In a published essay, Cohere co-founder and CEO Aidan Gomez criticized rival AI leaders (naming Anthropic's Dario Amodei) for calling for a coordinated industry slowdown, arguing that a mechanism which slows everyone down while preserving incumbents' commercial advantage does not make AI safer and risks entrenching dominant AI companies. Gomez instead called for an independent international framework for AI harms with genuinely independent testing bodies - contrasting this with 'handpicked' auditors he said risk regulatory capture - and for mandatory transparency when serious AI incidents occur.
Activity
Incidents and actions from tracked entities.
Revolut exposed customers' KYC data after attackers used a fraudulent government email to pass its verification checks
Sep 12, 2026Revolut confirmed a data breach in which attackers impersonating a government agency via a spoofed official email address obtained sensitive KYC data on an undisclosed number of customers, described by a crypto security researcher as appearing targeted at high-net-worth users. Exposed data included full names, dates of birth, occupations, postal and email addresses, phone numbers, passport and driver's license images, facial verification selfies, IBANs, and full transaction histories including Bitcoin transactions. Revolut declined to name the government agency involved or specify affected markets, and did not explain why email domain authentication alone was sufficient to release such sensitive data. On September 14, 2026, the attackers began publicly leaking customer data and threatened to release more daily until paid, escalating from theft to extortion.
Human rights groups called for suspension of G42-hosted Stargate UAE AI data center over surveillance and migrant labor risks
Sep 11, 2026Euro-Med Human Rights Monitor published a report demanding suspension of the Stargate UAE AI campus -- a multi-gigawatt data center project involving G42 alongside OpenAI, Oracle, Nvidia and SoftBank -- pending an independent human rights impact assessment. The report and accompanying regional press coverage cited the absence of credible independent oversight of the facility under the UAE's broad 2021 cybercrimes law, G42's documented history of surveillance-linked ventures (ToTok, DarkMatter), and reliance on low-wage migrant labor without documented labor protections for construction and operations staff.
SK Hynix cut daily water use by average 170,000 tons in 2025, exceeding its cumulative water-savings target
Sep 11, 2026SK Hynix's 2025 sustainability disclosures showed the company saved an average of 170,000 tons of water daily at its domestic plants in 2025, enough for roughly 550,000 people, through a water and wastewater reduction task force running since 2018. Cumulative water savings reached 303.37 million tons through 2025 against a 264 million-ton target, with water reuse up 54% to 73.59 million tons from 47.88 million tons in 2022. SK Hynix said it plans to raise its cumulative savings target to 329 million tons in 2026.
Careem and MAJRA (the UAE's National CSR Fund), together with corporate partners including Nestle and PepsiCo, announced plans to extend the Rahma Pledge - a program providing rest areas, hydration and healthcare support for delivery workers regardless of which platform they work for - beyond its original summer heat-safety run into a year-round initiative. The companies said the program drew more than 100,000 visits to rest areas over the preceding summer. Careem CEO Mudassir Sheikha and MAJRA CEO Sarah Shaw announced the expansion alongside UAE Minister of Economy and Tourism Abdulla bin Touq Al Marri.
DeepSeek allegedly routed millions of user queries to Anthropic's Claude without disclosure, prompting Chinese CAC probe
Sep 10, 2026Anthropic reported that DeepSeek both distilled Claude's outputs to train its own models and covertly rerouted user queries to Claude for answers, without telling users they were talking to a third-party US model. Anthropic said DeepSeek sent over 12.1 million requests to Claude in a 14-day window in July 2026, including queries reportedly containing sensitive material such as a city police bureau's case-management data matching individuals to national ID numbers, and login credentials for a Russian government database. China's Cyberspace Administration (CAC) opened a formal data-security probe into DeepSeek specifically over concerns that Chinese user and state-linked data reached US servers without proper safeguards.
Moonshot AI allegedly routed 23 million Kimi user queries to Anthropic's Claude via hidden proxy network, prompting Chinese CAC probe
Sep 10, 2026Anthropic reported that Moonshot AI covertly rerouted Kimi chatbot user queries to Claude and used the exchanges to train its own models, without disclosing to users they were being answered by a third-party US model. Anthropic said Moonshot routed over 23 million exchanges to Claude between May and July 2026, with nearly 300,000 requests funneled through a proxy network of roughly 5,380 accounts largely registered via servers in Singapore and Japan to obscure the data's origin. China's Cyberspace Administration (CAC) opened a formal data-security probe into Moonshot specifically, examining whether sensitive Chinese user and state-linked data reached US servers without proper safeguards. The probe came as Moonshot was reportedly pursuing a confidential Hong Kong IPO filing.
Nubank CEO David Velez repeatedly called for eliminating Colombia's usury rate cap protecting borrowers from predatory lending
Sep 10, 2026Nubank co-founder and CEO David Velez has publicly and repeatedly urged the Colombian government to eliminate or dismantle the country's 'tasa de usura' (usury rate cap), which limits maximum interest rates lenders can charge. Velez reiterated the call in September 2026 alongside Nubank's announcement of a 5-trillion-peso (~$1.3B) Colombia investment through 2030, arguing the cap is 'the biggest obstacle' to financial inclusion and that controlling prices limits credit markets. Economic-policy group ANIF opposed the proposal, warning that removing the cap would strip legal protection from vulnerable borrowers and could push more Colombians toward illegal 'gota a gota' lenders charging 382-666% annual rates. As Colombia's largest digital lender, Nubank would benefit financially from a higher or unregulated rate ceiling.
The US Department of Justice opened an antitrust investigation into Nvidia's licensing agreement with AI inference chip startup Groq, examining whether the deal was structured to neutralize a potential competitor in the AI chip market. The investigation is ongoing with no conclusions reached as of October 2026.
Anthropic disclosed blocking state-linked actors' attempts to use Claude for bioweapons research, cyberattacks, and surveillance
Sep 10, 2026On September 10, 2026, Anthropic published a threat intelligence report covering December 2025-August 2026 disclosing that it detected and blocked misuse of Claude models by state-linked and criminal actors. This included five case studies of attempts to use Claude in ways that could support biological weapons development (involving chikungunya, avian influenza, smallpox, and animal toxins), including a request from an actor affiliated with an unidentified military institution seeking help with a chikungunya research proposal that could have made the virus more dangerous. The report also identified Russia-linked cyber-espionage group GTG-20006 (linked to Midnight Blizzard), Chinese state-linked activity, and Yemen-based arms manufacturers using Claude for conventional weapons development, plus fraud, influence operations, and surveillance-tool cases. Anthropic said users in Russia, China, and Iran circumvented geographic restrictions via fraudulent accounts and resellers, and acknowledged that safeguards on older models (Haiku, Sonnet, Opus) were less stringent than on newer ones, cautioning it could not always determine whether flagged research was legitimate or nefarious.
Vietnam Grab drivers called two-day app boycott over falling earnings amid commission dispute
Sep 10, 2026In September 2026, Grab drivers in Vietnam organized a two-day coordinated app shutdown/boycott protesting falling earnings, calling for a review of commission rates. The action followed a similar pattern in Indonesia where Grab had cut commissions for two-wheeled drivers from 20% to 8% in July 2026 after months of driver pressure. Vietnamese authorities noted the boycott's actual operational impact was limited, and police fined at least one social media account for spreading false claims that Grab was fully paralyzed. Vietnam's Labour Code does not recognize app shutdowns by classified independent contractors as legal strikes, highlighting a regulatory gap in platform worker protections.
Spotify's unverified distributor pipeline let scammers upload AI-generated songs to real artists' verified pages without consent
Sep 10, 2026A 404 Media investigation demonstrated that anyone could hijack a real, verified artist's Spotify page by generating an AI song (via Udio), submitting it through distributor DistroKid under the artist's existing name, and falsely checking boxes claiming authorization -- with no verification performed by DistroKid or by Spotify (or Apple Music, Tidal, Amazon Music, Deezer). The reporter's fabricated track appeared on Brooklyn band Lathe of Heaven's official Spotify page within a day, on 2026-09-10. Musician Odette Child had separately compiled and forwarded to Spotify a list of 300+ AI-generated impostor songs -- affecting artists including Taylor Swift and deceased musicians -- which Spotify acknowledged receiving but did not act on. Spotify said reliable AI-detection remains 'a technically unsolved problem' and pointed to an in-beta 'Artist Profile Protection' opt-in review tool, first announced in March 2026 and still not generally available. Because Spotify's royalty payout has a roughly 8-week delay, scammers often collect payment before an impostor track is identified and removed, at return-on-investment estimated above 7,000%.
Anthropic pre-training researcher Jacob Coxon publicly resigned, warning labs are racing toward uncontrolled self-improving AI
Sep 9, 2026On September 9, 2026, Jacob Coxon, a 27-year-old AI pre-training researcher who had worked at both OpenAI and Anthropic, publicly resigned from Anthropic via a post on X, warning that AI labs are 'racing straight to self-improving superintelligence and gambling with our lives.' He said Anthropic understands the civilizational stakes but believes it must race to build advanced AI first because it doesn't trust competitors to act responsibly, and called the recent OpenAI Hugging Face breach and an Anthropic agent safety-evaluation escape a 'warning shot.' Coxon called for coordination between US labs on pacing agreements and said a temporary ban on improving model capabilities may be warranted in worst-case scenarios. Anthropic colleague Evan Hubinger publicly echoed related concerns, estimating a greater than 10% chance AI could cause catastrophic harm within a decade and acknowledging Anthropic lacks a working plan to solve alignment for superintelligence.
The EU General Court rejected Booking.com's appeal of the European Commission's 2023 prohibition of its EUR1.63 billion ($1.90 billion) acquisition of flight-booking group eTraveli. The Commission had found the deal would strengthen Booking.com's dominant position in the hotel online-travel-agency market and let it foreclose rival flight-and-hotel bundling competitors, even though the merger would have increased Booking's market share by only a few tenths of a percent. The court found errors in the Commission's market-share calculations but left the prohibition in force.
Huawei went on federal criminal trial over alleged Iran surveillance equipment sales and North Korea sanctions evasion
Sep 9, 2026A racketeering, money laundering, bank/wire fraud, sanctions-violation, and trade-secrets-theft trial against Huawei began September 9, 2026 in federal court in Brooklyn before Judge Ann Donnelly, expected to last about three months. Prosecutors allege Huawei supplied surveillance equipment to Iran that was used to 'monitor, identify and detain' protesters during the 2009 Tehran demonstrations, concealed business operations in North Korea, deceived banks about its Iran dealings to evade US sanctions, and stole trade secrets from five US technology companies. Huawei has pleaded not guilty and denies wrongdoing. The case stems from Huawei's 2019 US trade blacklisting.
TCS allegedly coerced ~2,500 Pune employees into resigning amid restructuring, union alleges labor-law violations
Sep 8, 2026IT employees' union NITES alleged that Tata Consultancy Services pressured approximately 2,500 employees at its Pune campuses to resign as part of an ongoing restructuring drive, disclosed September 8, 2026. NITES said affected staff were largely mid-to-senior professionals with 10-20 years of tenure, many over 40 with families, EMIs and other financial obligations, and claimed TCS violated the Industrial Disputes Act, 1947 by terminating employment without government notice or statutory retrenchment compensation, instead coercing 'voluntary resignations.' The union urged Maharashtra's Chief Minister to intervene and a separate employee forum, FITE, called for a Special Investigation Team. TCS called the characterization 'inaccurate and purposefully mischievous,' saying only a limited number of employees were affected by a skill-realignment initiative and that those affected received due care and severance.
Former Amazon warehouse employees filed a nationwide class action, backed by the advocacy group A Better Balance, alleging Amazon systematically refused pregnant workers accommodations required under the Pregnant Workers Fairness Act - including bathroom breaks, seating, and light duty - and in some cases forced workers onto unpaid leave or fired them for absences caused by the denied accommodations. Amazon said it approves most pregnancy accommodation requests.
Alibaba ran largest recorded unauthorized AI model extraction campaign against Anthropic's Claude to train Qwen
Sep 8, 2026Anthropic and U.S. national security agencies (NSA, FBI, CISA) reported that Alibaba conducted a systematic 'distillation' campaign extracting Claude's reasoning transcripts and internal model-development data to train its Qwen models. Between May and July 2026, Alibaba-linked accounts made 151+ million unauthorized exchanges with Claude, peaking at nearly 3 million per day from 3,500+ fraudulent accounts using residential proxies, disposable emails, and virtual cards. Exchanges included sensitive information from individual users, multinational companies, and state-affiliated actors. On September 8, 2026, NSA/FBI/CISA issued a joint statement naming Alibaba (alongside DeepSeek, Moonshot AI, MiniMax, StepFun, and Z.AI) for systematically extracting proprietary AI knowledge from American firms at industrial scale since at least 2024.
HelloBetter suffered cyberattack exposing mental-health app users' diagnoses, diary entries, and insurance data
Sep 7, 2026Hamburg-based digital therapeutics provider HelloBetter disclosed that attackers breached its business intelligence system on September 6-7, 2026 and exfiltrated a significant volume of data, including contact and insurance details, questionnaire responses, program progress, and free-text diary entries from users of its six prescription digital health apps (DiGA) covering conditions such as depression, panic disorder, and chronic pain. The company said it could not rule out that pseudonymized data remained individually identifiable, and reported the breach to Germany's BSI and the Hamburg data protection commissioner under GDPR Article 34.
NHS patient data opt-outs surged and MPs urged Labour to terminate Palantir's £330M Federated Data Platform contract
Sep 7, 2026In July 2026, two UK parliamentary committees (Science and Technology; Health and Social Care) urged the Labour government to exercise a February 2027 break clause and terminate Palantir's seven-year, £330M contract to run the NHS Federated Data Platform, citing use of Palantir's software to support military strikes in Gaza and Iran, its role in US ICE immigration operations, and data-security concerns. In September 2026, Health Innovation Minister James Frith disclosed to the Commons Health Committee that roughly 60,000 additional patients withdrew their medical records from NHS research between mid-May and mid-July 2026, attributing at least part of the rise to public 'mistrust' of Palantir that moved in step with press attention on the company's NHS role, while describing the increase as 'modest' but requiring continued monitoring. DHSC and Frith gave conflicting public statements over whether NHS trusts are required to use the platform.
Gangnam Unni breach exposed medical consultation data of ~220,000 users across Korea, Japan and other Asian markets
Sep 4, 2026Healing Paper, operator of the Gangnam Unni cosmetic-procedure platform, disclosed that an unauthorized party accessed consultation records for 219,665 users via an API on September 4, 2026, with a second attempted breach the next day through a different channel. Exposed data included names, contact details, and sensitive medical information such as procedure and hospital names, consultation photos, appointment details, and payment records, affecting roughly 160,000 users in South Korea, 48,000 in Japan, and others in Taiwan, Thailand and China. The company reported the breach to the Korea Internet & Security Agency (KISA) and police.
NHTSA issued special order demanding Tesla prove under oath that driverless Cybercab meets federal safety standards
Sep 4, 2026NHTSA opened Audit Query AQ26002 and issued a Special Order requiring Tesla to certify under oath, by September 30, 2026, how its Cybercab robotaxi - which has no steering wheel, pedals, or mirrors - complies with Federal Motor Vehicle Safety Standards. The order followed Tesla's September 3, 2026 launch of commercial Cybercab service in Austin, Texas, and carries civil penalties up to $139 million and potential criminal liability for false or withheld information.
Apple faces £2 billion UK lawsuit alleging its App Tracking Transparency rules unfairly favor its own advertising
Sep 3, 2026On September 3, 2026, app developers filed a £2 billion ($2.7 billion) claim at London's Competition Appeal Tribunal alleging Apple abused its market power through its App Tracking Transparency (ATT) framework, imposing stricter tracking-consent restrictions on third-party developers than on Apple's own advertising and services, giving Apple an unfair competitive advantage. The case is brought by developers represented by Ann Pope, a former senior official at the UK's Competition and Markets Authority. Apple says ATT exists to let users control tracking permissions. The claim follows a separate German Bundeskartellamt finding in August 2026 that ATT self-preferenced Apple's own services.
Telstra fined after failing to verify customer identity, enabling 15 unauthorized SIM swaps tied to fraud losses
Sep 3, 2026Australia's communications regulator ACMA found that between June 26 and October 30, 2025, Telstra failed to use required identity-authentication processes for high-risk account transactions, contravening Section 8 and subsection 13(1) of the Telecommunications Service Provider (Customer Identity Authentication) Determination 2022 and subsection 101(1) of the Telecommunications Act 1997. The investigation identified 15 unauthorized SIM swaps enabled by the lapses, contributing to customer fraud losses. ACMA issued Telstra an infringement notice of A$277,200, published September 3, 2026, alongside an enforceable undertaking.
Wipro rolled out 'TimeScope' laptop activity monitoring across India, linking inactivity to automatic leave deductions
Sep 2, 2026Wipro expanded a digital activity-monitoring tool called TimeScope to company-issued laptops and desktops across India in September 2026, after an initial deployment to roughly 5,000 employees in May 2026. The tool tracks login duration, active time on work applications (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, Chrome, etc.), and idle periods, covering fixed-price, billable, support, and undeployed roles. Under an internal policy, a day with no device login, no approved leave, no office swipe record, and no logged client-site visit can trigger an automatic leave deduction, which employees must contest to reverse. Wipro said the tool does not track personal activity, keystrokes, or screen content, and attributed the rollout to client requests for productivity visibility and concerns about employees logging in remotely while on vacation. The move follows a similar monitoring rollout at rival TCS weeks earlier and reflects an industry-wide shift toward outcome-based billing.
NSO Pegasus spyware found on devices of Serbian pro-democracy activists, an MP, and a local official ahead of 2026 elections
Sep 2, 2026Digital rights group SHARE Foundation, corroborated by Amnesty International and Citizen Lab, found at least 14 Serbians infected with mercenary spyware between December 2025 and August 2026, including student pro-democracy activists, an opposition member of parliament, and a local government official. At least one confirmed Pegasus infection (zero-click) was documented alongside at least two infections with a domestic NoviSpy spyware variant, one occurring after police confiscated a student's phone during questioning. Apple sent threat notifications to affected users in 110 countries on August 13, 2026. The targeting coincided with Serbia's March 2026 local elections and ongoing student protests following the 2024 Novi Sad railway station collapse, with additional targeting anticipated around October 2026 parliamentary elections. Citizen Lab researcher John Scott-Railton said Pegasus 'is still being used to hack people campaigning for democracy' despite a decade of NSO reform promises.
UK consumer group Which? set up a fake listing for the UK Prime Minister's residence at 10 Downing Street on Booking.com in minutes, using the real address and photo. The listing received 14 inquiries in a 20-minute window, had a fabricated 10/10 review published despite promised moderation, and Booking.com processed a payment for a week-long stay that remained unrefunded more than six weeks later. Which? also used Booking.com's internal messaging system to send an external phishing-style payment link requesting card details without triggering interception. The listing stayed live for about six weeks before removal on August 27, 2026; under Booking.com policy, hosts are not required to provide ID or proof of ownership until three months after a listing goes live. Booking.com disputed the test's methodology, and Which? urged UK regulator Ofcom to investigate the platform's compliance with the Online Safety Act.
Bolt Operations OU petitioned Kenya's High Court challenging the 2022 Transport Network Companies regulations. On September 1, 2026, Justice Florence Muigai Aburili ruled the 18% commission-cap and anti-circumvention provisions unconstitutional and invalid for lack of statutory price-setting authority and a regulatory impact assessment, suspending the declaration for 12 months while government redraws the rules. The same judgment struck down a separate rule requiring platforms to retain three years of detailed passenger and driver data and surrender it to the National Transport and Safety Authority on demand, finding it breached the constitutional right to privacy.
Malaysia's new Gig Workers Tribunal heard its first case, a driver's dispute with GrabCar over earnings features
Sep 1, 2026On September 1, 2026, Malaysia's Gig Workers Tribunal, newly established under the Gig Workers Act 2025 (Act 872), held its first hearing at the Kuching labour office in Sarawak: a self-represented e-hailing driver's claim against GrabCar Sdn Bhd over how Grab's Saver Trips, Advance Booking, and cashback-incentive features affected his earnings. Section 36 of the Act bars lawyers from the tribunal. The hearing was adjourned for further testimony and witness examination.
Australian business media reported Xero offered 'low performer' employees in Australia a choice between a redundancy package or a 30-day performance improvement plan, a more aggressive approach than standard PIP processes. The move coincided with the board seeking shareholder support for a CEO pay increase for Sukhinder Singh Cassidy and a surge in stock-based compensation (up 58% to NZ$240.1 million, 43.3% of free cash flow), even as Xero's share price had fallen over 60% from its 2025 peak amid an AI-driven 'SaaSpocalypse' sell-off in software stocks. Reported employee morale concerns centered on the gap between the CEO's public praise of company culture and internal performance-management pressure combined with AI-driven engineering-role automation.