But they were both great at getting attention. Public Domain Indeed, academics at the time reportedly sent flustered letters to the editor at calling the prediction "ridiculous" and "manifestly absurd." "There was never, even at that time, any reason to think that it would keep growing fast like that."

Image caption, Sir Ken McCallum gave his annual address at MI5's headquarters in central London MI5 is devoting more resource to countering state threats than during the Cold War, the head of the intelligence service has said, as he labelled Russia aggressor number one. Sir Ken McCallum warned MI5 was now facing a situation in which our terrorism and state threats operational missions are pretty much of equal scale because threats from foreign adversaries have quadrupled. He used an annual speech at the domestic intelligence service's headquarters in London to also warn of rising threats from Iran and extreme right-wing terrorism. Sir Ken also said MI5 had caught terrorists seeking to exploit AI, including by integrating the technology with drones - and warned the UK must stay ahead of the risk of new bioweapons being developed by violent groups. The MI5 head said Russia was waging hybrid warfare while carefully avoiding triggering a joint response from Nato, a line which he said the Kremlin would be foolish to cross.

Countries around the world have had their future economic prospects assessed by influential body, the International Monetary Fund (IMF). What the IMF says matters - it aims to keep the global economy stable and its twice-yearly forecasts are one of the most authoritative looks at what is really going on around the world. Yet like all forecasts they can also turn out to be incorrect, so they shouldn't be treated as gospel. Here are three things we've learnt about the UK from the IMF's latest report. The global economy has been rocked by the US-Israel war with Iran. The transportation and production of energy in the Middle East has been severely disrupted, causing oil prices to jump and inflation to rise.

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CXMT said it had made good progress on new DRAM architecture that would boost chip memory density. CXMT said it had made good progress on new DRAM architecture that would boost chip memory density. Tue 13 Oct 2026 05.48 EDTFirst published on Tue 13 Oct 2026 04.01 EDT Shares in semiconductor companies fell on Tuesday after the boss of Broadcom compared many AI investors to "casino" gamblers, and the Chinese memory chip maker CXMT said it had made good progress on a new chip architecture. Japan's Nikkei fell 1.8% and the Taiwan exchange lost almost 2%, with the country's chip maker TSMC down by a similar amount. Samsung Electronics shares dropped 7.4% on the South Korean exchange, while the memory chip maker SK Hynix was down 10%.

Image caption, Five crew members on the Ukrainian-registered merchant ship suffered minor injuries in Tuesday's attacks A merchant ship has sunk after drones hit two vessels off Bulgaria's Black Sea coast, Prime Minister Rumen Radev has said. He indicated Russia was suspected of the attacks and that he had called in its ambassador. One of the ships went down 17 nautical miles (31km) east of Krapets and one crew member was saved, he said. The other, Ukrainian-owned vessel was hit by three drones 18 nautical miles from the town of Byala and all 15 crew were rescued, he added. The drone attacks come a week after two other commercial ships were hit by sea and aerial drones in Bulgaria's exclusive economic zone.

'This is an apartheid regime' Does Trump have real leverage over Netanyahu? The Gaza "ceasefire" marked its first anniversary on October 10, but more than 100 humanitarian and human rights organisations said it exists "in name only" . Islamic Relief noted that Israeli forces have killed or wounded a Palestinian in Gaza on average every 90 minutes since the ceasefire took effect. Four Palestinians were killed in a drone strike near Panda Mall in western Gaza City on Saturday, which Israel said targeted members of Hamas's Nukhba force . Also on Saturday, eight-year-old Shahd al-Najjar was killed by Israeli fire that struck her inside her tent in western Gaza City.

The international technology exhibition CEATEC 2026 opens at Makuhari Messe in Chiba on Tuesday. CHIBA - Artificial intelligence and other cutting-edge digital technologies are on display as the CEATEC international exhibition opened on Tuesday at the Makuhari Messe convention center in Chiba, joined by 821 companies and organizations from Japan and abroad. "As societal challenges become increasingly complex, it is important not only to create new technologies, but also to change the future of industries, society and people's lives for the better," Takashi Niino, chair of the Japan Electronics and Information Technology Industries Association, an industry group that organizes the four-day event, said in a speech at an opening ceremony. Among the exhibitors, Mitsubishi Electric demonstrated AI technology capable of identifying abnormal sounds and human voices in noisy manufacturing environments. Hitachi presented its efforts to improve the efficiency of social infrastructure operations, including railways and power systems, using AI, while NEC showcased a service designed to protect organizations from cyberattacks.

Middle East and Central Asia's economy to shrink in 2026 amid war, IMF says Share Middle East and Central Asia's economy to shrink in 2026 amid war, IMF says on social media The economy of the Middle East and Central Asia is set to shrink in 2026 amid the fallout of the US-Israel war on Iran, with countries such as Kuwait and Qatar facing double-digit contractions, according to the International Monetary Fund (IMF). The region's gross domestic product (GDP) is forecast to contract by 0.3 percent this year, a sharp downgrade from the 1.9 percent expansion projected in April, the IMF said in its latest economic outlook on Tuesday. Kuwait, Iraq and Qatar are forecast to have the most severe economic contractions, with their GDPs expected to shrink by 16.7 percent, 16 percent and 15.6 percent, respectively. Bahrain's GDP is forecast to contract by 11.3 percent, while Iran's economy is projected to shrink by 7.6 percent. Saudi Arabia, which has partially offset the hit to its energy sector by boosting oil exports through the East-West pipeline, is projected to record negative growth of 3.3 percent.

AI could self-replicate on home devices within'months', Anthropic says Share AI could self-replicate on home devices within'months', Anthropic says on social media Small artificial intelligence models could soon begin self-replicating on everyday consumer products such as smart TVs and fridges, without needing a data centre, according to researchers at AI giant Anthropic. In a report released on Monday, the researchers said small AI models "may be months away from being capable enough" to copy themselves on internet of things (IoT) devices used in homes and small businesses. While data centres would be "a clear, high-value target" for AI worms, internet-connected devices like smart TVs, fridges, ovens and lawnmowers could soon also provide sufficient computing power for self-replication, the research team said. Although no current AI model proved to be both powerful and small enough to self-replicate reliably on a smart TV used in testing, the trend in development makes the emergence of such a model likely by the end of 2026, the researchers said. "Home and small business IoT devices might be the first target for such attacks because they're connected to the internet and, historically, have had minimal security measures in place," researchers William Zhou and Daniel Freeman said. The researchers said they anticipated the future would be "awash with agents running on all types of hardware", including some that "aren't under human control".