Search: “ars-technica”

In April 2026, researchers disclosed CVE-2026-31431 ('Copy Fail'), a highly reliable local privilege escalation vulnerability allowing unprivileged attackers to escalate to root across virtually all m

Eighteen U.S. cruise passengers from the MV Hondius returned to the U.S. on May 11, 2026, after weeks aboard the ship at the center of a deadly hantavirus outbreak. One passenger tested 'mildly' posit

Dua Lipa filed a $15 million lawsuit against Samsung, alleging the electronics company used her photograph to sell televisions without permission or payment. Samsung began featuring Lipa's image on TV

In a 9-0 Supreme Court decision, Cox Communications prevailed against Sony Music Entertainment in a landmark copyright case decided March 25, 2026, with the Court finding that internet service provide

Starlink is shutting down a GPS-style positioning feature that customers could previously access through its local API, with the company having restricted access to this capability that some users had

On August 10, 2025, a massive landslide struck Tracy Arm fjord in Alaska, preconditioned by glacial retreat caused by climate change, resulting in a 481-meter-high tsunami . The fjord is a popular des

AI-powered toys are rapidly emerging in the consumer market, including pocket pets, autonomous robots, and AI emotional companions that use advanced language models and adaptive learning capabilities.

A cyberattack shut down Canvas, an education platform used by universities and K-12 schools across the US on May 7, 2026, depriving students and teachers of essential classroom materials during final

Google has offered Gemini Nano for Chrome since 2024 as a lightweight, on-device model , but users reasonably expect the visible AI Mode to use the on-device model with queries staying local, when in

Google is rolling out updates to AI Overviews and AI Mode that include more direct links within responses and previews of websites to help users find trusted sources and original content more easily.

The Court of International Trade ruled that Trump's 10% global tariffs were illegal after small businesses sued, following the Supreme Court's February strike-down of his broader tariff regime. The co

Researchers at the University of Waterloo identified four more members of Sir John Franklin's 1845 expedition through DNA analysis of skeletal remains matched with living descendants' DNA samples. The

French cybercrime authorities escalated an investigation into Elon Musk and X to a criminal probe after Musk and former X CEO Linda Yaccarino declined to appear for summons issued in April. The invest

NASA's next-generation Mars helicopter rotor blades broke the sound barrier during March tests at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory , with rotor tip speeds reaching Mach 1.08 and boosting lift capability

Climate change is making pollen season longer and more intense, worsening health effects for millions of Americans with seasonal allergies and asthma . Warmer weather signals plants to bloom earlier a

Researchers demonstrated that spin qubits hosted in bulk-manufactured quantum dots can be moved between quantum dots without losing quantum information. The ability to move qubits around could enable

Firefly Aerospace plans to debut the upgraded Alpha Block 2 rocket late summer 2026, following a successful return to flight in March and seeing strong demand particularly for national security applic

Sony Interactive Entertainment President Hideaki Nishino says efficient AI development tools will accelerate the rate of new game releases as they lower creation barriers for developers of all sizes.

Nintendo will increase the Nintendo Switch 2's price in the U.S. from 449.99 to 499.99 beginning September 1, 2026 , with similar increases across Japan, Canada, and Europe, though Japan's increase ta

The Pentagon released declassified UFO/UAP files following President Trump's directive, with the initial batch containing 162 documents outlining decades-old investigations of reported unidentified ae

President Trump plans to fire FDA Commissioner Marty Makary following months of chaos at the agency . Makary has faced criticism over his handling of flavored vapes and for slow-walking a safety study

Apple CEO Tim Cook acknowledged in Q2 2026 earnings that high-demand Mac mini and Mac Studio configurations are severely constrained and may take several months to reach supply-demand balance. Apple h

In 2018, Elon Musk wanted OpenAI founders Sam Altman, Greg Brockman, and Ilya Sutskever to lead Tesla's artificial intelligence projects. Musk proposed making OpenAI a Tesla subsidiary or hiring its t

Former NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine has been appointed CEO of Quantum Space, a startup developing maneuverable spacecraft to meet U.S. national security space needs. The Maryland-based company,

Google unveiled the lightweight, screenless Fitbit Air on May 7, 2026, priced at $99 with week-long battery life and advanced health tracking capabilities. The company also rebranded the Fitbit app to

Porsche's Taycan Turbo GT equipped with a new Manthey Kit set a lap record for electric executive cars on the Nürburgring-Nordschleife with a time of 6:55.533 minutes . The kit features extensive modi

Mozilla ran an agentic harness powered by Claude Mythos Preview across Firefox's source code, identifying 271 security bugs fixed in Firefox 150 . The breakthrough was achieved through improvements in

Anthropic has signed an agreement with SpaceX to use all of the compute capacity at SpaceX's Colossus 1 data center in Memphis, Tennessee, providing access to over 300 megawatts of capacity (220,000+

On May 6, 2026, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit vacated the FCC's rules prohibiting digital discrimination in broadband access . The court held that the FCC erred by adopting a dispar

Google DeepMind has entered a research partnership with Fenris Creations (formerly CCP Games) focused on advancing AI understanding of complex, dynamic systems by exploring long-horizon planning, memo

NASA has unveiled an expansive strategy to establish a permanent human base on the Moon, outlining a plan that includes 73 landing missions. The agency aims to undertake at least one surface landing e

An analysis of more than 5 million births nationwide identified an ongoing drop in newborns receiving a vitamin K shot that helps prevent dangerous bleeding , with the number of babies not receiving t

Rivian CEO RJ Scaringe confirmed that the company is developing undisclosed variants of the R2, hinting at both a pickup truck and an 'R2X' performance model shortly after starting volume production o

SpaceX's IPO will give CEO Elon Musk 'virtually unchecked executive authority' and limit shareholder rights to sue the company. The company combines supervoting shares, mandatory arbitration, stricter

SpaceX is transitioning from the highly successful Falcon 9 rocket program toward the next generation as the Starship program enters its operational phase. SpaceX is preparing Starship V3, a larger an

NASA astronaut Reid Wiseman captured the 'Hello, World' photograph of Earth from the Orion spacecraft during the Artemis II mission on April 2, 2026, during the spacecraft's outbound journey toward th

TSMC has signed a 30-year offshore wind power agreement to secure renewable energy as power demand from AI-driven chip production continues to climb. Taiwan's semiconductor industry faces a forecasted

The Department of Homeland Security demanded that Google turn over location data and activity logs from a Canadian man who had criticized U.S. government actions following ICE killings, invoking a 'cu

Google Home's May 2026 update brings a faster camera experience, Gemini 3.1 for complex voice commands, and new web-based controls. The refreshed camera UI features faster navigation and zoomed-in pre

Ford's Long Beach skunkworks operation houses an engineering team developing a new electric vehicle lineup that breaks with convention . The 350-member team has engineered Ford's Universal Electric Ve

The Netherlands approved Tesla's Full Self-Driving (Supervised) system under UN Regulation 171 on April 10, 2026, becoming the first European country to do so. Other EU member states can recognize the

Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. announced a plan to reduce 'overprescribing' of psychiatric medications and support alternative treatment options, while claiming antidepressa

Panthalassa, a US startup, is developing floating data centers powered by ocean waves and cooled by seawater to address AI infrastructure's growing energy demands. Peter Thiel led a $140 million inves

Reddit is locking out some mobile browser users with an un-dismissable banner, forcing them to download the official app instead. The popup freezes the entire page, preventing users from scrolling, ac

Kaspersky researchers discovered a supply chain attack targeting the official Daemon Tools website, where compromised installers deliver a backdoor alongside legitimate software, enabling remote code

AMD has announced HDMI 2.1 support for Linux and SteamOS, enabling higher bandwidth for 4K 120Hz gaming and variable refresh rate (VRR) . The initial update includes HDMI Fixed Rate Link but excludes