The top U.S. artificial intelligence companies will participate in a government-led effort intended to craft federal standards on the technology to ensure that it's deployed safely and responsibly, the Commerce Department said Thursday. OpenAI, Anthropic, Microsoft Corp., Meta Platforms Inc. and Alphabet Inc.'s Google are among more than 200 members of a newly established AI Safety Institute Consortium under the department, Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo said. Also on the list are Apple Inc., Amazon Inc., Hugging Face Inc. and IBM. The top industry players will work with the National Institute of Standards and Technology, a body within Commerce, along with other technology companies, civil society groups, academics, and state and local government officials to establish safety standards regarding AI. "President Biden directed us to pull every lever to accomplish two key goals: set safety standards and protect our innovation ecosystem," Raimondo said in a statement. Major tech companies have been engaging with the Biden administration and policymakers in Washington on regulating AI as the technology rapidly advances and is poised to disrupt industries.

Scam and spam robocalls featuring lifelike AI-generated human voices are now officially illegal, in a unanimous ruling by the Federal Communications Commission. The new ruling, issued Thursday, promised to give'State Attorneys General across the country new tools to go after bad actors behind these nefarious robocalls.' 'Bad actors are using AI-generated voices in unsolicited robocalls to extort vulnerable family members, imitate celebrities, and misinform voters,' FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel said in a press release. Following the new ruling, FCC Chairwoman Jessica Rosenworcel (above) said, 'We're putting the fraudsters behind these robocalls on notice.' 'State Attorneys General will now have new tools to crack down on these scams and ensure the public is protected from fraud and misinformation,' Rosenworcel said. The FCC ruling will expand what activities prosecutors can pursue under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA), which is currently the primary law allowing the authorities to help limit junk calls.

The US government on Thursday outlawed robocalls that use voices generated by artificial intelligence, a decision that sends a clear message that exploiting the technology to scam people and mislead voters won't be tolerated. The unanimous ruling by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) targets robocalls made with AI voice-cloning tools under the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, a 1991 law restricting junk calls that use artificial and prerecorded voice messages. The announcement comes as New Hampshire authorities are advancing their investigation into AI-generated robocalls that mimicked President Joe Biden's voice to discourage people from voting in the state's first-in-the-nation primary last month. Effective immediately, the regulation empowers the FCC to fine companies that use AI voices in their calls or block the service providers that carry them. It also opens the door for call recipients to file lawsuits and gives state attorneys general a new mechanism to crack down on violators, according to the FCC.

It's now illegal in the US for robocallers to use AI-generated voices, thanks to a new ruling by the Federal Communications Commission on Thursday. In a unanimous decision, the FCC expands the Telephone Consumer Protection Act, or TCPA, to cover robocall scams that contain AI voice clones. The new rule goes into effect immediately, allowing the commission to fine companies and block providers for making these types of calls. "Bad actors are using AI-generated voices in unsolicited robocalls to extort vulnerable family members, imitate celebrities, and misinform voters," FCC chair Jessica Rosenworcel said in a statement on Thursday. The move comes a few days after the FCC and New Hampshire attorney general John Formella identified Life Corporation as the company behind the mysterious robocalls imitating President Joe Biden last month before the state's primary election.

A whole bunch of big tech companies, 200 in all, have joined a US-based effort to advance responsible AI practices. The US AI Safety Institute Consortium (AISIC) will count Meta, Google, Microsoft and Apple as members. Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo just announced the group's numerous new members and said that they'll be tasked with carrying out actions indicated by President Biden's sweeping executive order on artificial intelligence. "The U.S. government has a significant role to play in setting the standards and developing the tools we need to mitigate the risks and harness the immense potential of artificial intelligence," Raimondo said in a statement. Biden's October executive order was far-reaching, so this consortium will focus on developing guidelines for "red-teaming, capability evaluations, risk management, safety and security, and watermarking synthetic content."

The Federal Communication Commission is moving forward with its plan to ban AI robocalls. Commissioners voted unanimously on Wednesday in favor of a Declaratory Ruling that was proposed in late January. Under the measure, the FCC deems robocalls made using AI-generated voices to be "artificial" voices per the Telephone Consumer Protection Act (TCPA). That makes the practice illegal. The ruling takes effect immediately.

At the federal level, partisan battles have distracted lawmakers from developing bipartisan legislation. Senate Majority Leader Charles E. Schumer (D-N.Y.) has set up a bipartisan group of senators focused on AI policy that's expected to soon unveil an AI framework. But the House's efforts are far less advanced. At a Post Live event on Tuesday, Rep. Marcus J. Molinaro (R-N.Y.) said House Speaker Mike Johnson called for a working group on artificial intelligence to help move legislation.

Voyager 1 is still alive out there, barreling into the cosmos more than 15 billion miles away. However, a computer problem has kept the mission's loyal support team in Southern California from knowing much more about the status of one of NASA's longest-lived spacecraft. The computer glitch cropped up on November 14, and it affected Voyager 1's ability to send back telemetry data, such as measurements from the craft's science instruments or basic engineering information about how the probe was doing. As a result, the team has no insight into key parameters regarding the craft's propulsion, power, or control systems. "It would be the biggest miracle if we get it back. We certainly haven't given up," said Suzanne Dodd, Voyager project manager at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, in an interview with Ars.

Early on the morning of June 1, 2022, Alex Karp, the CEO of the data-analytics firm Palantir Technologies, crossed the border between Poland and Ukraine on foot, with five colleagues in tow. A pair of beaten-up Toyota Land Cruisers awaited on the other side. Chauffeured by armed guards, they sped down empty highways toward Kyiv, past bombed-out buildings, bridges damaged by artillery, the remnants of burned trucks. They arrived in the capital before the wartime curfew. The next day, Karp was escorted into the fortified bunker of the presidential palace, becoming the first leader of a major Western company to meet with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky since Russia's invasion three months earlier. Over a round of espressos, Karp told Zelensky that he was ready to open an office in Kyiv and deploy Palantir's data and artificial-intelligence software to support Ukraine's defense. Karp believed they could team up "in ways that allow David to beat a modern-day Goliath." In the stratosphere of top tech CEOs, Karp is an unusual figure.

Iranian state-backed hackers interrupted TV streaming services in the United Arab Emirates to broadcast a deepfake newsreader delivering a report on the war in Gaza, according to analysts at Microsoft. The tech company said a hacking operation run by the Islamic Revolutionary Guards, a key branch of the Iranian armed forces, had disrupted streaming platforms in the UAE with an AI-generated news broadcast branded "For Humanity". The fake news anchor introduced unverified images that claimed to show Palestinians injured and killed from Israeli military operations in Gaza. Analysts at Microsoft said the hacking group, known as Cotton Sandstorm, published videos on the Telegram messaging platform showing it hacking into three online streaming services and disrupting news channels with the fake newscaster. According to the Khaleej Times, a UAE-based news service, Dubai residents using a HK1RBOXX set-top box were interrupted in December with a message stating: "We have no choice but to hack to deliver this message to you," followed by the AI-generated anchor introducing "graphic" footage, as well as a ticker showing the number of people killed and wounded in Gaza so far.