An anonymous reader shares a report: Citigroup plans to dramatically reduce its reliance on IT contractors and hire thousands of employees for IT as the lender grapples with regulatory punishments over data governance and deficient controls. Citigroup's head of technology Tim Ryan told staff in recent weeks that the bank aims to cut back external contractors to 20% of those working in IT from the current 50%, according to an internal presentation to employees seen by Reuters. The briefing did not give a precise time horizon for the changes. As part of the overhaul, Citi will replenish the ranks by hiring more staff, and aims to have 50,000 employees in technology, up from 48,000 in 2024, the presentation showed. "Citi is growing our internal technology capabilities to support our strategy to improve safety and soundness, enable revenue growth and drive efficiencies," Citi said in a statement to Reuters.

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Google is continuing its quest to get more people to use Gemini, and it's doing that by giving away even more AI computing. From a report: Today, Google is releasing a raft of improvements for the Gemini 2.0 models, and as part of that upgrade, some of the AI's most advanced features are now available to free users. You'll be able to use the improved Deep Research to get in-depth information on a topic, and Google's newest reasoning model can peruse your search history to improve its understanding of you as a person. [...] With the aim of making Gemini more personal to you, Google is also plugging Flash Thinking Experimental into a new source of data: your search history. Google stresses that you have to opt in to this feature, and it can be disabled at any time. Gemini will even display a banner to remind you it's connected to your search history so you don't forget.

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OpenAI has warned the U.S. government that restricting AI models from learning from copyrighted material would threaten America's technological leadership against China, according to a proposal submitted [PDF] to the Office of Science and Technology Policy for the AI Action Plan. In its March 13 document, OpenAI argues its AI training aligns with fair use doctrine, saying its models don't replicate works but extract "patterns, linguistic structures, and contextual insights" without harming commercial value of original content. "If the PRC's developers have unfettered access to data and American companies are left without fair use access, the race for AI is effectively over. America loses, as does the success of democratic AI," OpenAI stated. The Microsoft-backed startup criticized European and UK approaches that allow copyright holders to opt out of AI training, claiming these restrictions hinder innovation, particularly for smaller companies with limited resources. The proposal comes as China-based DeepSeek recently released an AI model with capabilities comparable to American systems despite development at a fraction of the cost.

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An anonymous reader shares a report: Germany's foreign intelligence service in 2020 put at 80%-90% the likelihood that the coronavirus behind the COVID-19 pandemic was accidentally released from China's Wuhan Institute of Virology, two German newspapers reported on Wednesday. According to a joint report by publications Die Zeit and Sueddeutscher Zeitung, Germany's spying agency BND had indications that the institute had conducted gain-of-function experiments, whereby viruses are modified to become more transmissible to humans for research purposes. It also had indications that numerous violations of safety regulations had occurred at the lab, the papers said. The spy agency assessment's was based on an unspecified intelligence operation code-named "Saaremaa" as well as on publicly-available data. It had been commissioned by the office of Germany's chancellor at the time, Angela Merkel, but never published, the report said.

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Microsoft says that some USB printers will start printing random text after installing Windows updates released since late January 2025. From a report: The known issue affects Windows 10 (version 22H2) and Windows 11 (versions 22H2 and 23H2), but according to an update to the Windows release health dashboard, the latest Windows 11 24H2 is not impacted. "After installing the January 2025 Windows preview update (KB5050092), released January 29, 2025, or later updates, you might observe issues with USB connected dual-mode printers that support both USB Print and IPP Over USB protocols," Redmond explains. "You might observe that the printer unexpectedly prints random text and data, including network commands and unusual characters." On affected systems, users will often see erroneously printed text that begins with the header "POST /ipp/print HTTP/1.1," followed by other IPP (Internet Printing Protocol) related issues headers. These printing issues are more frequent when the printer is turned on or reconnected after being disconnected. Affected users will observe the printer unexpectedly printing when the print spooler sends IPP protocol messages to the printer and the printer driver is installed on the Windows device.

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Mozilla has warned that the U.S. Department of Justice's proposed remedies in its antitrust case against Google would harm independent browsers and reduce competition in the browser market. The DOJ and several state attorneys general last week filed revised proposed remedies in the U.S. v. Google search case that would prohibit all search payments to browser developers, a move Mozilla says would disproportionately impact smaller players. "These proposed remedies prohibiting search payments to small and independent browsers miss the bigger picture -- and the people who will suffer most are everyday internet users," said Mark Surman, President of Mozilla. Unlike Apple and Microsoft, which generate revenue from hardware and operating systems, Mozilla relies primarily on search revenue to fund browser development. Mozilla argues that cutting these payments would not solve search dominance but would instead strengthen the position of tech giants. Mozilla also warned that the proposal threatens its ability to maintain Gecko, one of only three major browser engines alongside Google's Chromium and Apple's WebKit. "If we lose our ability to maintain Gecko, it's game over for an open, independent web," Surman said, noting that even Microsoft abandoned its browser engine in 2019. "If Mozilla is unable to sustain our browser engine, it would severely impact browser engine competition and mean the death of the open web as we know it -- essentially, creating a web where dominant players like Google and Apple, have even more control, not less." Firefox serves 27 million monthly active users in the U.S. and nearly 205 million globally.

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An Australian man in his forties has become the first person in the world to leave hospital with an artificial heart made of titanium. From a report: The device is used as a stopgap for people with heart failure who are waiting for a donor heart, and previous recipients of this type of artificial heart had remained in US hospitals while it was in place. The man lived with the device for more than three months until he underwent surgery to receive a donated human heart. The man is recovering well, according to a statement from St Vincent's Hospital in Sydney, Australia, where the operations were conducted. The Australian is the sixth person globally to receive the device, known as BiVACOR, but the first to live with it for more than a month.

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Microsoft is preparing to launch an AI-powered Copilot for Gaming soon that will guide Xbox players through games and act as an assistant to download and launch games. From a report: Copilot for Gaming, as Microsoft is branding it, will be available through the Xbox mobile app initially and is designed to work on a second screen as a companion or assistant. Microsoft is positioning Copilot for Gaming as a sidekick of sorts, one that will accompany you through games, offering up tips and guides and useful information about a game world. During a press briefing, Sonali Yadav, product manager for gaming AI, demonstrated several scenarios for what Copilot for Gaming could be used for. One involved a concept demo of Copilot assisting an Overwatch 2 player by coaching them on the mistakes they made when trying to push without teammates.

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A new statistical analysis has identified the films audiences "love to hate," with Battlefield Earth, Morbius, Grease 2, and Cats topping the list of cinema's most detested productions. The study, published by data analyst Daniel Parris, examined review data from MovieLens to calculate both the percentage of one-star reviews and total disapproval magnitude for each release. A common thread among these widely derided titles: many were adaptations of popular books or shows, or attempted to capitalize on once-beloved franchises. Adam Sandler leads the actors most frequently appearing in widely disliked films, followed by comedians and action stars who have starred in productions with high one-star review rates. The research also reveals an industry trend toward increasing one-star reviews over time, with family-oriented fare and horror films receiving disproportionately negative ratings despite consistent box office profitability - suggesting studios have prioritized risk-averse, commercially viable projects over critical acclaim.

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Britain's competition watchdog has concluded that Apple and Google are stifling competition in the UK mobile browser market, following an investigation by the Competition and Markets Authority (CMA). The inquiry found Apple's iOS policies particularly restrictive, requiring all browsers to use its WebKit engine while giving Safari preferential access to features. Apple's practice of pre-installing Safari as the default browser also reduces awareness of alternatives, despite allowing users to change defaults. Google faces similar criticism for pre-installing Chrome on most Android devices, though investigators noted both companies have recently taken steps to facilitate browser switching. The probe identified Apple's revenue-sharing arrangement with Google -- which pays a significant share of search revenue to be the default iPhone search engine -- as "significantly reducing their financial incentives to compete."

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Parents who are worried about their children being on Roblox should not let them use it, the chief executive of the gigantic gaming platform has said. From a report: The site, which is the most popular in the UK among young gamers aged eight to 12, has been dogged by claims of some children being exposed to explicit or harmful content through its games, alongside multiple reported allegations of bullying and grooming. But its co-founder and CEO Dave Baszucki insisted that the company is vigilant in protecting its users and pointed out that "tens of millions" of people have "amazing experiences" on the site. When asked what his message is to parents who don't want their children on the platform, Mr Baszucki said: "My first message would be, if you're not comfortable, don't let your kids be on Roblox." [...] "That sounds a little counter-intuitive, but I would always trust parents to make their own decisions," he told BBC News in an exclusive interview.

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Netflix has deployed AI upscaling on the 1987-1993 sitcom "A Different World," resulting in significant visual artifacts documented by technology commentator Scott Hanselman. The AI processing, intended to enhance the original 360p footage for modern displays, has generated distortions resembling "lava lamp effects" on actors' bodies, improperly rendered mouths, and misshapen background objects including posters and tennis rackets. This marks Netflix's second controversial AI implementation in recent months, following December's AI-powered dubbing and mouth morphing on "La Palma."

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The abstract of a paper published on National Bureau of Economic Research: We document that, after remaining almost constant for almost 30 years, real labor productivity at U.S. restaurants surged over 15% during the COVID pandemic. This surge has persisted even as many conditions have returned to pre-pandemic levels. Using mobile phone data tracking visits and spending at more than 100,000 individual limited service restaurants across the country, we explore the potential sources of the surge. It cannot be explained by economies of scale, expanding market power, or a direct result of COVID-sourced demand fluctuations. The restaurants' productivity growth rates are strongly correlated, however, with reductions in the amount of time their customers spend in the establishments, particularly with a rising share of customers spending 10 minutes or less. The frequency of such 'take-out' customers rose considerably during COVID, even at fast food restaurants, and never went back down. The magnitude of the restaurant-level relationship between productivity and customer dwell time, if applied to the aggregate decrease in dwell time, can explain almost all of the aggregate productivity increase in our sample.

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D-Wave researchers have published findings in Science demonstrating what they call "quantum supremacy" by showing their quantum annealers can solve problems beyond the reach of classical computers. The team, led by Andrew D. King, demonstrated area-law scaling of entanglement in model quench dynamics of two-, three- and infinite-dimensional spin glasses. The research shows quantum annealers rapidly generating samples that closely match solutions to the Schrodinger equation, supporting observed stretched-exponential scaling in matrix-product-state approaches. According to the paper, D-Wave's processors completed these magnetic materials simulations in under 20 minutes, while the same calculations would require nearly a million years on Oak Ridge National Laboratory's supercomputers. The claim hasn't gone unchallenged. Miles Stoudenmire from the Flatiron Institute's Center for Computational Quantum Physics argues that classical computers can achieve comparable results using methods developed since D-Wave's initial findings. "We're just saying, 'Look, this one problem at this one time didn't beat classical computers. Try again,'" Stoudenmire noted. The quantum computing community has increasingly shifted terminology from "supremacy" to "advantage" or "utility," focusing on solving practical business or scientific problems faster, more accurately, or more economically than classical alternatives.

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Several Asian airlines have tightened restrictions on portable battery chargers amid growing concerns about fire risks, following a January blaze that destroyed an Air Busan aircraft in South Korea. South Korean airlines now require passengers to keep portable chargers within arm's reach rather than in overhead bins, a rule implemented March 1 to ease public anxiety, according to the Transportation Ministry. Taiwan's EVA Air and China Airlines have banned using or charging power banks on flights but still allow them in overhead compartments. Thai Airways announced a similar ban last Friday, citing "incidents of in-flight fires on international airlines." Battery-related incidents on U.S. airlines have increased from 32 in 2016 to 84 last year, with portable chargers identified as the most common culprit, according to Federal Aviation Administration data. The International Civil Aviation Organization has banned lithium-ion batteries from cargo holds since 2016, though no industry standard exists for regulating power banks.

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Global sales of smartwatches have fallen for the first time, new figures indicate, in large part due to a sharp decline in the popularity of market leader, Apple. From a report: Market research firm Counterpoint says 7% fewer of the devices were shipped in 2024 compared to the year before. Shipments of Apple Watches fell by 19% in that period, Counterpoint says. It blames the slump on a lack of new features in Apple's latest devices, and the fact a rumoured high-end Ultra 3 model never materialised.

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The Federal Trade Commission asked a judge in Seattle to delay the start of its trial accusing Amazon of duping consumers into signing up for its Prime program, citing resource constraints. CNBC: Attorneys for the FTC made the request during a status hearing on Wednesday before Judge John Chun in the U.S. District Court for the Western District of Washington. Chun had set a Sept. 22 start date for the trial. Jonathan Cohen, an attorney for the FTC, asked Chun for a two-month continuance on the case due to staffing and budgetary shortfalls. The FTC's request to delay due to staffing constraints comes amid a push by the Trump administration's Department of Government Efficiency to reduce spending. DOGE, which is led by tech baron Elon Musk, has slashed the federal government's workforce by more than 62,000 workers in February alone. "We have lost employees in the agency, in our division and on our case team," Cohen said.

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Schools across the United States are increasingly using artificial intelligence to monitor students' online activities, raising significant privacy concerns after Vancouver Public Schools inadvertently released nearly 3,500 unredacted, sensitive student documents to reporters. The surveillance software, developed by companies like Gaggle Safety Management, scans school-issued devices 24/7 for signs of bullying, self-harm, or violence, alerting staff when potential issues are detected. Approximately 1,500 school districts nationwide use Gaggle's technology to track six million students, with Vancouver schools paying $328,036 for three years of service. While school officials maintain the technology has helped counselors intervene with at-risk students, documents revealed LGBTQ+ students were potentially outed to administrators through the monitoring.

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IBM CEO Arvind Krishna has publicly disagreed with Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei's prediction that AI will write 90% of code within 3-6 months, estimating instead that only "20-30% of code could get written by AI." "Are there some really simple use cases? Yes, but there's an equally complicated number of ones where it's going to be zero," Krishna said during an onstage interview at SXSW. He argued AI will boost programmer productivity rather than eliminate jobs. "If you can do 30% more code with the same number of people, are you going to get more code written or less?" he asked. "History has shown that the most productive company gains market share, and then you can produce more products."

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Roomba maker iRobot has warned it may cease operations within 12 months unless it can refinance debt or find a buyer, just one day after launching a new vacuum cleaner line. In its March 12 quarterly report, the company disclosed it had spent $3.6 million to amend terms on a $200 million Carlyle Group loan from 2023, as U.S. revenue plunged 47% in the fourth quarter. "Given these uncertainties and the implication they may have on the Company's financials, there is substantial doubt about the Company's ability to continue as a going concern for a period of at least 12 months from the date of the issuance of its consolidated 2024 financial statements," the company wrote. The robot vacuum pioneer has initiated a formal strategic review after a failed Amazon acquisition, the departure of founder Colin Angle, and layoffs affecting over half its workforce. iRobot cited mounting competition from Chinese manufacturers and expects continued losses for "the foreseeable future."

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