Transforming a newly discovered software vulnerability into a cyberattack used to take months. Today—as the recent headlines over Anthropic’s Project Glasswing have shown—generative AI can do the job in minutes, often for less than a dollar of cloud computing time.
But while large language models present a real cyber-threat, they also provide an opportunity to reinforce cyberdefenses.…
Think one GPU is very much like another? Think again. It turns out that there’s surprising variability in the performance delivered by chips of the same model. That can make getting your money’s worth by renting time on a GPU from a cloud provider a real roll of the dice, according to research from the College of William & Mary, Jefferson Lab, and Silicon Data.
“It’s called the silicon…
Artificial intelligence harbors an enormous energy appetite. Such constant cravings are evident in the hefty carbon footprint of the data centers behind the AI boom and the steady increase over time of carbon emissions from training frontier AI models.
No wonder big tech companies are warming up to nuclear energy, envisioning a future fueled by reliable, carbon-free sources. But while…
In April of 2025, OpenAI released a new version of GPT-4o, one of the AI algorithms users could select to power ChatGPT, the company’s chatbot. The next week, OpenAI reverted to the previous version. “The update we removed was overly flattering or agreeable—often described as sycophantic,” the company announced.
Some people found the sycophancy hilarious. One user reportedly asked ChatGPT…
When Ukrainian mathematician Maryna Viazovska received a Fields Medal—widely regarded as the Nobel Prize for mathematics—in July 2022, it was big news. Not only was she the second woman to accept the honor in the award’s 86-year history, but she collected the medal just months after her country had been invaded by Russia. Nearly four years later, Viazovska is making waves again. Today, in a…
Mathematics is often regarded as the ideal domain for measuring AI progress effectively. Math’s step-by-step logic is easy to track, and its definitive automatically verifiable answers remove any human or subjective factors. But AI systems are improving at such a pace that math benchmarks are struggling to keep up.
Way back in November 2024, non-profit research organization Epoch AI quietly…
_For a different perspective on AI companions, see ourQ &A with Jaime Banks: How Do You Define an AI Companion?_
Novel technology is often a double-edged sword. New capabilities come with new risks, and artificial intelligence is certainly no exception.
AI used for human companionship, for instance, promises an ever-present digital friend in an increasingly lonely world. Chatbots dedicated…