DOGE Used AI for Housing Policy. The Government Won't Say How In response to a public records request, HUD has withheld documents about DOGE's use of AI--in part by citing a privilege that doesn't exist. Members of the so-called Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) who were working at the Department of Housing and Urban Development (HUD) used artificial intelligence to inform policy decisions. Now, the agency appears to be denying Freedom of Information Act requests for information on the development and use of AI tools, and the way they informed policy decisions, according to documents obtained by a FOIA request by Democracy Forward, a nonprofit legal organization. Last year, WIRED reported that Christopher Sweet, who was then a third-year student at the University of Chicago, had joined the DOGE team at HUD, along with Scott Langmack, who came to DOGE from a property technology startup called Kukun. Sweet's primary focus, according to HUD employees who spoke to WIRED at the time, was on using artificial intelligence to identify agency rules for potential rescission, or contract cancellations, as part of a similar effort across the government .

When Anna Funder stood before a pack of journalists at Parliament House this month, she presented herself not just as a writer but also a "victim of crime". The Stasiland author was using the analogy to illustrate how technology companies have flagrantly "hoovered up" her literary works for their own profit. Authors, artists, musicians and media organisations were last year assured those laws wouldn't be watered down when the federal government ruled out granting a legal exemption for artificial intelligence companies to mine content to train their large language models, which include ChatGPT, Gemini and Claude. But continual lobbying from tech giants and a whistleblower's tipoff to the independent senator David Pocock have ignited fears that the Albanese government might go back on its word - even as it continues to insist that it won't. The stoush has exposed splits within Labor about how to respond to AI and raised questions about how far the government should bend - if at all - to big tech to capture the supposed riches of the datacentre boom.

Guardian Australia has been told an industry proposal has been presented to cabinet that would grant AI companies special exemptions to mine creative content. In exchange, the companies would bankroll the artists' fund and commit more than $50bn worth of investment in datacentres. Australia'sleepwalking' into AI crisis and'tech bro free-for-all', says Greens senator The independent senator David Pocock said the proposal was the "ultimate dirty deal" as he demanded the government categorically rule it out. The potential adoption of a text and data mining exemption would represent a major reversal from the federal government, which last year ruled it out after criticism from artists, authors and media groups. Amid fears the government could capitulate to big tech, a delegation of creatives staged a press conference in parliament house on Wednesday to urge the government to hold the line.

Due to health and energy concerns, the California Legislature is considering bills to prohibit data centers from being exempted from the state's stringent environmental law and impose new tariffs on new major energy users that strain power supplies.

The attorney general, Michelle Rowland, will confirm the decision on Monday, shutting the door on the proposal floated by the Productivity Commission and backed by tech companies. The attorney general, Michelle Rowland, will confirm the decision on Monday, shutting the door on the proposal floated by the Productivity Commission and backed by tech companies. The Albanese government has explicitly ruled out handing tech companies free rein to mine creative content to train their artificial intelligence models, after a fierce backlash from authors and arts and media groups. The attorney general, Michelle Rowland, will confirm the decision on Monday, shutting the door on a contentious proposal floated by the Productivity Commission and backed by tech companies. "Australian creatives are not only world class, but they are also the lifeblood of Australian culture, and we must ensure the right legal protections are in place," Rowland said.

As confidence in the C.D.C. wanes, states are asserting more control over their vaccine policies, creating a fragmented public-health system. Last week, former officials from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention warned members of Congress that Robert F. Kennedy, Jr., the Secretary of Health and Human Services, was endangering the nation's welfare by dismissing evidence and expertise in favor of his own vaccine skepticism. Kennedy "censored C.D.C. science, politicized its processes, and stripped leaders of independence," Debra Houry, the agency's former chief medical officer, said in a hearing this past Wednesday. The following day, the Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices ()--the scientific panel that influences U.S. vaccine policy more than any other body--began a chaotic and contentious two-day meeting about updating the country's vaccination recommendations. The committee's members had been handpicked by Kennedy, some of them joining just days before. Several of's decisions, which were announced last week, will have limited practical impact.

Things to Do in L.A. Tap to enable a layout that focuses on the article. California has a strict vaccine mandate. Will it survive the Trump administration? Dr. Neville Anderson, right, tries to distract Perry Roj, 4, while nurse Breanna Kirby gives her a DTaP polio vaccination. Her mom, Devin Homsey, holds her tight at Larchmont Pediatrics.

Farquhar, the Tech Council of Australia CEO, told ABC's 7.30 program on Tuesday: "all AI usage of mining or searching or going across data is probably illegal under Australian law and I think that hurts a lot of investment of these companies in Australia". Farquhar's claim overlooks that this is not a settled issue in the US, and could have devastating effects on creative industries. Farquhar's argument is that it is not theft of people's work unless the AI is used to "copy an artist directly" such as creating a song in their style. "I do think people would say that, hey, if people are going to sit down with a digital companion, an AI song creator and they collaboratively work with an AI to create something new to the world, that's probably fair use." Farquhar said the benefits of large language models outweigh the issues raised by AI training its data on other people's work for free.

Arts, creative and media groups have demanded the government rule out allowing big tech companies to take Australian content to train their artificial intelligence models, with concerns such a shift would "sell out" Australian workers and lead to "rampant theft" of intellectual property. "It is not appropriate for big tech to steal the work of Australian artists, musicians, creators, news media, journalism, and use it for their own ends without paying for it," Ley said on Wednesday. In an interim report on "harnessing data and digital technology", the Productivity Commission set out proposals for how tech, including AI, could be regulated and treated in Australia, suggesting it could boost productivity by between 0.5% and 13% over the next decade, adding up to 116bn to Australia's GDP. The commission suggested several possible remedies, including expanding licensing schemes, or an exemption for "text and data mining" and expanding the existing fair dealing rules, which it said existed in other countries. The latter suggestion prompted fierce pushback from arts, creative and media companies, which raised alarm their work could be left open for massively wealthy tech companies to use – without compensation or payment – to train AI models.

Tariff exemptions are fundamental to attracting Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) into the manufacturing sector, though the associated administrative processes present areas for optimization for both investing entities and the national tax authority. This paper proposes a conceptual framework to empower tax administration by leveraging a synergistic integration of Optical Character Recognition (OCR) and Large Language Model (LLM) technologies. The proposed system is designed to first utilize OCR for intelligent digitization, precisely extracting data from diverse application documents and key regulatory texts such as tariff orders. Subsequently, the LLM would enhance the capabilities of administrative officers by automating the critical and time-intensive task of verifying submitted HS Tariff Codes for machinery, equipment, and raw materials against official exemption lists. By enhancing the speed and precision of these initial assessments, this AI-driven approach systematically reduces potential for non-alignment and non-optimized exemption utilization, thereby streamlining the investment journey for FDI companies. For the national administration, the benefits include a significant boost in operational capacity, reduced administrative load, and a strengthened control environment, ultimately improving the ease of doing business and solidifying the nation's appeal as a premier destination for high-value manufacturing FDI.