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Microsoft announces service 'restored,' global outage over

Tech giant Microsoft said Saturday it has "restored service" to customers, effectively bringing an end to a massive outage that caused chaos and disrupted public services and business around the world.

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Microsoft says services fully restored after hourslong global outage

Microsoft said Saturday that services were fully restored after a massive outage that lasted for hours.

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Influencers, AI, addiction: EU looks to protect consumers online

The European Union on Wednesday put forward new rules to crack down on influencer marketing, ban online features that trick Europeans and force platforms to give users the right to turn off "addictive" features.

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New research highlights shortcomings in the protection of freedom of expression on social media

Who ensures that social media platforms do not restrict people's freedom of expression? The EU has introduced a system intended to strengthen users' rights when posts are removed or accounts are suspended. However, new research ...

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I don't want AI in my online search. What options do I have?

Last week, Google announced a new artificial intelligence (AI) policy for schools that use Google apps. It provides new settings for opting in or out of AI products on student accounts. Schools that reject AI in the classroom ...

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Tracing the online networks behind AI-generated nude images

As Domestic Violence Awareness Month comes to a close this week, one University of Florida researcher is examining the roots of nudification apps, online platforms that use AI to turn images of clothed people—easily and convincingly—into ...

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How to prepare your online life for your death

What happens to all of your online accounts—credit cards, merchants, news subscriptions, social media, streaming services—after you die? How will your heirs know how to access these accounts or understand what you want done ...

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AI giants promise publishers new way to block some scraping

OpenAI, Google, Microsoft and Anthropic pledged on Friday to give media outlets and other websites a single way to prevent their content from being scraped to train artificial intelligence (AI) models, amid growing criticisms ...

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Thousands of deceptive ads evade Google's safeguards

Thousands of deceptive advertisements have slipped through Google's advertising safeguards, exposing internet users to fake virus warnings, misleading software promises and potentially dangerous downloads, according to new ...

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UK probes Meta over 'exploitative' new terms for media

Britain's competition watchdog Friday opened an investigation into whether Meta was imposing "exploitative" new terms allowing it to use media content for its own products, including AI, without giving publishers adequate ...

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41,000 DHS names leaked in major hack, collective says

A nonprofit news leak group said Wednesday it has published data on more than 41,000 employees of the U.S. Department of Homeland Security, including those working on President Donald Trump's immigration enforcement efforts.

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Google boosts news and link visibility in AI Mode

Google announced Thursday it will start displaying links to websites and articles more prominently and higher up in search results powered by artificial intelligence (AI), as brands and news publishers warn of a sharp decline ...

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US Senate to vote on kids online safety bills

The US Senate will vote on a pair of bills this week designed to protect children online which would be the first major legislation targeting the tech industry in a generation.

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In U-turn, Google sticks with tracking 'cookies'

Google on Monday said it was ditching its long mooted plan to block tracking "cookies" on its Chrome browser after years of resistance from online publishers and questions from regulators.

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Conspiracy theories take off after global IT crash

From fearmongering about a looming "World War III" to false narratives linking a cabal of global elite to a cyberattack, a torrent of online conspiracy theories took off Friday after a major IT crash.

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Musk's X misleads users with blue checks, EU charges

Tech billionaire Elon Musk's X platform is deceiving users with its blue checkmarks for certified accounts, and is also violating EU content rules, Brussels said Friday, in a finding that could lead to hefty fines.

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US says it broke up Russian AI bot farm on X

The United States has disrupted a Russian disinformation campaign involving AI-powered bots used to create fake profiles on the social media platform X, the Justice Department said Tuesday.

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Bot-like accounts spreading 'hate' during UK election: NGO

Bot-like social media accounts have spread "disinformation and hate" in tens of thousands of posts viewed an estimated 150 million times during the UK general election campaign, a watchdog investigation revealed Tuesday.