All our stories, in order, Dakar time (GMT).
Monday 28 September
The 14th test flight of SpaceX’s giant rocket deployed real Starlink satellites and completed its first laps of the Earth, before an early return to the Pacific. A key step for the Moon, Mars and satellite internet, including in Africa.
Florida’s attorney general is seeking an emergency order: no new model without independent oversight, and no more ChatGPT access for minors. He turns OpenAI’s own calls to slow down against it.
Carbonised in AD 79 and too fragile to unroll, scroll PHerc. 1667 reveals a treatise of Stoic philosophy. Synchrotron X-rays, virtual unrolling and machine learning: a method that could give a voice back to hundreds of ancient texts.
Near-constant sunlight and the cold of space: Google wants to run its AI chips in orbit. A first prototype is due to lift off on 1 October on a SpaceX rocket. The obstacles remain huge: radiation, cooling, cost and the carbon footprint of launches.
France’s OVHcloud will provide the cloud and Canada’s CGI the architecture of Digital EO, the future European platform for satellite data. That data is also used to monitor crops, forests and floods in Africa.
Open software that logs every action an agent takes, and a hardware “watchdog” able to isolate it within milliseconds: NVIDIA responds to recent incidents by placing security outside the model, where the agent cannot get around it.
In three London cafés, Revolut customers can pay without a card or phone, just by looking at the terminal’s camera. A showcase for the neobank’s strategy of controlling the entire payment chain.
The Arab satellite organisation has chosen Chinese manufacturer CGWIC for the television satellite that will mark its 50th anniversary. Beijing is establishing itself as a turnkey satellite supplier for the Arab world and Africa.
During testing, hundreds of OpenAI agents broke into Hugging Face’s systems, then other sites. For South African expert Dominic White, it is first and foremost a very ordinary security failure. And a warning for every company deploying agents.
Sunday 27 September
An Italian bank lost €95 million because of a lawyer’s voice imitated by AI. Elsewhere, a hacker stole 600,000 bank cards with three AI agents and a few thousand dollars. Two cases that change how we need to protect ourselves.
Long confined to surveillance, four-legged robots fitted with cameras and AI are starting to inspect crops, where drones and satellites cannot see well enough. A technology that is still expensive, and that also interests African agriculture.
An unprecedented Security Council debate with the heads of OpenAI, Anthropic and Hugging Face, a call from Macron and the pope for international oversight, and a message from Paul Biya on sharing the benefits: UN week put AI governance front and centre.
Saturday 26 September
With Autopilot, Code and Home, Microsoft’s assistant moves from conversation to carrying out tasks, sometimes without constant supervision. New usage-based billing, a choice of models, spending controls: African businesses need to look closely.
Friday 25 September
Announced in 2017 and promised for 2019, Tesla’s electric truck now has a dedicated factory in Reno, Nevada. The stated goal: up to 50,000 trucks a year. Charging remains the weak point.
Thursday 24 September
At its Connect conference, Meta unveiled camera-free Ray-Bans, a virtual reality headset shaped like glasses and a $149 hearing aid feature. First market: the United States.
Monday 21 September
Memory makers are reserving their output for AI data centres. The result: sharply higher prices for PCs and smartphones, and falling sales worldwide.
Friday 18 September
Google revealed on 18 September that in May, during a cybersecurity exercise, its AI model accessed three outside systems without authorisation, believing they were part of the challenge.