TechRadar News

Lucky folks who managed to preorder the Legend of Zelda 40th Anniversary Nintendo Switch 2 are having a great time, as today's the day it should arrive on your doorstep. However, given its unsurprisingly popularity, the limited-edition console sold out extremely quickly at most retailers. However, there's good news if you're still hoping to hook one for yourself.

It appears that multiple retailers will restock the gorgeous Zelda Switch 2 from November 5 to coincide with the launch of Ocarina of Time on Nintendo's latest hybrid console. This is according to briefly seen information on the Target store page, news of in-store restocks at Best Buy, as well as a Reddit post suggesting Walmart will not get more consoles until November 6.

For those in the UK, the console is actually available to order right now at several retailers, as stock has been less of an issue on this side of the pond.

Most of the current availability will also ship next week on November 5, as it's the second version of the console with a replaceable battery to meet upcoming EU regulations. Any immediate availability is more likely for the first wave of the console, which doesn't include this replaceable battery. Keep that in mind depending on your preferences.

Other retailers may take a different approach to restocks over the next week, so it's worth keeping an eye on the key links below — and I'll check them regularly to offer any updates right here.

Zelda Nintendo Switch 2 — US restock quick links

• Best Buy: in-store restocks Nov 5
• Walmart: restock expected Nov 6
• Target: restock expected Nov 5
• Nintendo Store: out of stock
• Amazon: restock TBC

Zelda Nintendo Switch 2 — UK restock quick links

• EE: in stock now
• Amazon: sold out
• Argos: restock TBC
• Currys: sold out
• Nintendo Store: restock TBC
• Very: restock TBC
• Smyths Toys: restock TBC
• ShopTo: restock TBC

(Image credit: Future / Nintendo)The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time preorders — US quick links

• Amazon: preorder for $59.88
• Walmart: preorder for $59.88
• Nintendo Store: preorder for $69.99
• Best Buy: preorder for $69.99
• GameStop: preorder for $69.99
• Target: preorder for $69.99

The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time preorders — UK quick links

• Amazon UK: preorder for £54.99
• Nintendo Store: preorder for £58.99
• ShopTo: preorder for £54.85
• Currys: preorder for £54.99
• Argos: preorder for £54.99
• Smyths Toys: preorder for £54.99
• Very: preorder for £54.99
• The Game Collection: preorder for £59.95
• Game: preorder for £54.99

• DHS data breach exposes personal details of over 41,000 employees and contractors
• The information includes personal information on ICE agents, as well as details of surveillance operations and tools used by undercover agents
• Numerous high-level officials across US government agencies have been named within the breach

The details of over 41,000 Department of Homeland Security employees and contractors has surfaced online, including staffers at Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and US Customs and Border Protection, following an apparent data breach.

The leak contains sensitive information such as email addresses, phone numbers, and office addresses for employees alongside internal information on how Homeland Security conducts undercover operations and surveillance programs.

The archive was published by a group calling itself the Department of Peace. They dubbed the leak ‘Icepick’, and shared a note stating, “They have our information, so it’s only fair that we have theirs.”

‘Icepick’ data dump exposes agents and contractors

The DHS has been locked in a battle with activists, protestors, and anonymous social media users who have been tracking and cataloguing the movements and behavior of ICE employees.

In response to protests and activist activity, the DHS has expanded its definition of “doxing” - the malicious exposure of personal information such as home addresses - to include basic information such as names.

The Icepick data leak has since been turned into a searchable database by Swiss cybersecurity researcher and journalist maia arson crimew, who said, “I don't think we should let them scare us into not looking into them.”

“The DHS especially as an agency completely lacks accountability, despite many parts of it being incredibly unpopular,” crimew said. “The people who work there know this too; for example, some of their LinkedIn bios simply say ‘stuff at US Government’.”

Of the 41,000 records exposed, around 10,000 belong to ICE employees, 6,200 belong to US Citizenship and Immigration Services, and a further 1,000 are Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency accounts.

Details on DHS operations contains references to “Keyhole” - an undercover surveillance of Minneapolis protest groups that took place earlier this year - alongside references to a Communications Intercept Center TechOps (CICTO) Program,” a “Title III Intercept Program” for wiretaps, and an “Illicit Sensor Intercept Program (ISIP).”

Tools used by employees have also been revealed in the breach, which include Palantir’s Falcon investigative platform, the PenLink platform used to analyze phone records and social media, and AI platforms such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT, Google’s Gemini, and Microsoft’s Copilot.

According to the transparency nonprofit Distributed Denial of Secrets, who verified the leak on behalf of Wired, the data was obtained from the DHS's Okta login system. An Okta spokesperson said, “We are aware of this report. Okta is secure, and we have no evidence our data or systems were compromised.”

A DHS spokesperson said that the agency is “aware of a potential breach and is actively working to address the situation swiftly and effectively. We take all security threats against our employees and officers seriously and will work to ensure all are properly protected. We will update the public when more information is available”

• FBI and international partners seized infrastructure tied to Virtualine, a hosting provider allegedly serving cybercriminals
• Authorities say the service facilitated phishing, ransomware operations, illicit crypto activity, and other crimes
• Investigators seized servers and customer data, though no arrests have been announced so far

The FBI has announced it seized the website of Virtualine, a bulletproof hosting service that allegedly allowed child pornography, laundered stolen and extorted crypto, and facilitated a wide range of other criminal activities.

The operation was carried out in partnership with German and Dutch authorities, as well as multiple private companies, with police raiding a data center in Limburg to seize “dozens of physical servers” that also hosted “hundreds” of virtual servers. As a result, they gained access to information about more than 3,000 of Virtualine’s customers, it was said.

“The police are currently taking follow-up actions towards these users,” the Dutch police said, although it’s difficult to say how valuable the information will be, since most bulletproof hosting providers don’t ask for private data, and criminals are good at hiding it, as well.

Bulletproof hosting

Every website, including hacking forums, criminal service providers, even fraudulent landing pages, needs a server that hosts it. Hosting providers renting out these servers are generally compliant with law enforcement agencies, so when the police requests a takedown or files a complaint, most of them comply. However, there is a subset of hosting providers, colloquially called “bulletproof hosting”, which are unusually resistant to pressure from the authorities.

It doesn’t mean all of them are inherently illegal or malicious. There are cases where such services are necessary - in countries with strong censorship, or where website owners want to protect their identities.

In this case, however, Virtualine was openly criminal, with the US Department of Justice (DOJ) saying it advertised its services to criminals on cybercrime forums saying, on at least one occasion, “You can use Virtualine for all illegal/black hat activities (including phis[h]ing, carding, email spam, port scanning and all others) except for child contents and terrorism activities.”

The company took it a step further. In March 2026, it introduced an “additional protection plan” that offers customers who receive takedown requests “another shell company not affiliated with Virtualine, after which the server is reactivated.”

Interestingly enough, Virtualine said it did not accept child porn or terrorism content, but according to the DOJ - did exactly the opposite.

One of its clients created a forum that allowed users to post and sell access to “nude, sexually suggestive, and/or sexually explicit images and videos of minors and adults,” while also promoting a hack-for-hire service that broke into people’s accounts and stole their explicit photos and videos. Virtualine was even notified about it by law enforcement agencies from Germany, Canada, and Australia, but decided to ignore the warnings and continue hosting the client.

At the same time, Virtualine’s customers were allowed to pay in Bitcoin, offering an unhosted bitcoin address that allowed customers “to direct pay without concern their funds would be flagged as illicit”. Citing Chainalysis data, BleepingComputer said the company’s wallet was seen receiving funds from ransomware operations, infostealers, Russian-language cybercrime forums, and more.

“Virtualine then laundered those proceeds to conceal their origin,” the blockchain company added.

Piercing the kevlar

Besides confiscating the servers and the data, the main website - virtualine.net - was defaced and now shows the usual FBI “this website has been seized” message. Unfortunately, no arrests have been made, which means the service will most likely continue operating.

According to BleepingComputer, it is “partially online” but its network prefixes currently have very low routing visibility, which could mean that much of its infrastructure was pulled offline.

Usually, disruptions such as this one are only temporary, and it won’t take long before they are remedied and the service becomes fully operational again.

• The next Hitman Elusive Target has been revealed
• The limited-time mission will see Agent 47 taking down an annoying podcaster
• The target will be played by real-world content creator Seán McLoughlin

The next Hitman Elusive Target has been revealed, and it's something that could happen in 2026.

As of October 29, players will be able to take out Finn Colton – a controversial millionaire content creator who goes by the online handle 'Finnvictus'. The mission will see the flashy mansion of the existing Hawke's Bay map turned into an even more elaborate space for content creation, with its own underground studio and cameras that live-stream everything 24/7.

Bald assassin protagonist Agent 47 has managed to gain entry thanks to an invite to appear on the content creator's flagship podcast and will have to contend with an environment that has eyes almost everywhere.

(Image credit: IO Interactive)

That's not all, however, as Colton is played by Seán McLoughlin, better known as 'Jacksepticeye', with the popular streamer lending both his likeness and voice to the character.

"I’ve been playing Hitman with my community for years, so getting to actually step into the World of Assassination is unreal," shared McLoughlin.

"Finn is loud, paranoid, and completely obsessed with content, and playing him was an absolute blast. I can’t wait to see all the creative ways you take him down."

The mission will be available for free for a limited time, though die-hard Hitman fans can pick up a themed DLC pack as well. It costs $7.99 / £6.99 and includes permanent access to the mission via the Elusive Target Arcade mode plus a new suit and some unique equipment to try.

Hitman: World of Assassination is available now for PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series X and Series S, Xbox One, and PC, or as Hitman World of Assassination – Signature Edition for Nintendo Switch 2.

• Ofcom has assessed the best ways of enforcing age checks online
• The regulator also identifies methods that aren't effective
• Around 4 in 10 under-16s plan to try to get around the ban in the UK

Back in June, the UK government ruled that under-16s should be banned from social media platforms, with enforcement scheduled to start during the first half of 2027. Now the communications regulator Ofcom has set out the ways it expects tech companies to abide by the law.

The challenge isn’t simply checking someone’s age. It’s doing so without turning everyday internet use into an identity check.

Pieter Arntz, Malwarebytes

In its new announcement (via the BBC), Ofcom highlights four "highly effective" methods for keeping under-16s out of apps and off sites they shouldn't be accessing — and they're all going to be familiar to anyone who's used age-gated services online in recent times.

The four methods are photo ID matching (using something like a passport or driving license), bank-based checks (Ofcom says 90% of UK 16-17 year-olds have a bank account), digital ID services (a third-party service like EasyID or Yoti), and facial age estimation via a webcam (which Ofcom says is best deployed as a secondary check).

This is a "rapid assessment" from Ofcom, and none of these approaches are confirmed yet — UK lawmakers will take the suggestions on board, and decide the best way to enforce the rules at a later date, most probably before the end of the year. All of these methods can be delivered "in a way that protects users' privacy" according to Ofcom.

Ultimately though, it will be down to tech companies to decide how to implement age checks that fulfil the requirements set down by the government. "Here are things that can work, they must preserve privacy, they must protect people's data, but it's on you to put in place what you think works for you," Ofcom CEO Dame Melanie Dawes told the BBC.

Challenges ahead

The recommendations put forward by Ofcom (Image credit: Ofcom)

Ofcom also lists checks that it thinks are ineffective: self-declaration, general contractual agreements, and verifiable parental consent. The regulator also acknowledges that "the risk of circumvention cannot be entirely eliminated", but says that correctly implemented safeguards should "significantly reduce the likelihood" of unauthorized access.

In its rapid assessment announcement, Ofcom also encourages app stores to take more responsibility over age checks. Right now, self-declarations are most commonly used to unlock downloads for age-restricted content.

The challenge for social media platforms is that teenagers don’t like to be told ‘no’.

Olli Krebs, SVP EMEA at Incode

These are going to be tough rules to enforce, whatever the approach is: recent research from EE suggests that 42% of 11-15 year-olds are planning to try and get around whatever restrictions are put in place. This could be by switching to apps or platforms not covered by the new laws, including messaging services and gaming sites.

Last week Ofcom also admitted that the Online Safety Act introduced in July 2025 had so far made "no significant change" to the harmful content children had been exposed to online. The act was intended to ensure protection from content involving pornography, serious violence, suicide material, racism, misogyny, and bullying.

"This finding is concerning and shows that further progress is needed to protect children online," says Ofcom. The regulator also recommended adding material around body stigma and depression to the primary content categories that children should be protected from online.

Analysis: What do privacy experts think?

(Image credit: natureaddict / Pixabay)

Ofcom's proposals are likely to spark some familiar privacy concerns — and security experts told us they aren't without foundation.

“The challenge isn’t simply checking someone’s age. It’s doing so without turning everyday internet use into an identity check," said Pieter Arntz, Senior Malware Intelligence Analyst at Malwarebytes. "Photo ID matching brings highly sensitive documents and facial images into the process, potentially creating another attractive target for criminals. The risks aren’t hypothetical: as I reported last year, a breach at a third-party support provider for Discord exposed government ID images belonging to around 70,000 users," he said.

Even if facial estimation techniques are more secure, there are are still downsides. "Facial age estimation can avoid uploading an identity document, but it still processes a sensitive image and makes an imperfect prediction," Pieter Arntz added. "Ofcom itself acknowledges that some technologies have a margin of error of a few years at 16, meaning people near the threshold may face an additional verification check," he said.

"My preference is double-blind verification: a provider confirms that you meet the age requirement but doesn’t learn which service you’re accessing, while the service receives proof of age without learning your identity. Proving you are old enough should not mean revealing who you are," he said.

Others feel the risks are more around teenagers finding workarounds.“The challenge for social media platforms is that teenagers don’t like to be told ‘no’. Many will conform, but tech-savvy young people are going to search for an open window on the ground floor," said Olli Krebs, SVP EMEA at the identity verification software provider Incode. "If the process is clunky, users of all ages will actively seek ways around it," he added.

Those workarounds could unintentionally make the problem worse. "The experience of countries such as Australia is that there will be a real risk of an increasingly technologically sophisticated population of young people will resort to a variety of circumvention techniques (primarily, but not exclusively VPNs) to access content hosted outside of the UK," said Will Richmond-Coggan, Partner specialising in Data and Privacy Disputes at Freeths.

"Such content is liable to be less well regulated generally, and to pose further risks of users gaining unsupervised access to progressively more dangerous and problematic content in relation to which the UK online safety legislation is largely powerless to take action," he added.

“None of this will be perfect. Young people will always push boundaries, and anyone promising a hundred per cent online safety is being unrealistic," concluded Olli Krebs from Incode. Exactly how successful it is depends very much on how the social media giants implement Ofcom's suggested age-check methods.

What you think of the social media ban, and Ofcom's new proposals? Let us know in the comments below.

• Sony Network Communications discloses breach affecting roughly 2.5 million ISP customers and former users
• Exposed data included personal details, while some email service users also lost email passwords
• Company contained the intrusion, notified authorities, and warned customers about phishing and fraud risks

A subsidiary of Sony Network Communications, the Japanese tech giant’s Internet Service Provider (ISP) arm, has confirmed suffering a data breach which saw it lose sensitive data on roughly 2.5 million people.

Among the stolen files were people’s phone numbers, email addresses, and in some cases - email passwords.

The company confirmed the news in an apology and notice letter in which it said threat actors accessed So-net, the company’s consumer-facing ISP service brand. The identity of the attackers was not disclosed, and nor was the method they used to break in. The breach happened on Monday, October 19 2026, and was spotted four days later, on October 23.

“Immediately after confirming the incident, we shut down the affected server and blocked communications from the source of the unauthorized access,” the machine-translated letter reads. A day later, the investigation determined that the attackers exfiltrated a total of 2,141,986 sensitive records belonging to both current and former members.

Trickling down to NTT Docomo

Of that number, roughly 1.8 million belong to current members, who had their names, phone numbers, email addresses, user IDs, dates of birth, genders, and internet connection IDs exposed to the hackers. Passwords were not leaked, Sony said.

There were also more than 440,000 records taken from plala (S Course), and this part also affects NTT Docomo, a separate internet service provider that uses Sony Network Communications’ underlying infrastructure as part of its service.

NTT Docomo issued a separate statement, notifying its customers of the incident, and urging them to stay vigilant with incoming emails and other communications:

“There is a risk of suspicious communications from those who misuse potentially leaked information in the future,” the machine-translated notice reads. “Please pay attention to the following points:

・Do not respond to emails, SMS, or phone calls

・Do not open links in the body

・Do not open attached files.”

The company added that the incident affects all Hikari service clients, as well as those that cancelled from May 2026, onwards.

Some So-net members’ email addresses and email passwords were, indeed, taken. A separate set of data affecting Email Service (G), A-Box (an additional mailbox service), So-net VAIO Mail, and PostPet Mail Account Service was nabbed, and the company reported 24,655 affected addresses for Email Service (G), 17,672 for A-Box, 7,005 for So-net VAIO Mail, and 5,069 for PostPet Mail Account Service. The breach affects both current So-net customers, and those that cancelled their subscriptions in March 2026 or later. Those that cancelled by the end of February were not affected, according to the announcement.

Banking data struck, too

Some customers also had their banking data exposed - but not many. “We confirmed the leakage of 16 records containing bank account information, including financial institution name, bank code, branch name, branch code, deposit account type, account number, and account holder's name,” the company said.

It stressed that it does not hold bank account PINs and therefore, they could not have been compromised. “We will individually contact the affected customers to apologize,” the notice reads.

Sony Network Communications said it notified the country’s Personal Information Protection Commission and other relevant government and law enforcement organizations and is currently investigating the attack.

So far, no hacking groups have claimed responsibility for the attack, and the data has not yet appeared anywhere on the dark web. There is also no word of this being an extortion attempt.

The attack comes less than a week after Japanese internet giant GMO Group told its customers to scan their computers for viruses, back up all of their data, disconnect the devices from the internet and then shut them down.

Via BleepingComputer

• JerryRigEverything has performed a teardown and durability test on the Trump phone
• This revealed that it's so similar to an HTC phone you can even swap their motherboards
• The Trump phone did at least survive the durability tests

It was starting to feel like we wouldn’t have to hear any more about the Trump Mobile T1, but a new durability test has confirmed what we already largely knew — namely that it's little more than a rebranded HTC.

A previous teardown from iFixit revealed that the Trump phone had essentially identical specs and components to the HTC U24 Pro — a mid-range Taiwanese phone from 2024. The design is ever so slightly different, with the Trump phone having a different camera housing and a gold paint job, but the dimensions are the same too.

Now, though, JerryRigEverything has gone a step further, revealing that not only is the internal layout the same, right down to the number of screws, but if you swap the Trump phone’s motherboard with the HTC U24 Pro’s, both phones still work.

So the Trump phone really is almost a carbon copy of that HTC handset — rather calling into question its claims of being “proudly American.”

Passes the durability test

The only upside to all this is that, by essentially being an HTC U24 Pro, the Trump phone matches that device for durability. It survived being bent in multiple directions, seemingly has effective water resistance, and has a screen that’s just as scratch-resistant as most modern smartphones.

So if you have bought one of these devices, then at least it might last you a while — but that’s likely more down to designers and engineers in Taiwan than anyone in the US.

And even if you haven’t bought one, the video is worth a watch, targeting as it does not just the phone but the entire Trump administration, to the point where one Reddit commenter described it as “the most entertaining durability test video I've ever seen”.

Are you waiting for Black Friday before picking up a brand new TV this year? Well, you might not need to, as this five-star-rated model — and our pick for the best TV you can buy this year in the TechRadar awards – is already down to a record-low price before the sales are even fully underway. Yep, the LG C6 65-inch OLED TV is at Amazon US for $1,399 (was $1,599). The same LG C6 is at Amazon UK for £1,699 (was £1,899).

For those in the UK, if the 65-inch model is too large for your room or outside of your budget, several other sizes of this top-rated TV are also reduced to record-low prices right now. Amazon has the 42-inch LG C6 for £899 (was £999), the 48-inch LG C6 for £999 (was £1,099), and the 55-inch LG C6 for £1,199 (was £1,399).

Whichever one you choose, you can be confident that you're getting the strongest all-around display for most people, according to our testing. The C6 is a top-tier OLED TV for streaming your favourite shows, watching 4K movies, enjoying fast-paced sports, or playing the latest games — especially something like GTA 6.

One big question remains: will the price go lower as we get closer to Black Friday? Of course, we can never know for sure, but I would be surprised if the C6 gets any cheaper than this over the next few weeks. Maybe by a small amount of about £50 tops, but Black Friday deals usually stick around the same price for a longer time these days, so personally, I would be happy to buy now if you don't want to wait.

LG C6 record-low price at Amazon

C6 65-inch OLED TV: was $1599.99 now $1399.99
You can get the five-star LG C6 at Amazon US for a record-low price right now. Our pick for the TV of the year offers fantastic overall picture quality and excellent all-around performance, making it the number one pick for watching films, streaming TV shows, playing games, or enjoying sports. Expect top-tier contrast, vivid colors, rich blacks, and expert motion handling.View Deal

C6 65-inch OLED TV: was £1899 now £1699
This is a record-low price for the top-tier TV and an early standout deal from this year's Black Friday sales in the UK. LG reclaimed the top spot on our best TV guide with the C6, as it boasts fantastic overall picture quality and excellent all-around performance, making it the number one pick for most. Contrast is top-tier, with vivid colours and rich blacks, while motion is handled expertly. No matter if you're watching films, streaming TV shows, playing games, or watching sports, it's up to the job. Smaller models from 42 inches also now start at £899. View Deal

Want to read up more on this TV before hitting the buy button? Then you can check out our five-star review of the LG C6. The brand has been leading the way in the world of OLED TVs for many years, and we concluded that this latest model is "a worthy successor to, and upgrade over, the LG C5."

Our expert tester has praise for basically every part of the C6, saying that it offers fantastic picture quality, with superior brightness and excellent contrast, a modern processor to refine images, brilliant motion smoothing that makes fast-paced sports and games great to watch, and surprisingly strong built-in sound. It'll be worth investing in a soundbar eventually, though, for the best experience.

The C6 is also one of the best options if you're hunting for a new gaming TV to prepare for GTA 6. It sports four HDMI 2.1 ports and a full suite of premium gaming features, such as support for 4K resolution at 165Hz, giving you a smooth and responsive experience when playing the latest games on current-gen consoles.

Proton's 'Unlimited' plan is now just $1, offering anyone one month of access to its VPN and entire suite of privacy tools.

It's a great deal, given that Proton Unlimited is normally $12.99 for 30 days. It means that people looking to ditch ad- and tracking-heavy Big Tech software providers, can dip their toes into a privacy ecosystem for almost no cost at all.

Proton Unlimited brings full access to Proton VPN, one of the best VPNs available, together with its Drive, Docs, Calendar, and the much-loved Mail as well. All of these are encrypted, offering the perfect privacy-first alternative to Google's cloud-based tools.

Once you sign-up, do make sure to deactivate auto-renew on your Proton Unlimited account or you'll be charged $12.99 for each month that the subscription rolls on.

Proton Unlimited: Get one month for $1
Was: $12.99
Now: $1

Proton Unlimited is now just $1 for your first month over Black Friday. It's Proton's top subscription which includes one of the best VPNs available, private email, 500 GB of online storage, a password manager, and ad-free access to encrypted office apps, such as Docs and Sheets, that are all guaranteed to keep your data super-secure. Since this is on its 1-month plan, you can cancel anytime, so give it a go.View Deal

If you do like what you get, then the sensible move for value is to renew after your $1 month on the 12-month plan to Proton Unlimited instead.

If you pay monthly, it's $12.99 per month, but if you're happy to shell out for the whole year at once, then it drops to $6.49 per month instead, right now, as per the other part of Proton's Black Friday VPN deals. It's the lowest price that the 12-month plan has ever been.

If you prefer a different privacy software provider, then there are Black Friday VPN deals elsewhere.

NordVPN, our best VPN overall, is now $13.50 less over two years on its Complete and Prime Plans. Surfshark, one of the fastest VPNs available, is offering two years of its top-value 'One' plan for just $67.23.

Neither of the above has the same complete breadth of private and encrypted software alternatives to Google that Proton has, though. Take a look at our reviews of Proton Mail, Proton Drive and Proton VPN if you want some more details.

• The FEC was hit by a cyberattack on Monday that took filing systems offline
• 24 and 48 hour donation reports couldn't be filed for almost 41 hours
• The attack has been blamed on a "bad actor", but no other details have been released

Just days before voters head to the polls in what is the most significant voting occasion in Donald Trump’s second term, the Federal Election Commission went offline for almost 41 hours to contain a cyberattack.

During that time, there was a window for big donors and SuperPACs to fund campaigns without being able to submit 24 and 48 hour funding reports, likely leaving millions of dollars undeclared.

Campaign and finance watchdogs have voiced outrage about the lack of transparency into funding at a critical time in the election cycle, especially as there are no caps on how much SuperPACs can spend to help or hinder candidates.

Funding transparency goes dark

An email sent to campaign compliance firms on Monday said that FEC services were taken down after a “bad actor” attempted to gain access to systems. Outside of this, there is little information to go on regarding who would be responsible or what their motives might be.

According to OpenSecrets research director Brendan Glavin, who spoke to Reuters, around $50 million was spent per day in the lead up to the FEC outage, with $250 spent on October 20 alone.

Disclosure delayed is disclosure denied,” Hilary Braseth, executive director of nonpartisan campaign finance watchdog OpenSecrets, said in a statement during the outage. “When hundreds of millions of dollars in outside money flood political airwaves in the final days before an election, transparency is not an optional luxury, it is a fundamental public safeguard.”

As would be expected, numerous conspiracy theories surrounding the FEC outage have been floated online. Many suggested the outage would give donors a window to funnel millions of dollars of undeclared funding into candidates needing a last minute boost.

“We ​didn't have access to the last-minute spending, which is really ramped up as the election draws nearer,” Molly White, a crypto and Big Tech political spending tracker, told Reuters. “We have no visibility into that when the filing systems are down. It's pretty ⁠devastating this close to the election”

“It's hard to say with any real information that that's what happened, but it's certainly I think where people's minds go very quickly,” she concluded.

SuperPACs back pro-AI candidates

AI has been a hot topic ahead of the midterm elections, which take place on November 3. The huge buildout of AI data centers across the US - and the billions spent to fund it - have been met with opposition by the majority of Americans.

To counter the outrage and swing the vote in favor of AI, numerous SuperPACS have spent millions of dollars to support campaigns of pro-AI candidates and millions more to harm those critical of the technology.

President Trump has pushed an administrative policy of AI at any cost, claiming that the US economy and national security depends on continuing AI superiority over rivals such as China. To that end, the estimates on the total AI infrastructural spending range between $2.8 trillion by 2030 to $10.3 trillion by 2032, so there is certainly a lot riding on this election.

With many states enacting or considering moratoriums on AI data centers, anti-AI candidates could scupper the Trump administration's hopes for being an AI powerhouse.

There's no shortage of enthusiasm for artificial intelligence. Organizations across every sector are investing heavily, experimenting, launching proof of concepts, and finding ways to turn the latest developments into real business value.

However, there's a growing disconnect between experimentation and execution. For all the discussions of AI transforming the way we work, many AI projects never progress beyond the pilot stage. It's a familiar story. The proof of concept delivers promising results, the business case adds up, and everything looks like it's heading in the right direction.

Yet somewhere along the way the project hits a bump on the road. This can look like costs beginning to rise, confidence starting to waver, integration with existing legacy systems proving more complicated than expected, and approvals taking longer than anticipated.

What started out as an exciting project slowly loses its momentum. As a result, the AI initiative ends up stuck in limbo. The reason is that running a successful AI pilot and successful AI implementation are two very different things. Transitioning from a controlled environment with governed variables to a production environment brings a new set of challenges: security, governance, culture, skills, integration, and readiness.

Unfortunately, this challenge is not uncommon. Research shows that 71% of organizations remain in the pilot or proof-of-concept phase of AI transformation, highlighting just how difficult it is to turn early promise into a business reality.

This limbo is what many organizations are now experiencing: the AI implementation gap. It's the space between proving that AI can work and deploying it at scale in a way that delivers measurable value. For today's technology leaders, bridging that gap has become one of the defining challenges of AI adoption. The pressure to move beyond experimentation is growing, but doing so requires more than just increasing investment or pushing strong proof of concepts into production.

The real challenge is creating the conditions in which AI can move from an isolated trial into a sustainable part of the wider business. That requires establishing the right technical and organizational foundations, preparing people and processes, and finding the right use cases. To deliver real value, organizations need to think less about speed and more about creating something secure, scalable, and consistent.

It isn’t a technology challenge, it’s a business one

When AI projects stall, it's seldom because of the technology itself. More often, organizations run into strategic, governance, and operational challenges that prevent encouraging pilots from becoming production-ready solutions.

One of the biggest barriers is analysis paralysis. The majority of organizations have no shortage of AI ideas, but they typically lack a clear way of understanding which use cases will deliver the greatest value. This means resources become spread across multiple proof-of-concepts, each showing promise but none receiving the attention needed to reach production. The number of pilots continues to soar while the number of live deployments stagnates.

However, some organizations make the opposite mistake by designing for scale before they've checked the concept works. Major investment is made in infrastructure, architecture, and implementation before a solution has been tested in real-world conditions. If the project then needs to change direction, the amount of investment already committed can make it tricky to adapt. As a result, organizations can end up locked into an approach that no longer delivers the value they envisioned.

Governance is another common stumbling block. For organizations operating across EMEA, navigating regulations such as the EU AI Act, GDPR, and DORA introduces understandable caution. The consequences of non-compliance can be significant, and uncertainty around an evolving regulation often slows decision-making. Many AI initiatives don't stall because the business lacks ambition, but because leaders want greater confidence that they're deploying the technology in the right way: compliantly and responsibly.

Lastly, organizations often underestimate what it will cost to move from a successful pilot to widespread deployment. AI projects that appear affordable during the proof-of-concept phase can become much more expensive once they're scaled, especially if they haven't been properly stress-tested.

That's why due diligence is critical. Yet more than half (56%) of organizations don't carry out a Total Cost of Ownership assessment before deciding where to place significant workloads. Without a clear understanding of the long-term investment required, it's easy for costs to accumulate and confidence in the project to dwindle.

Balancing certainty and speed

Closing the Implementation Gap isn't about moving faster. It's about moving with confidence and know-how.

Time and time again, organizations find themselves at one of two extremes: waiting until every unknown has been resolved before making any moves or rushing ahead with AI projects before they've been properly validated. Neither approach is sustainable. Those seeing the greatest success are the organizations finding a balance between certainty and speed - moving quickly where the evidence supports it, while building in the validation and governance needed to reduce risk.

That starts with validating ideas early. Before major investment is made, organizations need to ask the technical, commercial, and governance questions that could prevent a project from ever reaching production. It's far better to discover early that a use case won't deliver than to invest months of budget and time before uncovering the same conclusion.

Rapid prototyping also plays a crucial role. Instead of debating whether an idea might work in theory, businesses should aim to create something tangible that users can test within days. Seeing a concept in action changes the conversation from speculation to evidence, giving stakeholders the confidence to make informed decisions about where to invest next.

Equally important is maintaining transparency throughout the delivery process. AI projects shouldn't feel like a black box. Defined ownership, clear checkpoints, and agreed assessment criteria help everyone to understand where a project stands, whether it’s a success, and what comes next. Projects rarely stall because the technology isn't capable - they stall because critical decisions weren't made early enough or because expectations weren't aligned from the outset.

Bridging the implementation gap

The implementation gap isn't going to disappear overnight. With 71% of organizations still stuck between pilot and production, the challenge is clearly not a lack of willingness, technical ability or ideas. In most cases, they have all three.

Instead, it's the ability to turn experiments into solutions that actually work in the real world. That means treating the transition as a business issue, not simply a technical one. Organizations need an approach that balances speed with governance, validates value before investment is made, and gives stakeholders the confidence to scale. It also requires leaders to be confident enough to stop projects in their tracks if they're not going to deliver real value.

The organizations taking meaningful steps forward won't be those adding more pilots into the mix. They'll be those that have strong processes and capabilities in place to push the right pilots ahead. Fundamentally, closing the AI implementation gap means creating a path from pilot to production that can be followed again and again.

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• Windows 11 has a new preview (optional) update
• This introduces the ability to fully tailor the right-click (context) menu to your liking, as well as speeding up its performance
• That's great, but you're best off steering clear of a preview update and waiting for the full release in under two weeks – but even then, this feature will be on a gradual rollout

Windows 11 now has one of the most-wanted interface capabilities for many people, namely the ability to customize the right-click menu – but it's not quite fully finalized yet (although that's imminent).

The menu that pops up when you right-click on a file (or folder) is also known as the 'context' menu as it presents a bunch of options that vary contextually based on the type of file clicked – but in Windows 11, it's currently a sprawling affair.

Those who hate the lengthy right-click menu will now be able to customize it after installing a new Windows 11 update, although this is an optional release, meaning it's still in preview. This feature will be in next month's patch, the November update, though, so you haven't got long to wait for the full release (less than two weeks, in fact).

The customization settings for the right-click menu include the ability to remove Windows commands you're not fond of – like 'Send to' for example – or add abilities that you'd like to have, and also choose the apps you want to appear in the context menu.

It's a full range of customization and you can also elect to have the top panel of the menu (cut, paste, rename and so forth) directly integrated instead, so these functions appear alongside everything else (in a Windows 10 style – and you can shift the layout around too, moving Properties to the foot of the menu for example).

Microsoft boasts that the new right-click menu is faster, too: "The updated menu opens more quickly, reduces clutter, and gives you more control over the commands and app extensions that appear when you right-click."

As you may have noticed, all this work has been in testing for a while now.

Analysis: rolling frustrations and a lengthy wait

(Image credit: Elnur / Shutterstock)

The immediate response on the likes of Reddit seems positive, and there are Windows 11 users who have taken the plunge with this preview update who are observing that the right-click menu is indeed a lot faster.

One Redditor enthuses: "The new context menu is so good! Way faster, customization is cool."

Others acknowledge that this is undoubtedly a good move, but don't understand why it took Microsoft so long to get here: "Not bad imo. Crazy it took them 5 years though."

While the feedback is generally positive, there are complaints from those who have installed the update but haven't received the new context menu. This is because the right-click revamp has been implemented via a gradual rollout, so it's only being drip-fed through to a certain amount of PCs at a time (of those who have installed the optional update). As another Redditor puts it: "Those gradual rollouts though…"

You can force the feature to be deployed to your PC using a Windows configuration utility (ViVeTool), but I wouldn't recommend that approach. Microsoft tests the waters in a limited way for good reasons, especially with features still in preview, so you're running a larger than normal risk of some nasty bug ruining your day.

Anyway, you've waited five years for this performance and options tuning, as those on Reddit are keen to point out – so what's another couple of weeks? I'd hold on for the official November update, keeping clear of this preview, but even then, it'll still be a gradual rollout, and you may need some patience.

Still, the good news is that the context ball is rolling, and it hopefully won't be too long before the majority of Windows 11 users gain access to this important upgrade for a key piece of the UI.

Last week, we highlighted the excellent Seagate Expansion drive dropping to $460, but while I was running a price check ahead of Black Friday, I noticed the 16TB Expansion Desktop HDD now down to $400 (was $550) at Newegg.

If you're looking for extra storage for archiving files and media libraries, I don't think you can go far wrong with this desktop hard drive. Seagate has consistently impressed us in tests. And this high-capacity external HDD is about as simple as it gets, while coming with the ever-useful Rescue data recovery service (because you can't be too careful).

• Best for: Professionals looking for affordable, high-capacity storage across PC and Mac.

• Why we like it: First off, it's cheaper now than it was even last week as part of Newegg's Gametober sale. There's plenty of storage here from a brand we've regularly reviewed and trusted for years, and the plug-and-play setup is particularly welcome.

• What you need to know: You'll need to reformat this drive using Time Machine if you're using it on a Mac.

Expansion 16TB: was $549.99 now $459.99
This 16TB desktop external hard drive connects over USB 3.0 and works with Windows 10 or later and macOS 10.12 or later (you may need to reformat it for Time Machine). It includes Seagate’s Rescue data recovery services and a one-year warranty. View Deal

Price Context & Historical Value

You're now saving $150 (last week, the discount was $90). That makes this a much more attractive offer - although it's still expensive compared to hard drive prices a year ago, before the component crisis.

For comparison, the same drive is priced at $424 at Best Buy and $500 at Amazon, where you'll also find the 8TB model at $316 and the 24TB version selling at $680.

Should you buy it?

✅ Buy the Seagate Expansion 16TB if...

You need a standalone external desktop hard drive for storing all your files, with the added peace of mind of the Rescue Data Recovery Services software.

❌ Skip the Seagate Expansion 16TB if...

You want a fast SSD drive you can take with you on the go - this HDD isn't BUS-powered and needs to be plugged in.

• See all desktop hard drives at Newegg

Technology innovation should always be driven by one core objective – to improve people’s lives. Unleashing human imagination in new and exciting ways, whether that’s solving complex problems or making everyday life easier.

We’re at a fascinating moment in time, where smartphones have become the de facto platform, but in terms of innovation they have reached a bit of a plateau. New smartphones have largely incremental hardware updates and optimizations without groundbreaking new features.

But then AI came along to shake things up. And that AI, when used well, is making a huge positive impact in people’s lives. AI is best used to complement human abilities – if you look at fields like medical imaging, AI can help to analyze huge data sets and spot patterns for physicians to diagnose fully.

Across tech, AI is having a big impact in how we interact with technology. Most notably transforming smartphones and smart devices. And it’s created a new category where you don’t even need to be holding your phone – AI smart glasses.

The AI smart glasses category has been growing rapidly, with research by Omdia finding global shipments of AI glasses had reached 8.7 million units in 2025, up 322% year-on-year.

It’s interesting to look at the ‘why’. On paper, AI glasses don’t have as much processing power or storage or RAM as a smartphone, so how could they be of use? And it's down to the form factor and AI.

Potential for smart glasses

There’s a lot of potential for smart glasses in the B2B sector. Increased productivity, real-time interactivity or enhanced customer experiences, the potential use cases are huge across many verticals.

One example I love is the potential to change how people engage with cultural subject matter. Imagine a pair of AI glasses as an “audio guide 2.0” that would become a deeply personalized guide, interacting with the knowledge base and curation of the venue – whether it’s a museum, art gallery or historical heritage site.

Visitors can ask specific questions about certain subject matter and get real-time answers as they explore a museum or gallery, making it much more conversational and interactive. Lightweight in form factor, smart glasses can be worn over long periods of time. And in the future, the same tour could generate layers of explanations tailored to different audiences (children, amateurs, experts), without imposing the same experience on everyone. We’re already seeing these concepts being explored by cultural institutions.

This form factor can also blend seamlessly into everyday life, and make tasks easier. How many times have you been somewhere like a concert and witnessed a sea of smartphone screens? The same with navigating around a city. People experiencing life through their device. AI glasses are changing that, allowing you to be more present in the moment without having to live and capture memories through a phone screen.

I actually found myself running late and lost in Rotterdam train station recently. I speak three languages fluently, but if you’ve been to the Netherlands you know it’s hard to guess at some of the words. Safe to say, it was getting stressful. I was wearing AI glasses, and asked it to translate the signs around me – I was on my way quickly.

But with every emerging technology comes new challenges and societal considerations. And there’s a responsibility on manufacturers and innovators to find ways to realize this vision responsibly. For AI smart glasses, there's one crucial piece of the puzzle that will shape their true impact - and that's privacy.

Creating a privacy-first architecture

One element is data privacy. We’re in an era where people’s personal information has been largely commoditized. Where AI smart glasses are concerned, we’re seeing a huge amount of contention about how personal data is gathered by some manufacturers and used to train AI models.

For me, it’s very simple. Our company DNA has always been that privacy should be treated as a core principle, not an afterthought.

But what does privacy-by-design actually look like in practice?

Control of data should ultimately remain with the user. And that’s why it’s crucial to have data stored locally on smart glasses by default – and only transferred off the device when initiated by the user.

And you can safeguard local data even further with military-grade encryption – something that is particularly important for many organizations and will be required when handling internal and customer data. This means that even if someone else tries to take the AI glasses and pair them to another phone, the previous data cannot be accessed.

These concerns over data should also extend to how we interact with LLMs. As AI tools become embedded into our daily lives, the more requests we send to LLMs, the easier it is for them to build a profile of you. And it’s the same for AI smart glasses.

With a privacy-first architecture, third party AI requests are de-identified, so that LLMs cannot build an accurate profile. Policies where user data is not used to train any LLMs should be standard.

There’s also the matter of protecting the privacy of people around you when wearing smart glasses. It’s crucial to have visual indicators, like an LED indicator that lights up during photo or video capture to signal photography or video is being recorded at that moment.

It's obviously not good enough that on some AI glasses, it’s possible to obscure the LED and effectively hide it from view. Any AI glasses worth their salt should use a multi-sensor approach so that photos and video recording should automatically disable if the LED is obstructed or when the glasses are removed.

We collectively have this incredible opportunity - a new technology which combines the versatility of AI with wearables. But AI smart glasses will only be a huge benefit to us all, if privacy is handled correctly.

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• iFi unveils the UP Travel Max
• It's a Bluetooth adaptor for audio systems that rely on 3.5mm jacks
• Can be used on flights, in cars, and on your ancient iPods

I'm always struck by how odd it is that airlines seem comfortable to let modern tech trends fly straight by.

Only last year, I was given a pair of antique cheap wired earbuds for an in-flight entertainment system, and there's no way of using your own premium Bluetooth headphones instead — that is, unless you own one of a very select set of headphones or earbuds. Models such as the Bowers & Wilkins Pi8, Jabra Elite 10 Gen 2 or LG Tone Free T90S offer a case retransmission function to ping audio to your preferred listening gear wirelessly, from connected analog or digital sources.

But what if you don't want to buy new headphones for better flights? The other option is to buy a Bluetooth adaptor like iFi's new option. It is called the UP Travel Max, and it's up for preorder now for $129 / £129 (roughly AU$260, but iFi's Aussie website doesn't list a price), before going on sale at the end of November.

This device, like the Twelve South AirFly View which arrived only a day prior, is designed to be plugged into a 3.5mm jack. You then pair it to your Bluetooth headphones or earbuds (or speaker, if you're a maverick), letting you connect your wireless option into the wired medium.

The iFi has a 10-hour battery life, supports LDAC and aptX Lossless playback and has a built-in DAC, borrowed from other iFi devices. That's why it's a little pricier than more basic options: you don't just get the function, you want clean audio too.

Audio comes, audio goes

(Image credit: iFi)

The iFi UP Travel Max is a little different from some other Bluetooth adapter dongles, because it receives or transmits, depending on which mode you put it in.

Plug it into a flight console, and it can transmit from the screen to your headphones. But connect it to your personal vehicle's stereo, and it can receive from your smartphone, to use the big speakers while you're on the go. A button on the device lets you flick between the two.

Using transmit mode, you can also connect wireless headphones to older gadgets, like your classic iPod (which just celebrated its 25th birthday) to avoid using whatever wired headphones you have lying about to enjoy your old-school tunes.

I'm sure there are plenty of other niche use cases that could benefit from the iFi UP Travel Max too; my PC doesn't have a Bluetooth module so I'd be able to use it to pair wireless headphones, for example. The world is your oyster... or you could just use it on flights, to avoid those awful, highly breakable standard-issue buds.

It is now getting pretty difficult to track every time OpenAI and Anthropic models break containment, wander onto the wider web, and cause unintended, high-risk chaos.

The recent wave of rogue AI agent incidents has now prompted US President Donald Trump’s administration to consider asserting more power over AI tools.

These incidents expose a deep vulnerability for the UK. If advanced AI models are acting unpredictably with sensitive data and carrying out hacking campaigns against real people, what happens when that data is hosted, processed, and governed on foreign-owned infrastructure?

For far too long British IT has essentially handed the keys to US tech giants. The CMA’s market investigation into cloud services found that Amazon and Microsoft control 70-90% of the UK cloud computing market. And another US digital powerhouse in Google controls a smaller share.

These hyperscalers often repeat marketing platitudes about "sovereign" regional data centers located on British soil. I am sorry to be the bearer of bad news but the act of storing data in a UK-based data center is not enough to guarantee sovereignty.

In reality, these tech giants are "sovereignty-washing." Why? Because If the controlling entity is subject to foreign legal jurisdiction, such as the US CLOUD Act, foreign authorities can compel access to that data. It is irrelevant where the physical hardware resides. Hosting data on foreign-owned servers is basically just paying rent on digital turf that remains subject to external laws.

As foreign-owned autonomous AI agents process vast amounts of critical enterprise and state data, and increasingly turn adversarial, the decision to build Britain's AI future on foreign, proprietary stacks looks ever more short-sighted. The potential for financial, legal and national security breaches is simply not worth the risk.

It is time for the UK to end its over-reliance on sovereign-washed cloud providers and establish true digital independence by backing British tech.

Paying the "sovereignty tax"

By continuing to rely on foreign tech monopolies British institutions are paying a heavy "Sovereignty Tax.” By that I mean the insidious, hidden and steadily accumulating burden of building critical systems on platforms you cannot fully govern.

Hyperscalers reel in UK organizations using aggressive cloud credits and low upfront pricing. But once they are embedded in these cloud systems, those firms often find it hard to leave them. This can come in the form of data egress fees, proprietary technical debt, outage exposure, restrictive licensing rules and audit blind spots. All of these add to the creeping realization that leaving your current provider would be harder, and more expensive, than you ever anticipated.

This explains why an overwhelming 66% of UK IT leaders say they would consider switching cloud providers to regain control of their data and infrastructure. Yet despite this clear desire to break free, the proportion of UK IT leaders expecting to become even more deeply entrenched in US hyperscaler systems has more than doubled over the past year, rising from 12% to 28%.

This seems all the more bizarre given that a recent study from Proton Research showed that 45% of consumers would actively avoid doing business with companies that store data with US firms. Meanwhile, over half (58%) would happily pay higher fees to switch to a sovereign provider.

This forced entrapment dynamic has undoubtedly created an era of digital feudalism. A small group of foreign tech lords own the underlying digital land, while British businesses and public sector bodies exist merely as serfs… and pay a perpetual tribute for the right to operate. And the real-world operational costs of this reliance are coming home to roost. Over the past year, 39% of UK firms were hit by outages originating from US hyperscalers, with resulting risk exposure costing some organizations over £1 million.

As organizations increasingly deploy more and more compute-intensive AI workloads on these platforms, the technical lock-in will only continue to deepen.

Not only does this drain commercial value but it also means high-skilled engineering jobs, and IP heads across the Atlantic rather than staying in the UK.

Legal and security risks

As autonomous AI usage proliferates, legal and operational risks do so too. AI agents interact with database layers, corporate IP and sensitive citizen data while executing the tasks they are set.

If that data resides in a foreign-controlled ecosystem, UK organizations lose jurisdictional control over it. Without true data sovereignty, external powers effectively hold a "kill switch" over the UK’s critical infrastructure. For example, if a UK NHS trust is reliant on a foreign-hosted AI agent for patient triage, a regulatory dispute in another country could trigger a sudden access shutdown. This could paralyze hospital operations and put sensitive health records in the hands of foreign control.

By centralizing the UK’s national capability into a single foreign-owned monoculture, we are also creating a concentrated point of failure. What happens if the US shifts policy and revokes access, leaving the UK powerless over its own critical infrastructure?

The drone and missile strikes that hit Amazon Web Services facilities in the UAE in March that brought two of the three Availability Zones in the region offline was also clear proof that the cloud is not a borderless, invulnerable utility. For the UK to retain true security, it requires resilient distributed architecture.

British digital independence

It should be noted that global hyperscalers undoubtedly have a place in non-sensitive, low-risk applications. But prioritizing digital sovereignty is not an act of digital isolationism.

The fact that the UK government created a £500 million Sovereign AI initiative this April shows that policymakers do recognize the importance of digital resilience and maintaining control.

But that support for domestic innovation will continue to be undermined if public compute spend continues to be funneled towards multi-year deals with foreign incumbents.

The government’s procurement strategy must focus on actively purchasing from domestic cloud providers if its strategic ambition for creating a UK tech powerhouse is to work.

At the same time, proprietary vendor lock-in thrives in closed-loop ecosystems. The UK needs to treat open-source tech and open architectures as national assets. When you use open standards, moving your AI models and data between public, private, and local clouds is painless. You get actual flexibility instead of being locked into one setup. And, crucially, UK organizations avoid being hit with exorbitant transition fees.

Our European neighbors are already leading the way in regard to embracing true sovereignty. France is dropping Zoom and Office for sovereign, open-source ecosystems, and Germany is using Nextcloud to replace Google Docs.

The UK possesses capable domestic cloud platforms. We have the technical capacity and talent ready to scale. And UK firms are crying out for the powers that be to back homegrown tech; 90% of IT leaders are calling for a more proactive government stance in support of British companies. We just need the procurement bravery to match.

Controlling our destiny

The unpredictable and unprecedented nature of autonomous AI agents means the UK must reassess what it has been doing up to now. Building the future of British tech and economic security on rented land is fundamentally contradictory.

The UK already has companies that own the full tech stack required to power modern enterprise. These companies offer the same core capabilities as hyperscalers without the associated sovereign risk or vendor lock-in.

If the UK wants to prove itself as a global leader in AI the country needs to support its own tech providers.

That means distancing ourselves from sovereign-washed cloud providers and investing in open-source infrastructure. Doing so is the only way to protect our data and reclaim our digital autonomy, before it’s too late.

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• AI agents could tell you where you're going wrong before customers call to complain
• The system works by identifying early signs and fixing them
• By modelling outcomes, humans can make an informed decision on a fix

Oracle has plans to make customer service a lot more proactive with its new AI-powered applications, which now promise to identify and address problems before they even escalate into customer complaints.

Announced at the company's recent AI World conference, the company's new Claw-powered Fusion Agentic Applications for Customer Experience are designed to take on more and more business processes from start to finish, instead of simply helping human workers to get things done.

Service Health Check, one of the applications within the new suite, promises to detect emerging customer service issues and then investigate what's causing the issue to be able to issue recommendations – and even act upon them while keeping humans in the loop at important, decision-making points.

Reactive is being replaced by proactive

The Service Health Check application uses Oracle's new Fusion Claw – an agentic execution system launched just a few weeks ago that can reason across enterprise data, conduct research, model outcomes and carry out actions based on all that context.

Instead of waiting for a customer to complain, the application is designed to monitor early signs that previously led to a drop in retention. In theory, it means businesses can tackle recurring problems before they affect larger numbers of customers, improving overall customer satisfaction.

But the shift toward proactive customer service could have much broader implications on how businesses operate on the whole – where human workers previously needed to monitor performance dashboards and investigate patterns themselves, they can now free them up of significant admin time to manage agentic actions and focus on boosting revenue in other areas.

"Business leaders need to turn growth strategies into opportunities and deliver on customer commitments, but connecting customer demand with enterprise capacity in time to act remains a challenge," Applications Development SVP Kartik Raghavan explained, pointing toward the reason behind why the company launched its new customer service-focused agentic tools.

Protecting your personal information online is as challenging as ever. With many platforms requiring signups to access information, you’re inadvertently going to disclose personal information online, and this information is often made public. Whatever is made public on the internet stays there for a long time, and you’re likely not comfortable with this. What’s a possible solution? A data removal service like EasyOptOuts.

Data removal platforms scan people-finder/data broker sites for your data, then send automated deletion requests on your behalf. When processed, your information gets deleted from the people-finder sites, enhancing online privacy. Data removal platforms also send manual removal requests, but EasyOptOuts doesn’t– it sends only automated requests.

I extensively tested and reviewed EasyOptOuts to help you decide if it’s worth adopting as your personal data removal service. Read on to learn about its core features, pricing, setup, customer support, and other essential factors.

EasyOptOuts: Plans and pricing

EasyOptOuts has a simple pricing structure - you can check out the full details by clicking here. It costs $19.99 per year for personal use. There’s no monthly plan or tiered plans like most data removal platforms. It’s just one package that unlocks access to all features.

(Image credit: EasyOptOuts )

Businesses (with 10+ employees) can get a bulk subscription, but the price still amounts to $19.99 per year per user. The exception is for registered nonprofits, which get a 25% discount from EasyOptOuts.

At $19.99 per year, or barely $1.80 per month, EasyOptOuts is much more affordable than its rivals. But, does this affordability make it a better option? Let’s explore more to find out.

EasyOptOuts: Setup

I found EasyOptOuts’ setup process very straightforward, or shall I say, easy. Entering the homepage and hitting the Sign Up button kickstarts the process. When signing up, you’ll provide your email address and other personal information like date of birth, home address, and phone numbers.

You’re probably wondering, “I’m trying to guard my personal information online and yet need to provide all this information again to a data removal platform?” The answer is that whatever information you provide is what the data removal platform scans people-broker sites for.

EasyOptOuts scans 200+ broker sites, which isn’t that many compared to competitors. However, EasyOptOuts doesn’t aim to be a mass-market data removal service. Rather, it focuses on U.S.-centric people-finder sites. Non-U.S. residents are better off with broader-focused data removal platforms.

After inputting your personal information, EasyOptOuts runs a deep scan on its network of 200+ people-finder sites. The complete scan can take a long time, based on the volume of data found across the network. It could be a day, 2 days, 3 days, or even a week, so don’t fret if you don’t get the results within a short period.

Once the scan completes, users receive an email alert and can begin monitoring the progress of the removal requests. I don’t like that EasyOptOuts sends only automated requests. Sometimes, automated requests aren’t enough to delete your information from people-finder sites, so manually drafted requests are needed to complete the process.

However, I understand that automated-only requests are how EasyOptOuts can keep its price as low as $19.99 per year. If it had to employ experts to manually draft deletion requests, the price would be much higher.

EasyOptOuts doesn’t just run the initial scan. It rescans its people-finder site network every four months, then sends another set of deletion requests if your personal information is discovered again. This rescan is important because some people-finder sites have a habit of reuploading information they were asked to delete. It ensures that your information stays off public view as long as your EasyOptOuts subscription is valid.

Compared to most data removal platforms I’ve tested, setting up EasyOptOuts felt noticeably easier. Everything ran smoothly, from providing my personal information to the initial scan and monitoring the status of deletion requests from my dashboard.

EasyOptOuts: Ease of use

Above, I’ve hinted at EasyOptOuts’ simple setup process and generally intuitive user experience. Like most data removal platforms, EasyOptOuts doesn’t have a native smartphone app, so you’ll access it from your browser.

I think a PC is the best option over a mobile browser, given the volume of information you’ll have to input to get scanned. A mobile browser would be inconvenient for the initial setup, but suitable for monitoring the status of deletion requests.

(Image credit: EasyOptOuts )EasyOptOuts: Security and privacy

EasyOptOuts is a good addition to your online security toolkit, particularly for U.S. residents. It helps keep your information off those infamous people-finder sites like BeenVerified and PeopleLooker.

These sites have built a business model of aggregating personal information from public sources and then offering access for a fee. Tools like EasyOptOuts send deletion requests to scrub your data off people-finder sites.

However, on EasyOptOuts, you won’t find complementary security features like a VPN or password manager. It’s all about one thing – data removal – and does its job effectively. The drawback is the limited, U.S.-centric broker site coverage.

EasyOptOuts: Support

EasyOptOuts provides decent support, although I think it could be better. There’s an official support page filled with detailed answers to frequently asked questions (FAQs). For new users, this FAQs section helps answer important questions, so that you’ll not have to contact support directly for routine issues.

If you do need to contact the support team, there’s a dedicated email address for that. The support team is U.S.-based, so responses revolve around local working hours. I don’t like that there’s no telephone or live chat support, but given the low price charged by EasyOptOuts, it’s understandably difficult to maintain live support teams for users.

EasyOptOuts: Competition

EasyOptOuts has many competitors. Incogni and DeleteMe are the two notable names I’d like to highlight.

I chose Incogni because it feels like a more robust version of EasyOptOuts. It covers 420+ data broker sites, including non-U.S. ones, and offers both automated and manual deletion requests. This compares to EasyOptOuts, which covers 200+ sites and only supports automated requests. However, EasyOptOuts is much more budget-friendly, costing just $19.99 per year, whereas Incogni’s pricing starts from $7.99 per month.

DeleteMe provides much higher coverage, with 850+ sites, and supports manual deletion requests. I’ve tested it and can confidently say that you’ll get more data scrubbed with DeleteMe than EasyOptOuts. DeleteMe users also get complementary features like dark web monitoring and email masking.

However, DeleteMe is priced like a premium service. Its plans average $129 per year, multiples of EasyOptOuts’ $19.99 per year.

EasyOptOuts: Final verdict

If you’re a U.S. resident and need a budget-friendly tool for scrubbing your personal data off people-finder sites, EasyOptOuts is a good bet. For just $19.99 per year, much more affordable than competitors, you’ll get a reliable tool to scan people-finder sites and send deletion requests where your data is discovered.

Setting up your account, running the initial scan, and monitoring further scans are easy to handle, thanks to EasyOptOuts’ intuitive interface.

However, you should be aware of EasyOptOuts’ drawbacks, such as the limited people-finder site coverage, lack of manual deletion requests, and email-only support. Overall, it’s a reliable data removal platform.

• FADU's File-Semantic SSD runs path lookup, permission checks, and file-to-flash mapping in firmware instead of on the host
• NFSv3 requests ride inside standard NVMe commands, so GPUs, DPUs, and remote clients can reach files without requiring a host file system
• Its headline 460,000 ops/s result came from a PCIe 5.0 host, with PCIe 6.0 results promised by Q1 2027

South Korean controller designer FADU has shown off an SSD that understands files rather than just blocks, betting that the next bottleneck in AI storage is not raw bandwidth but the CPU time spent working out where data lives.

The File-Semantic SSD (FS-SSD), unveiled at the OCP Global Summit, moves file lookup, access checks and file-to-address translation into firmware on FADU's sixth-generation controller.

FADU's whitepaper promises GPUs, DPUs and network cards a route to their files with "no host filesystem, no block layer, and no storage-server CPU in the path." Partner samples are not expected until Q3 2027.

Not the first approach to the 'CPU problem'

FADU is no newcomer to data center flash. Its Gen5 controller sits in the SN861, which Western Digital launched and SanDisk now sells; last year, the company said it had signed controller supply deals with two of the four hyperscalers, weeks after revealing its Sierra PCIe 6.0 controller.

Its pitch here, however, isn't entirely new, with the recognition coming from a not-so-surprising front: Nvidia. Nvidia has been doing the same from the other end of the PCIe bus. GPUDirect Storage removed the CPU from the data path years ago, letting drives move data straight into GPU memory, but host software still decides what to fetch and issues every request.

Its decision to open source cuFile and shift that control path onto the GPU, with SCADA attacks adding accelerator-side overhead even as FADU attacks it from the drive end of the equation.

FADU says its own measurements show the host file system and block layer consuming about 30% of CPU cycles in a GPUDirect Storage random-read workload, a vendor figure that has not been independently reproduced. It also argues that existing bypass schemes only get the CPU out of the way by abandoning files altogether.

How does this work?

Rather than invent a new language for its drive, FADU borrowed an old one. NFS, short for Network File System, has let computers open files stored on other machines for decades. FS-SSD tucks NFS requests, such as looking up a file by name or reading part of it, inside the standard NVMe commands that SSDs already use.

Those commands can come from inside the same server or, using a networked version of NVMe called NVMe over Fabrics (NVMe-oF), from other machines in the data center. FADU chose NFS version 3 for three reasons: it is small, with just 21 operations; it works with any operating system; and it is stateless, meaning each request carries everything the drive needs to answer it, so the drive never has to remember who has which file open.

FADU has also merged two lookups that normally happen separately. On a regular system, the computer’s file system first works out which numbered block holds each piece of a file, and the SSD’s own internal software, called the flash translation layer, then works out where that block physically sits on the flash chips.

FS-SSD does both jobs with a single file layer based on F2FS, a Linux file system designed for flash memory, laid out to match how the chips are physically organized. One map then takes the drive straight from a file to the spot where it is stored, and that map is much smaller. A typical SSD carries about 1GB of DRAM for every terabyte of flash and fills almost all of it with its block map. FS-SSD uses the same amount, but FADU says about 95% of it is left free to keep details of frequently used files close at hand.

That layout also makes cleanup simpler. Flash memory cannot overwrite old data in place, so drives regularly move the data they still need elsewhere and wipe whole blocks clean, a chore known as garbage collection.

When F2FS runs on an ordinary computer, the file system and the SSD each do their own version of this cleanup, and the two end up multiplying each other’s work. FS-SSD runs just one, and FADU says that cuts write amplification by 63% compared with F2FS on a regular host. Lower write amplification means less wear on the flash, but the 63% figure comes from simulated tests on NVMeVirt, software from Seoul National University that imitates an SSD, rather than from a real drive.

In FADU’s own preliminary test, remote file throughput held at about 460,000 ops/s as the server was cut from 16 cores to one, while a standard Linux NFS server fell from roughly 150,000 ops/s to 40,000.

The testing has its limits, though. FADU’s Gen6 drive sat in a PCIe 5.0 host, so every sequential read result topped out near 14.1GB/s, roughly the Gen5 link limit, even as Gen6 drives such as Micron’s 9650, rated for 28GB/s reads, are already in mass production.

Both the client and server ran Intel’s Core i5-13600K desktop chip with 128GB of DDR5 and a 100Gb ConnectX-6 NIC. That processor has 14 physical cores and 20 threads, so FADU’s test likely counted threads rather than physical cores.

The world’s first file-semantic SSD is an idea that isn't entirely new

FADU calls FS-SSD the world’s first file-semantic SSD, and it may well be the first hardware demonstration of its kind, but the idea isn’t new. The DevFS research paper, presented in 2018, described a direct-access file system “embedded completely within a storage device,” though the authors tested it only as an emulated prototype.

NVM Express has standardized a key-value command set that addresses data by key rather than block address, and SK hynix has developed a key-value computational storage drive with Los Alamos National Laboratory. Unlike the key-value command set, FS-SSD has no standard behind it yet. FADU has not submitted a file-semantic command set to NVM Express or OCP Storage, so for now every client needs FADU’s own software.

FADU’s longer-term goal is a flash enclosure with nothing in front of it but a PCIe switch and a DPU (a network card with its own processors) or NIC handling NVMe-oF in hardware, with a reference design built on Xsight Labs’ 800G E1 DPU due by the end of 2027.

FADU’s model puts that at about 42% lower power and 57% lower cost per 16-drive system than a conventional storage server, though those are projections rather than measurements. DPU-fronted flash boxes already exist, such as Supermicro’s BlueField-powered JBOF, but those still run the storage software on the DPU’s Arm cores. FADU wants the drives themselves to serve the files.

FADU chief executive Nam Yi-hyun said the company will use FS-SSD as “a springboard to become a leading company in AI storage solutions,” according to The Herald Business. The bottleneck FADU is chasing is real, and building on NFSv3 rather than inventing a new protocol gives it a credible starting point.

For now, though, the evidence amounts to a Gen5 test bench, an emulated write-amplification figure, and modeled savings, with OEM and ODM talks still early. The Gen6-host results FADU expects by Q1 2027 will be the first real sign of whether the drive can do the most important part: handling the CPU’s job at full speed.

• An Israeli company is alleged to have launched a spy campaign using malicious ads targeting Starlink users
• The ads do not have to be clicked on, just served to the user to begin collecting data
• The ads were served to Starlink users across more than 100 countries

An alleged Israeli spy firm has been spotted snooping on Starlink users on an industrial scale by a digital defense firm.

These are the conclusions of research by Trend Micro’s AI cybersecurity unit TrendAI, whose researchers analyzed troves of digital advertising data. The research found that Israeli company Discover-Tech was the number one bidder on Starlink advertising traffic.

The surveillance was targeted at Starlink units across more than 100 countries - including regions with Starlink restrictions - and used malicious adverts to harvest user data across browsers and applications.

Starlink users surveilled by ads

Initially, TrendAI did not directly name Discover-Tech as the perpetrator of the alleged surveillance campaign, instead referring to them as “Shadow-Earth-79”. Discover-Tech is the same firm that was alleged to have targeted Al Jazeera journalists with malicious adverts earlier this month, as exposed by Citizen Lab.

As Starlink terminals route traffic through a network of satellites in orbit, they can circumvent local internet restrictions and are a useful way to stay connected during blackouts - such as those experienced by Ukraine - or government enforced internet shutdowns - such as those that affected Iran at the start of 2026.

But this circumvention also makes them lucrative targets for governments or authorities looking to track Starlink units on their turf.

As Starlink only provides the connection to the internet, adverts can still be served on webpages, and this is the critical piece of this puzzle. As Cofiant noted in their own report, Discover-Tech abused the ad bidding process to serve adverts that harvest critical data about the users that see them. Some adverts can collect data as the user trawls the internet, creating a de-anonymized profile that can set them up for further surveillance.

The advert doesn’t even have to be clicked on. As long as it is served to the user, it can begin tracking.

The TrendAI researchers noted an “obvious skew” towards bidding on advertising space that would target Starlink users, with Discover-Tech being the number one ad-buyer across Syria, Libya, Yemen and South Sudan despite the fact that “the demand for legitimate Western advertising in sanctioned or active-conflict states is effectively zero.”

Google, Comcast, and multiple other companies have since removed Discover-Tech from their ad platforms.

Via Reuters