Flock Safety is pitching its police-style drone program to private businesses. It could bring aerial surveillance to shopping centers, warehouses, and hospitals. Flock Safety, whose drones were once reserved for police departments, is now offering them for private-sector security, the company announced today, with potential customers including including businesses intent on curbing shoplifting. Companies in the US can now place Flock's drone docking stations on their premises. If the company has a waiver from the Federal Aviation Administration to fly beyond visual line of sight (these are becoming easier to get), its security team can fly the drones within a certain radius, often a few miles. "Instead of a 911 call [that triggers the drone], it's an alarm call," says Keith Kauffman, a former police chief who now directs Flock's drone program.

The Trump administration recently announced that it would be laying off approximately 6,700 workers at the Internal Revenue Service, about 8% of the people employed by the agency. Tens of thousands of federal employees at other agencies are also losing their jobs. The timing could not be worse. Millions of returns will need to be processed. Questions will need to be answered.

President Xi Jinping's embrace of Chinese tech bosses in a rare public meeting is fueling hope Beijing is shifting its stance to give the private sector a freer hand as it fights a trade war with U.S. President Donald Trump. Four years after launching a regulatory crackdown that plunged the tech sector into turmoil, China's top leader sat down publicly for the first time with Alibaba co-founder Jack Ma, whose firm bore the brunt of that campaign. Also on the guest list Monday were rising stars from robotics start-up Unitree, electric car giant BYD and AI newcomer DeepSeek -- firms rolling out world-beating innovations despite U.S. export controls. While a similar show of support from Xi in 2018 proved fleeting, developing national tech champions is core to Beijing's plan for boosting the economy as it deflates a bubble in the property market that once drove about a quarter of growth. Underscoring the importance of spurring innovation, high-tech industries contributed to 15% of gross domestic product last year and are set to overtake the housing sector in 2026, according to Bloomberg Economics.

Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice weighed in on the global artificial intelligence race, warning the United States must remain the "technological leader" against the "great competitor" -- China. "The United States is currently the technological leader, and we have to keep it that way. We absolutely have to win this race so that a democracy wins the race for these frontier technologies, not an authoritarian state -- and China, of course, is the great competitor here," Rice said Friday on "The Story." Earlier this week, Vice President JD Vance laid out the Trump administration's vision for the future of artificial intelligence during the AI Action Summit in Paris. During his remarks, Vance emphasized deregulation, private-sector innovations, safety and security as well as global cooperation while touting U.S. success in AI growth.

For a century, Britain led the world based on innovations in coal and steam power. For a second century, America led the world based on electrification, materials science and mass production. And now, with AI promising to both boost the economy and bolster national security, America has a chance to lead in the century ahead. However, with China ramping up its investment in AI, pouring billions into data centers and integrating AI across its economy, we cannot take the outcome for granted. A recent expert report reveals that America has lost its lead in most key technologies to its rival.

It's been five months since President Joe Biden signed an executive order (EO) to address the rapid advancements in artificial intelligence. The White House is today taking another step forward in implementing the EO with a policy that aims to regulate the federal government's use of AI. Safeguards that the agencies must have in place include, among other things, ways to mitigate the risk of algorithmic bias. "I believe that all leaders from government, civil society and the private sector have a moral, ethical and societal duty to make sure that artificial intelligence is adopted and advanced in a way that protects the public from potential harm while ensuring everyone is able to enjoy its benefits," Vice President Kamala Harris told reporters on a press call. Harris announced three binding requirements under a new Office of Management and Budget (OMB) policy.

There exists a growing discourse around the domination of Big Tech on the landscape of artificial intelligence (AI) research, yet our comprehension of this phenomenon remains cursory. This paper aims to broaden and deepen our understanding of Big Tech's reach and power within AI research. It highlights the dominance not merely in terms of sheer publication volume but rather in the propagation of new ideas or \textit{memes}. Current studies often oversimplify the concept of influence to the share of affiliations in academic papers, typically sourced from limited databases such as arXiv or specific academic conferences. The main goal of this paper is to unravel the specific nuances of such influence, determining which AI ideas are predominantly driven by Big Tech entities. By employing network and memetic analysis on AI-oriented paper abstracts and their citation network, we are able to grasp a deeper insight into this phenomenon. By utilizing two databases: OpenAlex and S2ORC, we are able to perform such analysis on a much bigger scale than previous attempts. Our findings suggest, that while Big Tech-affiliated papers are disproportionately more cited in some areas, the most cited papers are those affiliated with both Big Tech and Academia. Focusing on the most contagious memes, their attribution to specific affiliation groups (Big Tech, Academia, mixed affiliation) seems to be equally distributed between those three groups. This suggests that the notion of Big Tech domination over AI research is oversimplified in the discourse. Ultimately, this more nuanced understanding of Big Tech's and Academia's influence could inform a more symbiotic alliance between these stakeholders which would better serve the dual goals of societal welfare and the scientific integrity of AI research.

Japan plans to provide remote medical care services and smart farming technology to Ukraine in order to help revive its economy and restore areas of the country devastated by Russia's invasion, government sources said Saturday. The measures will serve as pillars of cooperation by Japanese companies and will be revealed at a meeting in Japan early next year to promote economic reconstruction in the Eastern European nation. The digital healthcare services will enable Japanese doctors to provide medical care to those injured people in Ukraine by having their ultrasound scans sent to Japan. Japan hopes to assist Ukraine with its wheat and sunflower yields through farming methods that utilize sensors and artificial intelligence technologies, which can help in ways such as providing the optimal amount of water or fertilizer to crops. Because of Japan's stringent regulations on providing weapons under its war-renouncing Constitution, Tokyo has instead committed to assisting with Ukraine's reconstruction efforts through its public and private sectors.

Experts discuss what is at stake in the AI race between the United States and China, warning it could'dictate the future of humanity.' The United States government and private sector should strike a balance between regulation and investment in artificial intelligence in order to retain a technological edge over China, experts advised. Gordon Chang, the author of "The Coming Collapse of China," advised a prohibition on investment into Chinese companies, given the country's government-down approach to military and technological developments. "We have to recognize the comprehensiveness of the Chinese system and cut trade and investment with China," Chang said. "If we do that, China does not have a chance of competing with the United States because we're a far stronger society."

Twitter CEO Elon Musk provides insight on the consequences of developing artificial intelligence and the potential impact on elections. Rapidly developing artificial intelligence technology may have prevented the Boston Marathon bombing, but it might also become law enforcement's newest nightmare. That was the message from Ed Davis, who was Boston's police commissioner during the deadly terrorist attack on April 15, 2013. A decade after that plot that killed three people and injured hundreds, he told Fox News Digital that AI "will ultimately improve investigations and allow many dangerous criminals to be brought to justice." "Use of artificial intelligence systems applied to secret and top-secret databases could very well have prevented the Boston Marathon bombing," he said.