February 22, 2025

US AI Safety Institute could face big cuts

The National Institute of Standards and Technology could fire as many as 500 staffers, according to multiple reports — cuts that further threaten a fledgling AI safety organization. Axios reported this week that the US AI Safety Institute (AISI) and Chips for America, both part of NIST, would be “gutted” by layoffs targeting probationary employees […]

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September 2023

Airbnb is verifying all properties in its top five markets including the U.S.

September 20, 2023
Airbnb is trying to crack down on fake listings by verifying all listings in its top five markets — US, Canada, Australia, UK, and France. The company is trying to crack down on fake listings through this program by asking hosts to submit information such as photos with GPS data The company said it will […]

Legit Security lands $40M to lock down apps and dev environments

September 20, 2023
Legit Security, a cybersecurity company developing a platform to identify app vulnerabilities from code, has raised $40 million in a Series B funding round led by CRV with participation from Cyberstarts, Bessemer Venture Partners and TCV. Co-founder and CEO Roni Fuchs says that the funds, which bring Legit’s total raised to $77 million, will be […]

Why the Bull Market is Still in Charge?

September 20, 2023
It’s been nearly 2 months that the S&P 500 (SPY) has been mired in a trading range. That is why investment veteran Steve Reitmeister shares his latest insights to explain…

The deepfake avatars who want to sell you everything

September 20, 2023
This story first appeared in China Report, MIT Technology Review’s newsletter about technology developments in China. Sign up to receive it in your inbox every Tuesday. Writing about China, a question I always get is: What technology is ubiquitous there but hasn’t caught on in the West? One of my go-to answers is livestream e-commerce.  If you…

Google-backed Indian audio platform Kuku FM raises $25 million

September 20, 2023
Google-backed audio content platform Kuku FM has raised $25 million in a new funding round as it looks to make deeper inroads with its audiobook offerings in the South Asian market. Indian billionaire and technologist Nandan Nilekani’s Fundamentum Partnership co-led the Series C funding in Kuku FM with International Finance Corporation, part of the World […]

Ghana’s Complete Farmer, which connects farmers to global food buyers, raises $10.4M

September 20, 2023
Africa’s agricultural sector has a significant social and economic impact, per McKinsey. The percentage of smallholder farmers in sub-Saharan Africa exceeds 60%, while agriculture accounts for approximately 23% of the region’s gross domestic product. But despite the apparent opportunity in the agricultural sector, it is difficult for Africa to successfully participate in global supply chains […]

Terraform fork gets renamed OpenTofu, and joins Linux Foundation

September 20, 2023
When HashiCorp announced it was changing its Terraform license in August, it set off a firestorm in the open source community, and actually represented an existential threat to startups who were built on top of the popular open source project. The community went into action and within weeks they had written a manifesto, and soon […]