Amazon shuts down Shanghai AI research lab, FT says
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25 minutes ago
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Russia says Aeroflot has recovered from cyberattack, but dozens more flights cancelled
Russian airline Aeroflot cancelled dozens more flights on Tuesday but said it had now stabilised its schedule after a major cyberattack a day earlier, and the transport ministry said the issue had been resolved. Two pro-Ukraine hacking groups claimed on Monday to have carried out a year-long operation to penetrate Aeroflot's network. They said they had crippled 7,000 servers, extracted data on passengers and employees and gained control over the personal computers of staff, including senior managers. Aeroflot's online timetable showed about 25 flights out of Moscow's Sheremetyevo airport had been cancelled on Tuesday, mostly overnight and through the morning. Nearly all afternoon and evening flights were due to take off, though dozens were delayed. Interfax news agency said 31 inbound flights to the capital had been cancelled. Aeroflot said it had "stabilised" its flight programme. The transport ministry said in a statement: "Thanks to the efforts of Aeroflot employees, with the active support of Sheremetyevo services, the problem that arose was resolved in the shortest possible time." The ministry described the issue as "a failure in the IT infrastructure". It did not refer to it as a cyberattack, although prosecutors have said they are investigating it as such. Responsibility was claimed by the Belarusian Cyber Partisans, a long-established group that opposes President Alexander Lukashenko, and by a more shadowy and recent hacking outfit that calls itself Silent Crow. 'SAVING FACE' Yuliana Shemetovets, a spokesperson for the Cyber Partisans, said Aeroflot was likely working with costly manual systems in order to maintain the appearance of business as usual. The ministry statement said there had been a "transition to domestic systems". "Without IT systems the company can work manually like in the old days when flight tickets cost more than $1K," Shemetovets told Reuters. "It would just be unprofitable, meaning the company would keep sustaining losses just to save face." She said that Aeroflot's CEO had not changed his password since 2022 and that the company was using an outdated version of Windows software. Some workers had passwords saved in a Word document on their computers, she added. Reuters could not independently confirm those details and has approached Aeroflot for comment. Aeroflot's shares were up 1.36 per cent on Tuesday, recovering some ground after slumping to their lowest mark since late 2024 on Monday. Russian lawmakers said the cyberattack was a wake-up call and that investigators should focus not only on the perpetrators but on those who had allowed it to happen. Mikhail Klimarev, director of the Internet Protection Society, a Russian digital rights group, said it was a serious episode that showed cybercriminals were learning "best practice" from around the world while Russian companies were hampered in their response because of sanctions. "It's like with viruses: If you don't communicate with people who have the flu, you have no immunity," he told Reuters. Klimarev said Russian security services had dropped the ball, and the incident highlighted a failure of the technical systems that are meant to allow them to counter such threats. He said there was a grave safety risk as the hackers could hypothetically have exploited their access to Aeroflot systems in order to change data and cause planes to crash.
CNA
25 minutes ago
- CNA
Microsoft in advanced talks for continued access to OpenAI tech, Bloomberg reports
Microsoft is in advanced talks for a deal that would give the Windows maker continued access to critical OpenAI technology in the future, Bloomberg News reported on Tuesday, citing two people familiar with the negotiations. The companies have discussed new terms that would allow Microsoft to use OpenAI's latest models and technology even if the ChatGPT maker declares it has achieved artificial general intelligence (AGI), or AI that surpasses human intelligence, the report said. A clause in OpenAI's current contract with Microsoft will shut the software giant out of some rights to the startup's advanced technology when it achieves AGI. Negotiators have been meeting regularly, and an agreement could come together in a matter of weeks, Bloomberg News reported. OpenAI did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment, while Microsoft declined to comment. OpenAI needs Microsoft's approval to complete its transition into a public-benefit corporation. The two have been in negotiations for months to revise the terms of their investment, including the future equity stake Microsoft will hold in OpenAI. Last month, the Information reported that Microsoft and OpenAI were at odds over the AGI clause. OpenAI is also facing a lawsuit from Elon Musk, who co-founded the company with Sam Altman in 2015 but left before it surged in popularity, accusing OpenAI of straying from its founding mission — to develop AI for the good of humanity, not corporate profit. Microsoft is set to report June-quarter earnings on Wednesday, with its relationship with OpenAI in the spotlight, as the startup turns to rivals Google, Oracle and CoreWeave for cloud capacity.
CNA
an hour ago
- CNA
Amazon-backed Skild AI unveils general-purpose AI model for multi-purpose robots
Robotics startup Skild AI, backed by and Japan's SoftBank Group, on Tuesday unveiled a foundational artificial intelligence model designed to run on nearly any robot — from assembly-line machines to humanoids. The model, called Skild Brain, enables robots to think, navigate and respond more like humans. Its launch comes amid a broader push to build humanoid robots capable of more diverse tasks than the single-purpose machines currently found on factory floors. In demonstration videos, Skild-powered robots were shown climbing stairs, maintaining balance after being shoved, and picking up objects in cluttered environments - tasks that require spatial reasoning and the ability to adapt to changing surroundings. The company said its model includes built-in power limits to prevent robots from applying unsafe force. Skild trains its model on simulated episodes and human-action videos, then fine-tunes it using data from every robot running the system. Co-founders Deepak Pathak and Abhinav Gupta told Reuters in an exclusive interview that the approach helps tackle a data scarcity problem unique to robotics. "Unlike language or vision, there is no data for robotics on the internet. So you cannot just go and apply these generative AI techniques," Pathak, who serves as CEO, told Reuters. Robots deployed by customers feed data back into Skild Brain to sharpen its skills, creating the same "shared brain," said Gupta, who previously founded Meta Platforms' robotics lab in Pittsburgh. Skild's clients include LG CNS - the IT solutions arm of LG Group - and other unnamed partners in logistics and other industrial applications. Unlike software, which can scale quickly, robotics requires physical deployment, which takes time, but Skild's approach allows robots to add new capabilities across different industries quickly, said Raviraj Jain, partner at the startup's investor Lightspeed Venture Partners. The two-year-old startup, which has hired staff from Tesla, Nvidia and Meta, raised $300 million in a Series A funding round last year that valued it at $1.5 billion. Its investors include Menlo Ventures, Khosla Ventures, Sequoia Capital and founder Jeff Bezos.
