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Meta has paused its Model Compatibility Initiative that tracked employee mouse movements, clicks, keystrokes, and screen content to train AI agents, after some of its collected data became accessible to more employees than intended. Meta says it has no evidence the information was improperly accessed and will not restart the program until it is confident in its safeguards. Wired reports: Meta rolled out the Model Compatibility Initiative (MCI) tool in April to US employees. The tool "collects computer inputs such as mouse movements, click locations and keystrokes, as well as screen content," according to workers who have been petitioning against it over privacy, security, and personal liberty concerns. When MCI launched, employees couldn't opt out, but that changed to a limited degree after workers protested. Meta executives have repeatedly defended the data-gathering project, saying it was necessary to train AI systems to operate computer software the way humans do and that employees were the best examples for the artificial intelligence to learn from. On Monday, a Meta engineer issued an internal security notice stating that databases filled with information gathered by MCI had been exposed to anyone inside the company. A former employee actively involved in pushing back against MCI describes the lapse as "a mess" -- and one that employees had expected would occur. "When workers raised concerns, leadership doubled down and failed to acknowledge the risks workers raised about the safety and privacy of worker and customer data," the person says. "Leadership has clearly created an authoritarian environment where workers are no longer respected or heard." But after critical comments poured into internal forums on Monday expressing frustration about the security issue, Meta shocked some of its staff by pausing MCI altogether, telling WIRED about the development several hours before announcing it to employees. A few workers told WIRED they were confused in the meantime because the tool was continuing to run on their laptops. Late on Monday, Stephane Kasriel, a Meta vice president overseeing AI research, announced the pause and told staff that the security issue had been discovered on June 18 and addressed within four hours. But the initial fix didn't stick and access to the data had to be further locked down. The issue made "some MCI-derived data" accessible to more people than intended, he wrote, without elaborating.

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One survey found that barely one in five voters believe he should be installed immediately as Prime Minister.

A major earthquake has sent shockwaves across three states, triggering urgent shelter in place warnings for millions of Americans.

Brooklyn Beckham sported matching cowboy hats with his wife Nicola Peltz's family as they celebrated her father Nelson's 84th birthday in Florida on Wednesday.

Oh, Snap(dragon): DC chief says the mobile-chip giant sees bit barns as its next growth market

Piling more taxes onto UK firms will be the 'road to ruin', Andy Burnham has been warned by the head of one of Britain's leading business groups.

Her mother was furious when her daughter was sent home early from Co-op Academy in Blackley.

In January, a judge ruled NHS bosses had 'violated the dignity' of the nurses, who worked at Darlington Memorial Hospital, by making them share a changing area with a biological male.

This is the second Midsummer model from the Malvern-based manufacturer, following in the tyre tracks of the limited-run Midsummer Speedster debuted last year.

The internet star, known for his parenting tips, revealed that his toddler daughter died at the family's home in Georgia.

As the UK melts through a sizzling heatwave, the threat of heat stroke is becoming increasingly real. Triggered by the body overheating, heat stroke can cause organ failure within hours.

France recorded its hottest-ever day for the second day running, with temperatures topping 40C in more than 50 departments since the latest heatwave began on June 17.

Rockstar Games has revealed the price of Grand Theft Auto VI to be $79.99, and confirmed that the physical versions of the game won't include a disc. Instead, they'll contain a one-time download code when it launches November 19. "Not only is that a disappointing decision for people who like to own physical games, but given the scale of the next GTA, it also sets a bad precedent for the rest of the industry," reports The Verge. From the report: There are a lot of advantages to buying digital. You can start a download from your couch. You can store multiple games on one hard drive so you don't have to get up to play something else. Storefronts like Steam or the PlayStation Store don't run out of inventory of the newest game you're interested in, and you can often get games at a cheaper price thanks to frequent sales. But it's becoming increasingly clear that digital ownership has significant disadvantages, too. If a game you don't own digitally is removed from a storefront, whether that's for things like licensing, artificially limited availability, or even the store eventually closing down, your only option is to hope you can find a physical version. If your account on a platform is banned, even if that ban isn't warranted, you might be locked out of your digital library with no way to play those games unless you buy them again or hope your account gets restored. You can't sell or trade digital games you've purchased, and while there are ways to share digital games, they require some work and are usually intended just for families. It's also much harder to preserve digital games because they only "exist" on the hard drive of a console, PC, or device they were downloaded to. This is an issue across many industries, not just console games; there are multiple examples of things like mobile games and streaming shows becoming lost for good when they don't have a physical version. Without physical versions, you also can't find a used version of a game at a garage sale or a local game shop. It's unclear whether Rockstar will ever release a physical version of the game. As for why, The Verge suspects the decision was made in part to prevent leaks; "by only being available digitally, Rockstar can ensure that GTA VI unlocks at the same exact time for everyone." "The digital-only choice might also indicate that the game has a massive file size that's too big for PlayStation and Xbox game discs."

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Low pressure from the Atlantic will bring an end to the heatwave across much of England - but Essex looks set to miss out

European Union diplomats said several countries were hoping to start expelling failed asylum seekers to the African nation, with deportations to Uzbekistan and Uganda also on the cards.

Nicola Sturgeon has been urged to release her written statement to police following revelations that detectives were frustrated by some of her answers.

Two days after he tearfully announced his resignation as Labour premier, Sir Keir travelled to Berlin for a meeting of 'E5' group of countries.

OpenAI and Broadcom have unveiled Jalapeno, OpenAI's first custom AI chip, designed primarily to handle inference for ChatGPT and other services. It's a major step in OpenAI's plan to "build the full stack behind its models and products," says OpenAI. "By designing more of the stack ourselves, we can serve more intelligence with greater efficiency and keep pushing advanced AI toward broader access." CNBC reports: The chip with Broadcom is an ASIC, which industry experts say is less flexible than Nvidia's GPU, but is also less expensive and can be designed for specific AI tasks. OpenAI said that it designed the chip in nine months, and that it also crafted large parts of the computer system where it will be used. The companies are calling the chip an "Intelligence Processor" and describe it as the first "AI accelerator" in a platform they're building "to make advanced AI faster, more reliable, and more accessible to more people." [...] A physical sample of the new chip will be delivered to OpenAI on Wednesday. The companies said they're aiming for initial deployment of the Jalapeno chips by the end of 2026, "expanding in the years ahead."

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There were chaotic scenes in Miami on Wednesday afternoon after Scottish football fans interrupted a live broadcast ahead of the nation's World Cup clash with Brazil.

Charles joined delegates from politics, science, business and international climate diplomacy for an environmental reception at St James's Palace, where temperatures were stifling.