The Boston startup uses AI to translate and verify legacy software for defense contractors, arguing modernization can't come at the cost of new bugs. Code Metal, a Boston-based startup that uses AI to write code and translate it into other programming languages, just closed a $125 million Series B funding round from new and existing investors. The news comes just a few months after the startup raised $36 million in series A financing led by Accel. Code Metal is part of a new wave of startups aiming to modernize the tech industry by using AI to generate code and translate it across programming languages. One of the questions that persists about AI-assisted code, though, is whether the output is any good--and what the consequences might be if it's not.

The final language of the annual bill that funds the US military is in. It removes provisions that would have helped ensure service members' ability to fix their own equipment. US lawmakers have removed provisions in the National Defense Authorization Act for 2026 that would have ensured military members' right to repair their own equipment. The final language of the NDAA was shared by the House Armed Services Committee on Sunday, after weeks of delays pushed the annual funding bill to the end of the year. Among a host of other language changes made as part of reconciling different versions of the legislation drafted by the Senate and the House of Representatives, two provisions focused on the right to repair--Section 836 of the Senate bill and Section 863 of the House bill--have both been removed.

A push by military contractors could alter pending legislation that would have empowered servicemembers to repair equipment. Lobbyists are pitching a subscription service instead. Right to repair provisions in the National Defense Authorization Act, which would secure funding for the US military in 2026, are likely to be struck from the final language of the bill despite enjoying broad bipartisan support, sources familiar with ongoing negotiations tell WIRED. They say that provisions in the act enabling servicemembers to repair their own equipment are likely to be removed entirely, and replaced with a data-as-a-service subscription plan that benefits defense contractors. The right to repair has become a thorny issue in the military.

Pentagon officials have sounded the alarm about'unique classes of vulnerabilities for AI or autonomous systems,' which they hope new research can fix. The program, dubbed Guaranteeing AI Robustness against Deception (GARD), has been tasked since 2022 with identifying how visual data or other electronic signals inputs for AI might be gamed by the calculated introduction of noise. Computer scientists with one of GARD's defense contractors have experimented with kaleidoscopic patches designed to fool AI-based systems into making false IDs. 'You can essentially, by adding noise to an image or a sensor, perhaps break a downstream machine learning algorithm,' as one senior Pentagon official managing the research explained Wednesday. The news comes as fears that the Pentagon has been'building killer robots in the basement' have allegedly led to stricter AI rules for the US military -- mandating that all systems must be approved before deployment.

Born and raised in Shanghai, Tan came to MIT to study high-energy astrophysics and wrote his dissertation on computational modeling of neutron stars. "Coming from China at that time, I had very little experience with computers," he says. "I was fortunate to find many helpful students during my time there." Tan also met his wife, Hong (Zhang) Tan, SM '88, PhD '96, at MIT. The pair were married in the MIT Chapel and today have two sons.

This content can also be viewed on the site it originates from. On a cloudless morning last May, a pilot took off from the Niagara Falls International Airport, heading for restricted military airspace over Lake Ontario. The plane, which bore the insignia of the United States Air Force, was a repurposed Czechoslovak jet, an L-39 Albatros, purchased by a private defense contractor. The bay in front of the cockpit was filled with sensors and computer processors that recorded the aircraft's performance. For two hours, the pilot flew counterclockwise around the lake.

The biggest U.S. defense contractors -- such as Lockheed Martin, Boeing, General Dynamics and Raytheon -- provide many of the technologically advanced weapons and systems used by U.S. service members. But there are thousands of other technology companies in the U.S., some large and many quite small, with big ideas and capabilities that have never had the opportunity to contribute to the nation's defense, even though the idea may appeal to them. In March, the Quick Reaction Special Projects program, which is part of the Rapid Reaction Technology Office within the office of the undersecretary of defense for research and engineering, published the "2021 Global Needs Statement." The Global Needs Statement -- which is just one of several proposal calls per year that RRTO engages with small and non-traditional companies to incubate innovation by showcasing new ideas and concepts to a Defense Department audience -- asks interested companies to provide their most compelling and innovative technologies and ideas in areas involving artificial intelligence and machine learning; autonomy; biotechnology; cyber; directed energy; fully networked command, communication and control; hypersonics; microelectronics; quantum technology; space and 5G communications. Those technology areas are of great interest to the Defense Department and were spelled out in the 2018 National Defense Strategy; respondents to the Global Needs Statement aren't expected to be the big players who usually get the government contracts. "For this particular initiative ... the vast majority of the companies that submit applications are companies that DOD doesn't do business with on a regular basis or at all," said John Lazar, RRTO's Director.

Washington – The Trump administration plans to reinterpret a Cold War-era arms agreement between 34 nations with the goal of allowing U.S. defense contractors to sell more American-made drones to a wide array of nations, three defense industry executives and a U.S. official told Reuters. The policy change, which has not been previously reported, could open up sales of armed U.S. drones to less stable governments such as Jordan and the United Arab Emirates that in the past have been forbidden from buying them under the 33-year-old Missile Technology Control Regime (MTCR), said the U.S. official, a former U.S. official and one of the executives. It could also undermine longstanding MTCR compliance from countries such as Russia, said the U.S. official, who has direct knowledge of the policy shift. Reinterpreting the MTCR is part of a broader Trump administration effort to sell more weapons overseas. It has overhauled a broad range of arms export regulations and removed the U.S. from international arms treaties including the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces Treaty and the Open Skies Treaty.

A defense contractor wants to study tiny insect brains as it strives to create capable and efficient forms of artificial intelligence. Defense One reported on a solicitation published by Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), which asked for recommendations on building computers the size of insect brains -- some of which have fewer than 1,000 neurons. Human brains, on the other hand, have somewhere around 100 billion neurons. "Nature has forced on these small insects drastic miniaturization and energy efficiency, some having only a few hundred neurons in a compact form-factor, while maintaining basic functionality," the solicitation reads. "Understanding highly integrated sensory and nervous systems in miniature insects and developing prototype computational models . . .

Silicon Valley has a long and secretive history of building hardware and software for the military and law enforcement. In contrast, a recent wave of employee protests against some of those government contracts has been short, fast, and surprisingly public--tearing through corporate campuses, mailing lists, and message boards inside some of the world's most powerful companies. The revolt is part of a growing political awakening among some tech employees about the uses of the products they build. What began as concern inside Google about a Pentagon contract to tap the company's artificial-intelligence smarts was catalyzed by outrage over Trump administration immigration policies. Now, it seems to be spreading quickly.