Security researchers at Paradigm Shift have published a working exploit, dubbed usbliter8, that achieves arbitrary code execution inside the SecureROM of Apple’s A12 and A13 chips.
That code is burned into the silicon at manufacture. No software update can reach it. Affected devices will carry this flaw for as long as they stay in use.
This is not a remote attack. It requires physical possession of the device, which must be in DFU mode and connected via USB to a dedicated RP2350-based microcontroller board. With that setup, the exploit finishes in under two seconds, before Apple’s signed boot chain loads.
Threat actors are exploiting an unauthenticated information disclosure vulnerability in the WordPress plugin Gravity SMTP, active on 100,000 sites.
The flaw is tracked as CVE-2026–4020 and received a medium severity rating. It affects all versions of the plugin from 2.1.4 and older and has been addressed in version 2.1.5, released on March 17.
WordPress security company Defiant is warning that hackers are actively exploiting the vulnerability. The company’s Wordfence firewall has blocked more than 17 million attempts against protected customers.
Welcome to another issue of Security & Tech Insights. This edition features original content that explores the benefits and challenges of emerging technologies impacting our global ecosystem, including AI, quantum, space, and energy.
It’s no secret that tech companies are racing to build “artificial general intelligence,” or AI that can match a human brain without needing a lifeline. But our brains already do the same heavy lifting with just a fraction of the resources. Whether it’s energy, water, land, components, or, you know… money… human brains are just way cheaper. Right now, you can either buy a human brain cell-based computer… or rent time on a remote one. Yep, even brainpower’s got a subscription plan these days. So what can these living computers actually do? How do they work? And, most importantly, should we be freaking out a little bit?
Watch how deep sea water is now drinkable • how deep sea water is now drinkable.
Stanford economist Erik Brynjolfsson explains why the greatest danger of artificial intelligence may not be mass unemployment itself, but the concentration of wealth, power, and decision-making in the hands of a small group of companies or individuals.
In this conversation, he discusses the “Turing Trap,” the disappearance and creation of jobs, universal basic income, the future of economic growth, and why businesses should use AI to amplify human abilities rather than simply replace workers. He also explains why AI could become more transformative than the Industrial Revolution, why its impact is still largely invisible in productivity statistics, and which human skills may become increasingly valuable.
00:00 – Introduction. 01:05 – Why companies focus on eliminating jobs. 03:41 – The Turing Trap. 06:51 – Which tasks and jobs should AI replace? 08:35 – Millions of jobs will disappear. 09:25 – Why stopping technological change will fail. 10:48 – Entrepreneurship, security and the jobs of the future. 12:41 – AI, universal basic income and concentrated power. 15:29 – Why AI should complement humans. 17:41 – An economy that no longer needs human consumers. 20:05 – Is the younger generation doomed? 22:38 – How AI could help less-experienced workers. 25:10 – The most valuable human skill in the AI era. 27:24 – Access to AI and the falling price of intelligence. 32:31 – Is the AI investment boom a bubble? 33:44 – Bigger than the Industrial Revolution. 34:36 – Why AI is not yet visible in productivity statistics. 39:29 – Could AI produce explosive economic growth? 41:51 – How Erik Brynjolfsson uses AI in his own work. 45:34 – Will AI replace economists and scientists? 49:53 – Is AI destroying the traditional learning process? 54:46 – Shared prosperity or unprecedented inequality? 56:27 – Could AI replace the free market?
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Google DeepMind just dropped a massive paper called From AGI to ASI, and the message is bigger than another AI release. The paper argues that AGI may not be the finish line everyone is waiting for. It may be the moment the real race begins. Once human-level AI can be copied, sped up, connected into agent teams, and used to build better AI, the jump after AGI could matter even more than AGI itself.
🚨 Why It Matters. This is bigger than another AI paper. Google DeepMind is already talking about what happens after AGI. If human-level AI can be copied, sped up, connected, and used to build better AI, then intelligence itself could become an industrial process.
