The Trump administration will allow Nvidia to resume selling H200 chips to China, but only if the U.S. government takes a 25% cut. Axios reports: Trump said on Truth Social that he'll allow Nvidia to sell H200 chips -- the generation of chips before its current, more-advanced Blackwell lineup -- to China, with the U.S. government pocketing a quarter of the revenue. He said he would apply "the same approach to AMD, Intel, and other GREAT American Companies."
American defense hawks fear that China could use Nvidia chips to advance its military ambitions. Trump said Monday that the sales will be subject to "conditions that allow for continued strong National Security." The blockade remains in place for Nvidia's current generation of Blackwell chips, which will be replaced in the second half of 2026 by even more advanced Rubin chips. Huang said recently he was unsure if China would want the older chips. "We applaud President Trump's decision to allow America's chip industry to compete to support high paying jobs and manufacturing in America," Nvidia said in a statement. "Offering H200 to approved commercial customers, vetted by the Department of Commerce, strikes a thoughtful balance that is great for America."
American defense hawks fear that China could use Nvidia chips to advance its military ambitions. Trump said Monday that the sales will be subject to "conditions that allow for continued strong National Security." The blockade remains in place for Nvidia's current generation of Blackwell chips, which will be replaced in the second half of 2026 by even more advanced Rubin chips. Huang said recently he was unsure if China would want the older chips. "We applaud President Trump's decision to allow America's chip industry to compete to support high paying jobs and manufacturing in America," Nvidia said in a statement. "Offering H200 to approved commercial customers, vetted by the Department of Commerce, strikes a thoughtful balance that is great for America."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Europol's GRIMM taskforce has arrested nearly 200 people accused of running or participating in "violence-as-a-service" schemes where cybercrime groups recruit youth online for real-world attacks. "These individuals are groomed or coerced into committing a range of violent crimes, from acts of intimidation and torture to murder," the European police said on Monday. The Register reports: GRIMM began in April, and includes investigators from Belgium, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Iceland, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden, the UK, plus Europol experts and online service providers. During its first six months, police involved in this operation arrested 63 people directly involved in carrying out or planning violent crimes, 40 "enablers" accused of facilitating violence-for-hire services, 84 recruiters, and six "instigators," five of whom the cops labeled "high-value targets." [...]
Many of the criminals involved in recruiting and carrying out these violence-for-hire services are also members of The Com. This is a loosely knit gang, primarily English speakers, involved in several interconnected networks of hackers, SIM swappers, and extortionists. Their reach has spread across the Atlantic, and over the summer, the FBI warned that a subset of this cybercrime group, called In Real Life (IRL) Com, poses a growing threat to youth. The FBI's security bulletin specifically called out IRL Com subgroups that offer swat-for-hire services, in which hoaxers falsely report shootings at someone's residence or call in bomb threats to trigger massive armed police responses at the victims' homes.
Many of the criminals involved in recruiting and carrying out these violence-for-hire services are also members of The Com. This is a loosely knit gang, primarily English speakers, involved in several interconnected networks of hackers, SIM swappers, and extortionists. Their reach has spread across the Atlantic, and over the summer, the FBI warned that a subset of this cybercrime group, called In Real Life (IRL) Com, poses a growing threat to youth. The FBI's security bulletin specifically called out IRL Com subgroups that offer swat-for-hire services, in which hoaxers falsely report shootings at someone's residence or call in bomb threats to trigger massive armed police responses at the victims' homes.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Longtime Slashdot reader hackingbear writes: Taiwan's government has ordered a one-year block of a popular, mainland Chinese-owned social media app Xiaohongshu, also known as The Little RedNote, citing its failure to cooperate with authorities over fraud-related concerns. Taiwan's Ministry of the Interior on Thursday cited Xiaohongshu's, which does not have business presence on the island, refusal to cooperate with authorities as the basis for the ban, claiming that the platform has been linked to more than 1,700 fraud-related cases that resulted in financial losses of 247.7 million Taiwanese dollars ($7.9 million). "Due to the inability to obtain necessary data in accordance with the law, law enforcement authorities have encountered significant obstacles in investigations, creating a de facto legal vacuum," the ministry said in a statement.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), Taiwan's opposition party, Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun decried the government plan to suspend access to Chinese social media platform Xiaohongshu for one year as censorship. "Many people online are already asking 'How to climb over the firewall to access Xiaohongshu,'" Cheng posted on social media. Meta was facing fines earlier this year for failing to disclose information on individuals who funded advertisements on its social media platforms, marking the second such penalty in Taiwan for violating the anti-fraud act. "Meta failed to fully disclose information regarding who paid for the advertisement and who benefited from it," Depute Minister Lin of Ministry of Digital Affairs said at a news conference on June 18.
If MODA decides to impose the fine, it would mark the second such penalty against Meta in Taiwan, following a NT$1 million ($33,381) fine issued in May for violating the Fraud Crime Hazard Prevention Act by failing to disclose information on individuals who commissioned and funded two Facebook advertisements. Meta's Threads were also included in the regulatory framework following nearly 1,900 fraud-related reports associated with the platform, with 718 confirmed as scams. Xiaohongshu has surged in popularity among young Taiwanese in recent years, amassing 3 million users in the island of 23 million.
Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), Taiwan's opposition party, Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun decried the government plan to suspend access to Chinese social media platform Xiaohongshu for one year as censorship. "Many people online are already asking 'How to climb over the firewall to access Xiaohongshu,'" Cheng posted on social media. Meta was facing fines earlier this year for failing to disclose information on individuals who funded advertisements on its social media platforms, marking the second such penalty in Taiwan for violating the anti-fraud act. "Meta failed to fully disclose information regarding who paid for the advertisement and who benefited from it," Depute Minister Lin of Ministry of Digital Affairs said at a news conference on June 18.
If MODA decides to impose the fine, it would mark the second such penalty against Meta in Taiwan, following a NT$1 million ($33,381) fine issued in May for violating the Fraud Crime Hazard Prevention Act by failing to disclose information on individuals who commissioned and funded two Facebook advertisements. Meta's Threads were also included in the regulatory framework following nearly 1,900 fraud-related reports associated with the platform, with 718 confirmed as scams. Xiaohongshu has surged in popularity among young Taiwanese in recent years, amassing 3 million users in the island of 23 million.
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An anonymous reader quotes a report from the Guardian: A coalition of more than 230 environmental groups has demanded a national moratorium on new datacenters in the U.S., the latest salvo in a growing backlash to a booming artificial intelligence industry that has been blamed for escalating electricity bills and worsening the climate crisis. The green groups, including Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth, Food & Water Watch and dozens of local organizations, have urged members of Congress to halt the proliferation of energy-hungry datacenters, accusing them of causing planet-heating emissions, sucking up vast amounts of water and exacerbating electricity bill increases that have hit Americans this year.
"The rapid, largely unregulated rise of datacenters to fuel the AI and crypto frenzy is disrupting communities across the country and threatening Americans' economic, environmental, climate and water security," the letter states, adding that approval of new data centers should be paused until new regulations are put in place. The push comes amid a growing revolt against moves by companies such as Meta, Google and Open AI to plow hundreds of billions of dollars into new datacenters, primarily to meet the huge computing demands of AI. At least 16 datacenter projects, worth a combined $64 billion, have been blocked or delayed due to local opposition to rising electricity costs. The facilities' need for huge amounts of water to cool down equipment has also proved controversial, particularly in drier areas where supplies are scarce. [...]
At the current rate of growth, datacenters could add up to 44m tons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere by 2030, equivalent to putting an extra 10m cars on to the road and exacerbating a climate crisis that is already spurring extreme weather disasters and ripping apart the fabric of the American insurance market. But it is the impact upon power bills, rather than the climate crisis, that is causing anguish for most voters, acknowledged Emily Wurth, managing director of organizing at Food & Water Watch, the group behind the letter to lawmakers. "I've been amazed by the groundswell of grassroots, bipartisan opposition to this, in all types of communities across the US," said Wurth. "Everyone is affected by this, the opposition has been across the political spectrum. A lot of people don't see the benefits coming from AI and feel they will be paying for it with their energy bills and water."
"It's an important talking point. We've seen outrageous utility price rises across the country and we are going to lean into this. Prices are going up across the board and this is something Americans really do care about."
"The rapid, largely unregulated rise of datacenters to fuel the AI and crypto frenzy is disrupting communities across the country and threatening Americans' economic, environmental, climate and water security," the letter states, adding that approval of new data centers should be paused until new regulations are put in place. The push comes amid a growing revolt against moves by companies such as Meta, Google and Open AI to plow hundreds of billions of dollars into new datacenters, primarily to meet the huge computing demands of AI. At least 16 datacenter projects, worth a combined $64 billion, have been blocked or delayed due to local opposition to rising electricity costs. The facilities' need for huge amounts of water to cool down equipment has also proved controversial, particularly in drier areas where supplies are scarce. [...]
At the current rate of growth, datacenters could add up to 44m tons of carbon dioxide to the atmosphere by 2030, equivalent to putting an extra 10m cars on to the road and exacerbating a climate crisis that is already spurring extreme weather disasters and ripping apart the fabric of the American insurance market. But it is the impact upon power bills, rather than the climate crisis, that is causing anguish for most voters, acknowledged Emily Wurth, managing director of organizing at Food & Water Watch, the group behind the letter to lawmakers. "I've been amazed by the groundswell of grassroots, bipartisan opposition to this, in all types of communities across the US," said Wurth. "Everyone is affected by this, the opposition has been across the political spectrum. A lot of people don't see the benefits coming from AI and feel they will be paying for it with their energy bills and water."
"It's an important talking point. We've seen outrageous utility price rises across the country and we are going to lean into this. Prices are going up across the board and this is something Americans really do care about."
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
Firefox 146 has been released with native fractional scaling support on Wayland -- finally giving Linux users crisp UI rendering. Other new additions include GPU process improvements on macOS, developer-focused CSS features, and broader access to Firefox Labs. Phoronix reports: Firefox 146 also now makes Firefox Labs available to all users, Firefox on macOS now has a dedicated GPU process by default, dropping Direct2D support on Windows, support for compressed elliptic curve points in WebCrypto, and updated the bundled Skia graphics library. Firefox 146 also has some fun developer enhancements like support for the CSS text-decoration-inset property, the @scope rule now being supported, CSS contrast-color() function being available, and several new experimental web features. The release notes and developer changes can be found at their respective links. Release binaries are available at Mozilla.org.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
IBM is buying Confluent for $11 billion in a major push to own real-time data streaming infrastructure essential for enterprise AI workloads. It marks Big Blue's biggest acquisition since Red Hat in 2019. Bloomberg reports: The AI boom has touched off billions of dollars in deals for businesses that build, train or leverage the technology, propelling the value of an entire ecosystem of data center developers, software makers, generative AI tool developers and data management firms. Mountain View, California-based Confluent sits in the data corner of that world, providing a platform for companies to gather -- or "stream" -- and analyze data in real time as opposed to shipping data in clunkier batches.
Manufacturers such as Michelin, for example, have used Confluent's platform to optimize their inventories of raw and semi-finished materials live. Instacart adopted Confluent to develop real-time fraud detection systems and gain more visibility into the availability of products sold on its grocery delivery platform. Businesses are increasingly tapping AI systems that manage tasks like this in real-time and require live flows of data to do so. IBM, which pioneered mainframe computers, has been trying to reposition its business around AI over the past few years. Under Chief Executive Officer Arvind Krishna, it's been buying software companies and selling generative AI-related services to enterprise clients. Software now makes up almost half its total revenue and continues to grow at a steady rate.
Manufacturers such as Michelin, for example, have used Confluent's platform to optimize their inventories of raw and semi-finished materials live. Instacart adopted Confluent to develop real-time fraud detection systems and gain more visibility into the availability of products sold on its grocery delivery platform. Businesses are increasingly tapping AI systems that manage tasks like this in real-time and require live flows of data to do so. IBM, which pioneered mainframe computers, has been trying to reposition its business around AI over the past few years. Under Chief Executive Officer Arvind Krishna, it's been buying software companies and selling generative AI-related services to enterprise clients. Software now makes up almost half its total revenue and continues to grow at a steady rate.
Read more of this story at Slashdot.
WASHINGTON (ANP/RTR/BLOOMBERG) - De Amerikaanse regering heeft chipconcern Nvidia toestemming gegeven om H200-chips voor kunstmatige intelligentie naar China te exporteren. Dat maakte president Donald Trump maandag bekend. De Amerikaanse regering zal 25 procent van de opbrengsten inhouden.
Trump meldde dat hij president Xi Jinping van China op de hoogte had gebracht van deze stap en dat Xi positief had gereageerd. Trump zei dat het ministerie van Handel de details van de overeenkomst aan het afronden was en dat dezelfde aanpak ook zal gelden voor andere AI-chipbedrijven, zoals Advanced Micro Devices en Intel.
Op zijn platform Truth Social benadrukt Trump dat de toestemming voor Nvidia alleen geldt voor de H200-chips uit de vorige generatie, Hopper. Volgens een bron van persbureau Bloomberg is dat een compromis dat Nvidia heeft gesloten; het concern hoopte eerder chips uit de huidige, geavanceerdere generatie Blackwell naar China te kunnen exporteren.
De aandelen van Nvidia, de marktleider op het gebied van AI-chips, stegen na de aankondiging nabeurs met 1,2 procent. Eerder waren ze al 3,16 procent hoger gesloten nadat nieuwssite Semafor een mogelijke goedkeuring had gemeld.
BRUSSEL (ANP/RTR) - In een overleg met de Oekraïense president Volodymyr Zelensky hebben NAVO-baas Mark Rutte en EU-Commissievoorzitter Ursula von der Leyen opnieuw hun steun uitgesproken voor Oekraïne. "Terwijl de vredesbesprekingen voortduren, blijft de EU Oekraïne onverminderd steunen", schreef Von der Leyen maandagavond op X.
Het overleg, dat plaatsvond in de ambtswoning van Rutte, werd ook bijgewoond door António Costa, de voorzitter van de raad van EU-regeringsleiders. Rutte sprak van een "goed gesprek" en zei opnieuw te streven naar "een rechtvaardige en duurzame vrede voor Oekraïne".
Eerder op de dag zei Zelensky dat hij verwacht dinsdag een aangepast vredesplan aan de Verenigde Staten voor te kunnen leggen. De Amerikaanse voorstellen waren vorige week door Rusland aangepast en uitgebreid tot 27 punten. Zelensky spreekt nu van 20 punten.
WASHINGTON (ANP/RTR) - De maker van een app die gebruikers laat zien waar zich agenten van de Amerikaanse immigratiedienst ICE bevinden, klaagt de regering van Donald Trump aan. De app werd in oktober op verzoek van de autoriteiten uit de appstore van Apple verwijderd.
Ontwikkelaar Joshua Aaron stelt dat daarmee zijn grondrecht om informatie te verspreiden is geschonden. Hij heeft een aanklacht ingediend tegen onder meer minister van Justitie Pam Bondi, minister van Binnenlandse Veiligheid Kristi Noem en ICE-directeur Todd Lyons. Volgens Aaron schendt de regering-Trump met een ingreep als deze niet alleen zijn grondrechten, maar die van alle burgers.
Het ministerie van Binnenlandse Veiligheid stelt dat de app de agenten van ICE in gevaar bracht.
De app, ICEBlock, had in oktober ongeveer een miljoen gebruikers en was alleen beschikbaar in de appstore van Apple, vanwege afwijkende privacyregels voor Android. De app werkt nog altijd voor mensen die ICEBlock vóór oktober hadden gedownload.
PHILIPSBURG/DEN HAAG (ANP) - Premier Luc Mercelina van Sint-Maarten heeft maandag in Den Haag premier Dick Schoof gevraagd om tijdelijke militaire bijstand. Hij wil hulp bij het bestrijden van de stijgende criminaliteit op het eiland. Volgens Mercelina is er recent sprake van een toename van georganiseerde misdaad.
De militaire bijstand heeft als doel de inwoners van Sint-Maarten gerust te stellen "dat alle nodige maatregelen worden genomen om de nationale veiligheid en de openbare veiligheid te handhaven", aldus Mercelina. Op het eiland waren in de afgelopen periode veel geweldsincidenten.
Zaterdagavond maakte een overval op een juwelier veel reacties los. Vier gemaskerde en in het zwart geklede mannen overvielen met veel geweld een zaak in een druk uitgaansgebied. Veel getuigen filmden de inbraak en zetten deze op sociale media.
Minister van Justitie Nathalie Tackling noemde de overval een aanval op de rechtsstaat. Tegen de verantwoordelijken zei ze: "Jullie zullen worden opgespoord, jullie zullen worden vervolgd, en jullie zullen de consequenties ondervinden. Deze daden zijn geen tekenen van lef. Het zijn misdrijven, en zij zullen worden gestopt."
Blackwell and Rubin kit remain off limits
US President Donald Trump has signalled he will allow Nvidia to resume sales of its H200 accelerators to China.…
'User Alignment Critic' will review agentic actions so bots don't do things like emptying your bank account
Google plans to add a second Gemini-based model to Chrome to address the security problems created by adding the first Gemini model to Chrome.…
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iain.davidson100 has added a photo to the pool:
iain.davidson100 has added a photo to the pool:
iain.davidson100 has added a photo to the pool:
