From the archive
AI policy sets the rules for how artificial intelligence is developed, deployed and held accountable. Follow AI regulation, copyright disputes, privacy, surveillance and government decisions affecting the technology. Our coverage explains who a proposal applies to, whether it is law or still under discussion, and what it could mean for developers, businesses and the people using AI.
Lead story
The Philippines’ Technical Education and Skills Development Authority (TESDA) has partnered with Amazon Web Services to add free cloud and AI courses to its online learning platform. The reported offer has no prerequisites, giving learners a direct route into foundational training without an upfront fee.
Read the report & discussion ↗AWS AI Watch
AWS has released Strands Decider 2B, an open-source model designed to handle routine, bounded choices inside AI agents. Rather than generating text, it scores available options, potentially leaving larger language models to handle the harder calls.
Cloudflare Watch
Cloudflare has released Clef and Clef-flash, two decision models designed to return structured answers with probabilities rather than open-ended prose. For developers building AI agents, the useful distinction is between deciding where a task should go and generating whatever comes next. The models are hosted on Workers AI,…
Anthropic Watch
Barclays is expanding its use of Anthropic’s Claude across the bank, with tools already assisting staff and handling about 120,000 Global Markets emails a day. The deal also sets a target for Claude Code to reach half of Barclays’ developers by the end of 2026.
Salesforce Watch
Salesforce has published customer accounts that put some numbers and operating rules behind agentic AI deployments. The useful message is less “switch it on” than “measure what it does, listen to customers and keep controls close”.
Watch Desk
A bipartisan Senate permitting bill would prevent utility ratepayers from bearing the costs of new power and grid upgrades needed for AI data centres, Axios reports. The proposal also reaches far beyond AI, changing how infrastructure projects and environmental reviews are handled.
Watch Desk
Companies are reporting financial gains from AI, yet only 13% are on track to scale their initiatives, according to a BearingPoint study reported by Crypto Briefing. The gap between promising pilots and AI woven into everyday operations is still the story behind the story.
Yann LeCun Watch
Yann LeCun says he has “zero concerns” about AI causing human extinction, arguing instead that recent agent incidents point to poor oversight and badly designed systems. In a Fortune interview, the AI researcher also warns that safety arguments could be used to entrench the biggest companies, while describing…
Microsoft AI Watch
Small businesses using AI tools should check what their existing Microsoft Purview setup actually covers before buying another security service. Acronis’s guide distinguishes AI visibility, data-loss controls and prompt-injection detection, and explains why the subscription name alone is no guarantee of protection.
Microsoft AI Watch
Microsoft 365 Copilot Business customers will move to usage-based billing by default for eligible services from 2 November, while everyday AI tasks remain covered by the per-user subscription. The practical catch: administrators must first create a spending policy before any usage-based charges can begin, and then need to…
OpenAI Watch
OpenAI and Synopsys have agreed to build GPT-Synopsys, a specialist model designed to operate Synopsys chip-design tools. The partnership could help engineers explore and refine more chip designs, but the product is still in development, not a finished tool with proven gains.
NVIDIA Watch
Nvidia’s board has added $150bn to its share-buyback authorisation, bringing the total to $235bn, Techzine Global reports. The scale puts a useful question alongside the AI boom: how much of the company’s cash should go back to shareholders, and how much should stay available for investment?
Watch Desk
The US Federal Trade Commission has opened an investigation into OpenAI, Anthropic and other AI companies over potential risks from their products, according to CNBC. The inquiry puts federal scrutiny of AI products on the record, but the agency has not named the other companies or detailed what…
Watch Desk
French developer H has unveiled Holo 4, a family of AI models designed to let agents work through graphical interfaces as well as more familiar tools such as command lines and APIs. The models target Windows and Linux, bringing the agent closer to the buttons and menus people…
