Justice Department Says Anthropic Can't Be Trusted With Warfighting Systems In response to Anthropic's lawsuit, the government said it lawfully penalized the company for trying to limit how its Claude AI models could be used by the military. The Trump administration argued in a court filing on Tuesday that it did not violate Anthropic's First Amendment rights by designating the AI developer a supply-chain risk and predicted that the company's lawsuit against the government will fail. "The First Amendment is not a license to unilaterally impose contract terms on the government, and Anthropic cites nothing to support such a radical conclusion," US Department of Justice attorneys wrote. The response was filed in a federal court in San Francisco, one of two venues where Anthropic is challenging the Pentagon's decision to sanction the company with a label that can bar companies from defense contracts over concerns about potential security vulnerabilities. Anthropic argues the Trump administration overstepped its authority in applying the label and preventing the company's technologies from being used inside the department.

America's drone industry lags behind China's dominance, but Congress and Trump's $2.5 billion investment aims to rebuild U.S. military and commercial drone production by 2027.

AI is nearly exclusively designed by men - here's how to fix it With the Trump administration's attacks on so-called woke AI it is becoming even harder to make the technology we use fairer and more diverse. It's day two of the conference at the Royal Society in London, but I'm finding it increasingly hard to concentrate on the speakers because my AI transcription software - which is supposed to make my life easier - keeps insisting on mistyping someone's name. The irony isn't lost on me: this is the session about artificial intelligence, and specifically about how women are being erased from the latest AI technologies. This is much bigger than the now-familiar idea that AI algorithms carry the biases of the datasets they are trained on, including gender bias. Instead, the focus of the conference session, chaired by computer scientist Wendy Hall, is seeking to address a more fundamental issue: the fact that new AI technologies, which will have a transformative effect on all of society, are being designed almost exclusively by men.

In today's episode, we discuss how the saga between Anthropic and the Department of Defense is far from over. This week on, our hosts look at what's at stake for Anthropic after the company sued the Department of Defense. They also take a look at the strategy behind the Trump administration sharing action-filled war memes on social media, and share a scoop about how a controversial company is taking in millions in government contracts by helping organize America250 celebrations. Plus: Could AI come for the jobs of venture capitalists? Can AI Kill the Venture Capitalist? Write to us at uncannyvalley@wired.com . You can always listen to this week's podcast through the audio player on this page, but if you want to subscribe for free to get every episode, here's how: If you're on an iPhone or iPad, open the app called Podcasts, or just tap this link . Zoë, Leah and I have really enjoyed being your new hosts these past few weeks, and we want to hear from you. If you like the show and have a minute, please leave us a review in the podcast or app of your choice. It really helps us reach more people, and for any questions and comments, you can always reach us at uncannyvalley@WIRED.com . This week, we're diving into Anthropic's lawsuit against the Department of Defense after the company was labeled as a supply chain risk. We're also discussing why on earth the Trump administration is sharing action film memes about the war in Iran and how a little known events company formed by some of the organizers of the January 6th rally is making bank in Trump's second term in office . Also, we'll talk about whether venture capitalists should be worried about AI taking their jobs .

US Lawmakers Move to Kill the FBI's Warrantless Wiretap Access A bipartisan bill would force the FBI to get a warrant to read Americans' messages and ban the federal purchase of commercial data on US residents ahead of a critical April deadline. A bipartisan privacy coalition in the United States Congress introduced legislation on Thursday that would impose a strict warrant requirement on the FBI's backdoor searches of Americans' communications, aligning federal law with a 2025 federal court ruling that found the warrantless practice unconstitutional. The bill, the Government Surveillance Reform Act of 2026, repeals controversial expansions of the government's warrantless wiretapping authority while overhauling key aspects of federal surveillance law--setting up a showdown with the US intelligence community and its congressional allies weeks before a sweeping global spy program sunsets on April 20. Senators Ron Wyden and Mike Lee are leading the legislative push alongside Representatives Warren Davidson and Zoe Lofgren. The measure carries endorsements from civil liberties organizations across the political spectrum.

What Anthropic's Clash With the Pentagon Is Really About Who will take responsibility for the technology? The weekslong conflict between Anthropic and the Department of Defense is entering a new phase. After being designated a supply-chain risk by DOD last week, which effectively forbids Pentagon contractors from using its products, the AI company filed a lawsuit against DOD this morning alleging that the government's actions were unconstitutional and ideologically motivated. Then, this afternoon, 37 employees from OpenAI and Google DeepMind--including Google's chief scientist, Jeff Dean--signed an amicus brief in support of Anthropic, in essence lending support to one of their employers' greatest business rivals (even as OpenAI itself has established a controversial new contract with DOD). For the past few weeks, Anthropic has been in heated negotiations with the Pentagon over how the U.S. military can use the firm's AI systems.

This week has brought more chaos in the feud between the Pentagon and Anthropic. This week has brought more chaos in the feud between the Pentagon and Anthropic. How AI firm Anthropic wound up in the Pentagon's crosshairs U ntil recently, Anthropic was one of the quieter names in the artificial intelligence boom. Despite being valued at about $350bn, it rarely generated the flashy headlines or public backlash associated with Sam Altman's OpenAI or Elon Musk's xAI. Its CEO and co-founder Dario Amodei was an industry fixture but hardly a household name outside of Silicon Valley, and its chatbot Claude lagged in popularity behind ChatGPT.

A 2023 law championed by Republicans requires the CDC have a director confirmed by the Senate. For months, though, it's had only acting directors--and the White House won't say when that will change. As the agency rotates through a cast of leaders, it's unclear when--or if--the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention will get a permanent director under Donald Trump's second term as president. Following Jim O'Neill's departure as acting CDC director last week, National Institutes of Health director Jay Bhattacharya will now lead both agencies temporarily. It's the latest in a series of shakeups at Trump's CDC, which has lost about a quarter of its staff to mass layoffs carried out by Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy, Jr. last year.

House Democrats are demanding answers from the National Institute of Standards and Technology and urging it to halt rumored changes they say could undermine its mission. One of the US government's top scientific research labs is taking steps that could drive away foreign scientists, a shift lawmakers and sources tell WIRED could cost the country valuable expertise and damage the agency's credibility. The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) helps determine the frameworks underpinning everything from cybersecurity to semiconductor manufacturing. Some of NIST's recent work includes establishing guidelines for securing AI systems and identifying health concerns with air purifiers and firefighting gloves. Many of the agency's thousands of employees, postdoctoral scientists, contractors, and guest researchers are brought in from around the world for their specialized expertise.

In hacker spaces and at their homes, creative protesters are laser-cutting and 3D-printing tools to resist an occupation. As the US government's immigration crackdown expands across the country, anxious residents have mobilized to look out for each other. One way they're doing that is by finding ways to build the tools they need to be resilient against the surge of Immigration and Customs Enforcement agents empowered to kill with impunity . All over the country, makers are 3D-printing thousands of whistles to help people on the ground alert others to nearby ICE activity. But the whistles are far from the only tools being used to respond to the surge of federal agents.