Category: Technology

Over 1.7 million electric cars are currently on the road in California. But drivers in the nation’s largest EV market say they are struggling to find chargers. VOA's Anna Rice narrates this report by Angelina Bagdasaryan. Video: Vazgen Varzhabetian ...

A California-based company backed by tech billionaires says it has discovered major copper deposits in Zambia using artificial intelligence. The discovery comes as demand for the metal is especially high for the global transition to cleaner energy sources. Kathy Short reports from Lusaka, Zambia. (Camera and produced by: Richard Kille) ...

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washington — President Joe Biden’s reelection campaign Monday defended its new TikTok account as a vital way to boost its appeal with young voters, even as his administration continued to raise security concerns about whether the popular social media app might be sharing user data with China’s communist government. The campaign's inaugural post featured the president being quizzed on Sunday's Super Bowl — and included a reference to the latest political conspiracy theory centering on pop superstar Taylor Swift. “The president’s TikTok debut last night — with more than 5 million views and counting — is proof positive of both our commitment and success in finding new, innovative ways to reach voters in an evolving, fragmented and increasingly personalized media environment,” Biden reelection deputy campaign manager Rob Flaherty said in a…

The University of the People, a tuition-free online university, was founded in 2009 and accredited in 2014. The game-changing goal of the U.S. nonprofit is to make education accessible to some 140,000 students from 200 countries. Maxim Adams has the story. Video: Dana Preobrazhenskaya. ...

A test of ChatGPT's capabilities to create false information finds the chatbot spreads more disinformation in Chinese, says media watchdog NewsGuard. VOA's Robin Guess has more. VOA footage by Michael Eckels, Roy Kim. ...

Four billion people worldwide have voted or are scheduled to do so in national elections through 2024. While the candidates and issues differ in each country, one common concern is the use of generative artificial intelligence in disinformation campaigns. VOA’s Valdya Baraputri has the story. ...

NEW YORK — An oversight board is criticizing Facebook owner Meta's policies regarding manipulated media as "incoherent" and insufficient to address the flood of online disinformation that already has begun to target elections across the globe this year.  The quasi-independent board on Monday said its review of an altered video of President Joe Biden that spread on Facebook exposed gaps in the policy. The board said Meta should expand the policy to focus not only on videos generated with artificial intelligence, but on media regardless of how it was created. That includes fake audio recordings, which already have convincingly impersonated political candidates in the U.S. and elsewhere.  It also said Meta should clarify the harm it is trying to prevent and should label images, videos and audio clips as manipulated instead…

Hong Kong — Scammers tricked a multinational firm out of some $26 million by impersonating senior executives using deepfake technology, Hong Kong police said Sunday, in one of the first cases of its kind in the city. Law enforcement agencies are scrambling to keep up with generative artificial intelligence, which experts say holds potential for disinformation and misuse — such as deepfake images showing people mouthing things they never said. A company employee in the Chinese finance hub received "video conference calls from someone posing as senior officers of the company requesting to transfer money to designated bank accounts," police told AFP. Police received a report of the incident on January 29, at which point some HK$200 million ($26 million) had already been lost via 15 transfers. "Investigations are still ongoing…

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BEIJING — A small but powerful Chinese rocket capable of carrying payloads at competitive costs delivered nine satellites into orbit Saturday, Chinese state media reported, in what is gearing up to be another busy year for Chinese commercial launches.  The Jielong-3, or Smart Dragon-3, blasted off from a floating barge off the coast of Yangjiang in southern Guangdong province, the second launch of the rocket in just two months.  Developed by China Rocket Company, a commercial offshoot of a state-owned launch vehicle manufacturer, Jielong-3 made its first flight in December 2022.  President Xi Jinping has called for the expansion of strategic industries including the commercial space sector, deemed key to building constellations of satellites for communications, remote sensing and navigation.  Also Saturday, Chinese automaker Geely Holding Group launched 11 satellites to…

NEW YORK — A graphic video from a Pennsylvania man accused of beheading his father that circulated for hours on YouTube has put a spotlight yet again on gaps in social media companies' ability to prevent horrific postings from spreading across the web. Police said Wednesday that they charged Justin Mohn, 32, with first-degree murder and abusing a corpse after he beheaded his father, Michael, in their Bucks County home and publicized it in a 14-minute YouTube video that anyone, anywhere could see. News of the incident — which drew comparisons to the beheading videos posted online by the Islamic State militants at the height of their prominence nearly a decade ago — came as the CEOs of Meta, TikTok and other social media companies were testifying in front of federal…

TOKYO — After a brief awakening, Japan's Moon lander is out of action again but will resume its mission if it survives the two-week lunar night, the space agency said Thursday. The unmanned Smart Lander for Investigating Moon (SLIM) touched down last month at a wonky angle that left its solar panels facing the wrong way. As the sun's angle shifted, it came back to life for two days this week and carried out scientific observations of a crater with its high-spec camera. "After completing operation from 1/30 (to) 1/31, #SLIM entered a two-week dormancy period during the long lunar night," space agency JAXA said on X, formerly Twitter. "Although SLIM was not designed for the harsh lunar nights, we plan to try to operate again from mid-February, when the Sun…

From counting machines to neural networks, the development of artificial intelligence has paralleled emerging brain science. Writer, Matt Dibble; graphic designer, Kateryna Stepchenko; motion designer, Valeryia Rusak; narrator, Hayde Fitzpatrick. ...

The Biden administration’s push for clean energy solutions has turned a rural Washington state town into a hub for electric vehicle battery production. VOA’s Natasha Mozgovaya reports from Moses Lake. ...

Moses Lake, Washington — It’s mid-winter in east Washington state, yet despite the chilly fog, two construction sites in the town of Moses Lake are brimming with activity. Several hundred workers are on an ambitious timeline to complete two new factories slanted to begin production of the next-generation components for electric vehicle batteries later this year. Two American start-ups, backed by $100 million in federal grants each, in addition to commercial partnerships, are racing to secure the domestic supply chain with the next-generation battery materials for EV automakers. “That's going to go into everything from electric vehicles to IoT [Internet of Things] devices to smartphones and wearables and a lot of battery-based applications that we don't even know exist yet,” explains Nik Anderson, director of program management with Group 14 Technologies,…

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The United Nations Conference on Trade and Development ranks Africa as the region with the lowest amount of e-commerce investment. UNCTAD says e-commerce is currently accessible to very few urban areas. An AI solution, however, aims to solve the problem. Senanu Tord reports from Accra, Ghana. ...

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JERUSALEM — Iran said Sunday it successfully launched three satellites into space, the latest for a program that the West says improves Tehran's ballistic missiles. The state-run IRNA news agency said the launch also saw the successful use of Iran's Simorgh rocket, which has had multiple failures in the past. The launch comes as heightened tensions grip the wider Middle East over Israel's continued war on Hamas in the Gaza Strip. While Iran has not intervened militarily in the conflict, it has faced increased pressure within its theocracy for action after a deadly Islamic State suicide bombing earlier this month and as proxy groups like Yemen's Houthi rebels conduct attacks linked to the war. Footage released by Iranian state television showed a nighttime launch for the Simorgh rocket. An Associated Press…

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LOS ANGELES — The estate of George Carlin has filed a lawsuit against the media company behind a fake hour-long comedy special that purportedly uses artificial intelligence to recreate the late standup comic's style and material.  The lawsuit filed in federal court in Los Angeles on Thursday asks that a judge order the podcast outlet, Dudesy, to immediately take down the audio special, "George Carlin: I'm Glad I'm Dead," in which a synthesis of Carlin, who died in 2008, delivers commentary on current events. Carlin's daughter, Kelly Carlin, said in a statement that the work is "a poorly-executed facsimile cobbled together by unscrupulous individuals to capitalize on the extraordinary goodwill my father established with his adoring fanbase."  The Carlin estate and its executor, Jerold Hamza, are named as plaintiffs in the…

Chinese-made drones dominate the global market and are used widely by government agencies inside the United States. As Matt Dibble reports, US cybersecurity watchdogs warn that using those drones come with risks. ...

WASHINGTON — U.S. officials hoping to break China's near monopoly on the production of rare earth elements needed for many cutting-edge technologies should engage the governments of Central Asia to develop high concentrations of REEs found in the region, says a new report.  The study by the U.S.-based International Tax and Investment Center warns that a failure to act could leave China with a "decisive advantage" in the sector, which is crucial to green energy, many new weapons systems and other advanced technologies.  "As the uses for these minerals has expanded, so too has global competition for them in a time of sharply increasing geostrategic and geo-economic tension," the report says.  "Advanced economies with secure, reliable access to REEs enjoy economic advantages in manufacturing, and corresponding economic disadvantages accrue for those…

Turkey makes space history. Plus, the 20th anniversary of twin rovers on Mars, and a flood of news for future missions to the Red Planet. VOA’s Arash Arabasadi brings us The Week in Space. ...

TOKYO — Japan's "Moon Sniper" craft landed around 55 meters from its target, the country's space agency said Thursday as it released the first images from the mission. The unmanned Smart Lander for Investigating Moon (SLIM), dubbed the "Moon Sniper" for its pin-point technology, had the goal of touching down within 100 meters of a specific landing spot. That is much more precise than the usual landing zone of several kilometers. "SLIM succeeded in a pin-point soft landing ... the landing point is confirmed to be 55 meters away from the target point," space agency JAXA said. Saturday's soft lunar landing made Japan the fifth nation to achieve the feat, after the United States, Soviet Union, China and India. But celebrations were muted because of a problem with the lightweight spacecraft's…

BRUSSELS — The European Union on Wednesday unveiled plans to strengthen the bloc's economic security, including measures to protect sensitive technology from falling into the hands of geopolitical rivals such as China.  Brussels has bolstered its armory of trade restrictions to tackle what it deems to be risks to European economic security, following Moscow's invasion of Ukraine and global trade tensions.  The fallout from the war in Ukraine hit Europe particularly hard, forcing the bloc to find alternative energy sources. Now, it wants to avoid a similar over-reliance on China, which dominates in green technology production and critical raw materials.  On Wednesday, EU officials outlined an economic security package containing five initiatives, including toughening rules on the screening of foreign direct investment and launching discussions on coordination around export controls.  The…