ASML and TSMC can disable chips if China invades | Albanese: Ban social media for under-16s | Indian voters bombarded with deepfakes, politicians approve

Good morning. It's Wednesday 22nd May.

The Daily Cyber & Tech Digest focuses on the topics we work on, including cybersecurity, critical technologies, foreign interference & disinformation.

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• ASML Holding NV and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC) have developed methods to disable their advanced chipmaking machines if China invades Taiwan, according to insiders. This capability is a response to US government concerns about the potential impact on the global semiconductor industry if conflict arises in Taiwan, a key producer of advanced semiconductors. Bloomberg

• Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese supports raising the minimum age for social media registration from 13 to 16 to protect children's mental health. He backs a campaign to delay social media access, emphasizing the harmful effects of online engagement on young people. The government is also funding an age assurance trial for websites to ensure effective age restrictions. The Guardian

• In India’s current elections, political candidates are using AI-generated deepfakes to reach voters, often without voters realizing they are interacting with digital clones. These deepfakes, including personalized messages in multiple languages, are becoming a significant tool for voter outreach in a nation with diverse linguistic needs. This practice raises concerns about the ethical implications and potential for misinformation, despite the intent to enhance engagement. WIRED

ASPI

Iran's President Raisi killed in helicopter crash
CNN
Yong Xiong and Teele Rebane
CNN has confirmed the geolocation of the crash site of the helicopter carrying Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi in the mountainous region of Varzeghan, near the village of Uzi, in Iran's East Azerbaijan Province. Drone footage and images of the wreckage taken by the Iranian Red Crescent and shown on state media FARS News Agency showed the crash site on a steep, tree-covered hillside. The accident occurred as Raisi and Foreign Minister Amir-Abdollahian were returning from a ceremony to open a dam on Iran’s border with Azerbaijan, state news agency IRNA reported. Seven others in the chopper also died in the crash. The crash site is around 38 miles (61 kilometers) from the dam site on the Iran-Azerbaijan border that the officials were visiting, with the exact location at 38.7189°, 46.6548° It was first geolocated by Nathan Ruser, an analyst on the Australian Strategic Policy Institute's Cyber, Tech & Security team (ASPI CTS), which CNN later confirmed.

World

Lithium miners plead ‘foreign entity’ case to US over China links
The Australian Financial Review
Peter Ker
Big Australian lithium miners say it would be “counter-intuitive” for the United States government to label them “foreign entities of concern” over their China links, as local miners prepare to fight for access to lucrative US critical minerals subsidies. The US government considers China, Russia, Iran and North Korea to be “foreign entities of concern” and has sought to ensure critical minerals that are “subject to the control” of those nations are not eligible for the subsidies offered under the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act and the Inflation Reduction Act.

With more 'unfriendly behaviour' and new weapons, the world is preparing for war in space
ABC
Annika Burgess
Floating among the stars are constellations of thousands of satellites that make our world go around. Global dependence on these systems often goes unnoticed, but any major orbital attack would up-end life as we know it. And analysts say space systems are under threat like never before. In recent years, China has shown it has the ability to "grapple" satellites and manoeuvre them into a graveyard orbit. There have been several destructive anti-satellite missile tests (ASAT) that have caused dangerous amounts of space debris. Signal jamming and spoofing attacks on navigational satellites are on the rise, putting civilians at risk. And this year, the US claimed Russia was planning to send nuclear weapons into space. It's no surprise the increase in "unfriendly behaviour" has led to more countries preparing for future space wars.

Australia

Anthony Albanese says children under 16 should be banned from social media
The Guardian
Karen Middleton and Josh Taylor
Anthony Albanese has endorsed banning children from registering social media accounts until they are 16, saying too much online engagement at a young age is seriously damaging their mental health. The prime minister is backing moves to raise the minimum age for registering social media accounts from 13 to 16 to give teenagers extra time to grow without being subjected to social pressures that can be exacerbated online. “What we want is our youngest Australians spending more time outside playing sport, engaging with each other in a normal way and less time online,” Albanese told Nova FM radio on Tuesday. “And one way to do that is through restrictions on social media.” He said the often-vicious commentary on social media could harm adults and have an even worse impact on children.

Government urged to ban AI-generated election materials
The Sydney Morning Herald
David Swan
The federal government is being urged to ban the use of generative AI in election materials, amid fears that deepfakes of Prime Minister Anthony Albanese or Opposition Leader Peter Dutton could be used to spread misinformation ahead of the next federal election. ACT independent senator David Pocock and teal independent MP Kate Chaney have written to government ministers to raise concerns about potential risks posed by artificial intelligence to Australian democracy, as a two-day Senate committee hearing into the adoption of the nascent technology wrapped up on Tuesday.

• AEC says it does not have legal powers to stop candidates using AI deepfakes in election campaigns
  ABC
  Oliver Gordon
  The Australian Electoral Commission has warned it has limited scope to protect voters from deepfake videos and phone calls imitating politicians in upcoming elections. It comes after concerns about AI being employed during elections overseas, including in the USA and South Korea. Australian Electoral Commissioner Tom Rogers says deepfakes that are political in nature are not currently prohibited under Australia's electoral laws. "If those messages were authorised, duly authorised, they do not fall afoul of the electoral act currently," he told a Senate committee investigating AI technologies. The AEC can act when misinformation is spread about the electoral process but has limited powers to intervene over political material. Mr Rogers said generative AI — the technology responsible for most deepfakes — was a growing issue for elections, here and abroad.

Western Sydney University discloses data breach, 7,500 ‘impacted individuals’ notified
Cyber Daily
Daniel Croft
In a student notification email seen by Cyber Daily, WSU interim vice-chancellor Professor Clare Pollock said the intrusion was detected in January this year but was “quickly shut down”; however, investigations have revealed that access occurred as early as 17 May 2023. “Since then, the university has been investigating the impact of the unauthorised access and investing in additional remediation measures,” Pollock said. “Monitoring and scanning indicates that the preventative measures taken as a part of the incident response have successfully prevented any further unauthorised access.” As part of its response, WSU engaged NSW Police and is working with the NSW Information and Privacy Commission. Investigations are still ongoing.

China

ASML, TSMC can disable chip machines if China invades Taiwan
Bloomberg
Diederik Baazil, Cagan Koc, and Jordan Robertson
Officials from the US government have privately expressed concerns to both their Dutch and Taiwanese counterparts about what happens if Chinese aggression escalates into an attack on the island responsible for producing the vast majority of the world’s advanced semiconductors, two of the people said, speaking on condition of anonymity. ASML reassured officials about its ability to remotely disable the machines when the Dutch government met with the company on the threat, two others said. The Netherlands has run simulations on a possible invasion in order to better assess the risks, they added. Spokespeople for ASML, TSMC and the Dutch trade ministry declined to comment. Spokespeople for the White House National Security Council, US Department of Defense and US Department of Commerce didn’t respond to emailed requests for comment.

Senate inquiry finds BMW imported cars tied to forced labor in China
The New York Times
Ana Swanson and Jack Ewing
A congressional investigation found that BMW, Jaguar Land Rover and Volkswagen purchased parts that originated from a Chinese supplier flagged by the United States for participating in forced labor programs in Xinjiang, a far western region of China where the local population is subject to mass surveillance and detentions. Both BMW and Jaguar Land Rover continued to import components made by the Chinese company into the United States in violation of American law, even after they were informed in writing about the presence of banned products in their supply chain, the report said.

Top China chipmakers SMIC and CXMT push to scrap foreign inputs
Nikkei Asia
Cheng Ting-Fang and Shunsuke Tabeta
China's top chipmakers are pushing hard to localize the supply of key chip materials and chemicals to counter U.S. export controls, sources with direct knowledge of these efforts told Nikkei Asia. Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corp., the country's top contract chipmaker, is asking its customers -- namely chip developers who use its production services -- to help it screen, verify and adopt local suppliers of wafers, chemicals, gasses and other materials in the production processes of their chips. The move has been picking up speed since last year. Similarly, ChangXin Memory Technologies (CXMT), China's leading maker of DRAM, has started an aggressive campaign to vet local suppliers to replace foreign ones, citing national policies.

Fast movers': Chinese satellites zoom around for inspections—or interference
Defence One
David D. Chen and Peter W. Singer
Is China building out a satellite network in geosynchronous Earth orbit while deploying a fleet of robot guardians to patrol them? In his final appearance before Congress as assistant defense secretary for space policy, on May 1, John Plumb appeared to suggest as much. “China has developed robotic satellites that…can be used for military purposes like grappling a satellite,” Plumb said. It is clear that China sees the space domain as the “ultimate high ground” for competition back on Earth, reinforced by its recent reorganization of the Strategic Support Force and creation of a new Aerospace Force that reports directly to the supreme Central Military Commission. This vision is backed by more aggressive rhetoric in recent years.

USA

Trump’s social media account shares video referencing ‘unified reich’
POLITICO
Natalie Allison
Donald Trump’s social media account on Monday shared a video referencing a “unified reich” in a post about how the country will change if he becomes president again. His campaign said a staffer did not see the word “reich” before it was posted — an explanation President Joe Biden’s team blasted on Monday night. In the video shared on Trump’s Truth Social account, while a narrator described “What happens after Donald Trump wins,” the screen twice flashed to a headline showing the words “Industrial strength significantly increased … driven by the creation of a unified reich.” The German phrase “reich” refers to an empire, but also carries the connotation of Adolf Hitler’s “Third Reich,” another name for his Nazi regime.

US says cyberattacks against water supplies are rising, and utilities need to do more to stop them
ABC News
Michael Phillis
Cyberattacks against water utilities across the country are becoming more frequent and more severe, the Environmental Protection Agency warned Monday as it issued an enforcement alert urging water systems to take immediate actions to protect the nation's drinking water. About 70% of utilities inspected by federal officials over the last year violated standards meant to prevent breaches or other intrusions, the agency said. Officials urged even small water systems to improve protections against hacks. Recent cyberattacks by groups affiliated with Russia and Iran have targeted smaller communities.

FBI arrests man for generating AI child sexual abuse imagery
404 Media
Samantha Cole
The FBI arrested a man on criminal charges after he allegedly used AI to generate child sexual abuse images and then sent them to a minor. Steven Anderegg, a 42 year old man from Holmen, Wisconsin, allegedly used Stable Diffusion, a text-to-image generative AI model, to create “thousands of realistic images of prepubescent minors,” prosecutors said in an announcement on Monday. “Many of these images depicted nude or partially clothed minors lasciviously displaying or touching their genitals or engaging in sexual intercourse with men. Evidence recovered from Anderegg’s electronic devices revealed that he generated these images using specific, sexually explicit text prompts related to minors, which he then stored on his computer.”

North Asia

Seoul investigating possible North Korean breach of defense officials’ emails
NK News
Shreyas Reddy
South Korean authorities are investigating a possible North Korean cyberattack that compromised the email accounts of over 100 South Koreans, including senior defense officials. The Ministry of National Defense has formed a task force to investigate the breach of senior military officials’ commercial email accounts, a spokesperson said during a briefing on Tuesday. Local media have reported that the ROK national police’s Security Investigation Bureau is looking into the intrusions affecting some 100 individuals, including a vice minister and high-ranking generals, and the defense ministry stated that the campaign appears to have targeted an even larger group.

Russia likely offering N. Korea technology aid to expand threats to U.S., others: Pentagon official
Yonhap News
Song Sang-Ho
Russia has likely given technology assistance to North Korea and Iran in return for their arms transfers to Moscow, a senior Pentagon official said Tuesday, casting it as an apparent move to expand security threats to the United States and others. Deputy Assistant Secretary of Defense for Space and Missile Defense John Hill made the remarks in response to a senator's question over how Washington is handling emerging space security cooperation between Tehran and Moscow as he attended a Senate subcommittee session.

Southeast Asia

Indonesia’s digital drive gets big tech backing
The Interpreter
Warief Djajanto Basorie
Two US technology tycoons and one British political luminary made separate visits to Jakarta in April, met Joko “Jokowi” Widodo at the presidential palace, and pitched projects that fall in line with Jokowi’s digital transformation agenda. First, Apple CEO Tim Cook met Jokowi 17 April, announcing a US$74 million investment to build an Apple Developer Academy for digital talent. Apple already has three such academies in Indonesia, in Batam island, an hour’s ferry trip south of Singapore; South Tangerang, a city to the west of Jakarta; and Surabaya, the capital of East Java province that has bustling industrial estates. Apple intends to build its fourth academy in Bali.

South & Central Asia

Indian voters are being bombarded with millions of deepfakes. Political candidates approve
WIRED
Nilesh Christopher and Varsha Bansal
On a stifling April afternoon in Ajmer, Rajasthan, politician Shakti Singh Rathore sat nervously in front of a greenscreen to shoot a short video. Wearing a crisp white shirt and a saffron scarf with the BJP logo, Rathore greeted his audience in Hindi, “Namashkar,” he began. Before he could continue, the director, Divyendra Singh Jadoun, interrupted, telling Rathore he was moving too much for the AI deepfake. Jadoun instructed him to look straight into the camera and move only his lips. “Start again,” he said.

Artificial Intelligence

Scarlett Johansson says she is 'shocked, angered' over new ChatGPT voice
National Public Radio
Bobby Allyn
Lawyers for Scarlett Johansson are demanding that OpenAI disclose how it developed an AI personal assistant voice that the actress says sounds uncannily similar to her own. Johansson's legal team has sent OpenAI two letters asking the company to detail the process by which it developed a voice the tech company dubbed "Sky," Johansson's publicist told NPR in a revelation that has not been previously reported. After OpenAI held a live demonstration of the voice last week, many observers compared it to Johansson's voice in the the 2013 Spike Jonze romantic sci-fi film "Her," which centers on a man who falls in love with the female voice of his computer's operating system.

‘Uncharted terrain’: How officials, campaigners and fact-checkers tackle AI’s influence on elections around the world
POLITICO
Mark Scott
When it comes to artificial intelligence’s role in elections, it’s easy to get lost in a sea of buzzwords, tech industry jargon and murky political activity. AI-generated deepfakes. Large language models. Recommendation algorithms powering social media. But behind the rise of this emerging technology lies a sea of election officials, civil society groups and fact-checking organizations from Peru to the Philippines — all trying to corral potential abuses of AI while, at the same time, attempting to harness the technology to improve how elections operate worldwide. It’s not an easy task. Ever-changing technical advances, limited budgets and breathtaking hysteria around what AI can supposedly do have created endless difficulties for those on the front line of protecting global elections from AI-fueled disinformation.

• From safety-first to sales pitches, AI companies speak for themselves
  POLITICO
  Mark Scott and Hanne Cokelaere
  Wherever you look, tech giants want to be seen doing the right thing when it comes to artificial intelligence. Meta and OpenAI published lengthy treaties detailing how they’re protecting this year’s global election cycle from harm. New kids on the bloc — France’s Mistral and the United States’ Inflection AI — espoused their “safety first” approach to the emerging technology. Old-school titan Amazon wanted everyone to know it was building its own AI systems responsibly. Amid such policy jargon, it’s easy to get lost. POLITICO set out to cut through the noise to determine the leading AI companies’ talking points. Many of these lines were front and center when firms’ executives set out to convince lawmakers worldwide that they could be trusted with fast-paced AI innovation.

• Analysis: In the age of AI, keep calm and vote on
  POLITICO
  Mark Scott
  When I started this series on artificial intelligence, disinformation and global elections, I had a pretty clear picture in mind. It came down to this: While AI had garnered people’s imagination — and the likes of deepfakes and other AI-generated falsehoods were starting to bubble to the surface — the technology did not yet represent a step change in how politically motivated lies, often spread via social media, would alter the mega-election cycle engulfing the world in 2024. Now, after nine stories and reporting trips from Chișinău to Seattle, I haven’t seen anything that would alter that initial view. But things, as always, are more complicated — and more volatile — than I first believed. What’s clear, based on more than 100 interviews with policymakers, government officials, tech executives and civil society groups, is that the technology — specifically, generative AI — is getting more advanced by the day.

• AI, Inc. flexes its election bona fides — and hunts for customers
  POLITICO
  Mark Scott
  Sitting in an unseasonably warm park in the British capital, Hannah O’Rourke cuts an unusual figure as an artificial intelligence advocate. The thirtysomething activist has spent much of her early career championing greater rights for workers and even lobbied the British government on behalf of students during the Covid-19 pandemic. But ahead of the United Kingdom’s general election — now expected in the fall — O’Rourke is channeling her inner tech bro. Throughout monthly hackathons, O’Rourke and other progressive computer scientists at CampaignLab, a nonprofit that she co-founded, whipped up an AI-powered chatbot. Designed with different personalities and varying emotions, it helps volunteers learn how to best interact with potentially skeptical voters on the campaign trail.

‘I Want That Sweet Baby’: AI-generated kids draw predators on TikTok and Instagram
Forbes
Alexandra S. Levine
The girls in the photos on TikTok and Instagram look like they could be five or six years old. On the older end, not quite thirteen. They’re pictured in lace and leather, bikinis and crop tops. They’re dressed suggestively as nurses, superheroes, ballerinas and french maids. Some wear bunny ears or devil horns; others, pigtails and oversized glasses. They’re black, white and Asian, blondes, redheads and brunettes. They were all made with AI, and they’ve become magnets for the attention of a troubling audience on some of the biggest social media apps in the world—older men.

Productivity soars in sectors of global economy most exposed to AI, says report
The Guardian
Larry Elliott
The sectors of the global economy most heavily exposed to artificial intelligence (AI) are witnessing a marked productivity increase and command a significant wage premium, according to a report. Boosting hopes that AI might help lift the global economy out of a 15-year, low-growth trough, a PwC study found productivity growth was almost five times as rapid in parts of the economy where AI penetration was highest than in less exposed sectors. PwC said that in the UK, one of the 15 countries covered by the report, job postings that require AI skills were growing 3.6 times faster relative to all job listings.

OpenAI’s Altman warns on ‘losing sight in AI gold rush’
The Australian
Jared Lynch
Sam Altman, chief executive of ChatGPT maker OpenAI, has warned people not to expect artificial intelligence to do all the work for them, saying the technology is “far from perfect” and does not offer a shortcut to building great businesses. Mr Altman made a surprise appearance at Microsoft annual Build developer conference in Seattle early Wednesday morning (Australian time), and offered a glimpse to where AI is headed and gave some advice to entrepreneurs. He was speaking after Microsoft chief executive Satya Nadella announced a suite of updates to the company’s Copilot AI platform, including a Teams Copilot that aims to lift productivity across departments or entire companies rather than individual users.

The global AI safety movement is already dead
Fast Company
Chris Stokel-Walker
Six months ago, the world’s attention was on the U.K., where attendees from national governments and international tech companies convened for the first global AI safety summit to discuss the threat and potential of artificial intelligence as the world watched. On Tuesday, a smaller number of attendees will gather in Seoul to continue that conversation. The comparatively lower-key event this week isn’t just an indication of how much more branding the U.K. gave the summit in an attempt to provide embattled prime minister Rishi Sunak with a legacy of his time in power. It’s a suggestion that a united, global AI safety movement has died before it even got started.

Misc

The fan site authorities say is 'profiting from the exploitation and sexualisation of children'
ABC
Carla Hildebrandt, Jessica Longbottom and Dunja Karagic
In one photo Rosie lounges on the ground, wearing a tight crop top, staring into the camera. In other photos she poses like a model, looking over her shoulder, pouting. These images have been posted to an online platform where "fans" can subscribe for "exclusive" pictures of their favourite influencers. Fans need to be over 18 to subscribe. In other words: adults only. But Rosie is a child. She's only allowed on the platform because one of her parents manages the account. Comments such as "beautiful", "bloody hot", "gorgeous", "so cute", "so attractive" or "babe" flood Rosie's page, often accompanied by fire or heart emojis. Many of these appear to be from men. They tell her she has the body of a "goddess", compliment her "cute" feet, tell her they're "in love" with her and that they "want to see more". Subscribers pay about $30 a month to see photos of Rosie and some pay even more to send her personal messages.

Eventbrite promoted illegal opioid sales to people searching for addiction recovery help
WIRED

Matt Burgess and Dhruv Mehrota

A WIRED investigation found thousands of Eventbrite posts selling escort services and drugs like Xanax and oxycodone—some of which the company’s algorithm recommended alongside addiction recovery events.This June, approximately 150 motorcycles will thunder down Route 9W in Saugerties, New York, for Ryan’s Ride for Recovery. Organized by Vince Kelder and his family, the barbecue and raffle will raise money to support their sober-living facility and honor their son who tragically died from a heroin overdose in 2015 after a years-long drug addiction. The Kelders established Raising Your Awareness about Narcotics (RYAN) to help others struggling with substance-use disorder. For years, the organization has relied on Eventbrite, an event management and ticketing website, to arrange its events. This year, however, alongside listings for Ryan’s Ride and other addiction recovery events, Eventbrite surfaced listings peddling illegal sales of prescription drugs like Xanax, Valium, and oxycodone.

Events & Podcasts

The Sydney Dialogue
ASPI
The Sydney Dialogue was created to help bring together governments, businesses and civil society to discuss and progress policy options. We will forecast the technologies of the next decade that will change our societies, economies and national security, prioritising speakers and delegates who are willing to push the envelope. We will promote diverse views that stimulate real conversations about the best ways to seize opportunities and minimise risks.

JoiningFORCES
ASPI
The JoiningFORCES conference will explore ways to bridge national and international boundaries to deliver more joint, collective and effective defence. It will bring together government ministers, senior defence officials, leading industry figures, and international experts across the two-day event and formal dinner. We will also use collaborative wargaming and scenario exercise techniques to generate insights on enhancing regional deterrence. Our focus will be on strategic and operational level challenges and will consider the vital role of industry in delivering capability at the speed needed to meet the strategic threats Australia faces.

WDSN's Policy Views and Brews
ASPI
ASPI’s Women in Defence and Security Network is excited to invite you to its inaugural ‘Policy Views and Brews’ networking event! Designed to be a relaxed atmosphere where like-minded people can exchange ideas on a range of themes within defence, policy and national security, each meet-up will revolve around a specific topic, inspired by a pre-designated article sent out beforehand.

The Daily Cyber & Tech Digest is brought to you by the Cyber, Technology & Security team at ASPI.