Straker updates on ongoing fraud investigation
Straker has provided an update on its ongoing investigation into transaction anomalies involving the bank accounts of its US subsidiary, Straker Translations.

The Auckland translation technology company, Straker, was suspended from trading on the Australian Securities Exchange after discovering suspected fraud at its United States subsidiary involving at least US$1.5 million (NZ$2.5m) and possibly more. ⌘ Read more

What Pope Leo XIV’s First Encyclical Says About the Power of AI
In Magnifica Humanitas, the Pope decries the concentration of technological power in a few global players. ⌘ Read more

The $180m payday that ‘meme king’ didn’t share with most staff
He’s the face of the viral “co-founder Albo” campaign. He’s also the founder whose $180 million exit handed a payday to a tiny circle while other staff were kept in the dark. ⌘ Read more

Meet Mark Zuckerberg’s right-hand man
By Meghan Bobrowsky

Tensions were running high at Meta Platforms.

For weeks, rumours circulated that the company was planning a large layoff as it poured tens of billions of dollars into artificial intelligence. Then, employees were told their keystrokes and mouse clicks would be recorded to help train AI agents to use computers. ⌘ Read more

Intel Working On pmtctl Tool For Linux In Dealing With Platform Telemetry Data
A set if 17 patches were posted today to the Linux kernel mailing list for introducing a new tool in the kernel source tree, pmtctl. This new pmtctl tool is for interfacing with Intel Platform Monitoring Technology… ⌘ Read more

Straker suspended after suspected US employee fraud
Auckland translation technology company Straker has been suspended from trading on the Australian Securities Exchange after discovering suspected fraud at its United States subsidiary involving at least US$1.5 million (NZ$2.5m) and possibly more.

Straker requested the voluntary suspension on Tuesday, saying it had identified transactions totalling approximately US$1.5m that it was confident had been misappropriated … ⌘ Read more

AI ‘capability leap’: 80% of software developers now using it
Late last year, AWS senior engineer Mike Nooney noticed a flurry of activity on social media that indicated something exciting had happened in his field: AI had taken what we described as a “capability leap”.

“So, I thought, let’s get in and have a look at Claude Code and some of the other tools,” he recounted to an audience at last week’s Techweek26 summit. ⌘ Read more

Are chatbots making things more difficult than old-fashioned transactions?
These days as consumers, we are often locked into these false amities with chatbots, our to-and-fro reliant on what previous questions and responses have been digested by the software. ⌘ Read more

Eroad faces ‘distraction’ as largest shareholder tries to overhaul board
Eroad’s chair says a reset towards the New Zealand and Australian market is being distracted by a shareholder’s board takeover effort.

Alongside publishing full-year results on Monday that showed flat revenue and a $161.1 million loss, the fleet technology company said its largest single shareholder, Ampfield Management, was seeking to overhaul its board. ⌘ Read more

Pacific Edge is back from the brink and needs to prove it can execute
Medical technology company Pacific Edge’s annual revenue has nearly halved as it looks towards an expected US-led turnaround in its fortunes.

The company has resumed billing Medicare in the US after being frozen out of the system last year. ⌘ Read more

Syos expands drone fleet with underwater minesweeper
New Zealand drone company Syos Aerospace says it is closely monitoring the war in Iran and believes its uncrewed underwater vehicles could be suited to detecting and clearing mines in the Strait of Hormuz, as it expands its autonomous systems portfolio.

Undersea expansion ⌘ Read more

‘AI washing’: firms are scrambling to rebrand themselves as tech-focused
Article URL: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/may/24/ai-washing-pr-firms-scrambling-rebrand

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48257980

Points: 15

# Comments: 2 ⌘ Read more

KernelScript: A Programming Language For Kernel Customization & App Optimizations
Multikernel Technologies Inc has been working on a multi-kernel architecture for the Linux kernel while in addition to that they have been developing KernelScript as a domain-specific language for carrying out Linux kernel customizations and app-specific optimizations… ⌘ Read more

Microsoft Flight Simulator’s new collaboration with NSW Rural Fire Service
The NSW Rural Fire Service has teamed up with Microsoft for a new aerial firefighting mission in Flight Simulator. 9news.com.au spoke to the game’s director, Jörg Neumann, to learn all about it, and how they’ve used a million-dollar camera to capture real life locations for the game. ⌘ Read more

What you need to know about VPNs in 2026
The technology is increasingly being used to dodge age and verification checks in Australia. But how does it work, and is it legal? ⌘ Read more

ICE Awards $25M Iris-Scanning Contract to Bi2 Technologies
Article URL: https://www.projectsaltbox.com/p/ice-awards-25-million-iris-scanning

Comments URL: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48252720

Points: 17

# Comments: 1 ⌘ Read more

Meta begins 8,000 global job cuts in AI efficiency push
By Kurt Wagner, Riley Griffin and Olivia Fletcher

Meta Platforms Inc. is alerting thousands of employees that they’re being laid off, part of a previously announced restructuring aimed at reducing costs while the company invests heavily in artificial intelligence. ⌘ Read more

E-hiking is here. You can tell by my 1,000-watt hips
By Nicole Nguyen

AI is entering the physical realm in a big way. Case in point: I spent Mother’s Day e-hiking with bionic leg boosters. ⌘ Read more

‘Huge validation’: Trump administration backs Aussie quantum tech
Two of Australia’s most prominent quantum names have been drawn into the Trump administration’s growing portfolio of strategic technology companies. ⌘ Read more

‘Creepy’ Listening Tool for Targeted Ads Didn’t Actually Work, FTC Says
Three firms will pay nearly $1 million for selling “Active Listening” technology that they claimed tapped people’s phones for advertising. The FTC alleges the “tech” was just pricey email lists. ⌘ Read more

US To Award $2 Billion To Quantum Companies, Take Equity Stakes
An anonymous reader quotes a report from the Quantum Insider: The Trump administration is preparing a new round of industrial policy aimed at quantum computing, with roughly $2 billion in grants expected to go to nine companies developing quantum hardware and related technologies. According to Reuters, citing a Wall Street Journal report, the U.S. Dep … ⌘ Read more

Colossal Biosciences Is Growing Chickens In a 3D-Printed Artificial Eggshell
Colossal Biosciences says it has grown chickens inside 3D-printed artificial eggshells. “The company says the egg technology could help conserve at-risk bird species,” reports MIT Technology. “It could also play a role in a project to re-create the extinct giant moa, a flightless 12-foot-tall bird that once lived in New … ⌘ Read more

Musk’s X admits breaking Australian child safety law, fined $650,000
Elon Musk’s social media company, formerly known as Twitter, failed to comply with an order to detail its child exploitation safeguards. ⌘ Read more

Software startup Factor bursts out of Taiawa tech hub into the big time
Wellington technology hub Taiawa is celebrating the first exit of one of its in-house startup companies in a $24 million deal announced this week.

The day before BusinessDesk visited Taiawa, NZ company Gentrack revealed it was acquiring Taiawa’s resident startup Factor for $ … ⌘ Read more

Space Mafia: How orbital AI changes everything
Artificial intelligence is no longer confined to the data centres of Silicon Valley or the cloud regions dotted around the world. ⌘ Read more

Tackling the future workforce challenge
Some of the biggest challenges posed by the rapid development and deployment of artificial intelligence have to be tackled in areas related to workforce management.

“Nowadays, we are experiencing the greatest change in work since the Industrial Revolution,” Deloitte’s talent and experience leader, Alexandra (Sasha) Kozlova, said at a Techweek26 panel in Wellington on Wednesday morning. ⌘ Read more

Google unveils new search bar, smart glasses as it ramps up the AI wars
Google may be starting to win the race towards truly useful consumer AI. ⌘ Read more

AI requires us to take ‘considered risks’ – Deloitte CEO
We are living through one of the most significant technological shifts in our careers, and it is happening at a rapid pace, Mike Horne, chief executive of Deloitte New Zealand, told Techweek26 attendees.

There was a palpable sense at the conference that the pace of technological innovation had accelerated to the point where its many potential impacts were becoming hard to comprehend. ⌘ Read more

Before Mass Layoffs, Meta Reassigns 7,000 Workers To Focus On AI
An anonymous reader quotes a report from the New York Times: Meta told employees on Monday that it was reassigning 7,000 workers to focus on new initiatives around artificial intelligence, the latest change in a company transformation spurred by the powerful technology. Employees will be moved to four new organizations focused on building new A.I. … ⌘ Read more

[$] What’s brewing in CXL
Compute\
Express Link (CXL) is a technology intended to enable the provision of
“memory nodes” in data centers that provide (possibly shared) memory to
nearby CPUs. It has, Dan Williams said at the beginning of his
memory-management-track session on the topic at the 2026 Linux Storage,\
Filesystem, Memory Management, and BPF Summit, “been making
memory-management problems worse since 2021”. He used the sessi … ⌘ Read more

US rebellion against AI is gaining steam
By Amrith Ramkumar, Katherine Blunt, Lindsay Ellis

The only thing growing faster than the artificial intelligence industry may be Americans’ negative feelings about it, as former Google chief executive Eric Schmidt saw on Friday. ⌘ Read more

Critical infrastructure’s AI moment arrives and why AI agents worry Five Eyes spies
It is December 2025, and a storm is sweeping through parts of the South Island, with emergency responders alongside a set of AI agentsresponding to it.

On Wednesday, One NZ’s AI and Data director, Summer Collins, told a crowd … ⌘ Read more

Advanced startups wow Techweek audience across biotech and AI
The breadth and scope of current AI and advanced technology development in New Zealand were highlighted on the opening day of the annual Techweek conference on Monday through a trio of case studies covering biotechnology, family management and efforts to digitise and automate sign language.

[BioOra chief executive and managing director John Robson](https://businessdesk.co.nz/article/startups/tech-st … ⌘ Read more

Small Town Fights Over Flock’s AI-Enhanced Network of License Plate-Reading Cameras
160 miles north of New York City, a man was convicted of manslaughter “with the help of license plate reader technology,” reports a local news station. In the small town of Troy (population: 51,000), the mayor described the cameras as “a critical tool” in that investigation. But locals and city officials “have … ⌘ Read more

PowerHub bets batteries can make wholesale power work for households
A company called PowerHub is hoping to bring a new focus to the New Zealand electricity market by offering residential and commercial consumers exposure to wholesale power prices while using battery technology to reduce exposure to extreme price spikes.

Spot market electricity prices are often significantly lower than standard retail rates, but previous attempts to expose households direct … ⌘ Read more

Digital legacy: How to make sure your family is not locked out
Security keeps people out of our documents, photos, financials, and secrets. How do you make sure family can access them if you die? ⌘ Read more

Suddenly, AI’s tech titans are talking up humanities. Wishful thinking or just a guilt trip?
After decades of dismissing liberal arts as useless, the tech world is coming around to the idea that learning about human nature could be a valuable asset. But it may be too late. ⌘ Read more

Kioxia and Dell Cram Nearly 10PB Into a Single 2U Server
BrianFagioli writes: Kioxia and Dell Technologies say they have built a 2U server configuration capable of scaling to 9.8PB of flash storage, which is the sort of density that would have sounded impossible just a few years ago. The setup combines a Dell PowerEdge R7725xd Server with 40 Kioxia LC9 Series 245.76TB NVMe SSDs and AMD EPYC processors. According t … ⌘ Read more

AMD Is Bringing Improved FSR 4 Upscaling To Its Older GPUs
AMD says FSR 4.1 will finally bring its newer hardware-accelerated upscaling technology to older Radeon GPUs. “The rollout will begin in July with RDNA3- and 3.5-based GPUs, which include the Radeon RX 7000 series, as well as integrated GPUs like the Radeon 890M and Radeon 8060S,” reports Ars Technica. “In ‘early 2027,’ support will also be extended to t … ⌘ Read more

AI start-up boss who faked millions in revenue faces jail time
The former chief executive has been told by his own lawyer that a jail sentence is unavoidable after pleading guilty to fraud. ⌘ Read more

Google takes fight to Apple, Microsoft with new high-end laptops
The web giant’s new line of Googlebook laptops will bring Gemini AI to the laptop in an attempt to compete with Apple’s MacBook and Microsoft’s Copilot+ PCs. ⌘ Read more

LinkedIn cuts hit Australia as global cull claims 875 jobs
Local leadership has been gutted but the Microsoft-owned company says AI isn’t to blame. ⌘ Read more

US Clears H200 Chip Sales To 10 China Firms
Longtime Slashdot reader schwit1 shares a report from CNBC: The U.S. has cleared around 10 Chinese firms to buy Nvidia’s second-most powerful AI chip, the H200, but not a single delivery has been made so far, three people familiar with the matter said, leaving a major technology deal in limbo as CEO Jensen Huang seeks a breakthrough in China this week. […] Before U.S. export curb … ⌘ Read more

Linux’s KVM With CET Virtualization Is Causing Some Hosts To Hang
Introduced to the Linux kernel last year was Control-flow Enforcement Technology “CET” virtualization for modern AMD and Intel CPUs. This complements CET that has existed in Linux for quite some time but it’s new now to the KVM virtualization world, but some yet to be diagnosed problems are causing some hosts to hang when making use of this virtualization security feature… ⌘ Read more

Firmus quietly scrubs UN logo ahead of $12 billion IPO push
AI factory builder Firmus, eyeing a $12 billion ASX float, displayed the UN emblem on every page of its website before quietly removing it. ⌘ Read more

LinkedIn Planning To Lay Off 5% of Staff In Latest Tech-Sector Cuts
An anonymous reader quotes a report from Reuters: LinkedIn planned to inform staff of layoffs on Wednesday, two people familiar with the matter told Reuters, in a widening of technology sector cuts this year. The Microsoft-owned social network plans to cut about 5% of its headcount as it reorganizes teams and focuses personnel on areas where … ⌘ Read more

KDE Receives $1.4 Million Investment From Sovereign Tech Fund
The German Sovereign Tech Fund has invested 1.2 million euros ($1.4 million USD) in KDE Plasma technologies to help strengthen the structural reliability and security of the desktop environment’s core infrastructure, including Plasma, KDE Linux, and the frameworks underlying its communication services. Longtime Slashdot reader jrepin shares an excerpt fro … ⌘ Read more

Ransom ‘paid’ to hackers who crippled online learning in Australia
More than 120 Australian schools, universities and TAFEs were caught in the world’s largest education breach. Now their data is supposedly deleted. ⌘ Read more

Sam Altman details ‘hair-raising’ chat with Elon Musk as he takes stand
Nobody has more to lose in the high-profile trial than OpenAI chief Sam Altman, and he has finally taken to the stand. ⌘ Read more

Amazon Employees Are ‘Tokenmaxxing’ Due To Pressure To Use AI Tools
An anonymous reader quotes a report from the Financial Times (via Ars Technica): Amazon employees are using an internal AI tool to automate non-essential tasks in a bid to show managers they are using the technology more frequently. The Seattle-based group has started to widely deploy its in-house “MeshClaw” product in recent weeks, allowing emplo … ⌘ Read more