wave of AI regulations, but in his comments Tuesday he touched on various facets of the debate of generative AI, including the ethics of using it, how it could evolve, and why it could be dangerous.

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The days when people can be abusively tracked using devices such as Apple's AirTags may be numbered; both Apple and Google today jointly announced work on a new standard that will prevent this from happening and hinted that Android users will soon be able to tell whether they’re being tracked by an AirTag.

Got to stop tracker abuse

The two companies say they have been working on a new industry specification to help prevent Bluetooth location-tracking devices being used to track people without permission. They also seem to have the industry behind them, as Samsung, Tile, Chipolo, eufy Security, and Pebblebee have all expressed support for the draft specification, which has been filed with the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF).

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