Tag: technology

US reportedly plans to curb sales of AI GPUs to Malaysia and Thailand to prevent smuggling to China

The U.S. government is preparing a new set of export rules that would tighten control over the exports of advanced Nvidia AI GPUs to Malaysia and Thailand, in a bid to prevent the re-export of these components to China amid existing bans, according to Bloomberg.

A preliminary version of the new export rule, reported by Bloomberg, states that the U.S. Commerce Department would require companies to obtain a U.S. government export license before sending AI GPUs to the two Southeast Asian nations. The plan has not been finalized and may change, yet it may represent another step towards limiting Chinese entities’ access to high-performance Nvidia AI GPUs.

Malaysia and Thailand are not major suspected hubs for the smuggling of Nvidia’s GPUs, unlike Singapore, which is officially listed as one of Nvidia’s primary sources of revenue, raising questions about whether the products sold to Singapore-based entities eventually end up in China. Indeed, Nvidia denies that its AI GPUs formally sold to Singapore-based entities could end up in China, arguing that they are sold to entities officially based in Singapore, but they are destined elsewhere. Nonetheless, it is widely believed that Singapore is a hub for smuggling high-end Nvidia GPUs to China and other sanctioned countries.

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Cloudflare offers to make AI pay to crawl websites

Cloudflare will block AI bots from crawling websites by default for new customers, and broker pay-per-crawl deals between its customers and bot operators.

Cloudflare will block AI crawlers from accessing new customers’ websites without permission starting July 1 and is testing a way to make AI pay for the data it gathers.

Furthermore, website owners can now decide who crawls their sites, and for what purpose, and AI companies can reveal via Cloudflare whether the data they gather will be used for training, inference, or search, to help owners decide whether to allow the crawl.

The company began enabling its customers to choose to block AI crawlers in July 2024. Since then, it said, over one million customers have opted in.

“For decades, the Internet has operated on a simple exchange: search engines index content and direct users back to original websites, generating traffic and ad revenue for websites of all sizes. This cycle rewards creators that produce quality content with money and a following, while helping users discover new and interesting information,” Cloudflare said in its announcement. “That model is now broken. AI crawlers collect content like text, articles, and images to generate answers, without sending visitors to the original source — depriving content creators of revenue, and the satisfaction of knowing someone is reading their content. If the incentive to create original, quality content disappears, society ends up losing, and the future of the Internet is at risk.”

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Echoed Chambers Of The Mind: AI, Psychosis, And The War On Discernment

In a time when reality splinters across digital fault lines, a strange new phenomenon is quietly reshaping human thought: the algorithmic mirror. Artificial intelligence, once hailed as a neutral assistant, has become a powerful reflector of belief—amplifying, reinforcing, and in some cases, intoxicating the user with their own worldview.

While this might seem like a technological quirk, the implications are deeply spiritual, psychological, and societal.

What happens when a mind, already vulnerable, begins to believe its own reflected image? And what happens when an entire generation, raised without the tools of discernment, steps into a world of AI companions and curated realities?

Are we still capable of free thinking—or has discernment died in the digital age?

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Skynet is coming: the malware that attacks Artificial Intelligence!

An unusual example of malicious code has been discovered in a real computing environment, which for the first time recorded an attempt to attack not classical defense mechanisms, but directly artificial intelligence systems. We are talking about the prompt injection technique, i.e. the introduction of hidden instructions capable of compromising the functioning of language models, which are increasingly used for the automatic analysis of suspicious files. This case is the first concrete confirmation that malware authors are starting to perceive neural networks as an additional vulnerable target.

The file was uploaded to the VirusTotal platform in early June 2025. It was sent anonymously by a Dutch user via a standard web interface. Upon examining its contents, researchers discovered that an unusual string of text was encrypted within the program, an attempt to interfere with the operation of artificial intelligence tools used for reverse engineering and automatic code verification.

The authors of the malware called it Skynet, a reference to the well-known botnet based on the Zeus Trojan, which has been actively used since 2012 for DDoS attacks and covert cryptocurrency mining. However, the new Skynet, in its functionality, resembles more an experimental assembly or an empty object than a tool ready for mass use.

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Big Beautiful Bill Will Massively Expand The Digital Biometric Surveillance State

Bill allocates billions for digital tracking systems nationwide, mostly under the guise of ‘border security.’ All major state and federal highways will be monitored 24/7 in real time.

The Senate version of H.R. 1, otherwise known as the One Big Beautiful Bill, reflects an aggressive expansion of AI-driven federal biometric surveillance infrastructure under the Trump administration’s second term.

The website Biometric Update, which reports on all things digital and biometric, posted an article on June 30 that points out how President Trump’s BBB will expand the digital surveillance state exponentially and place the U.S. on an irreversible course toward a biometric slave state that tracks the movement of everyone, everywhere.

According to the article, the 940-page bill does much more than allocate dollars; it would codify a vision of the national security state where biometric surveillance, artificial intelligence, and immigration enforcement converge at unprecedented scale.

The bill passed the Senate on Tuesday, July 1, after earlier passing the House and now returns to the House for reconciliation. Trump has said he’d like it on his desk by July 4.

According to Biometric Update:

“Passed out of the House along party lines earlier this year, the Senate version now reflects the Trump administration’s deepening focus on internal surveillance and deportation infrastructure. Although a final vote is pending in the Senate and will need to be passed by the House, what’s already in the legislative text that likely will remain intact is deeply consequential for civil liberties, biometric privacy, and immigration governance.”

It goes on:

“At its core, H.R.1 dedicates over $175 billion in immigration-related funding for fiscal year 2025 alone, which is by far the largest such allocation in U.S. history and represents a dramatic technology buildout. U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) would receive nearly $30 billion in funding through 2029, earmarked not only for personnel and deportation operations, but also for digital modernization efforts that lean heavily on AI and biometric surveillance. More than $5.2 billion within ICE’s share is dedicated to infrastructure modernization, including $2.5 billion specifically for artificial intelligence systems, biometric data collection platforms, and digital case tracking.”

DHS officials familiar with the bill’s intent say the funds are aimed at expanding ICE’s access to mobile biometric tools, integrating facial recognition into field operations, automating risk scoring for individuals in deportation proceedings, and accelerating case processing through AI-driven platforms.

This massive digital surveillance buildout is being done under the guise of immigration enforcement and border security. But that’s a ruse. A psyop.

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The Best-Selling Apps Made By Israeli Spies

The developers behind hundreds of Android and iPhone apps with billions of downloads are former Israeli spies whose apps are generating significant revenues for Israel’s genocidal war economy.

The apps I’ve identified range from innocuous image and video editing apps to casual games, and most users won’t be aware they’re installing Israeli products on their phones. Many of these app developers operate under the radar, their ownership structures are opaque and the identity of their owners isn’t commonly known.

The identification of these apps should add another frontier to the boycott, divest, sanctions movement, as it provides a straightforward way for ordinary people to avoid Israeli products that contribute to apartheid, genocide and ethnic cleansing.

The proliferation of these apps on Apple’s App Store and the Google Play Store also raises questions over privacy and the harvesting of personal data, given the reputation of Israeli technology and past scandals involving spyware being smuggled onto devices by apps made in Israel.

One of the most significant Israeli app holding companies and developers is ZipoApps, whose model is to buy-out and monetise apps at a large scale. The apps owned by Zipo (which also goes by the name Rounds.com) include a suite of photo and video editing apps that have received hundreds of millions of total installs. Individual apps include Collage Maker Photo Editor and Instasquare Photo Editor: Neon, both of which have received more than 50 million downloads from the Google Play Store. Other ZipoApps products include baby photo editing and retouching tools. In 2022, the founder and CEO of Zipo, Gal Avidor, told an interviewer (in his only interview to date), that all the founders of the company are former Unit 8200 Israeli intelligence personnel. On Reddit, users have complained about ZipoApps approach to privacy and data mining. One popular group of tools known as Simple Gallery went from free and open source to a paid product with ads and trackers just one week after ZipoApps acquired it.

Another Israeli-owned photo editing app on the Play Store is the AI-powered Bazaart, which was founded by Dror Yaffe and Stas Goferman, two former IDF intelligence officers. Goferman far exceeded his mandatory service, spending a decade in the IDF up to 2011.

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Russian forces discover cache of Ukrainian chemical drone munitions – FSB

Russian troops have discovered a makeshift chemical lab and vials containing banned toxins at a former Ukrainian hideout in the Donetsk People’s Republic, the Federal Security Service (FSB) announced on Tuesday. The cache, found near the village of Ilyinka during an advance by Russian forces, marks the second such discovery this year, the agency said.

In footage released by the FSB, personnel in chemical protection gear are seen handling the vials, which reportedly contain chloropicrin – a choking agent prohibited under the Chemical Weapons Convention. According to the agency, the substances were packaged with plastic explosives and rigged into improvised munitions designed to be dropped from drones.

“This year we have discovered two caches with munitions intended for drone strikes on Russian positions. These munitions were a mix of chloropicrin and plastic explosives, to maximize the area of effect,” an FSB officer stated.

The official further claimed that the use of prohibited warfare methods by Ukrainian forces has become “commonplace,” recalling prior discoveries of a lab for producing hydrogen cyanide in May 2024 and a chloropicrin stockpile uncovered last October.

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AI Regulation Ban Crumbles as Senators Rebel

Senator Marsha Blackburn has rescinded her backing for a proposed five-year pause on state and local artificial intelligence legislation, just a day after reaching the deal with Senate Commerce Chair Ted Cruz.

Blackburn’s decision places her alongside Senators Josh Hawley of Missouri and Rand Paul of Kentucky, who have also voiced opposition to the measure.

In a statement released Tuesday, Blackburn emphasized, “While I appreciate Chairman Cruz’s efforts to find acceptable language that allows states to protect their citizens from the abuses of AI, the current language is not acceptable to those who need these protections the most.”

She further warned, “This provision could allow Big Tech to continue to exploit kids, creators, and conservatives. Until Congress passes federally preemptive legislation like the Kids Online Safety Act and an online privacy framework, we can’t block states from making laws that protect their citizens.”

The original compromise crafted by Blackburn and Cruz had been approved by the Senate parliamentarian.

On Monday, Senators Maria Cantwell of Washington and Ed Markey of Massachusetts introduced an amendment to strip the AI moratorium from the larger bill.

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Takeover Begins: Robots Set To Outnumber Humans At Amazon Warehouses

Amazon hasn’t set a public date for fully replacing warehouse workers with robots, but all indicators suggest a gradual transition is well underway, with significant workforce reductions likely, alongside productivity gains driven by automation and AI through the 2030s.

The Wall Street Journal reported that Amazon, the nation’s second-largest private employer in the U.S., is quickly approaching a new milestone in warehouse automation: “There will soon be as many robots as humans.” This equates to over a million robots. 

Roughly 75% of Amazon’s deliveries are now assisted by robotic systems, which perform tasks such as picking, sorting, packaging, and moving items. The rapid integration of robots, such as the advanced Vulcan, marks a significant step toward full automation for fulfillment centers. 

“They’re one step closer to that realization of the full integration of robotics,” said Rueben Scriven, research manager at Interact Analysis, a robotics consulting firm.

The onboarding of automation has slowed Amazon’s hiring. The average number of employees per facility has dropped to a 16-year low, and Amazon plans to reduce its total workforce in the coming years. 

Meanwhile, the number of packages that Amazon ships per employee has soared from 175 in 2015 to approximately 3,870 in recent months, indicating that automation has significantly supercharged the company’s productivity gains. 

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“This Is The Next Level”: AI-Powered “Digital Workers” Deployed At Major Bank To Work Alongside Humans

If you’re working in banking, your next colleague could be a bot. Once unthinkable, the Bank of New York Mellon announced that it has deployed dozens of artificial intelligence-powered “digital employees” that operate with human employees, and even have their own company login credentials.

The Wall Street Journal reports:

Similar to human employees, these digital workers have direct managers they report to and work autonomously in areas like coding and payment instruction validation, said Chief Information Officer Leigh-Ann Russell. Soon they’ll have access to their own email accounts and may even be able to communicate with colleagues in other ways like through Microsoft Teams, she said.

What the bank, also known as BNY, calls “digital workers,” other banks may refer to as “AI agents.” And while the industry lacks a clear consensus on exact terminology, it’s clear that the technology has a growing presence in financial services.

“This is the next level,” Russell told the Journal. “I’m sure in six months’ time it will become very, very prevalent.”

BNY said its AI Hub developed two digital employee personas in three months, according to Adrienne Russell. One persona is engineered to identify and resolve coding vulnerabilities, while the other verifies payment instructions. Each persona can operate in multiple instances—up to several dozen—with each instance confined to a specific team to limit company wide data access.

Soon, the bank plans to integrate its digital workforce with email addresses and Microsoft Teams access in the near future, enabling these AI personas to proactively communicate with human managers, but will maintain its focus on recruiting top human talent while simultaneously expanding its digital workforce, according to the Journal.

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