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Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:

The company that wanted AI regulation under Biden may have gotten its wish, just not on its own terms:

The Trump administration is said to be discussing an executive order that would establish a government review process for new AI models before they're released to the public, The New York Times has reported, citing unnamed U.S. officials.

The proposed order would create an "AI working group" of tech executives and government officials to develop oversight procedures, with White House staff briefing leaders from Anthropic, Google, and OpenAI on the plans last week. These discussions, if true, would represent a sharp departure from the administration's current stance as something of a deregulatory champion — immediately upon taking office, the Trump administration revoked a Biden-era executive order addressing AI risks.

The sudden reversal coincides with a leadership vacuum in White House AI policy. David Sacks, who led the administration's deregulation push as AI czar, left the role in March, with White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles and Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent having since taken a more active role in shaping AI policy, according to The New York Times.

The new approach sounds a lot like the UK's AI Security Institute model, where government bodies evaluate frontier models against safety benchmarks before and after deployment. Officials told the New York Times that the NSA, the Office of the National Cyber Director, and the Director of National Intelligence could oversee the review. Critically, the system would grant the government early access to models without blocking their release.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, the catalyst for all this appears to have been Anthropic’s Mythos model, which the company’s marketing described as capable of finding thousands of critical software vulnerabilities and too dangerous for public release.

An Anonymous Coward writes:

Daemon Tools users: It's time to check your machines for stealthy infections, stat:

Daemon Tools, a widely used app for mounting disk images, has been backdoored in a monthlong compromise that has pushed malicious updates from the servers of its developer, researchers said Tuesday.

Kaspersky, the security firm reporting the supply-chain attack, said it began on April 8 and remained active as of the time its post went live. Installers that are signed by the developer's official digital certificate and downloaded from its website infect Daemon Tools executables, causing the malware to run at boot time. Kaspersky didn't explicitly say so, but based on technical details, the infected versions appear to be only those that run on Windows. Versions 12.5.0.2421 through 12.5.0.2434 are affected. Neither Kaspersky nor developer AVB could be contacted immediately for additional details.

Infected versions contain an initial payload that collects MAC addresses, hostnames, DNS domain names, running processes, installed software, and system locales. The malware sends them to an attacker-controlled server. Thousands of machines in more than 100 countries were targeted. Out of the many machines infected, about 12 of them, belonging to retail, scientific, government, and manufacturing organizations, have received a follow-on payload—an indication that the supply-chain attack targets select groups.

[...] One of the follow-on payloads pushed to about a dozen organizations was what Kaspersky described as a "minimalistic backdoor." It has the ability to execute commands, download files, and run shellcode payloads in memory—making the infection harder to detect.

Kaspersky said that it observed a more complex backdoor dubbed QUIC RAT, installed on a single machine belonging to an educational institution located in Russia. Initial analysis found that it can inject payloads into the notepad.exe and conhost.exe processes and supports a variety of C2 communication protocols, including HTTP, UDP, TCP, WSS, QUIC, DNS, and HTTP/3.

The 100 infected organizations were primarily located in Russia, Brazil, Turkey, Spain, Germany, France, Italy, and China. Kaspersky's visibility into the attack is limited because it's based solely on telemetry provided by its own products.

[...] More recent supply-chain attacks have hit Trivy, Checkmarx, and Bitwarden and more than 150 packages available through open source repositories. Last year, there were at least six notable such attacks.

Anyone who uses Daemon Tools should take time to scan the entirety of their machines using reputable antivirus software. Windows users should additionally check for indicators of compromise listed in the Kaspersky post. For more technically advanced users, Kaspersky recommends monitoring "suspicious code injections into legitimate system processes, especially when the source is executables launched from publicly accessible directories such as Temp, AppData, or Public."

Original Submission

Freeman writes:

https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2026/05/mozilla-says-271-vulnerabilities-found-by-mythos-have-almost-no-false-positives/

The disbelief was palpable when Mozilla's CTO last month declared that AI-assisted vulnerability detection meant "zero-days are numbered" and "defenders finally have a chance to win, decisively."
[...]
Mindful of the skepticism, Mozilla on Thursday provided a behind-the-scenes look into its use of Anthropic Mythos—an AI model for identifying software vulnerabilities—to ferret out 271 Firefox security flaws over two months. In a post, Mozilla engineers said the finally ready-for-prime-time breakthrough they achieved was primarily the result of two things: (1) improvement in the models themselves and (2) Mozilla's development of a custom "harness" that supported Mythos as it analyzed Firefox source code.
[...]
The biggest differentiating factor was the use of an agent harness, a piece of code that wraps around an LLM to guide it through a series of specific tasks. For such a harness to be useful, it requires significant resources to customize it to the project-specific semantics, tooling, and processes it will be used for.

Grinstead described the harness his team built as "the code that drives the LLM in order to accomplish a goal. It gives the model instructions (e.g., 'find a bug in this file'), provides it tools (e.g., allowing it to read/write files and evaluate test cases), then runs it in a loop until completion."
[...]
Thursday's behind-the-scenes view includes the unhiding of full Bugzilla reports for 12 of the 271 vulnerabilities Mozilla discovered using Mythos and, to a lesser extent, Claude Opus 4.6.
[...]
At least one researcher said Thursday that a cursory look at the reports showed they were "pretty impressive."
[...]
The critics are right to keep pushing back. Hype is a key method for inflating the already high puffed-up valuations of AI companies. Given the extensive praise Mozilla has given to Mythos, it's easy for even more trusting people to wonder: What's it getting in return? Far from settling the debate, Thursday's elaborations are likely to only further stoke the controversy.

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

https://www.mediaite.com/media/news/starbucks-ceo-defends-9-coffee-a-really-affordable-premium-experience/

As Americans struggle with the price of gas and groceries, Starbucks CEO Brian Niccol made the case for a $9 cup of coffee while speaking with The Wall Street Journal's What's News AM podcast.

"We're doing really well with Gen Z and millennials, and then really had strong performance across all income cohorts," Niccol said. "It can start with as little as $3 for a traditional cup of coffee. And then obviously you can build your way into all sorts of customized drinks that people love that move that ticket up."

Podcast host Luke Vargas asked, "You mentioned sort of strength across income cohorts. We've heard so much this week about the K-shaped economy. Fortunes for some Americans, very different than for others. Is that not really something that's coming up in your sales?"

"You know, we're not seeing that in our business," Niccol said. "What we're seeing is people, you know, they want to have a special experience, and regardless of what your income level is. In some cases, you know, a $9 experience does feel like you're splurging. And then, what that means is we have to make it worthwhile, right?"

"And then in other cases, certain people believe, 'Well, this is a really affordable premium experience.' Because they're saying like, 'Well it's less than $10 and I get a really premium experience,'" Niccol said. "So, regardless of where you're stationed in those income cohorts, we want to make that experience worth your while. And what we know is what's definitely something that drives that value is to be able to have a great seat, have a great moment of connection with a barista."

"We just saw on Friday, I'm sure you've seen the US consumer confidence reading, perceptions of the economy are worse than they've been since the '70s, since '08, since the pandemic," Vargas said. "These are some pretty bad reference points here. Just how do you market to that consumer?"

"Yeah. Look, when we've spent the time talking to customers, 'What is it that you're looking for in your experience?' They do talk about how they use their Starbucks experience as a moment of escapism. And my hope is we get more than our fair share of all those occasions," replied Niccol.

"Part of that is you're not playing the value game," Vargas suggested.

"Well, I think we're just playing it in a different way, which is the way we're going to play the value game is you're going to feel like it was worth it," said Niccol. "And it's not going to be a game of discounting or one-off promotions. I think people actually really do appreciate knowing, "Hey, if this is a $3 cup of coffee or a $5 latte, I know I'm going to get a great experience for that $5 experience, I'm in."

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:

https://news.mit.edu/2026/astronomers-pin-down-origins-planetary-odd-couple-0505

Across the Milky Way galaxy, a planetary odd couple is circling a star some 190 light years from Earth. A normally "lonely" hot Jupiter is sharing space with a mini-Neptune, in a rare and unlikely pairing that's had astronomers puzzled since the system's discovery in 2020.

Now MIT scientists have caught a glimpse into the atmosphere of the mini-Neptune, which is circling inside the orbit of its Jupiter-sized companion, and discovered clues to explain the origins of this unusual planetary system.

In a study appearing today in Astrophysical Journal Letters, the scientists report on new measurements of the mini-Neptune's atmosphere, made using NASA's James Webb Space Telescope (JWST). It is the first time astronomers have measured the composition of a mini-Neptune that resides inside the orbit of a hot Jupiter.

Their measurements reveal that the smaller planet has a "heavy" atmosphere that is rich with water vapor, carbon dioxide, sulfur dioxide, and hints of methane. Such a heavy atmosphere would not have been acquired by the planet if it had formed in its current location, very close to its star.

Instead, the scientists say their findings point to an alternate origin story: Both the mini-Neptune and the hot Jupiter may have formed much farther away, in the colder region of the system's early disk of protoplanetary material. There, the planets could slowly build up atmospheres of ice and other volatiles. Over time, the planets were likely drawn in toward the star in a gradual process that kept them close, with their atmospheres intact.

The team's results are the first to show that mini-Neptunes can form beyond a star's "frost line." This boundary refers to the minimum distance from a star where the temperature is low enough that water instantly condenses into ice.

"This is the first time we've observed the atmosphere of a planet that is inside the orbit of a hot Jupiter," says Saugata Barat, a postdoc in MIT's Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research and the lead author of the study. "This measurement tells us this mini-Neptune indeed formed beyond the frost line, giving confirmation that this formation channel does exist."

The team consists of astronomers around the world, including Andrew Vanderburg, a visiting assistant professor at MIT, and co-authors from multiple other institutions including the Harvard and Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, the University of South Queensland, the University of Texas at Austin, and Lund University.

As their name implies, mini-Neptunes are planets that are less massive than Neptune. They are considered to be gas dwarfs, which are made mostly of gas, with an inner, rocky core. Mini-Neptunes are the most commonly found planet in the Milky Way, though, interestingly, no such world exists in our own solar system. Astronomers have observed many planets circling a wide variety of stars in a range of planetary systems. Mini-Neptunes, then, are generally considered to be garden-variety planets.

But in 2020, Chelsea X. Huang, then a Torres Postdoctoral fellow at MIT (now on the faculty at University of South Queensland), discovered a mini-Neptune in a rare and puzzling circumstance: The planet appeared to be circling its star with an unlikely companion — a hot Jupiter.

The astronomers made their discovery using NASA's Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS). They analyzed TESS' measurements of TOI-1130, a star located 190 light years from Earth, and detected signs of a mini-Neptune and a hot Jupiter, orbiting the star every four and eight days respectively.

"This was a one-of-a-kind system," says Huang. "Hot Jupiters are 'lonely,' meaning they don't have companion planets inside their orbits. They are so massive, and their gravity is so strong, that whatever is inside their orbit just gets scattered away. But somehow, with this hot Jupiter, an inner companion has survived. And that raises questions about how such a system could form."

fliptop writes:

Nissan has reversed course on plans to build electric vehicles at its Mississippi assembly plant and will instead equip the factory to produce a range of body-on-frame trucks and SUVs, a shift that changes the company's manufacturing footprint and signals a renewed focus on larger, conventional vehicles. The decision affects local supply chains, workforce planning, and Nissan's place in the broader auto market as demand patterns evolve:

The move away from EV production at the Mississippi site is a clear operational pivot for Nissan, trading a battery-driven future for heavier, body-on-frame vehicles built for hauling and towing. That choice reflects a reassessment of where the company sees near-term returns and where it wants to allocate manufacturing capacity. It is notable because it alters expectations that U.S. plants would be central to Nissan's electric vehicle rollout.

From a market perspective, trucks and large SUVs remain strong sellers in the United States, and automakers chase profitable segments when margins are tight. Body-on-frame designs are traditionally preferred for towing and rugged use, and customers who prioritize those capabilities have kept demand elevated. Nissan's decision seems tied to serving established buyer preferences rather than betting exclusively on a rapid surge in EV adoption.

[...] Local employment effects will be significant but mixed, and the specifics will depend on how Nissan structures the transition and retraining programs. Body-on-frame production can support a wide range of skilled positions, but the mix of jobs differs from an EV-focused plant where battery technicians and electrical specialists are more in demand.

[...] There are also ripple effects for suppliers and battery ecosystem plans that may have counted on Nissan's EV commitment at that location. Battery cell makers, electric motor suppliers, and companies building charging infrastructure could see fewer business opportunities tied to this plant. At the same time, chassis, frame, and drivetrain suppliers that serve conventional trucks may find fresh demand.

[...] Regulatory and incentive environments sometimes nudge automakers toward or away from certain investments, but manufacturers also follow clear market signals. Incentives, fuel-economy rules, and consumer tax credits all play roles in decision making, yet companies still prioritize segments with stable, profitable demand. Nissan's choice suggests a pragmatic approach to those competing pressures.

Previously:

• Nissan to Go All-Electric by 2030 Despite Petrol Ban Delay
• Nissan Unveils $18 Billion "Ambition 2030" Electric Car Agenda with a Tesla Cybertruck Competitor

Original Submission

canopic jug writes:

Research scientist and avid skier Erik Johannes Husom has built his own pair of wooden skis from scratch and documented the process in images. That includes felling the tree and splitting it. He has a short video demonstrating the effectiveness of his new skis in actual use.

The main stages of the process included felling the tree, debarking it, cutting it down to suitable length, and splitting it into two halves. This was followed by shaping the wood, first using an axe, and then hand planes. The final polish was done using a knife and finally sandpaper.

The most challenging part came afterwards: Steam bending the wood to give the skis a raised tip (a "shovel"). I had trouble getting the wood soft enough to get a proper bend on it, and ended up using a combination of boiling and steaming to achieve this. The result was less than optimal, but I learnt some lessons on how to achieve a proper bend for the next pair of skis.

I'll add that split wood is quite flexible and by far stronger than sawed wood. So by splitting one can get greater strength with much less weight. Splitting was integral in how viking ships were made strong enough to be seaworthy on the open ocean and yet light enough for extended river ventures and even occasional portages.

Previously:
(2018) Attention Backcountry Skiers: Scientists Want Your Help - SoylentNews

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

Investigators spent weeks unravelling enthusiast's bedroom project

A university student in Taiwan is out on bail after being accused of interfering with signals sent to the country's high-speed rail network, bringing trains to a halt.

In a statement issued to local media, Taiwan High Speed Rail (THSR) confirmed that a 48-minute disruption to three trains on April 5 was caused by a rogue General Alarm signal of the kind triggered by specialized equipment used by train station staff.

This General Alarm signal was sent via a terrestrial trunked radio (TETRA) handset at Taichung Station. Staff followed protocol and engaged their emergency response plans, which in turn instructed trains to manually stop.

These devices are not the kind commuters usually carry around. Functioning much like walkie-talkies, they are typically used by station staff to communicate with one another and train drivers.

Given that these devices are most commonly used by station staff, officials initially assumed it was an inside job.

Rail police and telecommunications investigators probed the case after station control room staff ruled out the possibility of official equipment having been stolen or misused by staff.

Taiwan's Major Criminal Cases Unit joined the investigation on April 13 after chief prosecutor Chang Chun-hui deemed the case a threat to transportation safety.

  Over the course of two weeks, detectives concluded that the attack was likely carried out by the 23-year-old student, identified only by his surname Lin, who was described as a radio enthusiast.

According to statements reported by UDN, officials believe Lin exploited a vulnerability in the TETRA communication network and remotely triggered the General Alarm signal using unspecified electromagnetic equipment, which police said they found while searching his residence and workplace.

Following the raids, police seized seven radio devices, a laptop, two smartphones, and what appeared to be a software-defined radio (SDR) filter.

Officials said they believe the way Lin allegedly triggered the General Alarm was rudimentary and involved cloning signals using equipment he bought online.

Lin allegedly connected a radio to his laptop via an SDR filter, which captured the radio signal used by THSR, and configured his radio device to transmit the same signal, allowing him to trigger the General Alarm in a way that appeared to come from a station employee.

Police arrested Lin on April 28, and after questioning on April 29, concluded he was most likely behind the disruption. They released Lin on bail, convinced there was no need for further detention, setting the value at NT$100,000 ($3,183).

Original Submission

hubie writes:

Nvidia is also resurrecting a very old GPU to cope with VRAM supply woes:

We've had another warning from a major memory chipmaker that the RAM crisis will only worsen, and rumors continue to circulate that Nvidia could bring back an old GPU – from two generations ago – to help deal with video RAM woes.

Wccftech reports that Micron just posted record Q2 revenue, fuelled by AI demand, and the company's CEO, Sanjay Mehrotra, observed that this demand isn't going away – and in fact will only get stronger.

In an interview, Mehrotra told CNBC that [video not reviewed]: "AI is in very early innings; you just saw at GTC how much advances are being made in AI. And memory is a strategic asset; you need more memory, you need faster performance memory in order for AI to be able to deliver its full capabilities."

[...] Meanwhile, as VideoCardz recently pointed out, there are continued rumors that the RTX 3060 is going to be resurrected in its 12GB incarnation. This is according to the Board Channels [source in Chinese], a source of supply chain rumors over in China, and we're told production of the RTX 3060 could be fired up in June.

[...] It's very much a reflection of the situation with video RAM, and while 12GB is a considerable loadout for a budget graphics card, it's GDDR6 memory rather than the current generation, which uses GDDR7. Therefore, it won't interfere with the inventory of the latter.

[...] What's also worrying is that Micron isn't saying this in isolation. In fact, both the other major players in terms of RAM manufacturers, Samsung and SK Hynix, have issued similar (or more dire) warnings of their own.

Samsung recently said that it expects "significant shortages" across its memory products to last through to 2028 (at least), and SK Hynix previously warned that we could be dealing with the fallout from the RAM crisis until as late as 2030.

With all three memory-making giants issuing these kinds of ominous statements, and the likes of Nvidia rumored to be resurrecting old GPUs to get around video RAM supply constraints, the prospect of the RAM crisis easing off any time soon doesn't seem likely.

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:

https://www.slashgear.com/2165779/us-lithium-discovery-appalachia-rival-china/

Lithium is an important metal used to manufacture the batteries that power everything from mobile phones and laptops to EVs, power tools, and much more. It also has a variety of industrial and medical applications, and it's a substance that many Americans benefit from every day. The U.S. is not one of the world's major lithium producers, trailing behind nations like Chile, Australia, and China. A discovery in the Appalachian Mountains, however, has revealed that the nation's lithium reserves are larger than previously thought. But that's not quite the end of the story.

According to estimates from the U.S. Geological Survey, around 2.3 million metric tons of lithium oxide deposits are present across parts of Maine, New Hampshire, and North Carolina. But the problem is that this lithium lies within hard rock formations known as pegmatites, which aren't easily accessible. As of this writing, those rocks are not being mined, and quite a bit of work would need to be done before the lithium could be extracted and put to good use.

In contrast, China's dominant lithium-ion battery industry puts it far ahead of the U.S., at least for now. But even if America's newfound lithium deposits can be developed, establishing a secure domestic supply chain would require rebuilding much of the existing infrastructure. So this discovery, while potentially a positive for the U.S. moving forward, doesn't do much to change the current imbalance that exists between America and other countries.

The recent discovery of lithium oxide deposits across several states seems to bode well for the U.S., which depends on rare earth elements for electric cars. Extraction issues aside, the U.S. Geological Survey's 2.3 million metric ton estimate is also based on a 50% confidence level. This means there's an equal chance of there being more or less lithium than estimated. The only way to confirm the total is through further development and analysis. Even then, the USGS' projection does not account for how much of the lithium can actually be extracted.

Currently, the U.S. has a limited lithium production base despite holding 4.4 million metric tons in reserve. As of 2026, the nation only has one active lithium mine in Silver Peak, Nevada, which produced around 1,000 metric tons of lithium in 2025. That output is extremely small compared to China, which produced 62,000 metric tons of lithium in 2025. China also has a slightly larger reserve of 4.6 million metric tons.

However, there is a second mine under construction in Nevada as of mid-2025. The Thacker Pass Lithium Mine received its permits in 2022 after years of review, public forums, and revisions to the original applications. The mine is scheduled to begin operations in 2028, with an expected annual output of around 40,000 metric tons of lithium.

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:

The biggest risk often now comes from inside:

For the first time ever, internal threats have become more common that external ones, with hacking remaining pretty steady at 31% of attacks compared with employee misuse, which rose from 29% to 45%.

There's also the fact that hackers themselves are more frequently targeting company insiders, exploiting everyday employee behavior instead of having to rely on more sophisticated, crafted attacks from outside.

"While not inherently malicious, employee misuse can be just as damaging as a sophisticated breach, especially given that attackers are increasingly turning policy workarounds into external entry points," Senior Security Researcher Carl Morris explained.

Endpoints remain one of the biggest targets, with workers' devices involved in more than half (53%) of incidents. And while they account for a smaller percentage overall, identity attacks also rose from 10% to 17% in around a year.

Looking ahead, Orange Cyberdefense urges companies to acknowledge that many risks now come from within an organization. Tightening access controls and privileges can shrink the attack surface altogether, while simple multi-factor authentication can also serve to prevent attackers from gaining access.

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:

Experts warn that the legislation could lead to websites banning all VPN addresses due to technical limitations:

The legislation follows similar proposed bills from Wisconsin and Michigan and is seen as the first major US step toward regulating VPN use to avoid age verification. 

However, privacy advocates warn that the legislation could lead to a blanket ban of all VPN addresses in a "technical whack-a-mole that likely no company can win". The Electronic Frontiers Federation wrote that "if a website cannot reliably detect a VPN user's true location and the law requires it to do so for all users in a particular state, then the legal risk could push the site to either ban all known VPN IPs, or to mandate age verification for every visitor globally."

In the past year, both Australia and the UK have enacted age-verification measures to restrict access to "harmful content." While Australia's legislation has been called an "unmitigated disaster" by Wikipedia founder Jimmy Wales, it's been reported that children in the UK have been drawing on mustaches to get past age barriers.

Original Submission

An Anonymous Coward writes:

References to goblins and gremlins spiked with the release of GPT-5.1's 'Nerdy' personality, and then spread to other models:

OpenAI is opening up about its goblin problem. After a report from Wired revealed instructions to OpenAI's coding model to "never talk about goblins, gremlins, raccoons, trolls, ogres, pigeons, or other animals or creatures," the AI startup published an explanation on its website, calling references to the creatures a "strange habit" its models developed as a result of their training. As outlined in the blog post, OpenAI began noticing metaphors referencing goblins and other creatures starting with its GPT-5.1 model — specifically when using the "Nerdy" personality option. OpenAI says the problem continued to worsen with subsequent model releases, until it found that its reinforcement training rewarded the quirky metaphors with the Nerdy personality, which newer models were training on.

The rewards were applied only in the Nerdy condition, but reinforcement learning does not guarantee that learned behaviors stay neatly scoped to the condition that produced them. Once a style tic is rewarded, later training can spread or reinforce it elsewhere, especially if those outputs are reused in supervised fine-tuning or preference data.

Original Submission

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:

Curiosity just found molecules on Mars tied to the chemistry of life, hinting at a more habitable past:

NASA's Curiosity rover has discovered a wide variety of organic molecules on Mars, including compounds often viewed as essential ingredients for the origin of life on Earth.

These results come from a chemical experiment carried out on another planet for the first time. The findings show that the Martian surface can preserve molecules that might serve as indicators of ancient life. However, the experiment cannot determine whether these organic compounds formed from past life on Mars, natural geological activity, or arrived via meteorites.

To confirm any true signs of past life, scientists would need to return Martian rock samples to Earth for more detailed analysis.

[...] “We think we’re looking at organic matter that’s been preserved on Mars for 3.5 billion years,” said Williams, who helped develop the experiment. “It’s really useful to have evidence that ancient organic matter is preserved, because that is a way to assess the habitability of an environment. And if we want to search for evidence of life in the form of preserved organic carbon, this demonstrates it’s possible.”

[...] The experiment identified more than 20 different chemicals. Among them was a nitrogen-containing molecule with a structure similar to compounds involved in building DNA, something never before detected on Mars. The rover also found benzothiophene, a large sulfur-containing compound with a double-ring structure that is commonly delivered to planets by meteorites.

“The same stuff that rained down on Mars from meteorites is what rained down on Earth, and it probably provided the building blocks for life as we know it on our planet,” Williams said.

Arthur T Knackerbracket writes:

Apple processors are made by TSMC, but that could change:

There is no doubt that Apple needs to diversify its processor supply chain, but Samsung and Intel are weak alternatives next to TSMC. Apple may try anyway.

Rumors have come and gone about Apple buying Intel for its US foundries, but something about that idea stuck. More recent rumors suggested Apple could start relying on Intel for Apple Silicon production as soon as 2027 or 2028.

According to a new report from Bloomberg, Apple has been considering Intel and Samsung to build "main device chips" for some time. While the recent chip and memory shortage has added some pressure, Apple had allegedly been making these considerations well before the current situation.

Samsung makes sense as an option because it is the distant number two chip fabricator to TSMC. It has the capabilities of meeting Apple's strict quality demands, though it would be vastly limited on capacity.

Intel has been repeatedly mentioned in many rumors for various reasons. There was a time when it seemed Intel would dissolve, but it was revived thanks to a controversial 10% stake purchased from the US government under Trump.

The company even approached Apple for a direct investment, though it appears that nothing ever came from that.

Even if the Intel and TSMC's joint venture results in some Apple chip production in the United States, it would be a paltry amount that barely put a dent in TSMC's monopoly. However, it would surely score some brownie points with the US administration.

The report suggests that no decision has been made and Apple may not move forward with any new partners. TSMC continues to be the producer of Apple Silicon with over 60% of that made in Taiwan.

Apple is stuck between a rock and a hard place, as is the rest of the world. TSMC has been one of the few companies the world can rely on for advanced silicon, and if China decides to invade, it could devastate the global economy.

At this point, it seems Apple's only options are strengthening its rival Samsung or embracing the flailing Intel. This situation could be among the defining aspects of John Ternus' tenure as CEO, though some are apparently more worried about retiring executives.

Original Submission