us department
Nvidia will build AI supercomputers for US Department of Energy
Nvidia, the artificial intelligence (AI) chip leader, will build seven new supercomputers for the United States Department of Energy (DOE), CEO Jensen Huang has said. The company has $500bn in bookings for its AI chips, Huang said on Tuesday in a keynote address at the company's GTC event in Washington, DC, the US capital. It is striking deals around the world while also navigating a US-China trade war that could determine which country's technology is most used across the globe. Investors are looking for clarity on what chips the tech company will be able to sell to the vast Chinese market, but Huang in his keynote speech praised policies by US President Donald Trump while announcing new products and deals. These included network technology that will let Nvidia AI chips work with quantum computers.
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Smuggler jailed for 40 years after shipping ballistic missiles parts from Iran
A weapons smuggler, who used a fishing boat to ship ballistic missile parts from Iran to Houthi rebels in Yemen, has been sentenced to 40 years in a US prison. Pakistani national Muhammad Pahlawan was detained during a US military operation in the Arabian Sea in January 2024 - during which two US Navy Seals drowned. Pahlawan's crew would later testify they had been duped into taking part, having believed they were working as fishermen. The Houthis were launching sustained missile and drone attacks on Israel at the time, as well as targeting international commercial shipping in the Red Sea and Gulf of Aden, saying they were acting in support of the Palestinians in Gaza. Iran has consistently denied arming the Houthis.
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US charges Chinese nationals with illegally shipping Nvidia chips to China
Authorities in the United States have charged two Chinese citizens with shipping tens of millions of dollars' worth of advanced Nvidia chips to China in breach of export controls. Chuan Geng and Shiwei Yang are alleged to have "knowingly and willfully" exported the graphic processing units (GPUs) used to power artificial intelligence without authorisation from October 2022 to July 2025, the US Department of Justice said on Tuesday. Export records indicate that Geng and Yang, both 28, organised at least 21 shipments through their El Monte, California-based company ALX Solutions Inc to companies in Singapore and Malaysia, the Justice Department said. The exports included a December 2024 shipment of Nvidia H100 GPUs – described as the most powerful chip on the market – that was "falsely labelled" and had not obtained the necessary licence from the US Department of Commerce, the Justice Department said. According to prosecutors, ALX Solutions received payments from firms in Hong Kong and China, including a 1m sum from a China-based company in January 2024, rather than the companies that accepted the shipments.
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The Pentagon Signs Up for Grok, Days After the Chatbot's Antisemitic Meltdown
Elon Musk listens as President Donald Trump speaks during a news conference in the Oval Office of the White House, Friday, May 30, 2025, in Washington.Evan Vucci/ AP The Pentagon will start using Elon Musk's AI-powered chatbot, Grok, days after ito published a string of antisemitic posts, the Chief Digital and Artificial Intelligence Office announced on Monday. The move is a part of a larger rollout of Musk's company, xAI, for a new program called "Grok for Government," which describes itself a as a "suite of frontier AI products available to United States Government customers." The announcement comes days after Grok spewed antisemitic and racist statements to its users, including praise for Adolf Hitler and "the white man." It also referred to itself as "MechaHitler." The debacle kick-started a wave of celebration amongst online extremists, many of whom called for the creation of more hateful AI chatbots.
Outrage as Google scraps its promise not to use AI for weapons or surveillance
Google has updated its AI ethical guidelines and removed a key pledge not to use the tech in a dangerous way. The company erased the 2018 pledge on Tuesday which stated the tech giant'would not use AI for weapons or surveillance'. The revised policy now shows that Google will only develop AI'responsibly' and in line with'widely accepted principles of international law and human rights.' Google's change has sparked internal backlash as employees called the move'deeply concerning' and that the company should not be involved in'the business of war.' Matt Mahmoudi, Amnesty adviser on AI and human rights, shamed Google for the move, saying the tech giant set a'dangerous precedent.' 'AI-powered technologies could fuel surveillance and lethal killing systems at a vast scale, potentially leading to mass violations and infringing on the fundamental right to privacy,' he added.
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What are the mystery drones flying over the US?
Mysterious drones have been swarming the night skies above New Jersey and other nearby states for a month. They've been spotted over several US military sites. They've been videoed over houses and apartment buildings. A swarm was seen following a US Coast Guard rescue boat at the same time that New Jersey police reported 50 drones arriving on land from the ocean. But no one seems to know who's piloting them, or whether it's a coordinated effort.
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China launches investigation into US chipmaker Nvidia
Taipei, Taiwan – China has launched an antitrust investigation into chip giant Nvidia in what appears to be Beijing's latest act of retaliation against Washington's sanctions on Chinese tech companies. Chinese state media said on Monday that the California-based chipmaker was being investigated by the State Administration for Market Regulation for potentially violating China's antimonopoly laws. Regulators will also review the company's 6.9bn acquisition of Mellanox Technologies, an Israeli-American supplier specialising in computer networking products, state media reports said, without providing further details. Chinese regulators approved the deal in 2020 with several restrictive conditions, including a provision that Nvidia would not discriminate against Chinese suppliers. Nvidia, which designs advanced chips used to power artificial intelligence (AI), is one of the world's most valuable companies, with a market capitalisation of more than 3.4 trillion.
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Chinese regulators are investigating NVIDIA for potential antitrust violations
NVIDIA, graphics chip maker and recent backbone of the AI industry, is under investigation by Chinese regulators over potential antitrust violations, The New York Times reports. The concerns center on the acquisition of Mellanox Technologies, a computer networking company NVIDIA bought in 2020. As part of the conditions of that acquisition, Chinese regulators required NVIDIA to "provide information about new [Mellanox] products to rivals within 90 days of making them available to NVIDIA," Bloomberg writes. China's State Administration for Market Regulation is kicking off its investigation because it believes that those terms were violated. This wouldn't be the first time NVIDIA has been investigated for monopolistic behavior – The US Department of Justice reportedly launched its own antitrust investigation into NVIDIA in September 2024 – but it has a different flavor in the context of the escalating trade war between the US and China.
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The US Department of Defense is investing in deepfake detection
"This work represents a significant step forward in strengthening our information advantage as we combat sophisticated disinformation campaigns and synthetic-media threats," says Bustamante. Hive was chosen out of a pool of 36 companies to test its deepfake detection and attribution technology with the DOD. The contract could enable the department to detect and counter AI deception at scale. "This is the evolution of cyberwarfare." Hive's technology has been trained on a large amount of content, some AI-generated and some not.
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US Homeland Security will reportedly collect face scans of migrant kids
Update, August 15, 5:50PM ET: The US Department of Homeland Security has issued a statement disputing some of MIT Technology Review's reporting. We've updated our post below with its statement and more details. The US Department of Homeland Security (DHS), which is looking to improve its facial recognition algorithms, is reportedly planning to use the facial data of migrant children entering the country for training. According to MIT Technology Review, the agency intends to collect and analyze facial captures of kids younger than 14. John Boyd, the assistant director of Homeland Security's Office of Biometric Identity Management who's involved in the development of biometric services for the government, told the publication that the collection will include children "down to the infant."