Techmeme
October 8, 2023, 1:45 PM

Top News

Lily Hay Newman / Wired:
Hackers posted an initial data sample from 23andMe on BreachForums earlier in the week, claiming that it had 1M data points exclusively about Ashkenazi Jews  —  At least a million data points from 23andMe accounts appear to have been exposed on BreachForums.
Anthropic:
A research paper details how decomposing groups of neurons in a neural network into interpretable “features” may improve safety by enabling monitoring of LLMs  —  Neural networks are trained on data, not programmed to follow rules.  With each step of training …
Emma Fletcher / Federal Trade Commission:
One in four people in the US who reported losing money to fraud between January 2021-June 2023 said it started on social media, resulting in losses worth $2.7B  —  Scammers are hiding in plain sight on social media platforms and reports to the FTC's Consumer Sentinel Network point to huge profits.
Ben Schoon / 9to5Google:
IDC says Google shipped 37.9M Pixel phones between 2016 and 2023, suggesting the company shipped a record ~10M phones over the last 12 months  —  Google Pixel is still a minor player in the global smartphone market, but the brand continues to move along.  As the Pixel 8 series launched this week …
Sean Hollister / The Verge:
Even though the Pixel 8 and Pixel 8 Pro have the same Tensor G3 chip, features like Night Sight Video and enhanced Magic Eraser are exclusive to the Pixel 8 Pro  —  I can't believe Google finally did it.  I'm still in disbelief. … It's unheard of.  It's historic.
Cat Zakrzewski / Washington Post:
Amazon's Alexa has been claiming that the 2020 election was stolen citing sources from Rumble and Substack; Amazon says the errors were fixed  —  The popular voice assistant says the 2020 race was stolen, even as parent company Amazon promotes the tool as a reliable election news source — foreshadowing a new information battleground
Andy Patrizio / Ars Technica:
A history of Digital Equipment Corporation, which pioneered minicomputers after being founded in 1957 and was acquired by Compaq in 1998  —  One of the early pioneers in computing, the company disappeared in the late 1990s.  —  Even though very few of the early players in technology still exist, we use their creations to this day.
Kia Kokalitcheva / Axios:
Y Combinator hires Yelp policy chief Luther Lowe, best known for his public criticism of Google, to lead public policy, as the accelerator embraces politics  —  Best known for his relentless public criticism of Google as a monopoly, longtime Yelp public policy chief Luther Lowe has a new gig: heading up policy efforts for Y Combinator.
Reuters:
The US adds 42 tech companies from China and seven companies from India, UK, and other countries to an export control list over their support for Russian army  —  The U.S. Commerce Department on Friday added 42 Chinese companies to a government export control list over their support …

Sponsor Posts

Google:
Gemini 2.5 Pro: Our most intelligent AI model  —  Gemini 2.5 Pro (experimental) is now available, with thinking capabilities, enhanced performance, and improved accuracy.  Try it at no cost in the Gemini app.
UiPath:
UiPath Unveils 10 Innovations that Will Shape the Agentic Future  —  Orchestration engine, API workflows and agentic testing among key features of new UiPath Platform™ for agentic automation, launched at UiPath DevCon 2025
Zoho:
How EQ plays a defining role in workplace communication  —  What if everyone you worked with had a psychic ability to understand how you're feeling and respond accordingly?  Wouldn't that be great?
IDrive:
Protecting your Cloud Applications Data  —  Backing up Office 365, Google Workspace, Dropbox & Box data is critical to preventing data loss or corruption, complying with laws and avoiding critical downtime in case of a disaster.

Featured Podcasts

Invest Like the Best:
Royce Yudkoff & Rick Ruback - Entrepreneurship Through Acquisition
The leading destination to learn about business and investing. We do this by showcasing exceptional talent and ideas.
Subscribe to Invest Like the Best.
Diggnation:
Quitting Booze, Quitting Alexa, and AI Tries to Replace Us All
Kevin Rose and Alex Albrecht give you their unique, sometimes awkward, and always hilarious take on the edges of the internet.
Subscribe to Diggnation.
Techmeme Ride Home:
Saudi Arabia Enters The AI Race
The day's tech news, every day at 5pm ET. Fifteen minutes and you're up to date.
Subscribe to Techmeme Ride Home.
Grit:
How Matt Murphy Made Marvell Essential to AI and Cloud
Grit explores what it takes to create, build and scale world-class organizations.
Subscribe to Grit.
Lenny's Podcast:
How Palantir built the ultimate founder factory | Nabeel S. Qureshi (founder, writer, ex-Palantir)
Interviews with world-class product leaders and growth experts to uncover actionable advice to help you build, launch, and grow your own product.
Subscribe to Lenny's Podcast.
 

About This Page

This is a Techmeme archive page. It shows how the site appeared at 1:45 PM ET, October 8, 2023.

The most current version of the site as always is available at our home page. To view an earlier snapshot click here and then modify the date indicated.

More News

Wall Street Journal:
Reuters:

Earlier Picks

Paresh Dave / Wired:
Sergiu Gatlan / BleepingComputer:
Anissa Gardizy / The Information:
Ben Schoon / 9to5Google:
Andrew Hayward / Decrypt: