The Israeli military has been altering commercial drones to carry bombs and surveil people in Gaza, an investigation by Al Jazeera's Sanad verification agency has found. According to Sanad, drones manufactured by the Chinese tech giant DJI have been used to attack hospitals and civilian shelters and to surveil Palestinian prisoners being forced to act as human shields for heavily armoured Israeli soldiers. This is not the first time DJI drones have been modified and used by armies. There were similar reports about both sides of the Russia-Ukraine war in 2022. At the time, DJI suspended all sales to both countries and introduced software modifications that restricted the areas where its drones could be used and how high they could fly.

More AI chatbots now offer a deep research option, through which they can investigate a topic for you. Acting as autonomous AI agents, the bots will surf the web on your behalf, find the right online sources, and then present you with a detailed report based on their findings. The goal is to save you the time of checking out dozens or hundreds of websites yourself. Deep Research is quickly becoming a powerful feature among a host of AIs. You'll find it with OpenAI's ChatGPT, Google Gemini, Perplexity AI, and even xAI's Grok (which calls it DeepSearch).

Fine, I'm being a little dramatic, but don't act like I'm the only one who thinks a lot of "AI innovations" are a load of you know what. Most "AI innovations" are either overhyped or just plain ridiculous; looking at you, AI toaster. I still can't get over that and refuse to let it go. Also: Why I just added Gemini 2.5 Pro to the very short list of AI tools I pay for But every once in a while, something useful comes along. Google adding AI to Sheets was one of those moments for me.

It can be difficult to keep up with all the new artificial intelligence tools. You may even have access to numerous AI features and resources that you haven't had the time to notice. For example, Copilot Vision is now free for everyone to use in Microsoft Edge. That's perhaps not something you've realized if you don't use Edge as your regular browser, or if you've never heard of Copilot Vision. It's an extension of Microsoft's Copilot AI that can essentially'see' what you're looking at on the web.

Lenovo just introduced its most powerful creative laptop yet: the Legion 9i. Announced at Lenovo Tech World in Shanghai, it's built for serious game developers, 3D artists, and creators who need top-tier performance. With more than half of upcoming titles for current-gen systems built on Unreal Engine, the Legion 9i couldn't have come at a better time. The massive 18-inch PureSight display is something to behold, offering up to either 4K resolution in traditional 2D or 2K resolution in glasses-free 3D. The 3D effect is achieved using eye-tracking tech and a clever lens system, no headset or special 3D glasses needed!

Why does big tech think that improvements always have to mean different? If you're over having to relearn your essential computer programs every time some tech genius thinks it's time to switch up, check out this Microsoft Office 2019 for Windows deal. You can add the old-school programs you love, like Word, Excel, and Publisher, with the layouts you like for just 29.97 for life. With Microsoft Office 2019, you get all the essential programs you're familiar with in the Office suite to help you create documents and spreadsheets, draft presentations and design graphic art, and even track research and database information. Even though these are the older versions of Microsoft programs, your files will still be compatible with more recent iterations.

In a somewhat unexpected move, OpenAI is evolving its company structure -- and not necessarily toward profit. OpenAI LLC is the for-profit arm of the organization that runs products like ChatGPT. OpenAI Inc is the nonprofit arm that owns OpenAI LLC. On Monday, the company announced that OpenAI LLC would transition to a Public Benefit Corporation (PBC), with OpenAI Inc maintaining control as its largest shareholder. Other AI companies, including Anthropic and X.ai, and retail companies like Allbirds and Patagonia, are set up as PBCs.

SWE-Bench (pronounced "swee bench") launched in November 2024 as a way to evaluate an AI model's coding skill. It has since quickly become one of the most popular tests in AI. A SWE-Bench score has become a mainstay of major model releases from OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google--and outside of foundation models, the fine-tuners at AI firms are in constant competition to see who can rise above the pack. Despite all the fervor, this isn't exactly a truthful assessment of which model is "better." Entrants have begun to game the system--which is pushing many others to wonder whether there's a better way to actually measure AI achievement.

Multimodal AI, which can ingest content in non-text formats like audio and images, has leveled up the data that large language models (LLMs) can parse. However, new research from security specialist Enkrypt AI suggests these models are also more susceptible to novel jailbreak techniques. Also: Anthropic finds alarming'emerging trends' in Claude misuse report On Thursday, Enkrypt published findings that two multimodal models from French AI lab Mistral -- Pixtral-Large (25.02) and Pixtral-12b -- are up to 40 times more likely to produce chemical, biological, radiological, and nuclear (CBRN) information than competitors when prompted adversarially. The models are also 60 times more likely to generate child sexual exploitation material (CSEM) than competitors, which include OpenAI's GPT-4o and Anthropic's Claude 3.7 Sonnet. Mistral did not respond to ZDNET's request for comment on Enkrypt's findings.

FROM IVY TO ASHES – Trump goes scorched-earth on Harvard as fiery feud enters new phase. HELD IN THE CLOUDS – Disturbing claim surfaces about what the Biden team chose over flight safety. 'TABLES HAVE TURNED' – AOC taunts Trump's border czar during immigration town hall, he immediately responds. TIMESTAMP TWIST – Karen Read case rattled by digital curveball -- what the jury hears could change everything. CLEAR MESSAGE – New GOP bill aims to give death penalty to illegal immigrant murderers.