The Year Chatbots Were Tamed

A year ago, on Valentine’s Day, I said good night to my wife, went to my home office to answer some emails and accidentally had the strangest first date of my life. The date was a two-hour conversation with Sydney, the A.I. alter ego tucked inside Microsoft’s Bing search engine, which I had been assigned…

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Terrorists Are Paying for Check Marks on X, Report Says

X, the social media platform owned by Elon Musk, is potentially violating U.S. sanctions by accepting payments for subscription accounts from terrorist organizations and other groups barred from doing business in the country, according to a new report. The report, by the Tech Transparency Project, a nonprofit focused on accountability for large technology companies, shows…

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Hackers for China, Russia and Others Used OpenAI Systems, Report Says

Hackers working for nation-states have used OpenAI’s systems in the creation of their cyberattacks, according to research released Wednesday by OpenAI and Microsoft. The companies believe their research, published on their websites, documents for the first time how hackers with ties to foreign governments are using generative artificial intelligence in their attacks. But instead of…

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OpenAI Gives ChatGPT a Better ‘Memory’

OpenAI is giving ChatGPT a better memory. The San Francisco artificial intelligence start-up said on Tuesday that it was releasing a new version of its chatbot that would remember what users say so that it could use that information in future chats. If a user mentions a daughter, Lina, who is about to turn 5,…

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How China Built BYD, Its Tesla Killer

China’s BYD was a battery manufacturer trying its hand at building cars when it showed off its newest model in 2007. American executives at the Guangzhou auto show gaped at the car’s uneven purple paint job and the poor fit of its doors. “They were the laughingstock of the industry,” said Michael Dunne, a China…

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When the Voice You Hear Is Not the Actor You See

In the darkest moments of a family tragedy, when the playwright Mona Pirnot couldn’t find the strength to verbalize her feelings to her boyfriend or her therapist, she tried something a little unorthodox: She typed her thoughts into her laptop, and prompted a text-to-speech program to voice them aloud. It was a coping mechanism that…

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Imran Khan Uses A.I. To Give Victory Speech in Pakistan

Imran Khan, Pakistan’s former prime minister, has spent the duration of the country’s electoral campaign in jail, disqualified from running in what experts have described as one of the least credible general elections in the country’s 76-year history. But from behind bars, he has been rallying his supporters in recent months with speeches that use…

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Google Joins Effort to Help Spot Content Made With A.I.

Google, whose work in artificial intelligence helped make A.I.-generated content far easier to create and spread, now wants to ensure that such content is traceable as well. The tech giant said on Thursday that it was joining an effort to develop credentials for digital content, a sort of “nutrition label” that identifies when and how…

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