Category: Business

U.S. President Donald Trump says he wants to make the United States the cryptocurrency capital of the world. He is putting his plan into place in the early weeks of his second presidential term. VOA's Michelle Quinn has the story. ...

Several governments, including the U.S., Taiwan and Australia, have banned the use of China’s AI software DeepSeek on official devices. Analysts say these restrictions are justified, as tests show DeepSeek not only collects excessive user data but also filters sensitive topics and promotes Chinese government narratives more aggressively than Baidu and WeChat. This raises concern that it could become a powerful tool for controlling speech and public opinion.  Click here for the full story in Mandarin. ...

Robots with reasoning power are becoming a reality thanks to massive amounts of training data and breakthroughs in artificial intelligence. VOA's Matt Dibble visits a lab where robots are learning to solve problems themselves. Cameras: Matt Dibble, Tina Trinh. ...

WASHINGTON — A bipartisan duo in the U.S. House is proposing legislation to ban the Chinese artificial intelligence app DeepSeek from federal devices, similar to the policy already in place for the popular social media platform TikTok. Lawmakers Josh Gottheimer, a Democrat from New Jersey, and Darin LaHood, a Republican from Illinois, on Thursday introduced the "No DeepSeek on Government Devices Act," which would ban federal employees from using the Chinese AI app on government-owned electronics. They cited the Chinese government's ability to use the app for surveillance and misinformation as reasons to keep it away from federal networks. "The Chinese Communist Party has made it abundantly clear that it will exploit any tool at its disposal to undermine our national security, spew harmful disinformation, and collect data on Americans," Gottheimer…

U.S. prosecutors on Tuesday unveiled an expanded 14-count indictment accusing former Google software engineer Linwei Ding of stealing artificial intelligence trade secrets to benefit two Chinese companies he was secretly working for.  Ding, 38, a Chinese national, was charged by a federal grand jury in San Francisco with seven counts each of economic espionage and theft of trade secrets.  Each economic espionage charge carries a maximum 15-year prison term and $5 million fine, while each trade secrets charge carries a maximum 10-year term and $250,000 fine.  The defendant, also known as Leon Ding, was indicted last March on four counts of theft of trade secrets. He is free on bond. His lawyers did not immediately respond to requests for comment.  Ding's case was coordinated through an interagency Disruptive Technology Strike…

PARIS — France hosts top tech players next week at an artificial intelligence summit meant as a "wake-up call" for Europe as it struggles with AI challenges from the United States and China. Players from across the sector and representatives from 80 nations will gather in the French capital on February 10 and 11 in the sumptuous Grand Palais, built for the 1900 Universal Exhibition. In the run-up, President Emmanuel Macron will on Feb. 4 visit research centers applying AI to science and health, before hosting scientists and Nobel Prize winners at his Elysee Palace residence on Wednesday. A wider science conference will be held at the Polytechnique engineering school on Thursday and Friday. "The summit comes at exactly the right time for this wake-up call for France and Europe, and…

LONDON — Britain will become the first country to introduce laws against AI tools used to generate sexual abuse images, the government announced Saturday. The government will make it illegal to possess, create or distribute AI tools designed to generate sexualized images of children, punishable by up to five years in prison, interior minister Yvette Cooper revealed. It will also be illegal to possess AI "pedophile manuals" which teach people how to use AI to sexually abuse children, punishable by up to three years in prison. "We know that sick predators' activities online often lead to them carrying out the most horrific abuse in person," said Cooper. The new laws are "designed to keep our children safe online as technologies evolve. It is vital that we tackle child sexual abuse online…

SEOUL, SOUTH KOREA — When Chinese startup DeepSeek released its AI model this month, it was hailed as a breakthrough, a sign that China’s artificial intelligence companies could compete with their Silicon Valley counterparts using fewer resources. The narrative was clear: DeepSeek had done more with less, finding clever workarounds to U.S. chip restrictions. However, that storyline has begun to shift. OpenAI, the U.S.-based company behind ChatGPT, now claims DeepSeek may have improperly used its proprietary data to train its model, raising questions about whether DeepSeek’s success was truly an engineering marvel. In statements to several media outlets this week, OpenAI said it is reviewing indications that DeepSeek may have trained its AI by mimicking responses from OpenAI’s models. The process, known as distillation, is common among AI developers but is…

An estimated nine million Nigerians are deaf or have hearing impairments, and many cope with discrimination that limits their access to education and employment. But one initiative is working to change that — empowering deaf people with tech skills to improve their career prospects. Timothy Obiezu reports from Abuja. Camera: Timothy Obiezu ...

Days after Chinese upstart DeepSeek revealed a breakthrough in cheap AI computing that shook the U.S. technology industry, the chief executives of Microsoft and Meta defended massive spending that they said was key to staying competitive in the new field. DeepSeek's quick progress has stirred doubts about the lead America has in AI with models that it claims can match or even outperform Western rivals at a fraction of the cost, but the U.S. executives said on Wednesday that building huge computer networks was necessary to serve growing corporate needs. "Investing 'very heavily' in capital expenditure and infrastructure is going to be a strategic advantage over time," Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said on a post-earnings call. Satya Nadella, CEO of Microsoft, said the spending was needed to overcome the capacity…

A small Chinese company sent shockwaves around the tech world this week with news that it has created a high-performing artificial intelligence system with less computing power and at a lower cost than ones made by U.S. tech giants. Michelle Quinn reports. ...

A report issued Wednesday by Google found that hackers from numerous countries, particularly China, Iran and North Korea, have been using the company’s artificial intelligence-enabled Gemini chatbot to supercharge cyberattacks against targets in the United States. The company found — so far, at least — that access to publicly available large language models (LLMs) has made cyberattackers more efficient but has not meaningfully changed the kind of attacks they typically mount. LLMs are AI models that have been trained, using enormous amounts of previously generated content, to identify patterns in human languages. Among other things, this makes them adept at producing high-functioning, error-free computer programs. “Rather than enabling disruptive change, generative AI allows threat actors to move faster and at higher volume,” the report found. Generative AI offered some benefits…

Washington — Just one week after its initial release, China’s new artificial intelligence assistant, DeepSeek, has shocked American financial markets, technology companies and consumers, rocking confidence in America's lead on emerging large-language models. The tool caused a nearly $1 trillion loss in market value for U.S.-based companies with connections to AI. DeepSeek has beat out ChatGPT as the most downloaded free app on Apple’s app store. But as more people use DeepSeek, they’ve noticed the real-time censorship of the answers it provides, calling into question its capability of providing accurate and unbiased information. The app has gone through a series of real-time updates to the content it can display in its answers. Users have discovered that questions DeepSeek was previously able to answer are now met with the message, “Sorry, that's…

Conservationists in Kenya are using an artificial intelligence-powered application to monitor forest degradation and launch reforestation. The data collected by the application is also used to project the amount of carbon that can be stored by a growing patch of forest. Juma Majanga reports from Nyeri, Kenya. ...

Chinese researchers backed by a Hangzhou-based hedge fund recently released a new version of a large language model (LLM) called DeepSeek-R1 that rivals the capabilities of the most advanced U.S.-built products but reportedly does so with fewer computing resources and at much lower cost. High Flyer, the hedge fund that backs DeepSeek, said that the model nearly matches the performance of LLMs built by U.S. firms like OpenAI, Google and Meta, but does so using only about 2,000 older generation computer chips manufactured by U.S.-based industry leader Nvidia while costing only about $6 million worth of computing power to train. By comparison, Meta’s AI system, Llama, uses about 16,000 chips, and reportedly costs Meta vastly more money to train. Open-source model The apparent advance in Chinese AI capabilities comes after…

The multibillion-dollar Stargate Project announced by U.S. President Donald Trump will focus on building data centers with the goal of turning the U.S. into a computing power empire, according to experts. Some believe the significant boost in U.S. computational capabilities will widen the gap with China in artificial intelligence. “And this is an industrial buildout that, at least right now, China really is not in a position to do because of the [semiconductor] export controls that the United States is placing,” said Dean W. Ball, a research fellow at George Mason University’s Mercatus Center. However, there are signs that China is catching up with U.S. companies in key AI metrics by relying on open-source software. Click here for the full report in Mandarin. ...

LONDON/SINGAPORE — Investors hammered technology stocks on Monday, sending the likes of Nvidia and Oracle plummeting, as the emergence of a low-cost Chinese artificial intelligence model cast doubts on Western companies' dominance in this sector.  Startup DeepSeek last week launched a free assistant it says uses less data at a fraction of the cost of incumbent players' models, possibly marking a turning point in the level of investment needed for AI.   Futures on the Nasdaq 100 slid almost 4%, suggesting the index could see its biggest daily slide since September 2022 later on Monday, if those losses are sustained.  Those on the S&P 500 dropped 2%. Shares in AI chipmaker Nvidia fell more than 11%, rival Oracle dropped 8.5% and AI data analytics company Palantir lost 6.5% in pre-market trading.…

Plastic waste accounts for 10 to 12 percent of all solid waste in Kenya, according to the United Nations Environmental Program. A Kenyan tech company is using plastic waste to print 3D models that help college students with their learning while reducing damage to the environment. Mohammed Yusuf reports from Nairobi. ...

ABOARD AIR FORCE ONE — U.S. President Donald Trump said on Saturday he was in talks with multiple people over buying TikTok and would likely have a decision on the popular app's future in the next 30 days. "I have spoken to many people about TikTok and there is great interest in TikTok," Trump told reporters on Air Force One during a flight to Florida. Earlier in the day, Reuters reported two people with knowledge of the discussions said Trump's administration is working on a plan to save TikTok that involves tapping software company Oracle and a group of outside investors to effectively take control of the app's operations. Under the deal being negotiated by the White House, TikTok's China-based owner, ByteDance, would retain a stake in the company, but data…

HARRISBURG, PENNSYLVANIA — Looking for a quick fix for their fast-growing electricity diets, tech giants are increasingly looking to strike deals with power plant owners to plug in directly, avoiding a potentially longer and more expensive process of hooking into a fraying electric grid that serves everyone else.  It's raising questions over whether diverting power to higher-paying customers will leave enough for others and whether it's fair to excuse big power users from paying for the grid. Federal regulators are trying to figure out what to do about it, and quickly.  Front and center is the data center that Amazon's cloud computing subsidiary, Amazon Web Services, is building next to the Susquehanna nuclear plant in eastern Pennsylvania.  The arrangement between the plant's owners and AWS — called a "behind the meter"…

OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA — From his home in northern California, Nick Russell, a former farm manager, is monitoring the Los Angeles-area fires. He knows that about 600 kilometers south, people in Los Angeles are relying on his team’s live neighborhood-by-neighborhood updates on fire outbreaks, smoke direction, surface wind predictions and evacuation routes. Russell is vice president of operations at Watch Duty, a free app that tracks fires and other natural disasters. It relies on a variety of data sources such as cameras and sensors throughout the state, government agencies, first responders, a core of volunteers, and its own team of reporters. An emergency at his house, for example, would be "much different" from one at his neighbor's house .4 kilometers away, Russell said. "That is true for communities everywhere, and that’s where…

WASHINGTON — U.S. President Donald Trump on Thursday signed an executive order related to AI to "make America the world capital in artificial intelligence," his aide told reporters in the White House's Oval Office. The order sets a 180-day deadline for an Artificial Intelligence Action Plan to create a policy "to sustain and enhance America’s global AI dominance in order to promote human flourishing, economic competitiveness, and national security." Trump also told his AI adviser and national security assistant to work to remove policies and regulations put in place by former President Joe Biden. Trump on Monday revoked a 2023 executive order signed by Biden that sought to reduce the risks that artificial intelligence poses to consumers, workers and national security. Biden's order required developers of AI systems that pose risks…

London — Google's Android and Apple's iOS are facing fresh scrutiny from Britain's competition watchdog, which announced investigations Thursday targeting the two tech giants' mobile phone ecosystems under new powers to crack down on digital market abuses.  The Competition and Markets Authority said it launched separate investigations to determine whether the mobile ecosystems controlled by Apple and Google should be given "strategic market status" that would mandate changes in the companies' practices.  The watchdog is flexing its newly acquired regulatory muscles again after the new digital market rules took effect at the start of the year. The CMA has already used the new rules, designed to protect consumers and businesses from unfair practices by Big Tech companies, to open an investigation into Google's search ads business.  The new investigations will examine…

Before he had been in office for 48 hours, President Donald Trump sent a clear signal that to outpace China, his administration will be pursuing an aggressive agenda when it comes to pushing the United States forward on the development of artificial intelligence and the infrastructure that powers it. On his first day in office, Trump rescinded an executive order signed in 2023 by former President Joe Biden that sought to place some guardrails around the development of more and more powerful generative AI tools and to create other protections for privacy, civil rights and national security. The following day, Trump met with the leaders of several leading technology firms, including Sam Altman, CEO of Open AI; Larry Ellison, chairman of Oracle; and Masayoshi Son, CEO of SoftBank, to announce…

Singapore — TikTok’s short-lived shutdown in the United States has opened a wider debate in other countries regarding access to popular social media platforms by children. TikTok went dark temporarily Sunday in the U.S. after a new law banning it went into effect. The law required TikTok’s Chinese-owned parent company ByteDance to sell the app’s U.S. operation due to national security concerns over its ties to Beijing. After his inauguration on Monday, President Donald Trump signed an executive order halting the ban for 75 days, giving ByteDance additional time to find a buyer. The order provides relief to the app’s 170 million American users, many of them young adults. More than 60% of teenagers in the U.S. ages 13 to 17 use TikTok, with most of them accessing the platform daily,…

Millions of U.S. TikTok users are looking to newly sworn-in President Donald Trump, who has given the app’s Chinese parent, ByteDance, 75 days to strike a deal with a U.S. buyer. ...

WASHINGTON — President Donald Trump on Tuesday talked up a joint venture investing up to $500 billion for infrastructure tied to artificial intelligence by a new partnership formed by OpenAI, Oracle and SoftBank.  The new entity, Stargate, will start building data centers and the electricity generation needed for the further development of the fast-evolving AI in Texas, according to the White House. The initial investment is expected to be $100 billion and could reach five times that sum.  "It's big money and high quality people," said Trump, adding that it's "a resounding declaration of confidence in America's potential" under his new administration.  Joining Trump fresh off his inauguration at the White House were Masayoshi Son of SoftBank, Sam Altman of OpenAI and Larry Ellison of Oracle. All three credited Trump for…

Washington — TikTok restored services to users in the United States on Sunday after briefly blocking access due to a U.S. law banning the social media platform based on national security concerns.  The situation played out amid the change in U.S. administrations as President-elect Donald Trump said he would seek to “extend the period of time before the law's prohibitions take effect.”  He also proposed, in a post on his Truth Social platform, for the United States to take a 50% ownership stake in TikTok.  The U.S. Supreme Court on Friday upheld legislation passed by Congress that called for banning TikTok unless its China-based parent company sold it by Sunday.  The Biden administration had said it would not seek to enforce the ban in its final days in office, leaving the…