Writing on the threat generative AI poses to Wikipedia, Helen Choi notes that chatbots like Gemini and ChatGPT often answer queries directly, citing Wikipedia without prompting users to click through. She argues this reduces the readership Wikipedia depends on to recruit the volunteers who write, edit and maintain its articles, and calls on academics to actively support the platform given their stake in open knowledge.
blogs.lse.ac.uk
· 2026-10-20
Google announced TorchTPU, a version of the PyTorch framework built to run on its Tensor Processing Units, letting developers shift existing PyTorch-based AI apps to Google Cloud with a simple configuration change rather than a rewrite. The move follows Amazon's release a day earlier of TorchNeuron, its own PyTorch variant for AWS's Trainium chips, and Amazon's submission of code to decouple PyTorch features from Nvidia hardware.
techcrunch.com
· 2026-10-20
Google is rolling out a Personal Intelligence feature for Gemini AI in Android Auto starting today, with support for cars featuring Google built-in arriving in coming months. The feature lets Gemini pull information from Gmail, Calendar, Maps, Photos, YouTube, and Search to answer context-specific driving questions, such as checking a flight status from an email confirmation or navigating to a location shown in a recent photo.
theverge.com
· 2026-10-20
A benchmarking study retested five bot-detection systems—Proof of Human, Google reCAPTCHA v3, hCaptcha, Cloudflare Turnstile, and Cloudflare Bot Management—against conventional automation, stealth browsers, and AI-powered browsing agents completing a five-question survey. Detection rates across roughly 90-100 sessions per system ranged from 9% to 99%, a wider spread than the 33%-87% range the same researchers measured a year earlier against simpler automated browsers.
research.poh.org
· 2026-10-20
Google has released TorchTPU, an open-source project that lets PyTorch models run directly on its Tensor Processing Units. The package includes custom ATen kernels, a compilation cache for optimizing XLA computations, support for distributed training, and sample implementations for models like Llama, Qwen, ResNet and UNet. It is available via pip as version 0.2.0 or can be built from source using Bazel.
github.com
· 2026-10-20
Google is rolling out a new Chrome safety feature that warns users before they visit sites flagged as potentially malicious, available when Enhanced Protection is enabled. The warnings come in two tiers: a dismissible pop-up for 'suspicious' sites with a lower-confidence risk assessment, and a near full-screen red alert for 'dangerous' sites deemed high-risk. Google also upgraded its Gemini-powered scam detection for users with Enhanced Protection turned on.
theverge.com
· 2026-10-20
Google One's paid plans extend well beyond cloud storage, with higher tiers unlocking tiered access to Gemini AI features across Gmail, Docs, Slides and other Google apps. The AI Plus tier doubles Gemini usage and adds Flash model access, while AI Pro offers four times the free usage limit, the Gemini 4 Argon model, a larger context window, and Deep Research capabilities. The top-tier 30TB AI Ultra plan provides 20 times the Gemini usage of the Pro tier along with the most capable models in Google Flow and Gemini Notebook.
engadget.com
· 2026-10-20
Four Gemini 4 Argon agents, coordinating only through in-game chat and shared notes, wrote 2,783 programs of their own to defeat Minecraft's Ender Dragon in 27 hours and 14 minutes, according to a Google DeepMind paper. The agents died 605 times on Easy difficulty and spent roughly half the run battling the dragon, eventually winning by stacking dirt blocks to reach its crystals, at an estimated token cost of about $520.
tomshardware.com
· 2026-10-20
Google's DeepMind is recruiting physicists and nuclear engineers for its Chemical, Biological, Radiological, Nuclear and high-yield Explosives team, part of its Responsible Development and Innovation group, according to Data Center Dynamics. Listings call for a PhD in fields like plasma physics or nuclear engineering, government-lab experience, and familiarity with nonproliferation and arms-control policy, with salaries ranging from $174,000 to $252,000 plus a 15 percent bonus.
futurism.com
· 2026-10-20
microG GmsCore is a free, open-source reimplementation of Google's proprietary Play Services, letting apps that rely on Google APIs run on AOSP-based ROMs such as LineageOS without the non-free Google software. It provides core functions like network-based location, works on real devices and emulators, and is licensed under Apache 2.0, though it requires a ROM supporting signature spoofing and a separate Play Store replacement app.
github.com
· 2026-10-20
Some Google Home Speaker owners report their devices continuously downloading massive amounts of data in the background, with one user seeing over 200GB consumed in a single day. The issue, flagged by 9to5Google and Reddit users, appears linked to a failed firmware update and mostly affects the newer Home Speaker model. Google has confirmed the bug and says a fix is already rolling out.
theverge.com
· 2026-10-20
Revolut experienced a widespread service disruption starting Tuesday morning, affecting sign-ins, card payments, transfers, currency exchange, and live support for its app. The company said customer funds and data remain safe while it works to fix the issue, which reportedly stems from a power-related failure at a Google Cloud data center in London.
bleepingcomputer.com
· 2026-10-20
GoKawiil