Amazon’s AI chatbot Rufus drove sales on Black Friday
On Black Friday, Amazon sessions that resulted in a sale were up 100% in the U.S. when the AI chatbot Rufus was used. They only increased by 20% when Rufus wasn’t used.
OpenAI has trained its LLM to confess to bad behavior
OpenAI is testing another new way to expose the complicated processes at work inside large language models. Researchers at the company can make an LLM produce what they call a confession, in which the model explains how it carried out a task and (most of the time) owns up to any bad behavior. Figuring out…
TopTechTrends
How AI PR startup Clipbook won Mark Cuban’s investment from a cold email
Adam Joseph was shocked when Mark Cuban replied to his email with an inquisition full of questions.
Tech Alone Won’t Shape the Future — Here’s Why We Need Human Influence
The next generation of technology must be built in dialogue with artists, storytellers and cultural thinkers to create tools that feel human, not just functional.
At least 80 new tech unicorns were minted in 2025 so far
Using data from Crunchbase and PitchBook, TechCrunch tracked down the VC-backed startups that became unicorns so far this year.
How to Build a Self-Sustaining Client Network and Turn a Real Profit
One-off projects can pay the bills, but they don’t always build a business. This is what freelancers need to do instead.
Black Forest Labs raises $300M at $3.25B valuation
The round was co-led by Salesforce Ventures and Anjney Midha (AMP), and saw participation from a16z, NVIDIA, Northzone, Creandum, Earlybird VC, BroadLight Capital, General Catalyst, Temasek, Bain Capital Ventures, Air Street Capital, Visionaries Club, Canva and Figma Ventures.
The Download: spotting crimes in prisoners’ phone calls, and nominate an Innovator Under 35
This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. An AI model trained on prison phone calls now looks for planned crimes in those calls A US telecom company trained an AI model on years of inmates’ phone and video calls and…
Korea’s Coupang says data breach exposed nearly 34M customers’ personal information
E-commerce company Coupang has confirmed a massive data breach affecting 33.7 million customer accounts in South Korea.
Nominations are now open for our global 2026 Innovators Under 35 competition
We have some exciting news: Nominations are now open for MIT Technology Review’s 2026 Innovators Under 35 competition. This annual list recognizes 35 of the world’s best young scientists and inventors, and our newsroom has produced it for more than two decades. It’s free to nominate yourself or someone you know, and it only takes…
An AI model trained on prison phone calls now looks for planned crimes in those calls
A US telecom company trained an AI model on years of inmates’ phone and video calls and is now piloting that model to scan their calls, texts, and emails in the hope of predicting and preventing crimes. Securus Technologies president Kevin Elder told MIT Technology Review that the company began building its AI tools in…