Digital Sovereignty Movement Grows as Global Infrastructure Concentrates Under Few Companies
Digital sovereignty is becoming a defining issue of the digital age, shaped by the concentration of cloud infrastructure under the control of a few U.S.-based big tech companies. Governments, especially in the EU, are responding through regulation and investment to gain control while remaining globally integrated. Advances in AI and the expansion of digital infrastructure and capabilities add new layers of complexity, shifting the challenge from managing data flows to controlling the systems that generate, process, and secure the data.
The Potential Clash Over Lunar Resources: NASA’s Artemis, China’s Plans, and the Limits of Space Governance
The goal of NASA’s Artemis program has changed to building a permanent Moon base that will sustain continuous habitation and prepare for future missions to Mars. Alongside China’s efforts and the planned International Lunar Research Station, the Moon is now at the center of geopolitical competition. As nations begin planning for lunar resource extraction, unresolved legal issues persist while frameworks like the Artemis Accords are beginning to shape future access, control, and governance of the Moon.
New Gene Editing Approach Targets Genetic Error Source, Raising Hope for Treating Rare Diseases
Gene editing is moving beyond the correction of single genetic mutations toward approaches that target shared types of genetic errors, allowing one strategy to apply across multiple diseases. It is also evolving from a laboratory technique into broader clinical and research applications. As these capabilities expand and reinforce each other, gene editing is also becoming an ethical and governance challenge, raising questions about safety, access, and ethical limits.
Quantum Internet Potential Strengthens With Teleportation Record Between Different Quantum Sources
The transfer of a quantum state from one location to another, called “teleportation” because it’s instantaneous, is an exceedingly difficult feat when the quantum source at each location is different. Using quantum dot technology, scientists have teleported a quantum state between different sources over a record 270 metres with a rate of fidelity as high as 83%. The breakthrough is a key step in the creation of a quantum internet.
In Focus
When a Voice Is No Longer a Person: The Risks and Rewards of Voice Cloning and Synthetic Speech
Voice cloning now enables highly realistic speech, expanding its use in many applications. Carrying identity and emotion, synthetic speech can shape perception in the same way as real human voices, despite current limitations in factors such as natural expressiveness. Growing adoption raises security and governance challenges, including risks of impersonation, fraud, misinformation, reduced reliability of voice as an identifier, and the need for clear standards on consent and data use.
Nations Adopt Digital IDs for Citizens, While Critics Highlight Privacy Issues
Digital identity systems are becoming core infrastructure, enabling secure access to services like banking, healthcare, and government platforms. Different countries are adopting distinct models, from interoperable systems in the EU to centralized approaches elsewhere. While these systems promise efficiency and security, critics argue they could also reshape how individuals are monitored and granted access to society.
Biases and Flaws of AI Decision-Making for Employment and Immigration are Upending Lives
Increasingly used to speed decision-making in life-changing matters like employment and immigration, artificial intelligence demonstrates biases and other flaws that are upending lives. When human reviewers lack time and resources to vet AI-based decisions thoroughly, disclosure of the decision-making criteria and opportunities for redress are crucial for fairness. Governments are beginning to take notice, and current legal actions could force changes.
Editorial Perspectives
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Blog
Why Understanding History is Crucial for Responsible Artificial Intelligence Development
Palantir is a controversial company developing systems for U.S. government use in mass deportations. We examine the historical perspectives of Palantir's CEO, Alex Karp, in his 2025 book that promotes the use of "hard power" to preserve a particular form of democracy, and question whether history's lessons have been considered. We suggest that tech leaders tread very cautiously on the historical record when they produce AI applications as powerful as Palantir's.
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Blog
Tech Companies Race to Manufacture Intelligence but Nobody Agrees on What Intelligence Is. Will They Create a Frankenstein?
Big Tech is competing to create AGI, a machine intelligence that’s smarter than humans, but they differ on what intelligence is. We look at five of their definitions and recall the ongoing problems with AI sycophancy and self-preservation that point to a troubled future for AGI. Without controls to ensure such a powerful machine doesn’t wind up controlling us, we offer some suggestions – including applied philosophy – for a deeper appreciation of the potential for human intelligence.
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Blog
Depriving Children of Digital Privacy is Theft and Abuse Often Masquerading as “Free Speech,” and Online Protection for Kids Falls Far Short of Ideal
Privacy of thought is crucial for developing young minds but is under threat from AI influencing the thoughts and actions of children. Adults bear a fundamental responsibility to protect kids from online harms that include default conversation sharing for chatbot training and corporate policies allowing chatbots to engage in sexual and racist discussions with children. Impractical online age verification measures should be bolstered by severe penalties for stealing and abusing kids’ privacy, with no tolerance for irresponsible speech masquerading as “free.”
Podcasts and Webcasts
Louis Rosenberg on Our Future with Virtual Reality’s Risks and Benefits
Lindsay House: Leading 20,000 Citizen Scientists to Uncover Dark Energy’s Secrets
The Fascinating World of Mathematics at the Fields Institute, with Dr. Deirdre Haskell
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Latest Quantum Computing
Quantum Internet Potential Strengthens With Teleportation Record Between Different Quantum Sources
The transfer of a quantum state from one location to another, called “teleportation” because it’s instantaneous, is an exceedingly difficult feat when the quantum source at each location is different. Using quantum dot technology, scientists have teleported a quantum state between different sources over a record 270 metres with a rate of fidelity as high as 83%. The breakthrough is a key step in the creation of a quantum internet.
Computing Revolution is Closer with New Error Detection Protocol and the World’s “Most Accurate” Quantum Computer
Two major advances by Quantinuum have moved the goalpost closer for fully-functioning and error-free quantum computing. An unexpected result of the company’s research on the quantum contact process has led to a new method for error detection and correction, and Quantinuum’s new quantum computer, called Helios, boasts 99.9975% fidelity.
With Diamond Film and GKP Qubits, is Light About to Take Centre Stage in Quantum Computing and Drug Discovery Breakthroughs?
The discovery of a diamond film holds promise for enabling light-based memory for quantum networking and industrial-scale production of quantum processing units. Together with the recent development of photonic GKP qubits, the use of light for circuitry is advancing the prospect of full-scale quantum computing and its computational potential for discovering life-saving drugs.
Featured Science News
Why Artificial Neural Networks Fail in Processing Emotions Essential for Human Memory—and How Failure Can Lead to Blackmail
Artificial neural networks behind ChatGPT, Claude, and other popular large language models fall short in processing emotions, which are essential to human memory and motivation. The fault lines that lead machines to sycophancy, blackmail, jailbreaking, and other serious output errors are rooted in machine learning and choices made by human trainers. We look at examples of algorithmic failures and the reasons why.
Latest Philosophy of Technology
Digital Sovereignty Movement Grows as Global Infrastructure Concentrates Under Few Companies
Digital sovereignty is becoming a defining issue of the digital age, shaped by the concentration of cloud infrastructure under the control of a few U.S.-based big tech companies. Governments, especially in the EU, are responding through regulation and investment to gain control while remaining globally integrated. Advances in AI and the expansion of digital infrastructure and capabilities add new layers of complexity, shifting the challenge from managing data flows to controlling the systems that generate, process, and secure the data.
Quantum Governance: Can the Gap Between Technological Acceleration and Risk Management be Closed?
While quantum technologies rapidly advance as the basis for powerful and globally integrated systems, quantum governance mechanisms remain fragmented and unable to manage the serious risks of the revolutionary technology. Closing the governance gap could help to ensure peaceful, socially beneficial, and sustainable use of quantum technologies, but will require much broader national and international discussions than limited efforts to date.
Nations Adopt Digital IDs for Citizens, While Critics Highlight Privacy Issues
Digital identity systems are becoming core infrastructure, enabling secure access to services like banking, healthcare, and government platforms. Different countries are adopting distinct models, from interoperable systems in the EU to centralized approaches elsewhere. While these systems promise efficiency and security, critics argue they could also reshape how individuals are monitored and granted access to society.
Latest Technology Over Time
After Centuries of Exploring the Mysteries of the Great Pyramid Shafts, Will Robotics Help to Uncover Their Purpose?
Over 200 years have passed since French Emperor Napoleon’s night in the Great Pyramid puzzling over its purpose, and there remains no consensus but many theories on the question. The reason for the shafts in the King’s and Queen’s Chambers is particularly mystifying, and we explore many possibilities. Will robots, which have penetrated the shafts most deeply, help to unlock the secret that’s thousands of years old?
Decoding Ancient Technology Using Modern Technology
From the discovery of a 500-year-old ocean-going canoe in the Chatham Islands to the AI-powered decoding of ancient Roman scrolls buried in volcanic ash, modern technologies—like radiocarbon dating, CT scanning, and AI—are transforming the study of ancient artefacts. Mysteries endure, however, like the undeciphered Voynich Manuscript, and continue to challenge our understanding of the past.
The Fascinating History of the Computer, from ENIAC, Vacuum Tubes and Transistors, to Microchips
We trace computing history from ENIAC, the first computer in 1947, from vacuum tubes to transistors, to the development of microchips that put far greater computing power in our our phones than the giant ENIAC had. With the world at the brink of a quantum computing revolution, what lessons can we draw from our computing history to shape the best possible future with our next technological leap ?
Latest Science News
The Potential Clash Over Lunar Resources: NASA’s Artemis, China’s Plans, and the Limits of Space Governance
The goal of NASA’s Artemis program has changed to building a permanent Moon base that will sustain continuous habitation and prepare for future missions to Mars. Alongside China’s efforts and the planned International Lunar Research Station, the Moon is now at the center of geopolitical competition. As nations begin planning for lunar resource extraction, unresolved legal issues persist while frameworks like the Artemis Accords are beginning to shape future access, control, and governance of the Moon.
New Gene Editing Approach Targets Genetic Error Source, Raising Hope for Treating Rare Diseases
Gene editing is moving beyond the correction of single genetic mutations toward approaches that target shared types of genetic errors, allowing one strategy to apply across multiple diseases. It is also evolving from a laboratory technique into broader clinical and research applications. As these capabilities expand and reinforce each other, gene editing is also becoming an ethical and governance challenge, raising questions about safety, access, and ethical limits.
When a Voice Is No Longer a Person: The Risks and Rewards of Voice Cloning and Synthetic Speech
Voice cloning now enables highly realistic speech, expanding its use in many applications. Carrying identity and emotion, synthetic speech can shape perception in the same way as real human voices, despite current limitations in factors such as natural expressiveness. Growing adoption raises security and governance challenges, including risks of impersonation, fraud, misinformation, reduced reliability of voice as an identifier, and the need for clear standards on consent and data use.