The Register

Blighty’s latest stab at encryption? A secret order to pry open iCloud, sources claim

The UK's Home Office refuses to either confirm or deny reports that it recently ordered Apple to create a backdoor allowing the government to access any user's cloud data.…

Some of that cash is reportedly headed for $500B Stargate dream

The AI investment landscape is shifting once again, with SoftBank reportedly finalizing a $40 billion stake in OpenAI - pushing its valuation to around $300 billion.…

Shocking research warns electricity shortages could create construction bottleneck

AI's thirst for electricity will see datacenter energy use more than double by the end of the decade – just five years from now – according to the latest forecast from investment banker Goldman Sachs.…

Makers of content blockers, privacy add-ons say promises weren't kept

Google's overhaul of Chrome's extension architecture continues to pose problems for developers of ad blockers, content filters, and privacy tools.…

It's not auto-enrollment. It's just your current plan with extra Copilot for more money. Completely different

Users are now receiving notifications regarding their Microsoft 365 subscriptions and must take action if they wish to avoid Copilot and its extra charges.…

But 'original sin' has already been committed, shrugs industry

Governments are allowing AI developers to steal content – both creative and journalistic – for fear of upsetting the tech sector and damaging investment, a UK Parliamentary committee heard this week.…

Freshly minted organization aims to take the guesswork out of incident severity for insurers and policy holders

A world-first organization assembled to categorize the severity of cybersecurity incidents is up and running in the UK following a year-long incubation period.…

248-year-old democracy is not a tech startup

Opinion  120-hour work weeks, firing government staffers and dismantling agencies? Oh my. The US government under pseudo President Musk is in for a world of radical change.…

Shabby admin invented 'transparent tape' – a terrible storage medium but a magic tool for unlocking IT budgets

On Call  Each week at work creates memories many are happy to forget, but some are willing to share with fellow Register readers in On Call, our Friday column that tells your tales of tech support.…

Reverses life extensions for some servers it now feels aren’t useful in the inferencing age

Amazon Web Services is struggling to get the high-quality servers it needs to build AI infrastructure and has retired other hardware early to make room to accelerated machines.…

OCR plugin great for extracting crypto-wallet secrets from galleries

Kaspersky eggheads say they’ve spotted the first app containing hidden optical character recognition spyware in Apple’s App Store. Cunningly, the software nasty is designed to steal cryptocurrency.…

35% drop in payments across the year as your backups got better and law enforcement made a difference

Ransomware extortion payments fell in 2024, according to blockchain analyst biz Chainalysis this week.…

The British are coming, the British are coming ... to terms with their loss

Arm has given up on terminating one of its key licenses with Qualcomm, leaving the latter free to continue producing homegrown Arm-compatible chips for PCs, phones, and servers.…

Looking forward to someone putting the new into nuclear

Months after Amazon joined a half-billion-dollar funding round for next-gen modular nuclear startup X-energy, the biz has announced a supplemental Series C-1 raise - despite its fission reactor design remaining unproven.…

Lawsuit: 'Scale of intrusion into individuals' privacy is massive and unprecedented'

Updated  Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency has had its access to US Treasury payment systems restricted - at least temporarily - following a lawsuit from advocacy groups and unions.…

Concerns around unfixed problems remain after system resulted in harm to some 150 patients

The US Department of Veterans Affairs has restarted a project to implement Oracle electronic health records in its hospitals after the project was suspended in 2023.…

Some worry multiple languages will make it harder to maintain this open source uber-project, others disagree

Updated  Developers trying to add Rust code to the Linux kernel continue to face opposition from kernel maintainers who believe using multiple languages is an unwelcome and risky complication.…

Are cybersecurity roles included? Are Elon's enforcers vetted? Inquiring minds want to know

Updated  Elected officials are demanding answers as to whether the Trump administration and Elon Musk's Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) are hamstringing US national security.…

For those for whom a runny white or a hard yolk is just not good un œuf

Researchers have put computational fluid dynamics software to good use in devising a solution to the age-old problem of the perfect soft-boiled egg.…

Fourth time’s the harm?

Gravy Analytics has been sued yet again for allegedly failing to safeguard its vast stores of personal data, which are now feared stolen. And by personal data we mean information including the locations of tens of millions of smartphones, coordinates of which were ultimately harvested from installed apps.…