FBI arrests man in North Korean tech-worker probe across 16 states | US Senate strikes AI regulation ban from Trump megabill | Thailand PM Suspended by Court Over Leaked Call

Microsoft says AI system better than doctors at diagnosing complex health conditions

Good morning. It's Wednesday, 2nd of July.

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

Follow us on X, on LinkedIn, and on BlueSky.

• US law enforcement has arrested a New Jersey man and searched stashes of laptops in 16 states in a sweeping crackdown on North Korean efforts to use remote tech workers to covertly fund their weapons programs, the Justice Department said Monday. CNN

• The Republican-led U.S. Senate voted overwhelmingly on Tuesday to remove a 10-year federal moratorium on state regulation of artificial intelligence from President Trump's sweeping tax-cut and spending bill. Reuters

• Thailand’s Constitutional Court has suspended Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra over the leak of a recording of a phone call with Cambodia’s former leader Hun Sen, setting off further rumbles of political turbulence. The Diplomat

Australia

Elon Musk’s X wins ‘free speech’ fight against eSafety Commissioner
The Sydney Morning Herald
Alexander Darling and Erin Pearson
Lawyers for social media platform X have declared a judgment that found in X’s favour against the eSafety Commissioner “a win for free speech in Australia”. On Tuesday, the Administrative Review Tribunal struck out an order by Australia’s eSafety Commissioner Julie Inman-Grant, which demanded that Elon Musk’s X remove a post that insulted a transgender Australian man.

Information overload: Can we keep our minds and our democracy?
The Interpreter
In the not-so-distant past, Australians could count on a shared set of facts. Our democracy, like many others, was built on assumptions that information could be verified, that truth could be determined, public debate was deliberative and inclusive, and that those in power could be held accountable. But the information environment underpinning those assumptions has radically changed. Today, we inhabit a world where every human is a potential sensor and broadcaster, every social feed is a battleground, and every “truth” is contestable.

OpenAI wants AI tax breaks, promises $115b annual windfall
The Australian Financial Review
Michael Read and Paul Smith
OpenAI, the maker of ChatGPT, is urging the Albanese government to introduce tax breaks for businesses that adopt artificial intelligence, as it launched a report claiming the new technology could make the economy $115 billion bigger by 2030. OpenAI chief economist Ronnie Chatterji conducted a whirlwind set of meetings in Parliament House on Monday, as the San Francisco-based company prepared to launch an AI blueprint for Australia on Tuesday, co-authored with economic consultancy Mandala.

China

China’s Huawei open-sources AI models as it seeks adoption across the global AI market
Consumer News and Business Channel
Dylan Butts
Huawei has open-sourced two of its artificial intelligence models — a move tech experts say will help the U.S.-blacklisted firm continue to build its AI ecosystem and expand overseas. The Chinese tech giant announced on Monday the open-sourcing of the AI models under its Pangu series, as well as some of its model reasoning technology. The moves are in line with other Chinese AI players that continue to push an open-source development strategy. Baidu also open-sourced its large language model series Ernie on Monday.

China boosts science, tech outreach to Global South as its US collaboration dips: analysts
South China Morning Post
Bochen Han
China is ramping up its science and technology outreach to the Global South while its collaboration with the US on the same front is receding, analysts said on Tuesday at an event hosted by the Institute for China-America Studies, a Washington think tank. “China is very heavily engaging with those countries,” said Caroline Wagner of the Ohio State University, noting Beijing has signed science and technology agreements with “dozens and dozens of countries”. That development marks a “critical departure” from earlier years when China was primarily focused on the US, added Wagner, who formerly advised the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy as a researcher at Rand, a public policy group.

China's Xiaomi takes on Tesla, armed with 1,000 EV factory robots
Nikkei Asia
Itsuro Fujino
As Chinese manufacturer Xiaomi prepares to expand capacity for electric vehicles, the company is responding to the overwhelming demand for its EVs by employing 1,000 robots at its plant. Xiaomi's sole EV factory sits on a 720,000-square-meter site in Beijing that also contains a dealership, a delivery center and a test course. The factory itself is a rectangular block of a building where pressing, casting, bodywork, painting, battery packaging and assembly take place.

Two Chinese chip firms plan $1.7 billion IPOs, bet US export curbs to spur growth
Reuters
Two Chinese artificial intelligence chip startups are seeking to raise a combined 12 billion yuan in initial public offerings, hoping U.S. curbs on advanced chip sales to China will boost local demand for their products, their filings show. Beijing-based Moore Threads plans to raise 8 billion yuan, while Shanghai-based MetaX seeks 3.9 billion yuan, according to their IPO prospectuses filed on Monday. Both companies intend to list on Shanghai's STAR Market, the tech-focused board of the Shanghai Stock Exchange.

USA

US Senate strikes AI regulation ban from Trump megabill
Reuters
David Morgan
The Republican-led U.S. Senate voted overwhelmingly on Tuesday to remove a 10-year federal moratorium on state regulation of artificial intelligence from President Trump's sweeping tax-cut and spending bill. Lawmakers voted 99-1 to strike the ban from the bill by adopting an amendment offered by Republican Senator Marsha Blackburn. The action came during a marathon session known as a ""vote-a-rama,"" in which lawmakers offered numerous amendments to the legislation that Republicans eventually hope to pass.

• US Senate rejects plan to stop states regulating AI
  Financial Times
  The US Senate has voted down a proposed 10-year ban on states regulating artificial intelligence models, ending a controversial plan supported by Big Tech companies. Senators voted by a margin of 99 to one in favour of an amendment to remove the wording from Donald Trump’s flagship tax and spending legislation.

• Senate strikes AI regulatory ban from GOP bill after uproar from the states
  AP News

  Matt Brown and Matt O’Brien
  A proposal to deter states from regulating artificial intelligence for a decade was soundly defeated in the U.S. Senate on Tuesday, thwarting attempts to insert the measure into President Donald Trump’s big bill of tax breaks and spending cuts.

  The Senate voted 99-1 to strike the AI provision from the legislation after weeks of criticism from both Republican and Democratic governors and state officials.

US defense firms must ‘remain vigilant’ against Iranian cyber activity, agencies warn
The Record by Recorded Future
Martin Matishak
U.S. critical infrastructure entities, particularly defense contractors, must “remain vigilant” about Iranian cyberattacks amid ongoing unrest in the Middle East, federal agencies warned on Monday. “At this time, we have not seen indications of a coordinated campaign of malicious cyber activity in the U.S. that can be attributed to Iran,” an advisory from the Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency, FBI, National Security Agency and the Department of Defense Cyber Crime Center said.

• Trump hit by bombshell threat from hackers who stole his aides’ emails
  The Daily Beast
  Ewan Palmer
  An Iranian-linked hacking group has threatened to sell stolen emails from Donald Trump’s inner circle which it claims to have obtained during the 2024 election campaign. The hackers, who use the online pseudonym “Robert,” told Reuters they had around 100 gigabytes of emails taken from the accounts of White House Chief of Staff Susie Wiles, Trump lawyer Lindsey Halligan, longtime Trump ally and political consultant Roger Stone, and Stormy Daniels, the porn star whom the president paid to keep quiet about an alleged affair ahead of the 2016 election.

Trump says he’ll have to ‘take a look’ at deporting Musk
Bloomberg
Skylar Woodhouse and Akayla Gardner
President Donald Trump said he would look into deporting billionaire Elon Musk in response to a question about the ally-turned-critic of his signature tax and spending legislation. “I don’t know,” Trump told reporters at the White House on Tuesday when asked if he would deport the South African-born entrepreneur and US citizen, before adding that “we’ll have to take a look.” The president’s comments are the latest salvo in a renewed feud between Trump and the world’s richest person, who has ramped up his criticism of a Republican tax bill that expedites the end of a consumer credit for electric vehicle purchases.

• Trump says DOGE may "go back and eat Elon"
  Axios
  Avery Lotz
  President Trump said Tuesday that DOGE could investigate Elon Musk, the latest indicator that his patience with the Tesla CEO is running thin. The two men have engaged in a war of words in the past 24 hours, with Musk taking to X to vent his objections to the president's "big, beautiful bill" and the estimated trillions of dollars it would add to the national debt..

X will deploy AI to write community notes, expand fact-checking
Bloomberg
Kurt Wagner
Elon Musk’s X will start to publish Community Notes written by artificial intelligence agents, a move to increase the speed of the social network’s fact-checking product and expand it to reach more people. Developers will soon be able to submit their own AI agents for review by the company. Those AI agents will write a series of practice notes behind the scenes, and if the company deems them helpful, the bot will be deployed to write notes that will appear publicly on the service.

Hollywood Confronts AI Copyright Chaos in Washington, Courts
The Wall Street Journal
Amrith Ramkumar and Jessica Toonkel
Natasha Lyonne stayed up all night furiously texting and calling Cate Blanchett, Ron Howard and everyone else she knows in Hollywood, asking them to sign her letter to the Trump administration. The White House is about to issue its artificial-intelligence action plan, a document that could influence how U.S. copyright rules are applied to training large language models.

Americas

Canada suspends Hikvision operations over national security concerns
The Record by Recorded Future
Jonathan Greig
Canadian Minister of Industry Mélanie Joly said in a statement that the determination was made with “information and evidence provided by Canada's security and intelligence community” and that she strongly encourages Canadians to “take note of this decision and make their own decisions accordingly.” In addition to ending the company’s operations in Canada, agencies and government-owned corporations will be banned from purchasing or using Hikvision products.

North Asia

FBI arrests one man, searches laptops in 16 states in crackdown on North Korean tech-worker scheme
CNN
Hannah Rabinowitz and Sean Lyngaas
US law enforcement has arrested a New Jersey man and searched stashes of laptops in 16 states in a sweeping crackdown on North Korean efforts to use remote tech workers to covertly fund their weapons programs, the Justice Department said Monday. The scheme saw North Korean tech workers – with the help of people in the US, China and elsewhere – get hired at more than 100 US companies, prosecutors said. In one case, the North Koreans stole “export-controlled US military technology”; in another, they stole the equivalent of $740,000 from a Georgia-based tech firm, according to the Justice Department.

• FBI says it dismantled North Korean fraud scheme spanning 16 US states
  ABC News
  Charmayne Allison
  Authorities in the US have busted an alleged fraud scheme which planted remote tech workers in more than 100 American companies to help finance the North Korean regime's weapons programs. The scheme saw North Korean tech workers allegedly use stolen and fake identities to gain remote work at the companies with the help of co-conspirators in the US, China and other countries. In one case, the tech workers stole sensitive information including ""export-controlled US military technology"", the US Justice Department said.

• US government takes down major North Korean ‘remote IT workers’ operation
  TechCrunch
  Lorenzo Franceschi-Bicchiera
  The U.S. Department of Justice announced on Monday that it had taken several enforcement actions against North Korea’s money-making operations, which rely on undercover remote IT workers inside American tech companies to raise funds for the regime’s nuclear weapons program, as well as to steal data and cryptocurrency. As part of the DOJ’s multi-state effort, the government announced the arrest and indictment of U.S. national Zhenxing “Danny” Wang, who allegedly ran a years-long fraud scheme from New Jersey to sneak remote North Korean IT workers inside U.S. tech companies. According to the indictment, the scheme generated more than $5 million in revenue for the North Korean regime.

Korea Wealth Fund to boost bets on AI startups, eyes China tech
Bloomberg
David Ingles and Yoolim Lee
South Korea’s sovereign wealth fund plans to increase allocations to tech startups and venture capital funds as part of its broader push to deepen exposure to artificial intelligence and other disruptive technologies. Korea Investment Corp., which manages $206.5 billion in assets, is expanding its allocation to alternative assets to enhance returns, and exploring tech investment opportunities in China, Chief Executive Officer Park Il Young said in an interview with Bloomberg.

• Japan's Towa eyes third chip tool plant in South Korea amid AI boom
  Nikkei Asia
  Nami Matsuura
  Buoyed by strong demand brought about by the generative AI boom, Japanese chip tool maker Towa is considering further expanding its production capacity in South Korea, where it just completed a second facility. "It's possible that we build a third plant in South Korea," Towa's president, Muneo Miura, said in an interview with Nikkei on Monday. Until now, most of the Towa equipment sold in the South Korean market has been imported from Japan.

TikTok Shop opens for business in Japan as US fate hangs in balance
South China Morning Post
Danielle Popov
TikTok has launched its e-commerce platform in Japan, enabling users to directly buy products featured in videos, as the app continues to face an uncertain future in the US. TikTok Shop’s launch in Japan on Monday confirms the Post’s earlier report that the popular short-video app is seeking to diversify its global footprint while reducing its reliance on the US market, as President Donald Trump has demanded the app’s US operations be sold to American investors.

Southeast Asia

Thailand’s constitutional court suspends Prime Minister over leaked call
The Diplomat
Sebastian Strangio
Thailand’s Constitutional Court has suspended Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra over the leak of a recording of a phone call with Cambodia’s former leader Hun Sen, setting off further rumbles of political turbulence. The ruling came in response to a petition filed by 36 conservative senators, accusing the neophyte prime minister of breaching ethical standards over the leaked call, which related to the ongoing border dispute with Cambodia.

• Blow for Thai government as court suspends PM from duty
  Canberra Times
  Panu Wongcha-Um and Panarat Thepgumpanat
  Thailand's Constitutional Court has suspended Prime Minister Paetongtarn Shinawatra from duty pending a case seeking her dismissal, in a major setback for a government under fire on multiple fronts and fighting for its survival. The court accepted a petition from 36 senators accusing Paetongtarn of dishonesty and breaching ethical standards, based on a leak of a sensitive telephone call with Cambodia's influential former leader Hun Sen that was intended to de-escalate a territorial row and tense troop buildup at their border.

Hong Kong needs more cybersecurity professionals as threats increase: report
South China Morning Post
Hannah Wang
Hong Kong needs more professionals focused on cybersecurity due to persistent threats and a limited talent pool, according to a recent report from the Hong Kong China Network Security Association. The group said demand for cybersecurity professionals in Hong Kong was expected to grow steadily over the next three to five years, with a particular focus on skills related to cloud and artificial intelligence security.

Europe

Landmark EU tech rules holding back innovation, Google says
Reuters
Foo Yun Chee
Google will on Tuesday warn EU antitrust regulators and its critics that landmark European Union rules aimed at reining in Big Tech are hampering innovation to the detriment of European users and businesses. The U.S. tech giant will also urge regulators to give more detailed guidance to help it comply with the rules, and ask its critics to provide evidence of costs and benefits to prove their case.

UK

Tech firms face demands to stop illegal content going viral
BBC
Liv McMahon and Charlotte Edwards
Tech platforms could be forced to prevent illegal content from going viral and limit the ability for people to send virtual gifts to or record a child's livestream, under more online safety measures proposed by Ofcom. The UK regulator published a consultation on Monday seeking views on further protections to keep citizens, particularly children, safer online. These could also include making some larger platforms assess whether they need to proactively detect terrorist material under further online safety measures.

Tech firms suggested placing trackers under offenders’ skin at meeting with justice secretary
The Guardian
Robert Booth
Tracking devices inserted under offenders’ skin, robots assigned to contain prisoners and driverless vehicles used to transport them were among the measures proposed by technology companies to ministers who are gathering ideas to tackle the crisis in the UK justice system. The proposals were made at a meeting of more than two dozen tech companies in London last month, chaired by the justice secretary, Shabana Mahmood, minutes seen by the Guardian show.

M&S CEO: Most of cyberattack impact will be behind us by August
Reuters
Most of the impact of the cyberattack which hit Marks & Spencer in April will be behind it by August, Chief Executive Stuart Machin told shareholders at the retailer's annual general meeting on Tuesday. He said that the half of its online store which is not yet open will be fully restored within the next four weeks, and other systems which are currently being rebuilt will be operating by August.

Middle East

Saudi Vision 2030’s smart city has S. Korea at its heart: NMDC CEO
The Korea Herald
No Kyung-min
Saudi Arabia’s capital is undergoing a massive urban transformation aimed at reshaping not only Riyadh, but the entire Middle East -- and the kingdom wants South Korea to be part of the initiative, according to the head of the state-owned developer leading the project. New Murabba Development Co., wholly owned by Saudi Arabia’s Public Investment Fund, was established to build the world’s largest modern downtown in Riyadh as part of Crown Prince Mohammed bin Salman’s Vision 2030 initiative.

Gender & Women in Tech

I analyzed more than 100 extremist manifestos: Misogyny was the common thread
The Conversation
Karmvir K. Padda
As a researcher looking at digital extremism and gender-based violence, I’ve analyzed more than 100 manifestos written by people who carried out mass shootings, stabbings, vehicular attacks and other acts of ideologically, politically and religiously motivated violent extremism in Canada, the United States and beyond. These attackers may not belong to formal terrorist organizations, but their writings reveal consistent ideological patterns. Among them, one stands out: misogyny. The Waterloo case is not unique. In fact, it mirrors a growing number of violent incidents where gender-based hate plays a central role.

Big Tech

Amazon is on the cusp of using more robots than humans in its warehouses
The Wall Street Journal
Sebastian Herrera
The automation of Amazon.com facilities is approaching a new milestone: There will soon be as many robots as humans. The e-commerce giant, which has spent years automating tasks previously done by humans in its facilities, has deployed more than one million robots in those workplaces, Amazon said. That is the most it has ever had and near the count of human workers at the facilities.

Google agrees deal to buy power from planned nuclear fusion plant
Financial Times
Tom Wilson
Google has agreed to purchase power from a planned fusion power plant in the 2030s in only the second electricity offtake deal to be signed in the nascent fusion energy sector. The technology giant has committed to buy 200 megawatts of electricity from Commonwealth Fusion Systems’ planned power station in Virgina under a multiyear power purchase agreement, the companies said in a statement on Monday. US-headquartered CFS, which raised a record $1.8bn from investors including Google in 2021, hopes the proposed 400MW facility will be the first fusion power station to be connected to the grid.

Artificial Intelligence

Microsoft says AI system better than doctors at diagnosing complex health conditions
The Guardian
Dan Milmo
Microsoft has revealed details of an artificial intelligence system that performs better than human doctors at complex health diagnoses, creating a “path to medical superintelligence”. The company’s AI unit, which is led by the British tech pioneer Mustafa Suleyman, has developed a system that imitates a panel of expert physicians tackling “diagnostically complex and intellectually demanding” cases. Microsoft said that when paired with OpenAI’s advanced o3 AI model, its approach “solved” more than eight of 10 case studies specially chosen for the diagnostic challenge. When those case studies were tried on practising physicians – who had no access to colleagues, textbooks or chatbots – the accuracy rate was two out of 10.

OpenAI is sgutting down for the next week; Chief Research Officer Mark Chen warns employees: Meta knows we are ...
The Times of India
OpenAI is implementing a rare company-wide shutdown next week to give employees time to recharge after months of grueling 80-hour workweeks, according to multiple sources familiar with the matter as reported by Wired. The temporary closure comes as the ChatGPT maker fights to retain top talent amid Meta's aggressive $100 million recruitment offers.

Positive review only': Researchers hide AI prompts in papers
Nikkei Asia
Shogo Sugiyama and Ryosuke Eguchi
Research papers from 14 academic institutions in eight countries -- including Japan, South Korea and China -- contained hidden prompts directing artificial intelligence tools to give them good reviews, Nikkei has found. Nikkei looked at English-language preprints -- manuscripts that have yet to undergo formal peer review -- on the academic research platform arXiv.

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