Techmeme: Despite concerns, Labour MPs and other left-wing UK politicians stay active on X; the UK government says it stopped paid ads in 2024, after spending £9M in 2021 (Financial Times)

Top News

Heather Somerville / Wall Street Journal:

The US FCC bans imports, marketing, and sales of new foreign-made drones and components, including from China's DJI and Autel, citing national security concerns — American customers hoarding products in anticipation of restrictions against popular Chinese manufacturer DJI and a smaller competitor, Autel Robotics

More: The Verge, PCMag, Reuters, Politico, US FCC, DroneXL.co, Android Authority, Tom's Guide, The Independent, CNN, Fox News, DroneDJ, The Hill, Associated Press, New York Times, Telecompaper, TechNode, and Bloomberg

X: @brendancarrfcc and @fcc. Mastodon: @SuffolkLITLab@esq.social

Forums: r/radiocontrol, r/technology, r/politics, r/fpv, and Slashdot

Bonny Chu / Fox News:

The Pentagon partners with xAI to embed the company's frontier AI systems, based on the Grok family of models, directly into GenAI.mil as soon as early 2026 — Grok will be deployed across systems serving 3 million military and civilian personnel by early 2026

More: U.S. Department of War, Gizmodo, xAI, Benzinga, Crypto Briefing, Townhall, TESLARATI, and Sherwood News

X: @silvermanjacob. Bluesky: @nicholasgrossman, @therao, @grumpyoldveteran, @alejandrobriceno, and @spiritualmantis. Forums: r/BetterOffline

Rebecca Bellan / TechCrunch:

OpenAI details efforts to secure its ChatGPT Atlas browser against prompt injection attacks, including building an “LLM-based automated attacker” — Even as OpenAI works to harden its Atlas AI browser against cyberattacks, the company admits that prompt injections …

More: OpenAI, The Decoder, Digit, WinBuzzer, The Indian Express, Digital Trends, and KnowTechie

X: @dfinke, @xiangyuqi_pton, and @_lamaahmad

Forums: r/artificial, r/BlackboxAI_, r/BetterOffline, and r/firefox

Juli Clover / MacRumors:

The European Commission says Apple will bring AirPods-like pairing and iPhone notification access to third-party devices under the DMA in iOS 26.3 in 2026 — The European Commission today praised the interoperability changes that Apple is introducing in iOS 26.3, once again crediting the Digital Markets Act …

More: Engadget, Cult of Mac, SammyGuru, and SamMobile

Bluesky: @gateklons. Forums: Hacker News, r/europe, and MacRumors Forums

Reece Rogers / Wired:

Google's Nano Banana Pro and OpenAI's ChatGPT Images can make nonconsensual bikini deepfakes from photos of fully clothed women; Reddit bans r/ChatGPTJailbreak — Users of AI image generators are offering each other instructions on how to use the tech to alter pictures of women into realistic, revealing deepfakes.

More: Associated Press. Bluesky: @hypervisible.blacksky.app. Forums: r/artificial

Yueqi Yang / The Information:

Brett Harrison, the former president of FTX US, raised $35M for his new global exchange AX, which offers perpetual futures, a source says at a $187M valuation — Brett Harrison, the former president of FTX US, has raised $35 million for his startup Architect Financial Technologies, which offers a global perpetual futures exchange.

More: Crain's Chicago Business and Crypto Briefing

Kate Duguid / Financial Times:

US companies sold $1.7T of investment-grade bonds in 2025, nearing the $1.8T 2020 record, driven by AI infrastructure borrowing; Goldman says AI makes up ~30% — Investment-grade borrowers have issued $1.7tn of bonds this year, closing in on 2020s Covid debt rush

More: Tech in Asia, Reuters, Silicon UK, and Semafor

Bloomberg:

ServiceNow agrees to acquire cybersecurity startup Armis for $7.75B, set to close in H2 2026, pending approvals; Insight acquired Armis in a $1.1B deal in 2020 — ServiceNow Inc. has reached a deal to buy the cybersecurity startup Armis in a deal valued at $7.75 billion, representing its largest acquisition to date.

More: The Information, Investor's Business Daily, MarketWatch, CNBC, Reuters, Bloomberg Law, Constellation Research, Wall Street Journal, Business Wire, VINnews, and Benzinga

MiniMax:

China's MiniMax releases M2.1, an upgrade to its open-source M2 model that it says has “significantly enhanced” coding capabilities in Rust, Java, and others — MiniMax has been continuously transforming itself in a more AI-native way. The core driving forces of this process are models …

X: @arafatkatze, @yashasgunderia, @tokenbender, @tphuang, @rudrank, @minimax__ai, @goosewin, and @minimax__ai. Forums: r/singularity

Bloomberg:

Samsung's Harman agrees to acquire ZF's radar and automotive computing driver-assistance business for €1.5B, as the European auto-supplier sector struggles — Samsung Electronics Co.-owned Harman International is buying the advanced driver assistance systems business of Germany's ZF Group …

More: Samsung Newsroom, Reuters, SammyGuru, Korea Joongang Daily, Wall Street Journal, electrive.com, Analytics India Magazine, SamMobile, Automotive World, and KED Global

Reuters:

Chinese short-video app Kuaishou's Hong Kong stock fell as much as 6% to ~$8, the lowest since November 21, after it was hit by a cyberattack on December 22 — Shares of Kuaishou (1024.HK) dropped by as much as 6% on Tuesday to HK$62.70 ($8.06), their lowest since November 21 …

More: South China Morning Post, The Cyber Express, and Dow Jones Newswires

Financial Times:

Despite concerns, Labour MPs and other left-wing UK politicians stay active on X; the UK government says it stopped paid ads in 2024, after spending £9M in 2021 — Despite concerns, politicians continue to use Elon Musk's platform in search of a ‘civilised debate’ with constituents

Financial Times:

Sources: ByteDance has made preliminary plans to spend ~$23B in AI capex in 2026, up from ~$20B in 2025, and has budgeted ~$12B for AI processors — ByteDance set to increase capital expenditure next year in effort to further build AI infrastructure — TikTok owner ByteDance is set …

More: Benzinga, New York Times, City A.M., Capacity, and Reuters

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