wiredmikey shares a report from SecurityWeek: Microsoft on Wednesday published an advisory acknowledging the public disclosure of a vulnerability in Defender that could lead to privilege escalation. The security defect, tracked as CVE-2026-50656 (CVSS score of 7.8), was dropped last week by security researcher Nightmare Eclipse (also known as Chaotic Eclipse). "We are working to provide a high-quality security update that addresses this vulnerability. We will provide information in this CVE when the update is available," Microsoft adds.

RoguePlanet, Nightmare Eclipse explained last week, targets a race condition in Microsoft Defender and allows attackers to gain System privileges. The researcher released a proof-of-concept (PoC) exploit that demonstrates local privilege escalation (LPE) on Windows 11 and Windows 10 systems with the June 2026 patches installed. [...] On Wednesday, Nightmare Eclipse pointed out that the PoC works regardless of whether Defender's real-time protection is enabled or disabled. It may even work in passive mode, the researcher said.

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CCS Insight expects global smartphone shipments to fall 15% this year as AI-driven demand pushes memory manufacturers toward higher-margin server chips. "[S]ome entry-level devices have already seen their sticker prices go up by more than 50 percent since last year," reports The Register. From the report: The firm found that the primary smartphone market (meaning new devices) contracted 4.4 percent in the first quarter of this year, despite sales channels front-loading (meaning stockpiling) product inventory, as device prices begin to rise sharply. As CCS notes, this casts an ominous shadow on the outlook for the rest of the year, and it seems things have worsened since The Register first started reporting on the smartphone memory woes.

Back in January, the forecast was for handset price rises of 6-8 percent, while the most pessimistic outlook was that the global market might contract as much as 5.2 percent. By February, analysts were expecting to see a decline in shipments of around 8 percent across the global market, and for prices to increase by about 14 percent.

The root cause of all this is the AI craze, which has seen huge demand for high-performance GPU-filled servers to process it all. Chipmakers have moved to capitalize on this by prioritizing production of high-margin memory components for those servers, rather than making the plain old DRAM and NAND needed for PCs and phones. "The memory chip crisis shows no sign of slowing down in the near future, ramping up the pressure on manufacturers and consumers. Memory components now account for more than 30 percent of a manufacturer's bill of materials in some smartphones." said CCS research analyst Ben Hatton. "The full impact has yet to be felt in many regions, but it's clear that device prices will accelerate over the rest of the year."

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Carvana is testing a radically different new-car dealership model in Dallas, turning the location into a test-drive center and themed "playground" while requiring every purchase to be completed through its online platform. "Every single car that we sell, whether it's used or new, is online," said Tom Taira, Carvana president of special projects who's leading the new vehicle operations. "That's a very inherent difference. Even coming into the store, you're buying it online, and that's a big difference in how people think about it." The company hopes its no-haggle pricing, hourly employees, service operations, and national logistics network can reshape franchised auto retail. CNBC reports: Through its used vehicles sales, Carvana has become the most valuable auto retailer in the U.S. with a more than $70 billion market cap. Carvana's target with the new vehicle business is to grow its market share and customer base as well as assist used vehicle sales through trade-ins and other means, according to Taira. If the company is successful, the strategy could cause a ripple effect across the U.S. franchised dealership model, which the National Automobile Dealers Association reports includes 16,990 retailers that topped $1.3 trillion in sales last year.

[...] Carvana is using a location in Dallas as a test center for its foray into new vehicle sales. The facility looks like a traditional Stellantis dealership from the outside, but the consumer process for purchasing a vehicle and the responsibilities of its employees are unprecedented. Couches and chairs replace cubicles and sales offices. There are no finance and insurance departments, and instead of an army of commission-based employees, the facility has associates that are paid hourly to assist customers -- if they want the help.

The experience is meant to be as self-guided as a customer wants. By scanning QR codes located on 10-foot-by-10-foot screens inside the building or on vehicles and displays outside, shoppers can customize a vehicle, learn about a product's features and conduct test drives before deciding whether to purchase anything. If they do decide to buy something, it's online and not originated from a sales person, the company said.

The "playground" has roughly 50 vehicles divided by brand, with each having a theme. Jeep has an off-road display. Dodge has race tracks, including a Carvana-themed Charger pace car and part of a traditional track fence barrier. Chrysler minivans, meanwhile, have a soccer net and Ram's area is truck-centric. Carvana is not committing to expanding the exact experience to its other franchised dealer locations, but Taira told CNBC that the overall process of online sales, vehicle testing and service are expected to be consistent throughout the locations. Further reading:: Online Car Retailer Launching Nation's First Car "Vending Machine

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Engeland – Kroatië was op voorhand al één van de aantrekkelijkste affiches van de groepsfase van het WK.

Estonia plans to allow AI agents to have their own digital identities so they can act on behalf of people in a way that can be verified and audited. The initiative, backed by the country's Eesti.ai advisory board, calls for the development of ID codes that AI agents can use to take actions, subject to some unspecified authorization and task delegation process. Academics and corporate technical folk have already made related proposals in recognition of the absence of agentic technical infrastructure. Last month, researchers under the flag of OWASP proposed the Agent Name Service for agent discovery and interoperability. DNS for AI Discovery is another such project. But these have more to do with platform plumbing while Estonia, known for its embrace of technology, is more focused on permission and punishment. Establishing digital identities for AI agents and authorizing limited powers will help avoid scenarios where individuals are required to delegate broad authority to an agent at the expense of their rights, the government says. "In the future, AI will increasingly carry out digital tasks on our behalf, compiling reports, preparing declarations or interacting with information systems," said Prime Minister Kristen Michal in a statement. "To that end, it must be clear who is acting on whose behalf with what rights, and who is ultimately responsible." By taking this step, Estonia casts itself as "first country to create digital identities for AI agents." Two weeks ago, Argentina's President Javier Milei endorsed a similar idea, legislation to allow "non-human corporations," managed by software, with limited liability. "Limited liability is not a luxury for such entities; it is a precondition for their existence," Milei wrote in a Financial Times op-ed. Several decades ago, IBM took a similar line on liability but reached the opposite conclusion about automated decision making: "A computer can never be held accountable, therefore a computer must never make a management decision." Despite the citation of that passage from IBM's 1979 Training Manual in a 2025 blog post, Big Blue's designated author Doug Bonderud sounds less certain about the impermissibility of AI action these days. "Should AI be used for management decisions?" he mused. "Maybe. Will it be used to make some of these decisions? Almost certainly." While governments work on legal changes that will allow AI agents to operate, private sector companies are already taking a stance, at least with respect to external AI agent usage by customers. Target Corporation earlier this year revised its Terms & Conditions with a section titled Agentic Commerce and Delegated Access. It states, "Purchases and other actions taken by an Agentic Commerce Agent that you have authorized are considered transactions authorized by you." American Express meanwhile has taken the opposite tack by assuming liability for errant agentic commerce. "In the future, if a Card Member authorizes an AI agent to make a purchase and that agent sends American Express the customer’s authenticated purchase intent, American Express will protect eligible customers from charges related to AI agent error," the company said in April when it introduced its agentic commerce developer kit. In a pre-print paper last year titled "AI Agents and the Law," Georgia Institute of Technology professors Mark Riedl and Deven Desai observe that once AI agents have the ability to act in a way that changes the state of the world – e-commerce transactions as opposed to output that requires human interaction for effect – concerns about harm become more pressing. They note that while the law is well equipped to deal with conflicts arising from human agents, it's not well-suited to the possibilities of software agents. "Put simply, although computer science and law have similar notions of agents, a software agent is not the same as a human agent," they write "For example, agency law disciplines agents by imposing legal liabilities on agents when they misbehave. Human agents can face financial and even criminal penalties; that is not so for software agents." To date, AI companies have done their best to limit liability for AI harms. But they've not been entirely successful: A Canadian court held Air Canada liable for bad chatbot advice, and a German court held Google liable for inaccurate AI Overview content. It may be a while before the rules for AI agents get hammered out and harmonized to whatever extent is possible. But in the interim we'll at least have digital identifiers to call out bad agents by name. ®

DEN HAAG (ANP) - Het effect van de hogere prijzen van energie en brandstof door de oorlog in het Midden-Oosten op de financiën is voor de meeste huishoudens in Nederland beperkt. Dat meldt het Centraal Planbureau (CPB) in een nieuwe studie naar de doorwerking van die hogere prijzen op de besteedbare inkomens. Maar er zijn uitschieters, want de impact is groter voor huishoudens met lagere tot modale inkomens die meer gas verbruiken en vaker auto rijden.

In het onderzoek werd gekeken naar twee scenario's. In het scenario dat de marktverwachtingen volgt, is het negatieve effect op de inkomens dit jaar en volgend jaar in doorsnee minder dan 1 procent. Maar in het scenario waarbij de Iranoorlog toch langer duurt en de energieprijzen langer hoog blijven, dan neemt het negatieve inkomenseffect toe tot in doorsnee ongeveer 1 procent in 2026 en tot circa 2 procent in 2027.

Daarmee blijven de directe inkomenseffecten volgens het CPB voorlopig nog ruim onder het mediane koopkrachtverlies van ongeveer 4 procent tijdens de energiecrisis in 2022 door de oorlog in Oekraïne toen de gasprijzen zeer sterk stegen.

Maar voor huishoudens die een lager tot modaal inkomen hebben met een hoger gasverbruik en meer autokilometers, of beide, neemt het effect sterker toe. Daar kan het koopkrachtverlies tot 6 procent oplopen. Voor huishoudens met een bovenmodaal inkomen kan dat negatieve effect tot 4 procent van het inkomen stijgen.

Het CPB zegt verder dat er volgend jaar ook een groter effect komt van de gestegen gasprijzen, omdat richting de winter steeds meer huishoudens worden geconfronteerd met hogere gastarieven door aflopende energiecontracten. Dat kan vooral voor lagere inkomens zwaar doorwegen omdat energiekosten een relatief groot deel van het besteedbaar inkomen treffen.

Het onderzoek stelt verder dat het bezit van bijvoorbeeld warmtepompen en elektrische auto's huishoudens minder gevoelig maakt voor prijsstijgingen van brandstoffen. Lagere inkomens zouden daarvan potentieel het sterkst kunnen profiteren, maar in de praktijk hebben vooral huishoudens met hogere inkomens beschikking over een warmtepomp of elektrische auto.

DEN HAAG (ANP) - Het effect van de hogere prijzen van energie en brandstof door de oorlog in het Midden-Oosten op de financiën is voor de meeste huishoudens in Nederland beperkt. Dat meldt het Centraal Planbureau (CPB) in een nieuwe studie naar de doorwerking van die hogere prijzen op de besteedbare inkomens. Maar er zijn uitschieters, want de impact is groter voor huishoudens met lagere tot modale inkomens die meer gas verbruiken en vaker auto rijden.

In het onderzoek werd gekeken naar twee scenario's. In het scenario dat de marktverwachtingen volgt, is het negatieve effect op de inkomens dit jaar en volgend jaar in doorsnee minder dan 1 procent. Maar in het scenario waarbij de Iranoorlog toch langer duurt en de energieprijzen langer hoog blijven, dan neemt het negatieve inkomenseffect toe tot in doorsnee ongeveer 1 procent in 2026 en tot circa 2 procent in 2027.

Daarmee blijven de directe inkomenseffecten volgens het CPB voorlopig nog ruim onder het mediane koopkrachtverlies van ongeveer 4 procent tijdens de energiecrisis in 2022 door de oorlog in Oekraïne toen de gasprijzen zeer sterk stegen.

Maar voor huishoudens die een lager tot modaal inkomen hebben met een hoger gasverbruik en meer autokilometers, of beide, neemt het effect sterker toe. Daar kan het koopkrachtverlies tot 6 procent oplopen. Voor huishoudens met een bovenmodaal inkomen kan dat negatieve effect tot 4 procent van het inkomen stijgen.

Het CPB zegt verder dat er volgend jaar ook een groter effect komt van de gestegen gasprijzen, omdat richting de winter steeds meer huishoudens worden geconfronteerd met hogere gastarieven door aflopende energiecontracten. Dat kan vooral voor lagere inkomens zwaar doorwegen omdat energiekosten een relatief groot deel van het besteedbaar inkomen treffen.

Het onderzoek stelt verder dat het bezit van bijvoorbeeld warmtepompen en elektrische auto's huishoudens minder gevoelig maakt voor prijsstijgingen van brandstoffen. Lagere inkomens zouden daarvan potentieel het sterkst kunnen profiteren, maar in de praktijk hebben vooral huishoudens met hogere inkomens beschikking over een warmtepomp of elektrische auto.

UTRECHT (ANP) - Bedrijfspanden met voldoende stroomcapaciteit stijgen in waarde, stelt NVM Business. De wachtlijst voor een nieuwe of verzwaarde stroomaansluiting is de afgelopen jaren gegroeid. Hoe aantrekkelijk een pand voor een bedrijf is, wordt volgens de makelaarsvereniging steeds vaker bepaald door de beschikbaarheid van stroom in plaats van door locatie, bereikbaarheid of huurprijs. Panden zonder ruimte op het net worden moeilijker verhuurd of verkocht.

In drie jaar tijd is het aantal bedrijven op de wachtlijst toegenomen van 6000 tot 15.000. Bedrijven stellen door de krapte op het stroomnet uitbreidingen uit en gemeenten hebben steeds meer moeite met het ontwikkelen van nieuwe bedrijventerreinen, volgens de makelaarsvereniging. De nieuwbouw van bedrijfsruimte daalt dit jaar naar 2,5 miljoen vierkante meter, verwacht NVM. Dat was drie jaar geleden nog zo'n 2 miljoen vierkante meter meer. Terwijl de vraag naar bedrijfsruimte hoog blijft, volgens NVM.

De makelaarsvereniging ziet wel dat er gewerkt wordt aan oplossingen. Op bedrijventerreinen wordt geëxperimenteerd met gezamenlijk energiemanagement. Daarnaast investeren beleggers meer en vooral in oudere bedrijfspanden. Via verduurzaming en slimmer energieverbruik willen ze de panden waardevoller maken.