Author: admin
PayPal announced on Wednesday a new multi-year partnership with Google that will see the payments giant using Google’s AI technology to create new AI-powered shopping experiences. PayPal’s solutions, meanwhile, will be integrated across Google’s products, and PayPal will work with Google Cloud on hosting and improving its technology infrastructure. The companies did not detail what specific types of agentic shopping experiences they would work together to create but said Google would contribute its AI technology and expertise, and PayPal would leverage its global payment infrastructure, personalization, and identity solutions. In addition, both companies will join others to advocate for the…
The world’s countries may have pledged to cut its carbon pollution, but with global emissions reaching an all-time high last year, they’ve fallen far short. Digging out of that hole is going to require removing carbon straight from the atmosphere. But it comes with a hefty price tag, mostly because of the energy required. Removing one metric ton of CO2 using direct air capture is expected to require around 2,000 kWh of energy when the technology is sorted and scaled up. One startup called DACLab says it’s already doing it for less, though. “We have data that I can share…
ChatGPT, OpenAI’s text-generating AI chatbot, has taken the world by storm since its launch in November 2022. What started as a tool to supercharge productivity through writing essays and code with short text prompts has evolved into a behemoth with 300 million weekly active users. 2024 was a big year for OpenAI, from its partnership with Apple for its generative AI offering, Apple Intelligence, the release of GPT-4o with voice capabilities, and the highly-anticipated launch of its text-to-video model Sora. OpenAI also faced its share of internal drama, including the notable exits of high-level execs like co-founder and longtime chief…
Sam Ross, the co-founder and CEO of Numeral, came up with the idea for his sales tax compliance startup while traveling the world after having worked as a product manager at Airbnb. “This was early 2018, where you didn’t have remote work like you do today,” he told TechCrunch in an interview. Direct-to-consumer businesses were a big trend then, so he supported his travel dreams by running several self-funded e-commerce brands from the road. He operated an online jewelry store and still maintains a vitamin DTC site. While he loved the freedom his businesses offered, Ross (pictured above, left) was…
OREM, Utah (AP) — It took two decades for Utah Valley University to evolve from a small community college into the state’s largest school, boasting of having one of the safest campuses in the nation.It took only seconds for that image to be shattered by the assassination of right wing activist Charlie Kirk.The sprawling campus of nearly 50,000 students beneath the Wasatch Mountains will be forever tethered to the events of Sept. 10, when a bullet took down the founder of Turning Point USA as he spoke to a large crowd at an outdoor amphitheater in the middle of campus.The…
U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) law enforcement arm Homeland Security Investigations (HSI) has signed a contract worth $3 million with Magnet Forensics, a company that makes a phone-hacking and unlocking device called Graykey. The contract, which appeared on Tuesday in a federal government procurement database, said it is for software licenses for the phone-hacking tech for HSI “to recover digital evidence, process multiple devices, & generate forensic reports essential to mission of protecting national security & public.” While the contract doesn’t mention the name of the product, it’s likely referring to Graykey, a forensic system to unlock smartphones…
Google is partnering with the U.K. nonprofit StopNCII to bolster its efforts at combating the spread of nonconsensual intimate images, also known as revenge porn. The search giant will begin using StopNCII’s hashes, which are digital fingerprints of images and videos, to proactively identify and remove nonconsensual intimate imagery on Search. StopNCII helps adults prevent their private images from being shared online by creating a unique identifier, or hash, representing their intimate imagery. These hashes are then provided to partner platforms like Facebook, allowing them to identify and remove matching content from their platforms or services automatically. It’s worth noting that…
Google announced Thursday that it’s rolling out Gemini in Chrome to all Mac and Windows desktop users in the U.S. after previously limiting the capability to Google AI Pro and Google AI Ultra subscribers. The tech giant also announced that it’s bringing agentic capabilities to Chrome in the future, adding its AI Mode search feature to the address bar, launching new Gemini features, using AI to combat AI-generated scams, rolling out automatic password resets, and more. U.S. users who have their language set to English can now ask Gemini to clarify complex information on any web page they’re reading using…
If you can’t resist the urge to check your phone over and over, even if you’re out with friends, Meta has a solution: check your glasses instead. “The promise of glasses is to preserve this sense of presence that you have with other people,” said CEO Mark Zuckerberg at the Meta Connect 2025 keynote. “I think that we’ve lost it a little bit with phones, and we have the opportunity to get it back with glasses.” In reality, Meta wants its own hardware to eat into the marketshare of Apple and Google so that it doesn’t have to keep siphoning…
Google is making it possible to now share your Gemini Gems — custom AI assistants and experts designed for specific tasks — the company announced on Thursday. The feature launched last year, initially as part of the Gemini Advanced paid subscription, allowing users to write instructions to create an AI chatbot for different scenarios. For instance, Google launched with premade Gems like a learning coach, a brainstorming assistant, a career guide, a writing editor, and a coding partner. Now Google says you’ll be able to share your Gems with friends, family, or co-workers as easily as you can share a…