The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau proposed a new measure on Friday that could protect your Robux from scammers and hackers. The proposed rule would interpret terms in the Electronic Fund Transfer Act, or EFTA, which has traditionally been used to protect consumers from unauthorized debit transactions, to include some virtual currencies supplied by gaming and cryptocurrency companies. "Gamers--or in some cases their parents and guardians--have reported issues such as trouble when converting dollars to in-game currency, unauthorized transactions, account hacks and takeovers, theft, scams, and loss of assets," reads the CFPB's post announcing the proposal. "They have also described receiving limited to no help from gaming companies and the banks or digital wallets involved. Refunds are often denied, people are finding their gaming accounts suspended by the video game company after a player tries to get a refund from their financial institution, or people are left caught in doom loops with AI-powered customer service representatives while they're just trying to get straight answers."

Smart lighting company Govee has a new product that creates a quirky new product category. The Gaming Pixel Light displays still or animated pixel art set to 8-bit soundtracks. It can also show you weather updates, sports schedules and Bitcoin prices on its retro display. But it wouldn't be a CES 2025 gizmo without AI something or other stuffed inside, so you won't be surprised to learn that its companion app lets you generate AI pixel art from text prompts. As the product name suggests, the Gaming Pixel Light is marketed as a (desktop or wall-mounted) lighting companion for gamers.

The year 2024 saw the global economy stabilise following the fallout of the COVID-19 pandemic, even as growth in many countries lagged pre-2020 levels. Amid a patchy recovery, more than 2 billion people were eligible to vote this year, and economic issues, particularly rising living costs, were a top concern for voters around the world. Meanwhile, governments grappled with how to regulate potentially transformational technology such as artificial intelligence, and Donald Trump's victory in the United States' presidential election heralded a sharp turn towards protectionism. Trump has indicated that he will pursue an even more aggressive version of the "America First" protectionism that fuelled his rise to power during his second stint in the White House. On the campaign trail, Trump pledged to impose tariffs of 60 percent or higher on Chinese goods and a blanket 20 percent tariff on all other imports.

On Monday, police arrested 26-year-old Luigi Mangione and charged him in the murder of UnitedHealthcare CEO Brian Thompson. Mangione's five-day run from authorities ended after he was spotted eating at a McDonald's in Altoona, Pennsylvania, about 300 miles from Manhattan, where Thompson was gunned down on the morning of December 4. Authorities say they found Mangione carrying fake IDs and a 3D-printed "ghost gun," the model of which is known as the FMDA, or "Free Men Don't Ask." Meanwhile, a flood of mysterious drone sightings across New Jersey and neighboring states caused so much havoc, it quickly gained federal attention. While many people wondered why the US military couldn't just shoot down the drones, the FBI, Department of Homeland Security, and independent experts say the drone mystery may not be much of a mystery, and the drones are probably mostly just airplanes. As for more terrestrial threats, we dove into the far-right realm of "Active Clubs," small groups of young, fitness-focused men who are steeped in extremist ideology and linked to several violent attacks. While the man who helped invent the Active Club network, Robert Rundo, was sentenced in federal court this week, Active Clubs around the world are proliferating.

The doomers have it wrong. AI is not going to end the world--but it is going to end the web as we've known it. AI is already upending the economic covenant of the internet that's existed since the advent of search: A few companies (mostly Google) bring demand, and creators bring supply (and get some ad revenue or recognition from it). AI tools are already generating and summarizing content, obviating the need for users to click through to the sites of content providers, and thereby upsetting the balance. Meanwhile, an ocean of AI-powered deepfakes and bots will make us question what's real and will degrade people's trust in the online world.

Sign up for the Slatest to get the most insightful analysis, criticism, and advice out there, delivered to your inbox daily. On Thursday evening, President-elect Donald Trump announced on his Truth Social platform that he would be appointing David O. Sacks--the "PayPal Mafia" alum, longtime venture capitalist, All-In Podcast co-host, Elon Musk pal, and rock-ribbed Silicon Valley conservative--as the "White House A.I. & Crypto Czar." In his statement, Trump wrote that "Sacks will focus on making America the clear global leader" in artificial intelligence and cryptocurrency, which he deemed to be "two areas critical to the future of American competitiveness." In addition, Sacks will "safeguard Free Speech online," "steer us away from Big Tech bias and censorship," and "lead the Presidential Council of Advisors for Science and Technology." For his first-ever Truth Social post, the incoming czar responded to Trump with gratitude and claimed that he "looks forward to advancing American competitiveness in these critical technologies."

Chinese billionaire Jack Ma rallied his troops during a speech marking Ant's 20th anniversary, making a rare appearance after a government crackdown forced the fintech giant to scrap what would have been the world's largest initial public offering four years ago. The co-founder of Ant and affiliate Alibaba showed up on Sunday to talk about the next 20 years of the fintech company and the opportunities brought on by artificial intelligence, according to a speech transcript. "We were lucky to capture the opportunities of the internet 20 years ago," Ma said in the speech. "In the future 20 years, AI will bring changes far beyond the imagination, AI will bring on an even greater era."

For much of 2024, one of President-elect Donald Trump's staunchest allies in Silicon Valley was David Sacks, an entrepreneur, venture capitalist, and co-host of the popular podcast All-In. On his podcast and social media, Sacks argued that Trump's pro-industry stances would unleash innovation and spur growth in the tech industry. In June, Sacks hosted a fundraiser for Trump in San Francisco that included 300,000-a-person tickets. Now, Sacks has been rewarded with a position inside the White House: the brand-new role of "AI & crypto czar." It's unclear how much power this role actually has.

This story originally appeared on Inside Climate News and is part of the Climate Desk collaboration. In the old ranchlands of South Texas, dormant uranium mines are coming back online. A collection of new ones hope to start production soon, extracting radioactive fuel from the region's shallow aquifers. These mines are the leading edge of what government and industry leaders in Texas hope will be a nuclear renaissance, as America's latent nuclear sector begins to stir again. Texas is currently developing a host of high-tech industries that require enormous amounts of electricity, from cryptocurrency mines and artificial intelligence to hydrogen production and seawater desalination.

In perhaps the most adorable hacker story of the year, a trio of technologists in India found an innovative way to circumvent Apple's location restrictions on AirPod Pro 2s so they could enable the earbuds' hearing aid feature for their grandmas. The hack involved a homemade Faraday cage, a microwave, and a lot of trial and error. On the other end of the tech-advancements spectrum, the US military is currently testing an AI-enabled machine gun that is capable of auto-targeting swarms of drones. The Bullfrog, built by Allen Control Systems, is one of several advanced weapons technologies in the works to combat the growing threat of cheap, small drones on the battlefield. The US Department of Justice announced this week that an 18-year-old from California has admitted to making or orchestrating more than 375 swatting attacks across the United States.