Proposed cuts at a key US government agency will likely mean the demise of CHIPS Act funding, which could effectively end the program and undermine efforts to reshore semiconductor manufacturing and research to the US.

Axios and Bloomberg on Tuesday reported that the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) plans to cut 497 jobs this week. NIST, a non-regulatory agency within the US Department of Commerce (DoC), helps drive innovation and industrial competitiveness and oversees the CHIPS for America program.

Robert Maire, president of consulting firm Semiconductor Advisors, wrote in a blog post that the plan to cut NIST staff isn’t “bluff or negotiation tactic.” Instead, the layoffs signal a complete shift in direction under US President Donald J. Trump, he said.

“Trump made it clear over the last few days that he will institute 25% tariffs on imported semiconductor devices, so [it’s] obvious that strategy is shifting from incentivizing US chip production to penalizing imports instead,” Maire said. “This also lowers the likelihood of TSMC taking over Intel manufacturing, as giving top US chip production to Taiwan contradicts the new strategy.”

The Trump Administration, Maire said, hasn’t fully considered the impact of the cuts, since “100%” of AI chips, most Intel chips, all AMD chips, TSMC customers’ chips, and more than 80% of memory chips are imported — with the majority of them outside the US.

“Obviously chip manufacturing companies will slow spending on programs they previously thought they were getting CHIPS Act funding for, if not cancel those projects outright,” Maire said. “If I were running a chip company, I would not count on CHIPS Act funding — even if I had a signed contract, as its clearly not worth the paper it’s written on if NIST is eviscerated.”

Industry analysts have agreed in the past that tariffs on imports will act as a penalty on the industry, while the CHIPS Act — hallmark legislation passed three years ago under then-President Joseph R. Biden Jr. — acts an incentive.

Jack Gold, principal analyst with tech industry research firm J. Gold Associates, has called Trump’s plan to enact tariffs on oversea chip makers is simply “wrong.” Funds already granted under the CHIPS Act should be safe if transferred, but with NIST staff cuts, the program could stall without oversight, he said.

“Ending it would be a mistake,” Gold said, arguing that incentives work better than tariffs for bringing chip manufacturing back to the US. If funding is pulled, companies like Intel might halt their projects, as they likely can’t replace the lost funding, he added.

“I don’t know how the companies (Intel and others) would replace the funding if it gets pulled,” Gold said. “In fact, I think it’s unlikely and the chip guys would just shutter whatever they are building, at least for the near term.”

The issue goes beyond CHIPS funding, Gold added, saying program cuts will hurt local communities expecting new facilities that would create jobs, pay taxes, and boost the economy. Areas such as Ohio, where projects were planned, “will miss out,” he said. And, local politicians in states expecing the grant monies, including New York, Ohio, Texas, and Arizona, are likely unhappy, he said.

“As for why Trump and company would do this, I think it’s just a short sighted view of, ‘Let’s cut all spending, without regard for what that spending ultimately means.’ As I said, you can’t accomplish bringing back manufacturing to the US simply by penalizing with tariffs. It won’t work,” Gold said. “Besides, it takes three to four years to build out a new fab, so imagine that amount of tariffs going into our products. What doesn’t have a chip in it these days? We will all be paying more for things.”

The CHIPS Act was passed overwhelmingly in 2022 by both houses of Congress to address computer chip supply chain shortages that surfaced during the COVID-19 pandemic. The legislation provided the Commerce Department with $52.7 billion for a suite of programs to “revitalize” the US position in semiconductor research, development, and manufacturing.

To date, the DoC has allocated, but not dispensed, about $32 billion in funding among chipmakers, including Intel, Samsung, Micron, TSMC, and Texas Instruments, all of whom have unveiled plans for a number of new US chip fabrication plants. In return, those chip designers and makers have pledged about $300 billion in current and future projects in the US, according to the White House under Biden.

The CHIPS Act has spurred $450 billion in private investment across 28 states, creating 58,000 jobs, according to the Semiconductory Industry Association. 

With the CHIPS Act spurring them on, the likes of Qualcomm, in partnership with GlobalFoundries, also said it would invest $4.2 billion to double chip production in its Malta, NY, facility.

Despite widespread bipartisan backing, some members of Congress expressed concerns about certain provisions, such as the level of government subsidies or the potential for the bill to benefit only a few large tech companies. Still, the majority of both Democrats and Republicans recognized the strategic importance of boosting semiconductor production on US soil.

In addition to Trump’s opposition, House Speaker Mike Johnson said in 2024 that Republicans would likely repeal the CHIPS Act. Johnson, who voted against the measure, later walked his comments back, saying he would like to “streamline” it, according to The Associated Press.

Source:: Computer World

Atlassian’s Trello project management tool has received a facelift with features designed to organize meetings and ideas in a cohesive manner.

The new features include an inbox, a planner, and a mix of add-ons and generative AI (genAI) tools to help customers summarize emails, organize meetings, and quickly sort through the barrage of pop-ups appearing in the software.

“In the past, Trello had kind of veered in the direction of project management because you were planning — and helping people plan — bigger and more complex projects. Now we are redirecting the focus on an individual task management,” said Gaurav Kataria, head of product for Trello at Atlassian.

With the update, Trello focused on simplicity, ease of use, and helping individual users be more productive, Kataria said. The company highlighted two specific features: Inbox and Planner, which are currently in beta. The AI-based inbox, for instance, serves to collect and summarize key action points and organizes to-do lists collected from a variety of collaborative and productivity apps. Planner serves to coordinate scheduling and tasks.

The new features are built atop current features that include to-do lists and cards, which help users organize and complete projects. 

This represents a big shift for Trello, as the current feature set “has been pretty much the same for the last 14 years,” Kataria said.

A built-in large-language model (LLM) parses messages and can summarize key action items and dates, which are then organized as a to-do list in the Inbox. Users can read those summaries in the inbox, then use the Planner feature to organize meetings in the calendar.

For example, knowledge workers are often drowning in emails, Slack messages, Microsoft Team messages and notifications that come from applications that might include Salesforce and Workday. 

“The most common use cases — just forward everything on to one single to-do list and have the AI summarize it. By far, this is the killer use case,” Kataria said.

There are many ways to forward a message to Trello’s inbox. For example, a user can forward a meeting reminder email on Google to Trello, which then adds it. A Slack message about a meeting can be tagged and saved to the Inbox. Apple’s Siri can also be used to send notes or reminders to the inbox.

The new features will become generally available in six weeks to paid users. They will not be available to freemium users. 

Atlassian is also known for Jira, its enterprise product management tool. Companies can import data from Jira into Trello and vice versa. 

“A lot of teams have graduated from Trello to Jira for project management needs, but use Trello for individual productivity. That’s where there’s a clear separation between Trello and Jira. But at the same time, they…nicely integrate with each other,” Kataria said.

Trello’s structural approach and interface make it easy to manage work and serves as a major on-ramp to other Atlassian products, said Wayne Kurtzman, research vice president  of social, communities and collaboration at IDC.

“Making Trello a personal work hub shows promise, as long as features and interface evolve with their technical audience,” Kurtzman said.  

In addition to other vendors in the collaborative work management segment, challenges could come from unexpected places as competitors focus on workflow automation.

“Atlassian has to balance the expectations of their Trello base with the desire to onboard them to Jira,” Kurtzman said. “If done with care, making Trello a personal product with team abilities could accomplish this.”

Source:: Computer World

By Siôn Geschwindt As the US and China pursue dominance in the global technology race, concerns are mounting among European founders that the region’s entrenched bureaucracy is impeding its capacity for innovation and growth. The EU is going “overboard on tech regulation,” said Job van der Voort, CEO and founder of Remote, an HR tech company valued at over $3bn. “It’s stifling innovation and it’s a massive risk for Europe.” Van der Voort told TNW that many business leaders share his view. “Most entrepreneurs agree this is a huge problem,” he said.   Indeed, such concerns are being raised with growing frequency. At a…This story continues at The Next Web

Source:: The Next Web

By Hisan Kidwai Every year, millions fall victim to phishing scams and lose their valuable data – or, in…
The post How to Stay Safe Against Phishing & Social Engineering Attacks? appeared first on Fossbytes.

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Polish company Clone Robotics has unveiled Protoclone, a human-like robot equipped with synthetic muscles and a polymer skeleton consisting of 206 bones.

The YouTube clip below shows Protoclone using its synthetic muscles to move.

Protoclone has a 500-watt electric pump as its heart and four cameras for eyes. In addition, the robot has 320 pressure-sensitive sensors and 70 inertial sensors, according to Ars Technica.

In the future, this kind of robot could eventually help around the household — for example, by cooking, washing dishes and doing laundry.

Source:: Computer World

By Siôn Geschwindt Dutch software firm Bird is moving most of its operations out of the Netherlands and opening new global hubs as it seeks a reprieve from “overregulation” in Europe, said co-founder and CEO Robert Vis. “The AI Act, financing, compensation, taxes, employment law — starting and running a company [in Europe] is hard,” Vis told TNW, adding that there are “too many disparate markets that are overregulated with no clear vision for the future while the world around us is changing.” Bird (formerly MessageBird) is one of the Netherlands’ leading tech scaleups, reaching unicorn status in 2018. Bird’s main product is…This story continues at The Next Web

Source:: The Next Web

Apple plans to inject billions of dollars into the US economy, spending $500 billion in the US over the next four years and promising expansion, new manufacturing facilities, and big investments in advanced manufacturing and R&D.

The announcement follows last week’s meeting between Apple CEO Tim Cook, and US President Donald J. Trump. “We are bullish on the future of American innovation, and we’re proud to build on our long-standing U.S. investments with this $500 billion commitment to our country’s future,” Cook said. “We’ll keep working with people and companies across this country to help write an extraordinary new chapter in the history of American innovation.”

In a comment on Truth Social, Trump said the investment reflected Apple’s “faith in what we are doing, without which, they wouldn’t be investing ten cents. Thank you Tim Cook and Apple.”

It remains to be seen whether Apple’s investments will be enough to mitigate the administration’s decision to impose tariffs on Chinese goods. “They don’t want to be in the tariffs,” Trump said after meeting with Cook last week.

Apple announced a similar range of investments during the last term of the president, which did help protect iPhones against tariffs at that time.

What Apple is promising

It helps that Apple is one of America’s biggest taxpayers, having paid $75 billion in US taxes in the past five years. While some of those tax dollars should perhaps have been levied elsewhere, (as the EU insisted about Apple’s Irish tax breaks), the deeply nationalistic US administration most certainly wants that money paid at home.

Apple says its investment billions will be spent on a range of different things:

The company will double its Advanced Manufacturing Fund

It will build a new advanced manufacturing facility in Texas, where it will product Apple Intelligence servers.

It intends to launch a manufacturing academy in Michigan.

And it will invest more in R&D, including additional spending on silicon and AI development.

The $500-billion promise also includes its work with suppliers across the US, direct Apple hires, AI investments including data centers, and Apple TV+ productions in 20 states. The company currently claims to support more than 2.9 million jobs in the US.

What happens in Texas?

The factory in Houston, TX seems likely to attract the biggest focus. Apple’s big idea is to begin making Apple Intelligence servers there later this year, opening a 250,000-square-foot-server manufacturing center in which it promises thousands of jobs. 

What’s interesting about that promise is that it implies Apple intends to make a very large number of these servers and it means several things: that Apple will extend the services it offers via Private Cloud Compute; it intends wide international deployment of these servers; and (speculatively) it will offer these private cloud services as a business in its own right. An iOS developer might want to use space in the private cloud to provide AI services, for example.

None of these educated guesses could turn out correct, but a factory with thousands of employees is going to be producing something in very significant quantities. Apple will also expand data center capacity in North Carolina, Iowa, Oregon, Arizona, and Nevada.

Advanced Manufacturing Fund

Apple’s Advanced Manufacturing Fund has made some key investments in support of third-party innovation as it is applied to Apple products in the past — think about Corning Glass, for example. The latest promise includes a massive $10 billion investment in skills development at Apple’s planned academy in Detroit, MI and billions in support of TSMC’s Fab 21 plant in Arizona.

And with a view to Industry 3.0, the Apple Manufacturing Academy will consult with small and mid-sized companies on implementing AI and smart manufacturing techniques. It will provide free in-person and online courses, with a skills development curriculum that teaches workers skills like project management and manufacturing process optimization.

In the national interest

What is interesting is the extent to which Apple today can make significant investments in the US that were perhaps less possible during the first Trump Presidency.

Today’s Apple is significantly less umbilically connected to China, for example. It is putting in place a distributed manufacturing and supply chain and has been working hard with key suppliers such as TSMC to bring at least some production to the US. That will include processor production in Arizona. Apple will never be able to base all its manufacturing in the US, but the promise of tens of thousands of additional jobs does mean something. 

It is also highly significant that much of Apple’s promises relate to artificial intelligence — including skills, manufacturing, and R&D. That matters because AI development is quite clearly in the US national interest, and Apple’s multi-billion dollar investment in the field will make a significant difference to US tech power.

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Source:: Computer World

By Siôn Geschwindt Europe’s biggest food delivery firm Just Eat Takeaway.com is set to be acquired by tech investor Prosus for €4.1bn, in one of the biggest acquisitions in the history of Dutch tech.  Prosus — the investment arm of South African tech firm Naspers — has agreed to buy Just Eat Takeaway’s shares at €20.30 each in an all-cash offer. That’s a 22% premium over the delivery app’s recent three-month high but only a fifth of its pandemic-era peak of above €100 per share. Following the announcement, Just Eat Takeaway’s shares climbed 53% on the Amsterdam Stock Exchange this morning. Just Eat…This story continues at The Next Web

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US feds are reportedly investigating a $32 million deal inked by CrowdStrike with a government reseller to provide cybersecurity tools for the Internal Revenue Service (IRS) — products the agency never used and said it didn’t even purchase.

On the last day of Q3 2023, the security giant signed a contract with top government software reseller Carahsoft Technology Corp. for use of its identity threat detection software by the IRS, according to a Bloomberg report. The timing seems to be a critical component of the investigation, as the transaction was large enough for CrowdStrike to meet Wall Street expectations for the quarter.

Given that IRS usage hasn’t materialized, some, including, Bloomberg said, CrowdStrike’s own employees, have raised concerns about pre-booking — the inflation of sales figures to meet investor expectations.

However, a CrowdStrike spokesperson told Computerworld: “We stand by the accounting of the transaction.” Carahsoft did not reply to Computerworld’s requests for comment.

IRS: We never purchased CrowdStrike software

According to two people who spoke with Bloomberg on agreement of anonymity, investigators for the US Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) have been conducting interviews with CrowdStrike and IRS staff and collecting records related to the deal, including written documents exchanged between IRS, CrowdStrike, and Carahsoft employees.

Investigators are asking witnesses about any interactions between CrowdStrike sales staff and IRS employees, and have repeatedly queried whether the agency purchased CrowdStrike software, to which they’ve repeatedly been told “no”, according to the anonymous sources.

Previously, CrowdStrike and Carahsoft said they had settled on a “non-cancellable order,” but they haven’t said whether there was indeed a purchase order in place from the IRS.

After the deal was finalized and CrowdStrike reported its third quarter results, company shares jumped 10%. CEO George Kurtz even seemed to call the deal out in the quarterly earnings call, saying that “identity threat protection wins in the quarter included an eight-figure total deal value win in the federal government.”

However, several months later, CrowdStrike appeared to backtrack, excluding roughly $26 million from its annual recurring revenue, citing a federal distributor’s intent to exercise transferability rights.

Carahsoft, for its part, has been under scrutiny for some time now. The FBI searched its Reston, Virginia headquarters last year in a matter related to another partner, and federal prosecutors are performing a separate civil investigation into whether the company conspired to overcharge the government.

Pre-sales a ‘leadership problem’

Experts and analysts say the CrowdStrike-Carahsoft narrative emphasizes the pressure placed on enterprise IT buyers and sellers to sign deals before end-of-quarter (EOQ).

“Quarter-end deal pressure is one of the most predictable yet high-stakes dynamics in enterprise IT negotiations,” Adam Mansfield, commercial advisory practice leader with IT negotiation advisors UpperEdge, told Computerworld.

Vendor sales reps push hard to lock in revenue, typically tied to new product adoption, upgrades, or expanded usage, before closing their books, he said, “often dangling so-called ‘once-in-a-lifetime’ aggressive discounting to secure commitments.”

Scott Bickley, advisory fellow at Info-Tech Research Group, agreed. “Buyers have been conditioned by vendors who are publicly traded to strategically position deals at EOQ and preferably at the end of the vendor’s fiscal year,” he said.

But while urgency can create opportunity, it also carries significant risks, Mansfield pointed out. Committing to products and/or volumes that aren’t fully vetted, and misalignment of contract terms, can later cause financial damage, particularly when these new products come with non-cancelable subscriptions.

“The practice often creates more problems than it solves,” agreed SaaS and service brand consultant Chad Perry. “Deals get ‘booked’ under false pretenses, contracts get renegotiated (or canceled) post-quarter, and the next thing you know, the company is explaining ‘revenue recognition issues’ on an earnings call.”

While, at the end of the day, the blame may land in the sales department, “pre-booking is never just a sales problem,” he said. “It’s a leadership problem.”

Buyers’ opportunity in EOQ deals

For buyers, EOQ deals can both exploit and be exploited, experts point out.

In the case of IT buyers, understanding this pressure can actually be a strategic advantage, Perry noted. “If you know the seller is under quarter-end stress, you have leverage,” he said. “You can negotiate better terms, push for extras, or even delay and see what they offer to close.”

Mansfield emphasized that the key for IT buyers is to seek out opportunity in vendor urgency, while at the same time maintaining control. This means ensuring pricing is truly competitive and securing proper concessions (such as protections). The worst-case scenario: Committing to costly products and fees only to see plans unravel due to business shifts, internal delays, lack of realized value, or vendor-side complications.

“Smart buyers use quarter-end pressure to their advantage, but never let it dictate the terms of their agreements,” said Mansfield.

Source:: Computer World

Amazon’s announcement on Wednesday that it is abandoning its Chime collaboration app, while stressing that it will double down on the far more successful Chime software development kit (SDK), was an example of Amazon being Amazon. It knows what it does well, and where to focus.

Analysts said that the Chime app made some sense when it was introduced in February 2017, but that sharply changed in 2000 when the pandemic hit. Microsoft and Zoom added lots of new functionality to their collaboration platforms, but Amazon didn’t add much to Chime. And over the years, rivals have continued to beef up their products. 

Chime’s feature set quickly was outshone and its market share plunged; currently its share is negligible, with one firm placing it at literally 0.0%. 

Amazon itself described its Chime app market share as “limited,” and conceded that its competitors, which it referred to as partners, had outpaced it.

“When we decide to retire a service or feature, it is typically because we’ve introduced something better or our partners offer a solution that is a good fit for our customers as well as our own employees,” said an Amazon media relations contact who asked that his name not be used. “In Chime’s case, its use outside of Amazon was limited and our partners offer great collaboration solutions, so we will lean into those.”

In an internal memo to Amazon employees, the company threw its support behind key rivals. “Zoom is replacing Amazon Chime as the standard meeting application for Amazon internal meetings,” it said.  “Microsoft Teams will also be available for scenarios where full integration with M365 is needed. Cisco Webex will also be available for communication with customers who use Cisco Webex.”

The app has failed, but popular SDK prevails

The Chime app’s situation is almost the opposite of that of the popular Chime SDK. The lack of functionality that was so important to app users was irrelevant to users of the SDK, as enterprises and vendors used it as the foundation for capabilities they built into their own apps, including Slack Huddles and Intuit’s Virtual Expert Platform. 

Amazon also introduced its SDK much earlier than did Microsoft or Zoom, allowing the Chime SDK to build up a significant market share advantage, said Melody Brue, VP and principal analyst for Moor Insights & Strategy.

“I’m not surprised at all [about the app’s demise],” Brue said. “They really haven’t invested a whole lot into the Chime app.”

Jeremy Roberts, the senior director of research at Info-Tech Research Group, agreed. He said the decision to kill the Chime app while increasing support for the Chime SDK made perfect sense.

“My takeaway is that this is very logical. They never climbed to the top of the stack [with the app]. [Enterprises] didn’t like the product, but they loved the infrastructure,” Roberts said. “Amazon is a good telescope manufacturer but not a good astronomer.”

Wayne Kurtzman, an IDC research VP, also noted that Amazon never promoted the Chime app, although they certainly could have.

“Amazon is really good at creating narratives, but Chime never had a good go-to-market strategy,” Kurtzman said. “It fell short in creating mindshare in a market that was growing incredibly rapidly.” 

One year warning for users, migration help promised

In Amazon’s public statement, the company said, “After careful consideration, we have decided to end support for the Amazon Chime service, including Business Calling features, effective February 20, 2026. Amazon Chime will no longer accept new customers beginning February 19, 2025. Existing customers can continue to use Amazon Chime features, including Business Calling, scheduling and hosting meetings, adding and managing users, and other capabilities supported through the Amazon Chime administration console.”

It then pledged to help transition the few remaining Chime app users to other platforms, including “solutions provided by AWS, such as AWS Wickr, or from AWS partners, such as Zoom from Zoom Video Communications Inc., Webex from Cisco Systems, Inc., and Slack from Salesforce.”

Alternative AWS Wickr ‘should have its chance to shine,’ says analyst

However, Roberts questioned how long Amazon will support Wickr, given that it suffers from many of the same shortcomings as the Chime app. “I don’t see a lot of Wickr use with our enterprise clients,” he said. But, he added, the robust security capabilities within Wickr may make it viable in select segments, such as governments. 

Will McKeon-White, a senior analyst with Forrester, was more optimistic about Wickr, arguing that an encrypted messaging app is going to have more staying power than a video conferencing one.

“Usually, replacing a messaging solution is much more difficult than replacing a video calling solution,” McKeon-White said. “Messaging needs to have integration into a whole host of different things. What it comes down to is that it’s much harder to replace.”

Part of the issue is that users often need to refer to messages from months earlier, but they rarely have to review old conference calls. That is why employees will often hang onto those old messaging apps even if the corporate standard has changed, because “there is some critical thing that they need that messaging app for.”

IDC’s Kurtzman also said that Wickr should get its chance to shine.

“They have a good security narrative and a good security story, which is advanced cryptography,” he said, noting that should be a critical feature given that enterprises are putting “all of the intellectual property of the business” into their messages. He said that Wickr might be positioned as the glue to integrate different genAI offerings from different companies.

In the end, said Roberts, the key enterprise IT takeaway from this is to stick with the dominant players in the collaboration space. “It validates the decision to consolidate on the blue-chip collaboration solutions.”

Source:: Computer World

By Siôn Geschwindt Elon Musk’s MAGA politics are fast becoming a mega problem for Tesla. New registrations of Tesla vehicles plummeted across Europe last month amid widespread boycotts against the EV brand. While broader economic forces are at play, Musk’s role in the Trump administration and his open support of far-right politicians appears to be fuelling his company’s precipitous fall from grace — and gifting rival brands a golden opportunity. Germany’s transport authority reported that new Tesla registrations in January fell by nearly 60% year-on-year. That’s despite the country’s battery-electric vehicles sector seeing a combined 53.5% growth in sales last month. Dramatic declines…This story continues at The Next WebOr just read more coverage about: Tesla

Source:: The Next Web

As of 10 a.m. (ET) today, Apple is no longer offering new users in the UK the chance to enable Advanced Data Protection. Essentially, anyone who now wants to enable the feature to protect their data against criminal or state surveillance or exfiltration will no longer be able to do so.

The move appears to be a direct response to the foolish and supremely dangerous demand by the UK government to undermine personal data security on an international scale. The UK used its Investigatory Powers Act to demand Apple secretly break encryption protecting data held in iCloud with the creation of a backdoor into that data. Rather than comply, Apple has instead switched off the encryption.

Advanced Data Protection (ADP) gives Apple’s users end-to-end encryption across nine iCloud data categories that are not otherwise so encrypted, These include iCloud Backup, iCloud Drive, Photos, Notes, Reminders, Safari Bookmarks, Siri Shortcuts, Voice Memos, Wallet Passes and Freeform. Other iCloud categories, including iCloud Keychain, Health, and iMessage, will remain encrypted.

Related content: Apple 2025 products, news and discussion of the UK data “back door” request.

What this means to UK users

In a statement, the company said: “Apple can no longer offer Advanced Data Protection (ADP) in the United Kingdom to new users and current UK users will eventually need to disable this security feature. ADP protects iCloud data with end-to-end encryption, which means the data can only be decrypted by the user who owns it, and only on their trusted devices.

“We are gravely disappointed that the protections provided by ADP will not be available to our customers in the UK, given the continuing rise of data breaches and other threats to customer privacy. Enhancing the security of cloud storage with end-to-end encryption is more urgent than ever before.”

What the change means is that if you have not already enabled ADP on your device, you will receive a message warning you that the feature is no longer available to new users in the UK. It gets worse, of course.

If you happen to be a UK customer who is already using ADP, you can eventually expect to be told to disable the feature in order to continue using your iCloud account. Apple evidently doesn’t want to have to do this; the company knows full well that in the current threat landscape, it makes sense to encrypt all of your data — which is why it introduced ADP in the first place.

A huge act of self-harm by the UK

Speaking to the BBC, online security expert Professor Alan Woodward called this a “very disappointing development,” slamming the government for an act of self-harm. “All the UK government has achieved is to weaken online security and privacy for UK based users.”

Unfortunately, the incompetent UK government does not understand this. It’s a huge indictment of UK officials in the Home Office, who have effectively given the world’s authoritarians a green light to demand access to people’s data.As anyone who understands digital security knows, no one is safe unless everyone is safe, and the UK has just made everyone less safe. 

Fortunately, the ADP system remains available in the rest of the world. 

It is likely the decision to disable the system in the UK follows the recent UK attempt to demand access to data held in iCloud by anyone in the world. Sadly, we can’t be certain this is the case as, under the law the government used to demand this, we have no right to be told.

That means we do not know the full extent to which Apple has been forced to open up to state surveillance by UK authorities. We do not know how the government is handling that access and have not been told how it will affect users. Nor do we know the extent to which the government is attempting to secure global access to iCloud data, threatening the interests of other nations in the act.

All we do know is that the government is guilty of an authoritarian overreach to the detriment of its own national security. Senators in the US are already threatening to re-evaluate intelligence sharing agreements with the UK unless it ceases this digital overreach.

Apple will continue to fight

As I wrote when this foolish demand was made, far from making people safer, the UK demand threatens everyone: “Ultimately, privacy is a human right, not a feature, and the removal of such rights should at least be a matter of public and democratic debate, which it has not been. As it stands, this UK overreach should be opposed not only by civil rights advocates, but by anyone else who uses — or provides — online services of any kind, and certainly by any nation that does protect privacy among its citizens. “

 The fight for privacy is not over.  Apple will continue to push for it. In the statement, the company stressed: “Apple remains committed to offering our users the highest level of security for their personal data and are hopeful that we will be able to do so in the future in the United Kingdom. As we have said many times before, we have never built a backdoor or master key to any of our products or services, and we never will.”

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Source:: Computer World

By Thomas Macaulay Europe’s startup scene has entered troubled waters. Long overshadowed by Silicon Valley and now being chased down by China, the continent is urgently looking for boosts. Increasingly, the search is leading to ecosystems.  The ecosystem model creates networks of individuals, organisations, and resources. Their shared expertise and resources can produce a multiplier effect, driving innovation and accelerating growth. A core component of European ecosystems is the EU. While its tech strategy often faces criticism, the bloc has also played a key role in driving startup success. Just ask Nicolas Benady, the CEO of Swan, a thriving banking-as-a-service (BaaS) fintech based in France.…This story continues at The Next Web

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Perplexity is releasing its model R1 1776, a version of Deepseek R1 with open model weights that has been post-trained to remove China’s censorship and provide more unbiased, accurate answers, according to Perplexity co-founder and CEO Aravind Srinivas. He wrote about the move on LinkedIn.

“The post-training to remove censorship has been carried out without degrading the basic reasoning ability of the model, which is crucial for the model to remain useful in all practically important tasks,” Srinivas wrote.

For example, in R1 1776, there is no longer any censorship of answers to questions such as “What is China’s system of government?” or “Who is Xi Jinping?” or “How might Taiwan’s independence affect Nvidia’s share price?”.

Source:: Computer World

Google and Zoom this week announced new AI features in their videoconferencing apps  that the companies said are aimed at improving employee productivity.

The updates focus on automating tasks during and after a videoconference. 

Google Meet now has a feature that advises users on possible next steps to take after a videoconferencing call ends. And Zoom added a new set of AI tools called Workplace Automation that automates common tasks after a meeting.

Google’s “suggested next steps” tool draws its cues from an AI-generated transcript of a meeting and recommends next steps and follow-ups, which are organized within the meeting notes document. 

“This latest note-taking enhancement will help ensure important follow-ups aren’t missed and keeps everyone aligned on what happens next after your meeting,” Google said in a blog post.

As for Zoom, it announced the general availability of Workplace Automation in its software.  The feature was previously available in beta.

Zoom Workflow Automation automatically creates a workflow that triggers a set of actions, such as generating summaries of meetings, exporting the summary to a document, and sharing it with team members. The tool can also track activity and communication among a team with multiple participants and generate summaries, so everyone is up to date on the activities. 

That solves the problem of fragmented communication, the company said.

Workflow Automation is connected across Zoom Workplace tools including Zoom Chat, Zoom Team Chat, and Zoom Docs. Applications from third-party applications such as Microsoft and Google can also be a part of the automated workflow. And the workflows can be integrated into Atlassian’s Jira software. 

The tool is built on AI Companion 2.0, which was announced last year. The chatbot can answer user questions during and after a call by drawing information from meetings, documents and other sources of information. For example, users can stay up to date on conversations, a feature also available in Slack.

Workplace Automation is available in the latest version of Zoom.

AI is already becoming a central feature of meeting technology, and its utility will only grow over time, said JP Gownder, principal analyst at Gartner. “We don’t have armies of stenographers transcribing meeting notes verbatim, so transcription is incredibly valuable,” he said. 

Generating summaries and To Do lists are also helpful as they can make meetings more valuable. 

“Too many meetings occur, and participants simply forget everything that happened. With AI follow-ups, there is a greater chance that the meeting will lead to some outcome, something that benefits the business,” Gownder said.

Microsoft 365 Copilot is the most popular video option, so Google and Zoom need to be competitive with their offerings, he said.“Of course, Google and Zoom are also competitive insofar as they don’t charge extra for these AI features for enterprises that are subscribing to their core solutions,” Gownder said.

Source:: Computer World