Category: Business

LONDON — The European Union is investigating Chinese online retailer Temu over suspicions it's failing to prevent the sale of illegal products, the 27-nation bloc's executive arm said on Thursday. The European Commission opened its investigation five months after adding Temu to the list of "very large online platforms" needing the strictest level of scrutiny under the bloc's Digital Services Act. It's a wide-ranging rulebook designed to clean up online platforms and keep internet users safe, with the threat of hefty fines. Temu started entering Western markets only in the past two years and has grown in popularity by offering cheap goods — from clothing to home products — that are shipped from sellers in China. The company, owned by Pinduoduo Incorporated, a popular e-commerce site in China, now has 92…

The crowd-sourced fact-checking feature of Elon Musk's X, Community Notes, is "failing to counter false" claims about the U.S. election, the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) said in a report Wednesday. Out of the 283 misleading posts that CCDH has analyzed on the digital social media platform, 209 or 74% of the posts did not show accurate notes to all X users correcting false and misleading claims about the elections, the report said. "The 209 misleading posts in our sample that did not display available Community Notes to all users have amassed 2.2 billion views," CCDH said, urging the company to invest in safety and transparency. X did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. X launched its "Community Notes" feature last year, which allows users to…

JIUQUAN, China — China declared a “complete success” after it launched a new three-person crew to its orbiting space station early Wednesday as the country seeks to expand its exploration of outer space with missions to the moon and beyond. The Shenzhou-19 spaceship carrying the trio blasted off from the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center in northwest China at 4:27 a.m. local time atop a Long March-2F rocket, the backbone of China’s crewed space missions. “The crew condition is good and the launch has been successful,” the state broadcaster China Central Television announced. China built its own space station after being excluded from the International Space Station, mainly because of U.S. concerns over the People’s Liberation Army, the Chinese Communist Party’s military arm’s overall control over the space program. China’s moon program…

The Treasury Department on Monday finalized a new rule meant to prevent U.S.-based people and companies from investing in the development of a range of advanced technologies in China, thereby preventing Beijing from accessing cutting-edge expertise and equipment. The rule, which implements an executive order signed by President Joe Biden in 2023, focuses particularly on advanced semiconductors and microelectronics and the equipment used to make them, technology used in quantum computing, and artificial intelligence systems. When it takes effect on January 2, the rule will prohibit certain transactions in semiconductors, microelectronics and artificial intelligence. It also establishes mandatory reporting requirements for transactions that are not banned outright. In the field of quantum computing, the rule is more far-reaching, banning all transactions “related to the development of quantum computers or production…

NAIROBI, KENYA — Some companies are coming up with creative ways of making electric vehicles a more realistic option in power-challenged areas of Africa. Countries in Africa have been slow adopters of battery-powered vehicles because finding reliable sources of electricity is a challenge in many places. The Center for Strategic and International Studies described Africa as “the most energy-deficient continent in the world” and said that any progress made in electricity access in the last five years has been reversed by the pandemic and population growth. Onesmus Otieno, for one, regrets trading in his diesel-powered motor bike for an electric one. He earns his living making deliveries and ferrying passengers around Nairobi, Kenya’s capital, with his bike. The two-wheeled taxis popularly known as “boda boda” in Swahili are commonly used in…

Washington — A China-linked disinformation operation is using so-called “Spamouflage” networks to ramp up Beijing’s propaganda aimed at social media users in the West who regularly promote cryptocurrency-related content on X.   Spamouflage accounts are bots pretending to be authentic users that promote narratives that align with Beijing’s talking points issues, such as the COVID-19 pandemic, China’s human rights record, the war in Ukraine and the conflict in Gaza. The cryptocurrency accounts were discovered by a joint investigation between VOA Mandarin and DoubleThink Lab, a Taiwan-based social media analytics firm.   DoubleThink Lab’s analysis uncovered 1,153 accounts that primarily repost news and promotions about cryptocurrency and are likely bots deployed by engagement boosting services to raise their clients’ visibility on social media.   The findings suggest that some official Chinese X…

Experts say small modular reactors, called SMRs, are bringing affordable nuclear energy to less wealthy countries. But what are SMRs and why are proponents so excited about them? VOA reporter Henry Wilkins explains ...

washington — The Pentagon and U.S. intelligence agencies have new marching orders — to more quickly embrace and deploy artificial intelligence as a matter of national security. U.S. President Joe Biden signed the directive, part of a new national security memorandum, on Thursday. The goal is to make sure the United States remains a leader in AI technology while also aiming to prevent the country from falling victim to AI tools wielded by adversaries like China. The memo, which calls AI “an era-defining technology,” also lays out guidelines that the White House says are designed to prevent the use of AI to harm civil liberties or human rights. The new rules will “ensure that our national security agencies are adopting these technologies in ways that align with our values,” a senior…

VIPPEROD, Denmark — European scientists have developed an artificial intelligence algorithm capable of interpreting pig sounds, aiming to create a tool that can help farmers improve animal welfare. The algorithm could potentially alert farmers to negative emotions in pigs, thereby improving their well-being, according to Elodie Mandel-Briefer, a behavioral biologist at University of Copenhagen who is co-leading the study. The scientists, from universities in Denmark, Germany, Switzerland, France, Norway and the Czech Republic, used thousands of recorded pig sounds in different scenarios, including play, isolation and competition for food, to find that grunts, oinks, and squeals reveal positive or negative emotions. While many farmers already have a good understanding of the well-being of their animals by watching them in the pig pen, existing tools mostly measure their physical condition, said Mandel-Briefer.…

Chinese officials recently released a 25-year space exploration plan that details five major scientific themes and 17 priority areas for scientific breakthroughs with one goal: to make China a world leader in space by 2050 and a key competitor with the U.S. in space, for decades to come. Last week, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the China National Space Administration, and the China Manned Space Agency jointly released a space exploration plan for 2024 through 2050. It includes searching for extraterrestrial life, exploring Mars, Venus, and Jupiter, sending space crews to the moon and building an international lunar research station by 2025. Clayton Swope, deputy director of the Aerospace Security Project at the Center for Strategic and International Studies, says the plan highlights China’s long-term commitment and answers some lingering…

A top Chinese official has urged tech giant Apple to deepen its presence and investment in innovation in the world’s second largest economy at a time when supply chains and companies are shifting production and operations away from China. As U.S.-China geopolitical tensions simmer and tech competition between Beijing and Western countries intensifies, foreign investment in China shrunk in 2023 to its lowest level in three decades, according to government statistics. The United States has banned the export of advanced technology to China and Beijing’s crackdown on spying in the name of national security concerns has spooked investors. On Wednesday, Jin Zhuanglong - China's Minister for Industry and Information Technology – told Apple CEO Tim Cook he hoped that, “Apple will continue to deepen its presence in the Chinese market,"…

Washington — When it comes to combating disinformation ahead of the U.S. presidential elections, artificial intelligence and chatbots are failing, a media research group has found. The latest audit by the research group NewsGuard found that generative AI tools struggle to effectively respond to false narratives. In its latest audit of 10 leading chatbots, compiled in September, NewsGuard found that AI will repeat misinformation 18% of the time and offer a nonresponse 38.33% of the time — leading to a “fail rate” of almost 40%, according to NewsGuard. “These chatbots clearly struggle when it comes to handling prompt inquiries related to news and information,” said McKenzie Sadeghi, the audit’s author. “There's a lot of sources out there, and the chatbots might not be able to discern between which ones are reliable…

Microsoft will allow customers to build autonomous artificial intelligence agents starting in November, the software giant said on Monday, in its latest move to tap the booming technology. The company is positioning autonomous agents — programs which require little human intervention unlike chatbots — as "apps for an AI-driven world," capable of handling client inquiries, identifying sales leads and managing inventory. Other big technology firms such as Salesforce have also touted the potential of such agents, tools that some analysts say could provide companies with an easier path to monetizing the billions of dollars they are pouring into AI. Microsoft said its customers can use Copilot Studio - an application that requires little knowledge of computer code - to create autonomous agents in public preview from November. It is using several AI…

The artificial intelligence boom has benefited chatbot makers, computer scientists and Nvidia investors. It's also providing an unusual windfall for Anguilla, a tiny island in the Caribbean. ChatGPT's debut nearly two years ago heralded the dawn of the AI age and kicked off a digital gold rush as companies scrambled to stake their own claims by acquiring websites that end in .ai. That's where Anguilla comes in. The British territory was allotted control of the .ai internet address in the 1990s. It was one of hundreds of obscure top-level domains assigned to individual countries and territories based on their names. While the domains are supposed to indicate a website has a link to a particular region or language, it's not always a requirement. Google uses google.ai to showcase its artificial…

WASHINGTON — China-based DJI sued the U.S. Defense Department on Friday for adding the drone maker to a list of companies allegedly working with Beijing's military, saying the designation is wrong and has caused the company significant financial harm. DJI, the world's largest drone manufacturer that sells more than half of all U.S. commercial drones, asked a U.S. District Judge in Washington to order its removal from the Pentagon list designating it as a "Chinese military company," saying it "is neither owned nor controlled by the Chinese military." Being placed on the list represents a warning to U.S. entities and companies about the national security risks of conducting business with them. DJI's lawsuit says because of the Defense Department's "unlawful and misguided decision" it has "lost business deals, been stigmatized as…

The Tana River delta on the Kenyan coast includes a vast range of habitats and a remarkably productive ecosystem, says UNESCO. It is also home to many bird species, including some that are nearly threatened. Residents are helping local conservation efforts with an app called eBird. Juma Majanga reports. ...

In a year with over 60 national elections worldwide, concerns are high that individuals and entities are using deepfake images and recordings to contribute to the flood of election misinformation. VOA’s Rio Tuasikal reports on some potentially dangerous videos made using generative AI. ...

U.S. federal prosecutors are stepping up their pursuit of suspects who use artificial intelligence tools to manipulate or create child sex abuse images, as law enforcement fears the technology could spur a flood of illicit material. The U.S. Justice Department has brought two criminal cases this year against defendants accused of using generative AI systems, which create text or images in response to user prompts, to produce explicit images of children. "There's more to come," said James Silver, the chief of the Justice Department's Computer Crime and Intellectual Property Section, predicting further similar cases. "What we're concerned about is the normalization of this," Silver said in an interview. "AI makes it easier to generate these kinds of images, and the more that are out there, the more normalized this becomes.…

Meta's independent content watchdog said Thursday there were "serious questions" about how the social media giant deals with anti-immigrant content, particularly in Europe.  The Oversight Board, established by Meta in 2020 and sometimes called its "supreme court," launched a probe after seeing a "significant number" of appeals over anti-immigrant content.  The board has chosen two symbolic cases -- one from Germany and the other from Poland -- to assess whether Meta, which owns Facebook and Instagram, is following human rights law and its own policies on hate speech.  Helle Thorning-Schmidt, co-chair of the board and a former Danish prime minister, said it was "critical" to get the balance right between free speech and protection of vulnerable groups.  "The high number of appeals we get on immigration-related content from across the…

BEIJING — China's state security ministry said that a foreign company had been found to have illegally conducted geographic mapping activities in the country under the guise of autonomous driving research and outsourcing to a licensed Chinese mapping firm. The ministry did not disclose the names of either company in a statement on its WeChat account on Wednesday. The foreign company, ineligible for geographic surveying and mapping activities in China, "purchased a number of cars and equipped them with high-precision radar, GPS, optical lenses and other gear," read the statement. In addition to directly instructing the Chinese company to conduct surveying and mapping in many Chinese provinces, the foreign company appointed foreign technicians to give "practical guidance" to mapping staffers with the Chinese firm, enabling the latter to transfer its acquired…

BEIJING — Intel products sold in China should be subject to a security review, the Cybersecurity Association of China (CSAC) said on Wednesday, alleging the U.S. chipmaker has "constantly harmed" the country's national security and interests.  While CSAC is an industry group rather than a government body, it has close ties to the Chinese state and the raft of accusations against Intel, published in a long post on its official WeChat group, could trigger a security review from China's powerful cyberspace regulator, the Cyberspace Administration of China (CAC).  "It is recommended that a network security review is initiated on the products Intel sells in China, so as to effectively safeguard China's national security and the legitimate rights and interests of Chinese consumers," CSAC said.  Last year, the CAC barred domestic operators…

LONDON — The world is on the brink of a new age of electricity with fossil fuel demand set to peak by the end of the decade, meaning surplus oil and gas supplies could drive investment into green energy, the International Energy Agency said on Wednesday. But it also flagged a high level of uncertainty as conflicts embroil the oil and gas-producing Middle East and Russia and as countries representing half of global energy demand have elections in 2024. “In the second half of this decade, the prospect of more ample – or even surplus – supplies of oil and natural gas, depending on how geopolitical tensions evolve, would move us into a very different energy world,” IEA Executive Director Fatih Birol said in a release alongside its annual report. Surplus…

LONDON — Some of the most prominent artificial intelligence models are falling short of European regulations in key areas such as cybersecurity resilience and discriminatory output, according to data seen by Reuters. The EU had long debated new AI regulations before OpenAI released ChatGPT to the public in late 2022. The record-breaking popularity and ensuing public debate over the supposed existential risks of such models spurred lawmakers to draw up specific rules around "general-purpose" AIs. Now a new tool designed by Swiss startup LatticeFlow and partners, and supported by European Union officials, has tested generative AI models developed by big tech companies like Meta and OpenAI across dozens of categories in line with the bloc's wide-sweeping AI Act, which is coming into effect in stages over the next two years. Awarding…

As energy-hungry computer data centers and artificial intelligence programs place ever greater demands on the U.S. power grid, tech companies are looking to a technology that just a few years ago appeared ready to be phased out: nuclear energy.  After several decades in which investment in new nuclear facilities in the U.S. had slowed to a crawl, tech giants Microsoft and Google have recently announced investments in the technology, aimed at securing a reliable source of emissions-free power for years into the future.   Earlier this year, online retailer Amazon, which has an expansive cloud computing business, announced it had reached an agreement to purchase a nuclear energy-fueled data center in Pennsylvania and that it had plans to buy more in the future.  However, the three companies' strategies rely on…

Israel has become the top target of Iranian cyberattacks since the start of the Gaza war last year, while Tehran had focused primarily on the United States before the conflict, Microsoft said Tuesday. "Following the outbreak of the Israel-Hamas war, Iran surged its cyber, influence, and cyber-enabled influence operations against Israel," Microsoft said in an annual report. "From October 7, 2023, to July 2024, nearly half of the Iranian operations Microsoft observed targeted Israeli companies," said the Microsoft Digital Defense Report. From July to October 2023, only 10 percent of Iranian cyberattacks targeted Israel, while 35 percent aimed at American entities and 20 percent at the United Arab Emirates, according to the US software giant. Since the war started Iran has launched numerous social media operations with the aim of…

NAIROBI, KENYA — More than 400 delegates and organizations working in Africa’s farming sector are in Nairobi, Kenya, this week to discuss how digital agriculture can improve the lives of farmers and the continent's food system. Tech innovators discussed the need for increased funding, especially for women. In past decades, African farmers have struggled to produce enough food to feed the continent. DigiCow is one of the tech companies at the conference that says it has answers to the problem. The Kenya-based company says it provides farmers with digital recordkeeping, education via audio on an app, and access to financing and marketing. Maureen Saitoti, DigiCow’s brand manager, said the platform has improved the lives of at least half a million farmers. "Other than access to finance, it is also able to…

WASHINGTON — Russia, China and Iran are increasingly relying on criminal networks to lead cyberespionage and hacking operations against adversaries such as the United States, according to a report on digital threats published Tuesday by Microsoft. The growing collaboration between authoritarian governments and criminal hackers has alarmed national security officials and cybersecurity experts. They say it represents the increasingly blurred lines between actions directed by Beijing or the Kremlin aimed at undermining rivals and the illicit activities of groups typically more interested in financial gain. In one example, Microsoft's analysts found that a criminal hacking group with links to Iran infiltrated an Israeli dating site and then tried to sell or ransom the personal information it obtained. Microsoft concluded the hackers had two motives: to embarrass Israelis and make money. In…