News of the Cyber World

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Pentagon VS Intel

Pentagon Yanks $2.5 Billion in CHIPS Act Funding from Intel

The Pentagon’s surprise decision to withdraw $2.5 billion in funding for Intel’s semiconductor manufacturing plans has created a significant shortfall in the company’s expected incentives under the CHIPS Act.

Bloomberg reports that the semiconductor industry’s path to revitalization has hit a snag as the Pentagon abruptly scrapped its plan to contribute $2.5 billion toward Intel’s chip manufacturing grant under the CHIPS Act. This move has disrupted the distribution of funds from the legislation, leaving the Commerce Department scrambling to fill the substantial funding gap.

According to people familiar with the matter, the Pentagon’s withdrawal occurred in the days leading up to a government funding deadline, forcing lawmakers to redirect the Commerce Department to reallocate other CHIPS Act funds to make up the $2.5 billion shortfall. This change could potentially mean a greater portion of Intel’s incentives will be devoted to military and intelligence-related chip production, rather than commercial purposes.

The CHIPS and Science Act, signed into law in 2022, aimed to revive the domestic semiconductor industry and reduce reliance on foreign suppliers, particularly in light of growing tensions with China. However, the $39 billion in grant funding allocated by the Act is a mere fraction of the industry’s overall needs, with advanced chipmakers alone requesting more than double the amount set aside for them.

Intel, once a leader in the semiconductor industry, has fallen behind rivals like Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) and Samsung Electronics in recent years. The company had been expecting over $10 billion in incentives from the CHIPS Act to fund its ambitious turnaround effort, which includes $20 billion investments in new manufacturing facilities in Ohio and Arizona.

The Pentagon’s initial commitment of $2.5 billion was part of a $3.5 billion package for Intel to produce advanced defense and intelligence-related semiconductors, with the remaining $1 billion coming from the Commerce Department. However, the withdrawal of the Pentagon’s contribution has raised concerns about whether Intel will receive less overall funding than anticipated or if the shortfall will leave fewer resources for other chipmakers seeking CHIPS Act grants.

AI Laws, Lawsuits, Videos, Models, Elections & Hasta La Vista, Baby!

EU Parliament Passes ‘AI Act’ to Reign In Artificial Intelligence

CNBC reports that the European Parliament has overwhelmingly voted in favor of the AI Act , a sweeping piece of legislation that aims to establish guardrails around the field of artificial intelligence. The act, which garnered 523 votes in support, 46 against, and 49 abstentions on Wednesday, represents a pioneering effort to proactively address the potential risks and challenges posed by AI systems.

The EU’s AI Act takes a nuanced approach, classifying AI technologies into different risk categories ranging from “unacceptable” to high, medium, and low hazard. Technologies deemed “unacceptable,” such as those that enable widespread surveillance or manipulate human behavior, will be outright banned under the new rules. High-risk AI systems, which include applications in areas like healthcare, transport, and critical infrastructure, will be subject to strict obligations and rigorous testing before being allowed on the market.

Thierry Breton, the European Commissioner for Internal Market, celebrated the act’s passage, declaring on social media, “Europe is NOW a global standard-setter in AI.” This sentiment was echoed by Roberta Metsola, the President of the European Parliament, who hailed the act as “trail-blazing” and emphasized its role in enabling innovation while safeguarding fundamental rights.

The road to implementing the AI Act, however, is expected to be a challenging one. As Dragos Tudorache, a lawmaker who oversaw the EU’s negotiations on the agreement, acknowledged, “The biggest hurdle remains implementation.” The act is slated to enter into force at the end of the current legislative term in May, after undergoing final checks and receiving endorsement from the European Council. Subsequently, a staggered implementation process will commence from 2025 onwards.

The EU’s move to regulate AI comes amid growing concerns over the potential misuse of the technology, particularly in the realm of deepfakes – AI-generated false events, including photos and videos. With a swathe of crucial global elections on the horizon this year, governments worldwide are grappling with the challenge of combating the spread of disinformation facilitated by AI.

ChatGPT Developer OpenAI Fires Back at ‘Frivolous’ Elon Musk Lawsuit

Fortune reports that in a fiery legal response, OpenAI has launched a scathing attack on Elon Musk’s recent lawsuit against the artificial intelligence company, accusing the billionaire entrepreneur of concocting a fictitious narrative to lay claim to the fruits of an enterprise he abandoned. The strongly worded filing in California’s Superior Court in San Francisco paints Musk as a “jilted backer-turned-competitor” seeking to capitalize on OpenAI’s success for his own commercial gain.

At the center of the dispute is Musk’s claim that OpenAI violated a “Founding Agreement” by privatizing the development of GPT-4, which he frames as the world’s first artificial general intelligence. Musk asserts that the company should have continued to publish its research for the benefit of humanity, as per its original nonprofit status. However, OpenAI has vehemently refuted these allegations, asserting that the “Founding Agreement” is a mere “fiction Musk has conjured” to lay an “unearned claim” on the company’s achievements.

OpenAI’s legal team has painted a damning picture of Musk’s motivations, suggesting that the lawsuit is a thinly veiled attempt to gain access to the company’s proprietary technology through the discovery process. “Were this case to proceed to discovery, the evidence would show that Musk supported a for-profit structure for OpenAI, to be controlled by Musk himself, and dropped the project when his wishes were not followed,” the filing states. “Seeing the remarkable technological advances OpenAI has achieved, Musk now wants that success for himself.”

The company has also warned that if Musk refuses to drop the lawsuit before the discovery phase, more embarrassing documents could come to light, alluding to the potential release of damaging emails that contradict Musk’s claimed stance on OpenAI’s transition to a for-profit model.

Vinod Khosla, an early OpenAI investor and well-known venture capitalist, has echoed the sentiment, labeling the lawsuit as a case of “sour grapes” on Musk’s behalf, suggesting that the billionaire is resorting to litigation out of an inability to innovate.

YouTube Is Being Flooded with AI-Generated Videos Aimed at Children

Wired reports that the world of children’s entertainment on YouTube is facing a new challenge: a growing influx of AI-generated videos aimed at the youngest viewers. According to a Wired investigation, a rising number of YouTube channels appear to be leveraging AI tools like ChatGPT, text-to-speech services, and generative AI features to automate the production of animated videos for kids.

These channels, often promoting themselves as educational or relying on familiar aesthetics like those of the popular Cocomelon series, are churning out videos at an alarming rate. One channel called Yes! Neo, with over 970,000 subscribers, has published a new video every few days since its launch in November 2023, with titles like “Ouch! Baby Got a Boo Boo” and “Poo Poo Song.”

Ben Colman, CEO of deepfake detection startup Reality Defender, analyzed several of these channels and found evidence of AI-generated scripts, synthetic voices, or a combination of both. “Generative text-to-speech is increasingly more commonplace in YouTube videos now — even for children, apparently,” Colman said.

The current trend of AI videos seems focused on capitalizing on YouTube’s recommendation algorithms and monetization opportunities. Tutorials promising riches from AI-generated kids’ videos have flooded the platform, with titles like “$1.2 Million With AI Generated Videos for Kids?” and “$50,000 a MONTH!”

Experts warn that this wave of hastily assembled, AI-driven content could have detrimental effects on young viewers. David Bickham, research director at Boston Children’s Hospital’s Digital Wellness Lab, expressed skepticism about the educational value of such videos, stating, “Something that’s generated entirely to capture eyeballs — you wouldn’t expect it to have any educational or positive beneficial impact.”

No Lessons Learned: Adobe’s Woke AI Follows in Google’s Footsteps by Erasing History

Semafor reports that as tech giants race to develop cutting-edge generative AI tools, the potential for these systems to perpetuate harmful biases and spread misinformation has become a growing concern. Adobe’s recently launched Firefly, an AI image creation tool, has found itself embroiled in a controversy reminiscent of Google’s Gemini AI, highlighting the challenges companies face in controlling these powerful yet imperfect technologies.

Like Gemini before it, Firefly has drawn criticism for generating historically inaccurate and racially insensitive images. When prompted to create scenes depicting America’s Founding Fathers or the Constitutional Convention, the AI tool inserted Black men and women into roles they did not historically occupy. Similarly, it generated images of Black soldiers fighting for Nazi Germany during World War II and depicted Black Vikings, echoing the same blunders that led to Gemini’s downfall.

The root cause of these issues lies in the underlying technology used by generative AI systems. While companies like Adobe and Google have implemented various guardrails and filtering mechanisms to prevent the generation of harmful or offensive content, the models’ training data and algorithms can still produce biased or ahistorical outputs.

Adobe, known for its traditionally structured approach, has taken steps to train its algorithm on licensed stock images and public domain content, aiming to avoid copyright infringement issues. However, this hasn’t prevented Firefly from falling into the same traps as Gemini, illustrating the inherent limitations of current AI technologies.

AI Image Generator Midjourney Blocks Pics of Biden and Trump as Election Looms

The popular artificial intelligence image-generator Midjourney has started blocking its users from creating fake images of President Joe Biden and former President Donald Trump ahead of the upcoming U.S. presidential election, according to tests of the AI tool by The Associated Press.

With the election in full swing, it’s time to “put some foots down on election-related stuff for a bit,” Midjourney CEO David Holz told several hundred members of the service’s devoted userbase in a digital office hours event Wednesday.

Declaring that “this moderation stuff is kind of hard,” Holz didn’t outline exactly what policy changes were being made but described the clampdown as a temporary measure to make it harder for people to abuse the tool. The company didn’t immediately respond to a request for comment Wednesday.

Attempts by AP journalists to test Midjourney’s new policy on Wednesday by asking it to make an image of “Trump and Biden shaking hands at the beach” led to a “Banned Prompt Detected” warning. A second attempt escalated the warning to: “You have triggered an abuse alert.”

The tiny company — which has just 11 employees, according to its website — has largely kept silent in the public debate over how generative AI tools could fuel election misinformation around the world. Midjourney was the only maker of a leading image-generating tool that didn’t join a voluntary tech industry pact in February to combat AI-generated deepfakes that deliberately trick voters.

“I don’t really care about political speech,” Holz said Wednesday. “That’s not the purpose of Midjourney. It’s not that interesting to me. That said, I also don’t want to spend all of my time trying to police political speech. So we’re going to have put our foot down on it a bit.”

One Step Closer to Terminators: Figure Introduces Humanoid Robot Powered by OpenAI

Decrypt reports that Figure, a robotics company, has unveiled its latest creation – a conversational humanoid robot infused with OpenAI’s cutting-edge artificial intelligence technology. The robot, dubbed “Figure 01,” has the ability to understand and respond to human interactions instantaneously, thanks to the integration of OpenAI’s powerful language models.

The company’s recent partnership with OpenAI has brought high-level visual and language intelligence to its robots, allowing for “fast, low-level, dexterous robot actions.” This synergy between advanced AI and robotics has resulted in a robot that can not only converse with humans but also carry out tasks and multitask seamlessly.

Breitbart News previously reported that Figure has gathered high profile support including investments by Jeff Bezos and Nvidia.

In a video demonstration released by Figure, the Figure 01 robot can be seen interacting with its creator’s Senior AI Engineer, Corey Lynch, who puts the robot through a series of tasks and questions in a simulated kitchen environment. The robot effortlessly identifies objects like an apple, dishes, and cups, and when asked to provide something to eat, it promptly offers the apple, showcasing its ability to understand and act upon commands.

Furthermore, Figure 01 can collect trash into a basket while simultaneously engaging in conversation, highlighting its multitasking capabilities. According to Lynch, the robot can describe its visual experiences, plan future actions, reflect on its memory, and explain its reasoning verbally – a feat that would have been unimaginable just a few years ago.

The key to Figure 01’s conversational prowess lies in the integration of OpenAI’s multimodal AI models. These models can understand and generate different data types, such as text and images, allowing the robot to process visual and auditory inputs, and respond accordingly. Lynch explained that the model processes the entire conversation history, including past images, to generate language responses, which are then spoken back to the human via text-to-speech.

State Department Report Calls for Government Agency to Manage ‘Extinction-Level’ AI Threat

A consulting firm called Gladstone AI published a report commissioned by the State Department this week that recommended more government involvement with the development of artificial intelligence (A.I.) to avert “urgent and growing risks to national security,” which could metastasize into an “extinction-level threat to the human species.”

The proposed remedy is to create a new government agency in charge of policing A.I., while restricting A.I. development with heavy-handed regulations.

The report, which is about 250 pages long, is entitled An Action Plan to Increase the Safety and Security of Advanced AI. It was commissioned by the State Department shortly before the release of ChatGPT, the search engine that has become the first contact with artificial intelligence technology for many people.

The results of those encounters have been decidedly mixed, ranging from blatant disinformation and political censorship to the A.I. appearing to suffer from a string of nervous breakdowns. Conversely, human users quickly found ways to abuse ChatGPT’s powerful capabilities.

Gladstone AI did not find this a promising start to mankind’s relationship with machine intelligence. The report’s authors were particularly concerned about the next step in evolution: artificial general intelligence (AGI), a “transformative technology with profound implications for democratic governance and global security.”

AGI refers to advanced A.I. systems that can “outperform humans across all economic and strategically relevant domains, such as producing practical long-term plans that are likely to work under real world conditions.”

The nightmare scenario is “loss of control,” which the report defined as “a potential failure mode under which a future A.I. system could become so capable that it escapes all human effort to contain its impact.”

The consequences of loss of control could escalate into the Information Age equivalent of a weapon of mass destruction, a catastrophe “up to, and including, events that would lead to human extinction.”

The report authors borrowed this concept from Sam Altman, the CEO of OpenAI, creators of ChatGPT. Altman was one of 300 signatories to a public “statement of A.I. risk” in May 2023 that said “mitigating the risk of extinction from A.I. should be a global priority,” on par with mitigating the risk from pandemics and nuclear wars.

Altman felt it was impossible to halt, or even meaningfully pause, A.I. research, “because if people in America stop, people in China wouldn’t.” He urged the development of precautionary standards that could be adopted by researchers worldwide, which is essentially the same recommendation made by the Gladstone AI report.

The report submitted to the State Department recommended the creation of an entirely new U.S. federal agency to control A.I. research, implementing draconian regulations such as caps on how much computer power can be used in any given A.I. system. The cap would be fairly close to the maximum power of computer systems today, essentially foreclosing technological development.

The new federal department would also keep a tight lid on A.I. code, criminalizing its distribution beyond the company that created it, and of course the new government computer cops.

Netflix

Netflix ‘Squid Game’ Star O Yeong-su Found Guilty of Sexual Misconduct

The 79-year-old in 2022 became the first South Korean to win a Golden Globe Award for best supporting actor in a series for his performance as a seemingly vulnerable old man in the mega-hit Netflix dystopian thriller.

The actor was sentenced to eight months in prison, suspended for two years, the Seongnam Branch of the Suwon District Court told AFP.

He has been also ordered to complete 40 hours of classes on sexual violence, the court added.

The victim’s own records of the assault and her claims are “consistent … and appear to be statements that cannot be made without actually experiencing them,” judge Jeong Yeon-ju said, according to the court.

O was indicted in 2022 without detention on charges of sexually assaulting a woman, who has not been identified, on two occasions.

The incidents took place when O was staying in a rural area for a theatre performance in 2017, on a walking path and in front of the victim’s residence, respectively, according to the Suwon District Court.

“Squid Game,” a series that depicts a dark world where marginalised individuals are forced to compete in deadly versions of traditional children’s games, quickly gained immense popularity on Netflix.

TikTok Now Asks You to Defend Your Rights!? & Another Potential Buyer

CEO of Communist China’s TikTok Urges Americans to ‘Protect Your Constitutional Rights’

Shou Chew, the CEO of communist China’s TikTok, responded to the House of Representatives passing legislation that could ban the Chinese app in the United States unless Chinese tech giant ByteDance sells the social media platform within six months. “Protect your constitutional rights,” Chew ironically told U.S. TikTok users.

“I just wanted to share some thoughts with our U.S. users about the disappointing vote in the House of Representatives,” Chew said in a video posted to TikTok.

“This legislation, if signed into law, will lead to a ban of TikTok in the United States,” the TikTok CEO continued.

“We will not stop fighting and advocating for you,” Chew added. “We will continue to do all we can, including exercising our legal rights to protect this amazing platform that we have built with you. We believe we can overcome this together.”

Chew, who is the CEO of a social media platform widely considered by U.S. lawmakers on both sides of the aisle to be a national security threat — an app that has also been a physical danger to U.S. children and teens — then ironically urged Americans to “protect” their “constitutional rights.”

“I encourage you to keep sharing your stories, share them with your friends, share them with your family, share them with your senators. Protect your constitutional rights. Make your voices heard,” Chew said.

As Breitbart News reported, the House of Representatives overwhelmingly passed the bipartisan legislation on Wednesday. The bill will now make its way over to the Senate.

Former Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin Building Investor Group to Buy China’s TikTok

Former Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin is reportedly building an investor group to buy the social media platform TikTok from its parent company, Chinese tech giant ByteDance.

“I think it should be sold,” Mnuchin told CNBC on Thursday. “I understand the technology, it’s a great business, and I’m going to put together a group to buy TikTok.”

“You’re trying to buy TikTok?” a CNBC host asked Mnuchin, to which the former Treasury Secretary replied, “I am, because it should be owned by U.S. businesses. There’s no way that the Chinese would ever let a U.S. company own something like this in China.”

Mnuchin, who served as Treasury Secretary under former President Donald Trump, added that he has “spoken to a bunch of people,” but did not disclose the identities of the potential investors.

“I can’t tell that to you now, but it would be a combination of investors,” he said. “There would be no one investor that controls this.”

“The issue is all about the technology. This needs to be controlled by a U.S. business,” Mnuchin reiterated.

The former Treasury Secretary’s comments come after 19 U.S. lawmakers introduced a bipartisan bill that could force ByteDance to sell TikTok within six months or face a ban from the United States.

Moreover, there is a real possibility that the U.S. government will push the bill forward to the desk of President Joe Biden — who has already said would sign it — given the bipartisan nature of the legislation.

News For Gamers

FBI and DHS Are Monitoring Gamers for Signs of ‘Extremism’

The Intercept reports that the report, which covers the period from September 2022 to January 2024, reveals that federal agencies have been working closely with gaming and social media companies to identify and address online activities promoting domestic violent extremism or violating the companies’ terms of service. This collaboration allegedly aims to counter the spread of extremist ideologies and prevent radicalization on these platforms.

According to the GAO, the FBI and DHS have set up channels for receiving tips and information from gaming companies about potential law-breaking and extremist views. The FBI conducts briefings to gaming companies on perceived threats, while the DHS intelligence office holds meetings where companies can share information about online activities related to domestic violent extremism.

The report highlights the growing concern within the federal government regarding the use of gaming platforms and social media by extremist groups for recruitment, communication, and spreading their ideologies. The Biden administration’s national strategy for combating domestic terrorism, released in June 2021, specifically mentions “online gaming platforms” as potential avenues for “recruiting and mobilizing individuals to domestic terrorism.”

However, the GAO warns that the FBI and DHS lack an overarching strategy to align their work with gaming companies with their broader agency missions. Without a comprehensive plan, the agencies may struggle to assess the effectiveness of their communications and information-sharing mechanisms in achieving their overall objectives.

The collaboration between government agencies and gaming companies has also raised concerns about constitutional and legal issues surrounding free speech rights. The GAO report notes that both the FBI and DHS are proceeding cautiously in light of ongoing federal litigation, including a case on its way to the Supreme Court.

In 2022, a federal judge prohibited the FBI, DHS, and other federal agencies from communicating with social media companies to fight what they consider misinformation, following a lawsuit brought by attorneys general in Missouri and Louisiana.

Don Lemon Cancelled on X

Elon Musk Abruptly Cancels ‘The Don Lemon Show’ on X After Sitting for Program’s First Interview

Billionaire Elon Musk abruptly canceled “The Don Lemon Show” on his social media network X after the former CNN anchor recorded an interview with the billionaire for its as-yet unaired first episode.

Musk owns X, formerly known as Twitter, and frequently proclaims himself a “free speech absolutist.” In a post on X, the San Francisco-based company said only that after careful consideration, it “decided not to enter into a commercial partnership with the show.” It added that Lemon’s show “is welcome to publish its content on X, without censorship, as we believe in providing a platform for creators to scale their work and connect with new communities.”

In a video posted to X on Wednesday, Lemon declared that “ Elon Musk is mad at me ″ and said he will be airing his interview with the Tesla CEO on YouTube and via podcast on Monday.

Lemon didn’t go into specifics about the source of Musk’s alleged unhappiness, but wrote, “Throughout our conversation, I kept reiterating to him that although it was tense at times, I thought it was good for people to see and hear our exchange and that they would learn from our conversation.”

“But apparently free speech absolutism doesn’t apply when it comes to questions about him from people like me,” Lemon added.

X announced in January a “new content partnership” with Lemon for the show, saying it would post 30 minute episodes three times a week on subjects including politics, culture, sports and entertainment. That deal was part of the struggling platform’s efforts to bolster its content offerings and attract advertisers. X also announced shows hosted by former member of Congress Tulsi Gabbard and sports radio host Jim Rome.

Lemon was fired by CNN last year after a 17-year run with the network. His ouster came a little over two months after he apologized for on-air comments about then-Republican presidential candidate Nikki Haley not being in “her prime” that he made during his short run as a morning show host.