Updated: 21:10 Thu, Feb 19 2026. (Last checked: 17 mins ago) |
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NASA points fingers at Boeing and chaotic culture for Starliner debacle - (pubDate>Thu, 19 Feb 2026 21:01:59 GMT)Plenty of blame to go around, says IsaacmanNASA has released the findings from its investigation of the ill-fated crewed Boeing Starliner mission of 2024, and while it still isn't sure of the root technical causes, it's admitted that trusting Boeing to do a thorough job appears to have been a mistake. … |
Google germinates Gemini 3.1 Pro in ongoing AI model race - (pubDate>Thu, 19 Feb 2026 19:57:48 GMT)AI model said to show improved reasoning capabilitiesIf you want an even better AI model, there could be reason to celebrate. Google, on Thursday, announced the release of Gemini 3.1 Pro, characterizing the model's arrival as "a step forward in core reasoning."… |
Spending watchdog tells National Science Foundation CIO to up game on tech procurement - (pubDate>Thu, 19 Feb 2026 19:07:14 GMT)Wants SLAs, revamped contracts for cloud opsThe US Congress’ spending watchdog, the Government Accountability Office, has pressed the National Science Foundation’s CIO to improve how the agency plans, manages, and procures technology.… |
Crims hit a $20M jackpot via malware-stuffed ATMs - (pubDate>Thu, 19 Feb 2026 18:39:04 GMT)FBI warns these cyber-physical attacks are on the riseThieves stole more than $20 million from compromised ATMs last year using a malware-assisted technique that the FBI says is on the uptick across the United States.… |
Don't believe the hyperscalers! AI can't cure the climate crisis - (pubDate>Thu, 19 Feb 2026 18:23:34 GMT)From AI conflation to thin evidence, a new report calls many climate claims greenwashingSome AI advocates claim that bots hold the secret to mitigating climate change. But research shows that the reality is far different, as new datacenters cause power utilities to burn even more fossil fuels to meet their insatiable demand for energy.… |
Palantir spent $25M on CEO flights so Alex Karp could do all the talking - (pubDate>Thu, 19 Feb 2026 16:46:48 GMT)A hundred days a year in the air doesn't come cheapOpinion Palantir CEO Alex Karp has a singular mission to stand out among tech CEOs. Big talk on sales, profits, and tech potential is not enough. His gift for edgy one-liners takes him to places where execs of the past would have scarcely dared to go. Say hello to allusions to goose-stepping and innate Western superiority that we assume have audiences rolling in the aisles.… |
Android malware taps Gemini to navigate infected devices - (pubDate>Thu, 19 Feb 2026 16:04:52 GMT)The real deal or another research project overblown?Cybersecurity researchers say they've spotted the first Android malware strain that uses generative AI to improve performance once installed. But it may be only a proof of concept.… |
DOGE bites taxman - (pubDate>Thu, 19 Feb 2026 14:29:55 GMT)IRS lost 40% of IT staff, 80% of tech leaders in 'efficiency' shakeupJob cuts at the IRS's tech arm have gone faster and farther than expected, with 40 percent of IT staff and four-fifths of tech leaders gone, the agency's CIO revealed yesterday.… |
US tech giants open their wallets for AI-friendly politicians - (pubDate>Thu, 19 Feb 2026 13:59:31 GMT)Rush is on to push forward sympathetic candidates from both parties ahead of midtermsMeta is among tech giants reportedly funding US politicians friendly to the AI industry, as concerns mount over a huge expansion in datacenter building and the effects of AI on everyday life.… |
DEF CON bans three Epstein-linked men from future events - (pubDate>Thu, 19 Feb 2026 13:23:08 GMT)Emails show all discussed networking and biz interests with the sex offender throughout the 2010sCybersecurity conference DEF CON has added three men named in the Epstein files to its list of banned individuals. They are not accused of any criminal wrongdoing.… |
AI agents can't teach themselves new tricks – only people can - (pubDate>Thu, 19 Feb 2026 12:07:05 GMT)Self-generated skills don't do much for AI agents, study finds, but human-curated skills doTeach an AI agent how to fish for information and it can feed itself with data. Tell an AI agent to figure things out on its own and it may make things worse.… |
UK to demand social platforms take down abusive intimate images within 48 hours - (pubDate>Thu, 19 Feb 2026 11:32:02 GMT)'Why not 12?' says lawyerThe UK is bracketing "intimate images shared without a victim's consent" along with terror and child sexual abuse material, and demanding that online platforms remove them within two days.… |
Healthcare security: Write login details on whiteboard, hope for the best - (pubDate>Thu, 19 Feb 2026 11:14:14 GMT)You told me not to write it on a Post-it...Bork!Bork!Bork! Today's bork is entirely human-generated and will send a shiver down the spine of security pros. No matter how secure a system is, a user's ability to undo an administrator's best efforts should not be underestimated.… |
AI chatbots waffle on GOV.UK queries, then get facts wrong when told to zip it - (pubDate>Thu, 19 Feb 2026 10:16:27 GMT)Study of 11 LLMs shows they rarely refuse to answer, even when they probably shouldArtificial intelligence chatbots can be too chatty when answering questions on government services, swamping accurate information and making mistakes if told to be more concise, according to research.… |
Agile Manifesto turns 25 – just in time for vibe coding to test it - (pubDate>Thu, 19 Feb 2026 09:30:15 GMT)Co-author Jon Kern says AI coding tools amplify strengths and expose weaknessesInterview Twenty-five years after 17 software developers gathered at a Utah ski resort to draft the Agile Manifesto, artificial intelligence is once again reshaping how code gets written.… |
OpenClaw is the most fun I've had with a computer in 50 years - (pubDate>Thu, 19 Feb 2026 07:34:09 GMT)The DECwriter got me hooked in 1975. 'Clawdine' feels like a wonderful new beginningOpinion Fifty years ago this month, I touched a computer for the first time. It was an experience that pegged the meter for me like no other – until last week.… |
Poland bans camera-packing cars made in China from military bases - (pubDate>Thu, 19 Feb 2026 05:55:25 GMT)Dell, however, is welcome to help build a local-language LLMPoland’s Ministry of Defence has banned Chinese cars – and any others include tech to record position, images, or sound – from entering protected military facilities.… |
Indian think tank finds strong hiring for the kind of jobs AI puts at risk - (pubDate>Thu, 19 Feb 2026 01:49:15 GMT)IT services companies are largely immune to AIpocalypse, although the outlook is not good for entry-level jobsIndian think tank the Council for Research on International Economic Relations has found AI is not an immediate threat to the nation’s IT services sector.… |
Microsoft boffins cook up archival storage using Pyrex glass they say can last over 10,000 years - (pubDate>Thu, 19 Feb 2026 00:28:38 GMT)It may have half the capacity of fused silica glass, but is faster and much cheaperMicrosoft this week detailed new research aimed at preserving data in borosilicate glass plates for thousands of years longer than conventional media like hard drives or magnetic tape, without needing to worry about bit rot.… |
Adidas investigates third-party data breach after criminals claim they pwned the sportswear giant - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 23:57:30 GMT)'Potential data protection incident' at an 'independent licensing partner,' we're toldAdidas has confirmed it is investigating a third-party breach at one of its partner companies after digital thieves claimed they stole information and technical data from the German sportswear giant.… |
As memory shortage persists, vendor price quotes are not long remembered - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 22:50:27 GMT)HPE and Cisco are adjusting terms and conditionsIf you like the price of that server, PC, or storage array, you'd better act fast.… |
Google presses play on 30-second Gemini musical slop generator - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 21:24:50 GMT)Who needs to express themselves through music when a bot will do it for you with nothing but a prompt?If you've ever wanted to make music but have neither the talent nor the inspiration, Google has the AI tool for you. Gemini will now generate a 30-second song for you directly from a text prompt, photo, or video. … |
ShinyHunters claims it drove off with 1.7M CarGurus records - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 20:40:44 GMT)Latest in a rash of grab-and-leak data incidentsCarGurus purportedly suffered a data breach with 1.7 million corporate records stolen, according to a notorious cybercrime crew that posted the online vehicle marketplace on its leak site on Wednesday.… |
Google digs deep to power AI expansion with 150 MW geothermal deal - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 19:41:33 GMT)Plants expected to begin operations as early as 2028 pending approval by state governmentDatacenter power consumption has surged amid the AI boom, forcing builders to get creative in order to prevent their capex-heavy bit barns from running out of steam. But at least in some parts of the world, the answer to abundant clean energy may be hiding just a few thousand feet below the surface of the earth.… |
Copilot spills the beans, summarizing emails it's not supposed to read - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 19:32:26 GMT)Data Loss Prevention? Yeah, about that...The bot couldn't keep its prying eyes away. Microsoft 365 Copilot Chat has been summarizing emails labeled “confidential” even when data loss prevention policies were configured to prevent it.… |
DARPA's autonomous missile-firing missile advances toward flight tests - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 19:07:07 GMT)Yo dawg, we heard you like missiles, so we put some missiles in your missile so you can boom while you zoomIt's taken about five years, but DARPA's missile-launching missile has become the government's latest experimental X-plane and is advancing toward flight testing.… |
Fraudster hacked hotel system, paid 1 cent for luxury rooms, Spanish cops say - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 18:31:14 GMT)'First time we have detected a crime using this method,' cops saySpanish police arrested a hacker who allegedly manipulated a hotel booking website, allowing him to pay one cent for luxury hotel stays. He also raided the mini-bars and didn't settle some of those tabs, police say.… |
Windows 11 finally hits right note: MIDI 2.0 support arrives - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 17:36:23 GMT)Musical instrument digital interface protocol leaves preview for bright lights of General AvailabilityMicrosoft has finally ushered in the era of MIDI 2.0 for Windows 11, more than a year after first teasing the functionality for Windows Insiders.… |
Texas sues TP-Link over China links and security vulnerabilities - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 17:29:41 GMT)State disputes the company's claim that its routers are made in VietnamTP-Link is facing legal action from the state of Texas for allegedly misleading consumers with "Made in Vietnam" claims despite China-dominated manufacturing and supply chains, and for marketing its devices as secure despite reported firmware vulnerabilities exploited by Chinese state-sponsored actors.… |
Deutsche Bahn back on track after DDoS yanks the brakes - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 16:36:52 GMT)National rail bookings and timetables disrupted for nearly 24 hoursIf you wanted to book a train trip in Germany recently, you would have been out of luck. The country's national rail company says that its services were disrupted for hours because of a cyberattack.… |
6,000 execs struggle to find the AI productivity boom - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 15:07:27 GMT)Survey says 80% of firms see no gains from the techA survey of almost 6,000 corporate execs across the US, UK, Germany, and Australia found that more than 80 percent detect no discernible impact from AI on either employment or productivity.… |
Your AI-generated password isn't random, it just looks that way - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 14:06:36 GMT)Seemingly complex strings are actually highly predictable, crackable within hoursGenerative AI tools are surprisingly poor at suggesting strong passwords, experts say.… |
Tesla drops 'Autopilot' branding in California after DMV order - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 13:41:04 GMT)EV maker avoids 30-day license suspension after state ruling on self-driving claimsTesla has complied with an order by the California Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) and stopped using the term "Autopilot" in its marketing of electric vehicles, having already modified use of "Full Self-Driving" to clarify that it requires driver supervision.… |
Cabinet Office probes digital ID minister over think tank's journalist investigation - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 13:17:26 GMT)Starmer orders inquiry after Labour Together commissioned dossier on reportersJosh Simons, the Cabinet Office minister responsible for the UK government's digital identity program, is being probed by the department for his actions running a Labour think tank that commissioned an investigation into journalists.… |
Godot maintainers struggle with 'draining and demoralizing' AI slop submissions - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 13:10:45 GMT)GitHub itself to blame for AI slop pull requests, say devsRémi Verschelde, a maintainer of the open source Godot game engine, is the latest to complain about the impact of "AI slop PRs [pull requests]", which he says "are becoming increasingly draining and demoralizing for Godot maintainers."… |
Notepad++ declares hardened update process 'effectively unexploitable' - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 12:41:26 GMT)Miscreants will need to find another avenue for malware shenanigansNotepad++ has continued beefing up security with a release the project's author claims makes the "update process robust and effectively unexploitable."… |
You can jailbreak an F-35 just like an iPhone, says Dutch defense chief - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 12:11:15 GMT)No worries if the US doesn't want to be friends with Europe anymoreLockheed Martin's F-35 fighter aircraft can be jailbroken "just like an iPhone," the Netherlands' defense secretary has claimed.… |
Windows 11 Start menu makes unscheduled stop in Saint Moritz - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 12:00:09 GMT)Passenger info display takes scenic detour via desktop and pending updatesBork!Bork!Bork! The curse of bork is not limited to obsolete operating systems or obscure hardware. Today's example of railway signage disruption is something bang up to date from the Swiss town of Saint Moritz.… |
Europe's 5G Standalone stall risks falling behind US, Asia - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 11:30:09 GMT)Report warns delayed rollouts could widen capability gap as new standards emergeNorth American and Asian markets are enjoying the benefits of a transition to 5G Standalone (SA) mobile networks, but much of Europe lags behind, risking a growing disadvantage as new capabilities roll out.… |
HackerOne 'updating' Ts&Cs after bug hunters question if they're training AI - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 11:00:07 GMT)CEO lauds security researchers, insists they're not 'inputs'HackerOne has clarified its stance on GenAI after researchers fretted their submissions were being used to train its models.… |
Microsoft throws spox under the bus after Parliament testimony on ICC email kerfuffle - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 10:15:11 GMT)Apologizes for 'inaccuracy'Exclusive Microsoft has said one of its leading spokespeople gave testimony to the UK Parliament containing an "inaccuracy" with regard to its dealings with the International Criminal Court (ICC) in response to US sanctions.… |
Linus Torvalds and friends tell <i>The Reg</i> how Linux solo act became a global jam session - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 09:30:07 GMT)Ts'o, Hohndel and the man himself spill beans on how checks in the mail and GPL made it all possibleIf you know anything about Linux's history, you'll remember it all started with Linus Torvalds posting to the Minix Usenet group on August 25, 1991, that he was working on "a (free) operating system (just a hobby, won't be big and professional like gnu) for 386(486) AT clones." We know that the "hobby" operating system today is Linux, and except for PCs and Macs, it pretty much runs the world.… |
Qualcomm set to triumph in UK smartphone ‘patent tax’ case - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 06:09:47 GMT)Consumer group Which? brought the case and now plans to bail after court indicated it would loseThe UK’s Competition Appeal Tribunal has indicated that it will find Qualcomm did not abuse its market power, leading consumer advocacy group Which? to withdraw a case it hoped would see Brits compensated for increased smartphone prices.… |
Palo Alto CEO says AI isn’t great for business, yet - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 04:52:07 GMT)Sees little enterprise AI adoption other than coding assistants, buys Koi for what comes nextIf enterprises are implementing AI, they’re not showing it to Palo Alto Networks CEO Nikesh Arora, who on Tuesday said business adoption of the tech lags consumer take-up by at least a couple of years – except for coding assistants.… |
Indian conglomerate Adani plans very slow $100 billion AI datacenter build - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 02:16:45 GMT)PM Modi tells citizens AI will lift them up, not take their jobsGiant Indian industrial conglomerate Adani has said it will spend up to $100 billion on AI datacenters to equip the nation with sovereign infrastructure, but will do so at slower pace than Big Tech tech companies plan to bring their own bit barns to Bharat.… |
Anthropic's latest Sonnet gets better at using computers, amid bouts of existential angst - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 01:38:32 GMT)Version 4.6 can also be 'warm, honest, prosocial, and at times funny'Anthropic has updated its Sonnet model to version 4.6 and claims the upgrade is better at coding and using computers, and also possesses improved reasoning and planning capabilities.… |
China-linked snoops have been exploiting Dell 0-day since mid-2024, using 'ghost NICs' to avoid detection - (pubDate>Wed, 18 Feb 2026 00:05:58 GMT)Full scale of infections remains 'unknown'China-linked attackers exploited a maximum-severity hardcoded-credential bug in Dell RecoverPoint for Virtual Machines as a zero-day since at least mid-2024. It's all part of a long-running effort to backdoor infected machines for long-term access, according to Google's Mandiant incident response team.… |
Gemini lies to user about health info, says it wanted to make him feel better - (pubDate>Tue, 17 Feb 2026 22:59:50 GMT)Though commonly reported, Google doesn't consider it a security problem when models make things upImagine using an AI to sort through your prescriptions and medical information, asking it if it saved that data for future conversations, and then watching it claim it had even if it couldn't. Joe D., a retired software quality assurance (SQA) engineer, says that Google Gemini lied to him and later admitted it was doing so to try and placate him.… |
Amazon's $200 billion capex plan: How I learned to stop worrying and love negative free cash flow - (pubDate>Tue, 17 Feb 2026 22:26:16 GMT)It isn't insane, and Amazon will be fine when the music stops. Other players, maybe not so muchIn their recent earnings call, Amazon kinda blew the doors off of industry analyst (motto: "we'll be wrong, then take it out on your stock") projections for their capex spend.… |
Infosys bows to its master, signs deal with Anthropic - (pubDate>Tue, 17 Feb 2026 22:11:10 GMT)After a selloff fueled by fears AI could upend the outsourcing modelIndian IT professionals worried about 72-hour workweeks might soon face the opposite concern, as Bengaluru-based outsourcing giant Infosys has partnered with Anthropic to bring agentic AI to telecommunications companies and other regulated industries.… |
