August 14, 2026

The Download: Flock’s new rules, cloning’s future, and children’s cells

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. Flock is tightening its rules in response to a growing surveillance backlash The police-tech giant Flock is changing officers’ access to its nationwide network of license plate readers. The move comes…

Technology

A fundamental flaw leaves LLMs strikingly vulnerable to attack

July 30, 2026
It is impossible to make large language models fully secure against hacks because of a fundamental flaw in how they work, a team of researchers argue in a paper presented at the International Conference on Machine Learning, a top AI conference, this month. The claim has huge implications for the safety of this technology, which…

How an overlooked geothermal plant got a second chance

July 29, 2026
In June 2024, a small company called Zanskar purchased a geothermal power plant in New Mexico that was failing fast. The water coming from the underground reservoir was getting colder by the day, making the plant uneconomical to run. Now, two years later, that plant is running at full capacity again, thanks to a new…

The Download: a chip talent battle, and deflating AI hype

July 29, 2026
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. Samsung’s chip workers are jumping ship to rival SK Hynix   Lee, an engineer at Samsung’s semiconductor division, used to work late. But lately, he’s been clocking out on time and heading…

The AI Hype Index: Unsexy AI

July 29, 2026
It feels bad enough when an open letter signed by leading economists warns that AI might steal your job. The fact it may soon be better than you at making dinner? Insult to injury. But that’s exactly what the company 1X promised when it showed off a pair of new, impressively dexterous (and, to some,…

The Download: OpenAI’s predictable hack, and an AI stock sell-off

July 28, 2026
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. OpenAI called the Hugging Face attack unprecedented. But we’ve been here before.  —Will Douglas Heaven, senior AI editor Reading OpenAI’s account last week of how some of its models broke their…

Samsung’s chip workers are jumping ship to rival SK Hynix 

July 28, 2026
Lee, an engineer at Samsung’s semiconductor division, clocks out when his shift ends. He used to work longer hours, going the extra mile to excel at his projects. But lately, he’s been coming straight home to work on his job application for the chipmaker’s South Korean rival SK Hynix, sharing tips with his coworkers on…

OpenAI called the Hugging Face attack unprecedented. But we’ve been here before. 

July 27, 2026
This story originally appeared in The Algorithm, our weekly newsletter on AI. To get stories like this in your inbox first, sign up here. Reading OpenAI’s account last week of how some of its models broke their containment and hacked into the computer systems of Hugging Face, another AI company, was the first time I got…