Most of the tools tested by researchers at the nonprofit Center for Countering Digital Hate could be used to successfully clone a wide range of voices belonging to European and American politicians.
Four out of five companies in Europe's largest economy continue to use fax machines. But Germany's parliament has until the end of June to stop relying on the antiquated communication technology.
Our special series, Body Electric, is back! This time, host Manoush Zomorodi does a deep dive into our headphone habits... because many of us wear them for hours at a time, and all that listening is taking a toll on our hearing.
Manoush speaks with exposure scientist Rick Neitzel, who has partnered with Apple on a first-of-its-kind study to find how our daily listening patterns are affecting our hearing. Neitzel offers advice on safe listening habits that can help protect our ears in the long term.
Later, Manoush takes us into the future of "consumer hearables" and how tech companies want us to never — ever— take our earbuds out.
Interested in joining the Apple Hearing Study? Sign up here.
Binge the whole Body Electric series here. Sign up for the Body Electric Challenge and our newsletter here.
After the Hamas attack of Oct. 7 triggered Israel's invasion of the Gaza Strip, hundreds of thousands of Palestinians began fleeing from the North of Gaza to the South. As they fled, many Palestinians reported passing through checkpoints with cameras. Israel had previously used facial recognition software in the West Bank, and some Palestinians reached out to The New York Times reporter Sheera Frenkel to investigate whether the same was happening in Gaza.
Science correspondent Geoff Brumfiel talks to Frenkel about how Israel launched this facial recognition system in Gaza late last year with the help of private companies and Google photos.
The fines and charges come after New Hampshire voters got robocalls from an AI-generated version of President Biden's voice urging them not to vote in the upcoming presidential primary.
With IT systems down, staff at Ascension have to use manual processes they left behind some 20 years ago. It's the latest in a string of attacks on health care systems that house private patient data.
Many of us wear earbuds for hours at a time, sometimes all day long, and all that listening is taking a toll on our hearing. This episode, host Manoush Zomorodi investigates our headphone habits. She speaks with exposure scientist Rick Neitzel, who has partnered with Apple to create a first-of-its-kind study into how our daily sound exposure and listening patterns are affecting our hearing. Neitzel offers advice on safe listening habits that can help protect our ears in the long term.
Later, Manoush takes us into the future of "consumer hearables" and how tech companies want us to never — ever— take our earbuds out.
Interested in joining the Apple Hearing Study? Sign up here.
Bad weather may have been a cause of Sunday's crash that killed Ebrahim Raisi. But mechanical issues, possibly exacerbated by a lack of spare parts due to U.S. sanctions, could also be a factor.
The Seoul summit is a follow-up to last November's summit in the U.K., where participating countries agreed to work together to contain risks posed by galloping advances in artificial intelligence.
Johansson says she was approached multiple times by OpenAI to be the voice of ChatGPT, and that she declined. Then the company released a voice assistant that sounded uncannily like her.
Oversharing can make children vulnerable to identity theft, harassment and predators. To protect their privacy, share a 'holiday card-or-less' amount of data online, says expert Leah Plunkett.
Scientists are testing the limits of artificial intelligence when it comes to language learning. One recent challenge? Learning ... whale! Researchers are using machine learning to analyze and decode whale sounds — and it's just as complicated as it seems.
Curious about other mysteries of nature? Email us at shortwave@npr.org.
A helium leak pushed back a planned launch to May 25. Boeing's program that would shuttle astronauts to and from the International Space Station has been plagued with problems.
Last month, the world narrowly avoided a cyberattack of stunning ambition. The targets were some of the most important computers on the planet. Computers that power the internet. Computers used by banks and airlines and even the military.
What these computers had in common was that they all relied on open source software.
A strange fact about modern life is that most of the computers responsible for it are running open source software. That is, software mostly written by unpaid, sometimes even anonymous volunteers. Some crucial open source programs are managed by just a single overworked programmer. And as the world learned last month, these programs can become attractive targets for hackers.
In this case, the hackers had infiltrated a popular open source program called XZ. Slowly, over the course of two years, they transformed XZ into a secret backdoor. And if they hadn't been caught, they could have taken control of large swaths of the internet.
On today's show, we get the story behind the XZ hack and what made it possible. How the hackers took advantage of the strange way we make modern software. And what that tells us about the economics of one of the most important industries in the world. Help support Planet Money and hear our bonus episodes by subscribing to Planet Money+ in Apple Podcasts or at plus.npr.org/planetmoney.
