U.S. officials say the FBI and its partners in Europe infiltrated and seized control of a major malware network that was used for more than 15 years to commit a gamut of online crimes including crippling ransomware attacks

WEST BRIDGEWATER, Mass.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Sep 12, 2023--

Less than eight months after discouraging companies from developing advanced artificial intelligence, Elon Musk has unveiled his answer to “woke” AI chatbots like ChatGPT. The tech billionaire claims his new Grok AI is both smarter and funnier than its rivals, offering paid users of X (formerly Twitter) the chance to ask it “spicy questions that are rejected by most other AI systems”. The X boss offered an example of how it will answer “almost anything”, sharing a screenshot of a user asking it how to make cocaine. “Grok is designed to answer questions with a bit of wit and has a rebellious streak,” a blog post announcing its launch noted. “Please don’t use it if you hate humour!” What differentiates it from OpenAI’s ChatGPT and Google’s Bard is that it has access to real-time data from X, which Mr Musk took over almost exactly a year ago. Before the takeover, AI firms were using Twitter as a data set to train its models, however the tech billionaire shut this down following the release of ChatGPT last November. Initially labelled “TruthGPT”, Grok takes its name from Robert A. Heinlein’s novel Stranger in a Strange Land, meaning understanding something thoroughly and intuitively, while the tone of its responses are modelled on the same writing style as Douglas Adams’s Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy. But with X as its training set, Grok risks mimicking the same misinformation and toxic discourse that has plagued the platform since before Musk’s takeover. Not only does it adopt a more informal tone to its rivals, Grok also appears to have less safety filters preventing it from answering questions about sensitive topics. Despite claiming that Grok outperforms ChatGPT, which is freely available, xAI did acknowledge that it does not yet match the capabilities of OpenAI’s more powerful GPT-4 model – which carries a similar monthly fee to Grok. In its own in-house tests, xAI graded Grok against GPT-4 on the 2023 Hungarian national high school finals in mathematics. Grok passed the exam with a mark of 59 per cent, while GPT-4 scored 68 per cent. In March this year, Mr Musk was among hundreds of leading tech figures to add their name to an open letter calling on all AI labs to pause the training of AI systems. The letter warned that artificial intelligence with “human-competitive intelligence” could pose “profound risks to society and humanity”, potentially leading to the loss of control of human civilisation and even its extinction. This letter of discouragement looks increasingly like a plea to allow his own companies – which include the newly formed xAI – to catch up. Just weeks before signing it, Mr Musk was approaching AI researchers to form xAI, with the explicit intention of taking on ChatGPT. The world’s richest person had been instrumental in the formation of OpenAI in 2015 but cut ties after it became a for-profit endeavour. His team included researchers from OpenAI and Google’s DeepMind, who had experience in developing large language models (LLMs) that power AI chatbots. The reason he cited for creating his own chatbot was due to apparent fears that these tech companies were creating “woke” AI systems. “The danger of training AI to be woke – in other words, lie – is deadly,” he tweeted last December in reply to a post by OpenAI chief executive Sam Altman. The new chatbot fits in with Musk’s broader goals that he is hoping to achieve with his other companies, including SpaceX’s mission to transform humanity into a multi-planetary species “Unless the woke mind virus, which is fundamentally anti-science, anti-merit, and anti-human in general, is stopped, civilisation will never become multiplanetary,” Mr Musk said. In justifying why it built Grok, xAI said its goal was to create a tool that “maximally benefits all of humanity”. The blog post explained: “We believe that it is important to design AI tools that are useful to people of all backgrounds and political views.” Read More How Elon Musk’s ‘spicy’ Grok compares to ‘woke’ ChatGPT Musk shares cocaine recipe in effort to prove Grok AI is ‘rebellious’ Elon Musk unveils new sarcasm-loving AI chatbot for premium X subscribers 10 ways AI will change the world – from curing cancer to wiping out humanity Musk shares cocaine recipe in effort to prove Grok AI is ‘rebellious’

Foxconn’s results mirror those of Apple’s most recent numbers, which showed a drop in iPhone and iPad sales.

More than 100,000 user accounts of the popular artificial intelligence chatbot platform ChatGPT have been compromised over the last year using information-stealing malware, a new report has revealed. The report, published by Singapore-based cybersecurity firm Group-IB, identified 101,134 compromised accounts, the credentials of many of which have been traded over the last year on illicit dark web marketplaces. At its peak in May, nearly 27,000 credentials of compromised ChatGPT accounts were traded on the dark web, the group noted, adding that the Asia-Pacific region experienced the highest concentration of ChatGPT credentials offered for sale. This region, according to the report, accounted for almost 40 per cent of compromised accounts between June 2022 and May 2023, followed by Europe. Since its widespread rollout in November last year, ChatGPT has seen growing use, with employees taking advantage of the chatbot to optimise their work across fields from software development to business communications. As the chatbot stores the history of user queries and the AI’s responses, experts have warned that unauthorised access to ChatGPT accounts could expose confidential or sensitive information. “Employees enter classified correspondences or use the bot to optimize proprietary code. Given that ChatGPT’s standard configuration retains all conversations, this could inadvertently offer a trove of sensitive intelligence to threat actors if they obtain account credentials,” said Dmitry Shestakov, the head of threat intelligence at Group-IB. Several businesses, institutions and universities across the world, including several in Japan, have either banned use of the chatbot, or have warned staff to not reveal sensitive information to the AI bot as such data can be exploited for targeted attacks against companies and their employees. The Singapore-based cybersecurity group warned in its latest report that ChatGPT accounts have already gained popularity within underground communities on the dark web that are accessible only via special software. Using malicious software known as info stealers, credentials saved in browsers, bank card details, crypto wallet information, cookies, browsing history and other information from browsers installed on infected computers are being stolen and sent to operators. Logs containing user information, including data on the IP addresses, are being actively traded on dark web marketplaces, according to Group-IB. A majority of logs containing ChatGPT accounts have been breached by the infamous Raccoon info stealer, the group noted. Experts urge users to update passwords regularly and implement two-factor authentication for accessing their ChatGPT accounts. Users are also advised to disable the chatbot’s chat saving feature from its settings menu or manually delete conversations immediately after use. Read More ChatGPT ‘grandma exploit’ gives users free keys for Windows 11 Protect personal data when introducing AI, privacy watchdog warns businesses How Europe is leading the world in the push to regulate AI Scientists warn of threat to internet from AI-trained AIs ChatGPT ‘grandma exploit’ helps people pirate software Hundreds attend ‘soulless’ AI-generated church service

The best VPN deals for booking your next trip: BEST OVERALL ExpressVPN (1 year +

NickEh30 said, 'I may have to cut all the ties to pursue legal action if he tries to contact me any further'

AUSTIN, Texas--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Aug 2, 2023--

Elon Musk’s X, formerly known as Twitter, slowed down access to rivals and news organisations, according to a new report. The company seemingly added a delay of as long as five seconds when people clicked on links to go elsewhere on the web, according to a Washington Post report. The delay was applied to a host of rival websites, including Facebook, Instagram and Bluesky. It was also used on the websites of news organisations that have been critical of Mr Musk, such as Reuters and the New York Times. Clicking a link on X to one of the affected websites resulted in a delay of about five seconds before the webpage loaded, the Washington Post reported, citing tests it conducted on Tuesday. Reuters also saw a similar delay in tests it ran. By late Tuesday afternoon, X appeared to have eliminated the delay. When contacted for comment, X confirmed the delay was removed but did not elaborate. Billionaire ElonMusk, who bought Twitter in October, has previously lashed out at news organizations and journalists who have reported critically on his companies, which include Tesla and SpaceX. Twitter has previously prevented users from posting links to competing social media platforms. Reuters could not establish the precise time when X began delaying links to some websites. A user on Hacker News, a tech forum, posted about the delay earlier on Tuesday and wrote that X began delaying links to the New York Times on Aug. 4. On that day, Musk criticized the publication’s coverage of South Africa and accused it of supporting calls for genocide. Reuters has no evidence that the two events are related. A spokesperson for the New York Times said it has not received an explanation from X about the link delay. “While we don’t know the rationale behind the application of this time delay, we would be concerned by targeted pressure applied to any news organization for unclear reasons,” the spokesperson said on Tuesday. A Reuters spokesperson said: “We are aware of the report in the Washington Post of a delay in opening links to Reuters stories on X. We are looking into the matter.” Bluesky, an X rival that has Twitter co-founder Jack Dorsey on its board, did not reply to a request for comment. Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, did not immediately respond to a request for comment. Additional reporting by Reuters Read More Twitter turning Tweetdeck into paid service after slowing down access to rivals The last parts of Twitter are being removed Musk pledges to fund legal bills of X users ‘unfairly treated’ by employers for posts Musk’s Twitter takeover sparks mass exodus of climate experts Snapchat experiences ‘temporary outage’ as My AI chatbot posts own Story WhatsApp rolls out AI tool for creating custom art

NIJMEGEN, Netherlands--(BUSINESS WIRE)--Jun 14, 2023--

A federal judge has temporarily blocked Microsoft’s planned $69 billion purchase of video game company Activision Blizzard

After setting the Big Win record for 'The Wild Machine' and winning over $800K, xQc lost his money due to a server error