Techmeme
May 15, 2025, 7:45 AM

Top News

Bloomberg:
Issie Lapowsky / Vanity Fair:
Niket Nishant / Reuters:
Coinbase says hackers accessed data for a “small subset” of users, but not login credentials, expects to incur $180M-$400M in costs, and refuses a $20M ransom  —  Crypto exchange Coinbase (COIN.O) said on Thursday it expects to incur between $180 million and $400 million in costs related to a cyber attack.
Maxwell Zeff / TechCrunch:
OpenAI releases GPT-4.1 for Plus, Pro, and Team users in ChatGPT, and replaces GPT-4o mini with GPT-4.1 mini for all ChatGPT users  —  OpenAI is releasing its GPT-4.1 and GPT-4.1 mini AI models in ChatGPT, the company announced in a post on X Wednesday.  —  The GPT-4.1 models …
Kyle Wiggers / TechCrunch:
OpenAI launches the Safety Evaluations Hub, a webpage showing how its models score on various tests for harmful content, jailbreaks, and hallucinations  —  OpenAI is moving to publish the results of its internal AI model safety evaluations more regularly in what the outfit is saying is an effort to increase transparency.
More: CNBC, OpenAI, Tom's Guide, Tech in Asia, and Maginative
Bluesky: @sal19X: @haydenfield and @openaiLinkedIn: Jennifer Elias
Lauren Forristal / TechCrunch:
YouTube previews new ad formats coming to the platform, including an enhanced shoppable connected TV offering with a new interactive product feed  —  YouTube made its pitch to advertisers on Wednesday, accompanied by a flashy performance from Lady Gaga and special appearances from popular YouTubers like Brittany Broski and MrBeast.
Paresh Dave / Wired:
Microsoft plans to shut down Bing Search APIs on August 11; a source says the largest customers will retain access, and DuckDuckGo confirms it won't be affected  —  Microsoft is limiting access to tools that boosted its rivals, but larger customers like DuckDuckGo say they won't be affected.
Jess Weatherbed / The Verge:
Jordan Novet / CNBC:
Jay Peters / The Verge:
Grok replied with information about South Africa's “white genocide” when X users asked it to fact-check unrelated topics; the issue appears to have been fixed  —  Grok kept bringing it up in response to seemingly unrelated posts. … Grok, the AI model from Elon Musk's xAI …
Wired:
The CFPB withdraws its proposal for new rules to more tightly regulate US data brokers and their ability to sell sensitive information about Americans  —  Russell Vought, acting director of the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau, has canceled plans to more tightly regulate the sale of Americans' sensitive personal data.
Andy Greenberg / Wired:
Huione Guarantee, a Telegram-based black market for crypto scammers and money launderers that enabled $27B+ in transactions, shuts down after mass account bans  —  Following a WIRED inquiry, Telegram banned thousands of accounts used for crypto scam money laundering, including those of Haowang Guarantee …
Johnny Ryan / Irish Council for Civil Liberties:
The Belgian Court of Appeal rules the Transparency & Consent Framework, used by Google, Microsoft, Amazon, and much of the internet, is illegal across Europe  —  Landmark court decision against “TCF” consent pop ups on 80% of the internet  —  Google, Microsoft, Amazon, X …
Joe Tidy / BBC:
Hacking group DragonForce says it stole UK retailer Co-op's customer data and planned to deploy ransomware, but Co-op quickly shut down its systems, unlike M&S  —  Co-op narrowly averted being locked out of its computer systems during the cyber attack that saw customer data stolen …
Google DeepMind:
Google DeepMind unveils AlphaEvolve, a Gemini-powered AI coding agent that designs and optimizes advanced algorithms using an evolutionary framework  —  New AI agent evolves algorithms for math and practical applications in computing by combining the creativity of large language models with automated evaluators
Sara Salinas / CNBC:
Netflix says its ad-supported tier now has 94M MAUs, up from 70M in November 2024, and reaches more 18- to 34-year-olds than any US broadcast or cable network  —  Netflix said Wednesday its cheaper, ad-supported tier now has 94 million monthly active users — an increase of more than 20 million since its last public tally in November.
Juli Clover / MacRumors:
Epic submits a new version of Fortnite to the US App Store after pulling the one it submitted on May 9, citing an update with new content  —  On Friday, Epic Games submitted Fortnite to the U.S. App Store, and since then, we've been waiting to see if Apple would approve the game and allow it back on the iPhone and the iPad.
Bloomberg:
Documents: Microsoft's recent layoffs of 6,000 workers hit software engineers in Washington state hardest, making up 40%+ of the ~2,000 positions cut there  —  In Microsoft's home state of Washington, software engineering was by far the largest single job category to receive layoff notices …
Reuters:
Waymo recalls 1,212 vehicles to update software and address collision risks, after the NHTSA opened an investigation in May 2024 following reports of incidents  —  Alphabet's (GOOGL.O) Waymo is recalling more than 1,200 self-driving vehicles to update software and address risks of collisions with chains …
Ivan Mehta / TechCrunch:
Hedra, which offers a web-based video generation and editing suite powered by its Character-3 model, raised a $32M Series A led by a16z, following a $10M seed  —  People are using AI video generation tools to contribute to an unexpected new viral trend: podcasts featuring AI-generated talking babies.
Ryan Browne / CNBC:
Proofpoint agrees to acquire German company Hornetsecurity, which specializes in managed cloud-based email security services, for $1B, set to close in H2 2025  —  Cybersecurity firm Proofpoint announced Thursday it will acquire Germany-based competitor Hornetsecurity for $1 billion to strengthen …

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More News

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Earlier Picks

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Jennifer Maas / Variety: