America gave up its rare earth edge. China took full advantage.

Decades of cheaper imports left US dependent on China for crucial rare earth processing.
The Download: India’s smart glasses menace and AI’s trillion-dollar gamble

This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. Smart glasses are already causing havoc in India When Shubnam saw an I…
Small undersea volcanoes may unleash outsized tsunamis

Post-eruption imaging of the Hunga caldera gives new details of its collapse.
A new report from Europe raises serious alarms about orbital collisions

“I think we are going to lose the ability to use certain orbits.”
Smart glasses are already causing havoc in India

Shubnam was packing boxes for a move into a new home when their friend sent them an Instagram video. The footage had only been up for a few hours, but it was days old, recorded at a Delhi protest this…
The AI Hype Index: AI loves cheating

Brace yourself: It turns out AI is being optimized for cheating. OpenAI’s agents hacked into Hugging Face to get the answers to a cybersecurity test. Next, they solved a prestigious math problem (or just stole from two…
Woman's brain worm infection confirmed after eggs grow tails in lab test

There is no single definitive test for these worms, but the tail is fairly convincing.
New Anthropic, OpenAI models make same promise: A little more for a lot less money

The frontier AI model race has entered its comparison shopping phase.
Cities across US oppose Trump FCC plan to preempt local broadband rules

Cities defend permit requirements, say ISPs aren’t building networks fast enough.
Microsoft disrupts AI-assisted platform that compromised 12,000 accounts

EvilTokens provided an end-to-end platform that makes mass compromises faster and easier.