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Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:

https://www.cnet.com/tech/services-and-software/inside-defcon-the-conference-that-made-cybersecurity-noob-friendly/

The first thing I learned at Defcon was that I apparently didn't know what a badge was.

I already had one hanging around my neck: the press credential that got me through the door at the annual hacker convention in Las Vegas in early August. Yet everywhere I looked, people stood in long lines to buy more. When I asked what they were waiting for and heard "badges," I glanced down at mine, confused.

I would soon learn that Defcon badges can be electronic puzzles, soldering projects, collectibles and signs of belonging to a culture I was experiencing for the first time. Those badges were my first indication of how much I had to learn.

Everyone else seemed to understand the schedule, the language and the unwritten rules. But me? I felt like I was back in high school and had somehow missed orientation.

Over the next few days, talking with professionals, hobbyists and other beginners made cybersecurity feel much more accessible. For the first time, I could see a path from playing around with hacking tools to actually understanding how they work.

I wasn't completely new to hacking. In college at UCLA, I spent more time than I probably should have in the library experimenting with Firesheep, a Firefox extension that demonstrated how exposed session cookies could be intercepted over shared Wi-Fi. Watching it work showed me how easily technology could be manipulated.

I didn't build Firesheep or understand the code behind it. I knew how to install it and click around. In hacker terminology, that made me a script kiddie: someone who uses tools created by other people without fully understanding how they work.

Still, I loved testing technology's limits and making it do things it wasn't designed to do. I liked the feeling of opening a door everyone else assumed was locked. That curiosity stuck, even if my technical knowledge never caught up. 

Defcon was my chance to see whether it finally could.

An Anonymous Coward writes:

https://arstechnica.com/health/2026/08/sabotage-experts-lawmakers-blast-rfk-jr-for-destroying-healthcare-research/

The federal agency tasked with studying ways to improve America's outstandingly poor healthcare system is "on the brink," experts warn. The Trump administration has cut its staff by 75 percent, canceled its grants en masse, and is refusing to spend tens of millions of dollars appropriated by Congress.

Whether the agency "will survive the second Trump administration is an open question," health policy experts Aaron Carroll and David Atkins wrote in an opinion piece published today in the Annals of Internal Medicine.

The agency in question is the Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality (AHRQ), which has focused on ways to improve patient safety, healthcare quality, care delivery, and new technologies and practices since the 1990s. In the past, "Republican leaders recognized that health care disparities were fundamental quality problems," Carroll and Atkins wrote. But recently, disparities in care have become partisan issues.

During Trump's second term, DOGE cuts led to the firing or retirement of an estimated 75 percent of the AHRQ's staff. In July, AHRQ abruptly sent grant cancellation letters to around 150 researchers. More than 100 research grants collectively worth over $250 million have been canceled. Although Congress appropriated $345 million for the 2026 fiscal year, much of it has gone unspent, with only $15 million going to grants so far. As such, scientists across over 30 states have halted research, laid off staff, shut down programs, and stopped pursuing new lines of research.

In addition to the losses in data and research findings, Carroll and Atkins lament the loss to the scientific community. "This is what it looks like when we stop developing the next generation of health services researchers." Reversing the damage is doable, but will be difficult, they write, while calling on Congress to act.

Last week, 30 Democratic senators sent a fiery letter [PDF] to anti-vaccine Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. Noting the same series of events as Carroll and Atkins, they called Kennedy's handling of AHRQ "sabotage" and an "outrageous abuse of administrative power that will leave Americans sicker, poorer, and dying from preventable causes."

They highlighted just a few of the research programs that were axed under Kennedy, including studies on training rural healthcare workers to handle maternal medical emergencies in Connecticut, improving access to home dialysis in New York, reducing risks of patient falls in rural hospitals in Colorado, reducing overuse of antibiotics in Utah, improving autism screening and care for Black children in North Carolina, and improving chronic pain management to reduce reliance on opioids in Virginia. The senators also noted that grants were canceled out of the blue with form letters, which had contradictory explanations and incorrect citations.

With "profound concern and unequivocal opposition" to the mass grant cancellations, the senators wrote, "We demand that you immediately rescind these cancellations and ensure that the funding Congress appropriates to AHRQ is invested in health research in accordance with the law."

"We want to be clear: Democrats and Republicans did not work together to appropriate funds for AHRQ as a gentle suggestion for the [health] Department to follow at their discretion or leisure," they wrote. "We provided this money with the explicit instruction that the Department faithfully support life-saving research to improve access and health outcomes for Americans."

The health department under Kennedy has previously defended the cuts. The senators gave Kennedy until August 25 to respond to their letter.

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

https://www.zdnet.com/article/top-6-ai-free-linux-distros/

AI is everywhere, and the technology's tendrils continue finding their way into more and more places. Will we soon see AI in shopping carts, waffle makers, heated blankets -- rocks?

OK, maybe AI in rocks is a stretch, but you get the point.

Microsoft and Apple are embedding their respective AIs into the heart of their operating systems, and some Linux distributions, such as Omarchy, have followed suit.

Fortunately, not every Linux distribution has plans to add AI into the mix. In fact, several distros have either explicitly taken a stance against AI -- or have a general ethos that ensures AI will not become part of the OS. 

One thing to know: Just because an OS refuses to ship (or use) AI, it doesn't mean that users can't install it for themselves. That's up to the end user. Also, not every one of these distro developers has made public statements about not including AI, but their foundations and ethos stand against such things. To that end, I've had to draw conclusions based on my long-term experience and understanding of how these distributions work and evolve.

Here are the best of those distros.

Debian has made it clear that AI will never be included in the OS. For Debian, part of the issue is the openness of LLMs. The developers made that perfectly clear when they stated, "AI models released under DFSG-compatible license without original training data or program are not seen as DFSG-compliant." DFSG stands for Debian Free Software Guidelines, and the developers and community take the standard seriously. Because of this, I cannot see any point at which Debian will include AI with the operating system.

Keep in mind that Debian is the "mother of distributions," because so many distributions (including Ubuntu) use it as a base. This means that all of those distributions beneath it will not have to deal with preinstalled AI.

Although the Void developers haven't taken an official public stance on AI in the OS, it's safe to assume we'll never see it ship with AI. One reason for this is the very nature of Void Linux as a "DIY" Linux distribution. 

Void Linux starts with just the basics and leaves the rest up to the user. That ethos alone should ensure that AI is never a part of the base. On top of all that, Void is considered a minimalist distro, which means it aims to be as small as possible. (AI would increase the ISO size.)

I'm fairly confident that Void Linux will never include AI out of the box.

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:

https://www.theregister.com/offbeat/2026/08/19/nasa-estimates-the-size-of-the-hole-spacex-made-in-the-moon/5289425

NASA has used its Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO) to capture more pics of the mess on the moon left by a SpaceX Falcon 9 upper stage.

As The Register has previously reported, in 2025 private aerospace concerns Firefly and ispace hired a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket for their respective Blue Ghost Mission 1 and RESILIENCE moonshots.

RESILIENCE did not live up to its name. Blue Ghost did rather better.

The trajectory used to get the two craft to Luna meant the upper stage of the Falcon 9 was on a collision course with Earth's sole permanent natural satellite. The vehicle met its end in early August, and South Korea's space agency captured a few snaps.

NASA did likewise between August 11 and 12, and on Tuesday shared some of them.

You're looking at four of those images, each taken from a different angle as LRO passed 60 miles (96km) above the lunar surface while travelling at a mile per second (1600 m/s).

Crater boffins who have seen the snaps apparently think they show the Falcon 9 made a hole 60 feet wide and 10 feet deep (18m x 3m).

We're told that the darker area that fans around the crater in the upper-left image is rougher than the surroundings, as this surface material has been altered over a long time by solar wind, galactic cosmic rays, and micrometeorite impacts. The brighter rays and splotch above the crater in the lower-right image is fresher material that was excavated from deeper below the surface.

Another piece of SpaceX hardware, the Starship used in the 13^th test flight, has also turned up in the Australian territory of Christmas Island.

The island is a speck in the Indian Ocean more famous for its annual migration of red crabs (and its role Australian immigration policies)  than its contributions to space exploration. It is, however, usefully close to the location where the Starship hit the water.

As SpaceX explained on X, its recovery team towed the spacecraft to the island to take advantage of the calm waters in its vicinity so engineers can perform extra post-flight analysis. The company hopes to return it to its Texas Starbase for more work.

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

Rob, the Administrator over at Linux.org has announced:

I set up an IRC server this week. irc.linux.org, port 6697, TLS.

Main channel is #linux.org.

NickServ and ChanServ are both running, so you can lock down your nickname and register your own channels:

/msg NickServ REGISTER
/msg ChanServ REGISTER #yourchannel

Once a channel is registered it stays yours, ops and all, even if you're the only one who ever shows up.

If you haven't touched IRC in fifteen years, nothing has changed,. apt install hexchat or apt install irssi, connect, join, type.

Channels are open for the taking. Distro channels, project channels, whatever you want to run. Grab them before somebody else does.

Original Submission

"mrcoolbp" writes:

It seems like Nvidia's not getting back into the Middle Kingdom anytime soon:

Chinese web giant Baidu yesterday told investors it sees good days ahead for its Kunlunxin chip biz, because local buyers won't have alternatives.

Baidu has previously said it plans to spin out and float Kunlunxin, which makes CUDA-compliant inferencing chips that it uses for its own cloud services and has sold to the likes of Huawei and ZTE, who use them in kit they sell to Chinese telcos.

Speaking on the company's Q2 earnings call, Dou Shen, executive veep of Baidu's AI Cloud Group, said Baidu is working to list Kunlunxin and will have concrete info to share soon.

"From a business perspective, we remain very confident in Kunlunxin's long-term growth and commercial potential for a few reasons," he said. One of those reasons is that demand for inferencing continues to rise, and Baidu thinks that trend will continue for the long term.

His second reason was that China's domestic market has "significant growth potential" because supply of AI chips is "likely to remain constrained for some time."

"Against this backdrop, customers are increasingly seeking high performance, reliable, and cost-efficient domestic AI chips."

Those remarks are notable in the context of the US government's policy to allow Nvidia to resume sales of its products into China, and Beijing's response of giving itself a veto over any purchases by local companies.

After Washington banned Nvidia from selling its products in China, the company said that decision cost it $10.5 billion in six months. In its most recent results announcement the GPU giant said it had not won any revenue in China after the USA's policy reversal, and is "uncertain whether any imports will be allowed into the country."

And now Baidu is saying Chinese buyers are looking to local chips due to supply challenges.

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:

After only two years in business, too:

Firm Test-Fires 3D-Printed, Fully Cryogenic Reusable Rocket Engine — Indian Startup Leverages SLM Printing To Create Its First Working Prototype

As a broad description, SLM printers work by depositing a layer of microscopic metal powder on a base, and then firing a laser that melts the powder into solid at specific places. The base then drops down a fraction of a millimeter, a new layer of powder is deposited, and the process repeats. All told, this results in layers around just 0.05 to 0.06 mm thick, made of metals and alloys that traditional consumer 3D printers can't quite handle. Here's an illustrative video of the process.

Additionally, the burn is stronger than the commonly used Kerolox, while leaving behind almost no residue, lowering maintenance time and improving reusability turnaround. Drawbacks include lower fuel density (thus the need for larger tank sizes), trickier storage due to the low temperature, and potential hazards for handling.

Othisis has reportedly signed MoUs (memorandum of understanding) to carry payloads into space, even though it's only been formally in business for two years. The company is the brainchild of Syed Affan, the creator of the Rocketry India Discord server, who founded the company while pursuing his undergraduate degree.

Original Submission

Anonymous Coward writes:

It's like Windows Recall, but without all the creepy screenshots. (But it's still kind of creepy.):

ChatGPT's desktop app on macOS has a new feature called Computer History that turns your actions into training data, learning how you work, suggesting automations, and even picking up tasks you left half done. It uses your activity to build a timeline that ChatGPT and Codex can reference when you make a request.

The feature is opt in, rather than opt out, and you can exclude certain apps and websites from Computer History, and you can delete entries if you want finer-grained control. Ari Weinstein, Product and Engineering manager at OpenAI, said on X that Computer History will automatically ignore content in incognito or private browser tabs.

In a quick demo video, Dominik Kundel, a member of the Developer Experiences team at OpenAI, shows the app looking up the last document he edited, checking if it was shared with people via Slack, and delivering a recap of how he spent his morning.

The feature is definitely reminiscent of Windows Recall, but where Microsoft's controversial AI feature relied heavily on screenshots, OpenAI says Computer History doesn't capture images, videos, or audio, instead relying on "events."

https://www.theregister.com/ai-and-ml/2026/08/14/openai-ditches-recall-style-screenshot-surveillance-for-friendly-keylogging/5287618
https://thenextweb.com/news/openai-chatgpt-computer-history-mac-keystrokes

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:

The CMP 170HX has quickly gone from crypto trash to AI treasure:

Nvidia Crypto Mining GPUs Hacked To Restore Locked-Away VRAM — Software Mod Unlocks 64GB Of VRAM On $250 CMP 170HX

Nvidia's approach is somewhat reminiscent of the old AMD Phenom II and Athlon II days, where some models shipped with disabled cores that could sometimes be unlocked through BIOS tweaks. Similarly, the CMP 170HX 8GB and 10GB models can potentially be unlocked to access their full memory capacity of 64GB and 80GB, respectively, though only 40GB is confirmed to be working from user feedback. As detailed in "A Canary in the Crypto Mine: Defeating Stack Protection in a GPU Secure Coprocessor," Jon Pry's research paper provides the technical blueprint for bypassing Nvidia’s Falcon security microprocessor, which tools like CMP Unlocked are based on.

One of the most remarkable aspects of this exploit is that it is entirely software-based and requires no physical modifications to the CMP 170HX. It sounds like a joke, but you are literally downloading more memory for your graphics card. It’s important to note, however, that the amount of memory you can successfully unlock and maintain stability will vary. The issue is that there is no way to know whether the locked-away memory is fully functional because Nvidia did so for product segmentation, or whether the chipmaker deactivated it due to physical defects. It's a similar situation to another repurposed crypto device, AMD's BC-250, that we recently tested.

Beyond unlocking the hidden memory, the software exploit can also restore processing power to the CMP 170HX’s Streaming Multiprocessors (SMs), which increases its computational performance. Another notable benefit is the upgrade to a faster PCIe interface speed. The CMP 170HX can now operate at PCIe 2.0 x4 speeds, a significant upgrade from its original restriction to PCIe 1.0 x4. There is still untapped performance, though. Nvidia implemented hard restrictions on the CMP 170HX’s connectivity by limiting the accelerator to just four PCIe lanes and physically omitting 12 capacitors from the PCB. If you solder the missing capacitors to the PCB, it could unlock full PCIe x16 bandwidth and enable the accelerator's maximum throughput, though we haven't seen that in action.

The CMP 170HX launched with a hefty price tag of $4,300 at the height of the cryptocurrency mining boom. Nowadays, they used to sell for around $250 on eBay. However, when word of the exploit got out, they immediately jumped to over $1,000, a 4X increase in market value. Nvidia’s A100, offered in 40GB and 80GB PCIe variants, starts at around $3,500 and $11,500, respectively. The CMP 170HX is attractive for AI users because it costs a fraction of the A100 but can offer the same memory capacity, though the silicon lottery is not always generous. Regardless, Nvidia’s Ampere architecture is now two generations old. Even with added memory capacity, it cannot match the raw computational performance or efficiency of Hopper or Blackwell.

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:

They're so full of errors that Congressional lawyers are spending a lot of time trying to fix them:

The House Office of Legislative Counsel is swamped with AI-generated bills that are riddled with wrong terms, incorrect citations and other mistakes, according to Politico. More and more representatives' offices are using publicly available general AI tools like ChatGPT and Claude to write their legislative proposals. Politico's sources said lawyers at the US House Office of Legislative Counsel (OLC) are spending more time to review and rewrite them than they would have if they had written the bills from scratch.

The sources explained that AI tools tend to miss nuances and tiny crucial details, which could have a huge effect on how a law is interpreted and enacted. Wade Ballou, who headed the office for almost 10 years until 2024, said AI can't determine whether a pot of money should be a "tax credit, tax deduction, tax exclusion or a grant," for instance. Sometimes, its classification of "state" only includes the 50 states, which would exclude DC and tribal nations from federal programs. A lawyer who worked with the office also told Politico that AI would incorrectly cite previous statutes in drafts.

AI-generated proposals are also creating a different kind of problem: Congressional staffers reportedly aren't as deeply familiar with what their bills are about and hope to accomplish anymore. Because they use AI to draft their proposals, they're not forced to "learn the issue as deeply."

In order to keep up with the increasing workload brought about by AI-drafted bills, the OLC is, well... exploring the use of AI to "improve efficiencies." A working group within the office has developed an AI tool called "Comparative Print Suite" that can help staffers visualize how a proposal will change current laws. Unlike general AI tools, it returns an error if it can't figure out where changes in the proposal should be made, preventing hallucinations from making it into draft bills.

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:

The custom build from Microsoft's Chinese joint venture was scheduled to retire in February 2027:

China Reportedly Orders State Agencies To Uninstall Its Government-Only Edition Of Windows 10 — Beijing Accelerates Planned Retirement Over Data Security Concerns

The affected software is the government edition developed by C&M Information Technologies (CMIT), a joint venture set up in 2016 between Microsoft and state-owned China Electronics Technology Group, with the Chinese side holding the majority stake. The build is based on Windows 10 Enterprise but strips out OneDrive and other consumer-facing components, disables certain native functions, keeps updates and activation inside China, and lets government users substitute Chinese encryption algorithms for Microsoft's standard cryptography. China Customs and Shanghai's Commission of Economy and Informatization were among the first pilot customers when the edition launched in 2017.

Beijing banned Windows 8 from government procurement in 2014, ordered a three-year replacement of foreign PCs in government offices starting in 2019, and in 2022 told central agencies and state firms to scrap foreign-branded computers entirely. The domestic stack built to absorb that demand now includes Kylin V10, UnionTech's UOS, and Huawei's HarmonyOS 5 laptops, and it reaches down to the silicon in systems like Huawei's Qingyun desktops running the homegrown Kirin 9000X.

StatCounter's traffic data shows how little of that campaign has reached the consumer market. Windows accounted for 87.64% of Chinese desktop web traffic in July 2026, and Windows 10 alone still made up 43.56% of Chinese Windows usage, compared with 50.01% for Windows 11, ten months after mainstream support ended. Roughly two in five Chinese desktops are currently running an unsupported Microsoft OS, the gap that CMIT's edition was meant to close for government users.

It's not clear what the scope of the new directive is, with Bloomberg's reporting covering “some” state-linked entities. CMIT didn't respond to the outlet's request for comment.

Original Submission

Atlassian, a software company, is planning on building a new tower in Sydney called Atlassian Central at a cost of $1.4 billion and standing tall at 180 metres. With Australia in the grip of a WFH age of enlightenment this construction is truly an outlier.

Co-founder and CEO Mike Cannon-Brookes said the primary objective was to "self-fund further investment in AI and enterprise sales" while strengthening the company's financial profile.

[...] Asked about the tower's occupancy and purpose after laying off hundreds of employees, the company gave news.com.au a fascinating insight into how working in the tower will play out day-to-day.

Gina Creegan, Atlassian's head of workplace, said the tower has been designed for the "future of work from day one".

"The timber habitats bring that vision to life, connecting spaces that are purpose-built for how we work," she said.

"Instead of traditional desk rows, workspaces are designed around distinct modes of work: deep focus, collaboration, social connection and recharge."

It is understood that each of these states of work will have its own dedicated floors inside the building — with focus rooms, sprint rooms, small meeting rooms and customer and event spaces across dedicated floors.

They're also designed to feel like vertical neighbourhoods, with park floors, terraces and natural materials designed to give space to reset between different modes of work.

The idea is that workers will move between these sections of the building throughout the day rather than sitting at one assigned desk.

Under the company's "Team Anywhere" policy, it's understood there will be no attendance quotas or a mandated number of office days, so the building will not be built for a fixed attendance target or desk per employee ratios.

Original Submission

One of the great hopes for BEV development has been solid-state / Lithium-metal batteries. No goo in the electrolyte, ~double the energy density of Li-ion batteries and faster charging to finally end the BEV range discussion. Looks like this is still in the future. MotorTrend has a summary of current development activity at a variety of battery and car companies. Here's a sampling, many more at the link: https://www.motortrend.com/features/solid-state-batteries-future-cars

... perhaps the industry's biggest shift during the past two years is that the race has become less "solid-state versus liquid-electrolyte lithium-ion" and more "semi-solid first, all-solid later." This effectively delays resolution of the toughest challenges—like how to keep a solid electrolyte/separator in sufficiently intimate contact with the electrodes to work properly (which often requires high pressure). Today, semi-solid architectures are already bringing significant benefits to vehicles, while pure ceramic/sulfide lithium-metal batteries (which claim the wildest range/recharging stats) remain years away. Here's a roundup of the leaders:

Battery-swapping Chinese automaker Nio produced 150-kWh WELION semi-solid-state packs boasting 260-Wh/kg energy density in 2024. The idea was for owners to rent these packs for long trips, but low demand halted production after a few hundred were produced.

China's SAIC teamed with battery supplier QingTao Energy to produce a semi-solid-state pack for IM Motors' L6 Lightyear Max. Its 130-kWh pack is rated for 621 miles of (CLTC) range, recharging 249 miles' worth in 12 minutes at 400 kW.

Toyota is working with Idemitsu Kosan to develop an all-solid-state cell using an undisclosed high-energy cathode, a sulfide solid electrolyte, and an undisclosed (likely lithium) anode. A pilot electrolyte plant is under construction, and the supply chain is being built.
[...]
Samsung SDI is working with BMW and others on a reportedly oxide-based all-solid-state anodeless/lithium-metal design with a high-nickel cathode. A pilot production line is running, with production gearing up for an announced target of 2027 mass production.

VW Group's PowerCo has teamed with QuantumScape to develop a novel cell design using a pure copper current collector that plates lithium metal during its first charging cycle, a solid ceramic separator that prevents dendrite growth from the anode, and a liquid catholyte that maintains contact with the cathode particles under roughly 50 psi of stack pressure. It's been demonstrated in a Ducati motorcycle, and manufacturing license agreements are signed.
[...]

I'm sticking with my older ICE cars for now. As well as quick fill-ups, they are also pre-touch screen and much of the other recent slop (IMO) that has been added to basic transportation.
There are hints that some car companies are coming to their senses and going back to actual knobs and buttons, after realizing that a touch screen is not the right user interface for a moving vehicle. If that continues, I might be in the market for a new car again (the last new car I bought was in 1992).

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:

Destroying books to train AI models is 'all' the Vegas warehouse does:

An operation exposed by an AirTag

Employees who spoke to 404 Media said they spend their time at the facility cutting the spines off of books and feeding them into a scanner. VGT3 is reportedly part of another, larger facility in Las Vegas called LAS8. Its purpose, according to the employees who spoke to 404 media, is solely to cut the spines off books and scan them. "All we do is scan books," one employee told the outlet.

Often, these large orders contain a scattershot of different books. An independent bookseller in Ireland, for example, received an order for 5,000 books that they suspected was for training AI. “Some was high-quality non-fiction, like A History of Connemara, and the next thing might be The Eddie Hobbs Guide to your SSIA,” Tomás Kenny of Kennys Bookshop said at the time. 404 Media says that employees at VGT3 are required to scan the ISBN (barcode) of each book, lending credibility to the theory that AI companies are working through a list of every book that has ever been published.

Or, at least, every book with an ISBN. A bookseller told 404 Media that these large orders "never" include rare books that don't have an ISBN.

Earlier this year, court filings revealed Anthropic's 'Project Panama,' which kicked off in 2024. Documents as part of those filings make the project's purpose clear: "Project Panama is our effort to destructively scan all the books in the world," said an internal planning document. A judge ruled that Anthropic was allowed to use books to train its AI models. However, it was fined $1.5 billion for keeping 7 million pirated books in a central library. In a 2025 lawsuit against Meta, it was revealed that it had pirated nearly 82TB of books.

Scanning books en masse is nothing new. In 2005, Google spearheaded Google Books by scanning out-of-copyright titles from an on-campus library using specialized scanners. The books were then returned. Presumably, Google made use of some type of V-shaped scanner, which lays a book out naturally so as not to disturb the spine and binding.

In the case of VGT3, 404 reports that employees cut off the spine of the book before scanning, presumably to feed the pages flat into an industrial scanner. The insatiable hunger for data in frontier AI models seems to be moving at a faster pace than Google's early book digitization efforts.

It's hard to say why a facility like VGT3 operates in this way, though it likely comes down to cost. As major companies like Meta and Anthropic have been caught with a library of pirated books, they now need to buy them. And when purchasing thousands of books at a time, it's probably much cheaper to get secondhand copies from marketplaces like Biblio than it is to spend full price on digital versions of those books (if digital versions exist in the first place).

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:

Secret parameter allowed hackers to steal passwords when a target clicked on a link:

It's not every day that attackers can force a frontier AI model to cough up user passwords and other sensitive data without user confirmation. That's exactly what researchers recently did to Microsoft 365 Copilot Enterprise. Even more unusual is the source they tapped to discover the critical vulnerability that made their exploit possible. Rather than employing reverse engineering or other traditional vulnerability-hunting methods, they asked Copilot. The LLM assistant readily complied.

Researchers at security firm Varonis knew they wanted to create an exploit that would exfiltrate user data when a user did nothing more than click on a link. Like most AI assistants today, Copilot steadfastly refused and made clear that sensitive prompts like that require explicit user consent in the form of a gesture, such as pressing a return key or other key. In response, the researchers peppered Copilot with questions about the guardrails that required user confirmation before the assistant can execute powerful commands.

The dialog was like a game of 20 questions. Each answer provided a new clue that divulged information about the complex safety mechanism. Why was auto-execution impossible, they asked. What URL structures and deep links were involved? What happens when a page is loaded with input already in the prompt field? Each answer provided a deeper view into the guardrail and its limits. Eventually, Copilot provided a stunning Microsoft trade secret—an undocumented prompt parameter that completely bypassed the requirement for user consent.

"At the beginning, Copilot kept refusing, but every refusal revealed technical details about its internal architecture," Varonis Senior Researcher Lior Adar said in an interview. "Copilot eventually disclosed undocumented parameters. I took those parameters and used them for prompts for running automatically."

The parameter was the string ?autorun=1. When accompanied by the separate, well-known parameter ?q=, the researchers' prompt silently fired the moment the target clicked on the malicious URL. Microsoft silently mitigated the vulnerability in February, three months after Varonis reported it, by no longer allowing ?q= to inject text into the chatbot input. The user instead had to click and type manually, a requirement that prevented third-party browser integrations from using the parameter as intended. Microsoft introduced more comprehensive fixes on Tuesday.

Like most AI assistants, Copilot can receive prompts that are embedded into a URL. The base part of the URL can allow the LLM to open, say, Gmail. Parameters and text to the right in the URL can then instruct the assistant to summarize inbox contents or begin drafting a new message. As noted already, the commands aren't supposed to execute without user approval.

With the Copilot revelation of the undocumented parameter, the researchers now had a simple means to circumvent the protection and inject a prompt directly into Copilot. The format of the URL looked like this:

https://copilot.microsoft.com/?q=&autorun=1