As of today, the US is no longer a member of the World Health Organization—and it leaves the United Nations health agency with hundreds of millions of dollars in unpaid bills, according to reporting by Stat News .

A year ago today, the US informed the WHO of its intent to exit, setting the clock for a one-year withdrawal period mandated in a 1948 joint resolution of Congress. But, in practice, the withdrawal was immediate, with the Trump administration cutting all ties with WHO upon the announcement. In explaining his reasoning for leaving the WHO, Trump referenced his long-standing complaints about the agency’s handling of the COVID-19 pandemic, dues payments, and alleged protection of China. Trump had attempted extract the US from WHO during his first term , but the Biden administration rescinded the withdrawal on the first day in office, well before the one-year notice period was reached.

The joint resolution also stipulated that the US would have to pay its financial obligations in full before departing. But, that too has not been honored by the Trump administration. According to Stat, the US owed the WHO $278 million in dues, which are a percentage of each member state’s gross domestic product. That dues payment covered the country's 2024–2025 membership, as WHO runs on a two-year budget cycle.

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The project developer for one of the Internet’s most popular networking tools is scrapping its vulnerability reward program after being overrun by a spike in the submission of low-quality reports, much of it AI-generated slop.

“We are just a small single open source project with a small number of active maintainers,” Daniel Stenberg, the founder and lead developer of the open source app cURL, said Thursday . “It is not in our power to change how all these people and their slop machines work. We need to make moves to ensure our survival and intact mental health.”

Manufacturing bogus bugs

His comments came as cURL users complained that the move was treating the symptoms caused by AI slop without addressing the cause. The users said they were concerned the move would eliminate a key means for ensuring and maintaining the security of the tool. Stenberg largely agreed, but indicated his team had little choice.

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On Thursday, Ilya Lichtenstein, who was at the center of a massive 2016 crypto heist worth billions at the time, wrote online that he is now out of prison and has changed his ways.

“Ten years ago, I decided that I would hack the largest cryptocurrency exchange in the world,” Lichtenstein wrote on LinkedIn , detailing a time when his startup was barely making money and he decided to steal some instead.

“This was a terrible idea. It was the worst thing I had ever done,” he added. “It upended my life, the lives of people close to me, and affected thousands of users of the exchange. I know I disappointed a lot of people who believed in me and grossly misused my talents.”

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Apple is working on a wearable device that will allow the user to take advantage of AI models, according to sources familiar with the product who spoke with tech publication The Information.

The product is said to be "the same size as an AirTag, only slightly thicker," and will be worn as a pin, inviting comparisons to the failed Humane AI pin that launched to bad reviews and lackluster sales in 2024. The Humane product was criticized for sluggish performance and low battery life, but those shortcomings could potentially be addressed by Apple's solution, should Apple offload the processing to a synced external device like an iPhone.

The Information's sources don't specify whether that's the plan, or if it will be a standalone device.

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Journalists and advocates have been trying to grasp how many victims in total were harmed by Grok's nudifying scandal after xAI delayed restricting outputs and app stores refused to cut off access for days.

The latest estimates show that perhaps millions were harmed in the days immediately after Elon Musk promoted Grok's undressing feature on his own X feed by posting a pic of himself in a bikini.

Over just 11 days after Musk's post, Grok sexualized more than 3 million images, of which 23,000 were of children, the Center for Countering Digital Hate (CCDH) estimated in research published Thursday.

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It's no secret that students worldwide use AI chatbots to do their homework and avoid learning things. On the flip side, students can also use AI as a tool to beef up their knowledge and plan for the future with flashcards or study guides. Google hopes its latest Gemini feature will help with the latter. The company has announced that Gemini can now create free SAT practice tests and coach students to help them get higher scores.

As a standardized test, the content of the SAT follows a predictable pattern. So there's no need to use a lengthy, personalized prompt to get Gemini going. Just say something like, "I want to take a practice SAT test," and the chatbot will generate one complete with clickable buttons, graphs, and score analysis.

Of course, generative AI can go off the rails and provide incorrect information, which is a problem when you're trying to learn things. However, Google says it has worked with education firms like The Princeton Review to ensure the AI-generated tests resemble what students will see in the real deal.

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Ars readers of a certain age no doubt remember the 1980s He-Man and the Masters of the Universe series (and its spinoff, She-Ra: Princess of Powers ) and the many, many offshoots of this hugely popular Mattel franchise , including an extensive line of action figures. Amazon MGM Studios no doubt hopes to cash in on any lingering nostalgia with its forthcoming film, Masters of the Universe. Judging by the extended teaser trailer, we're getting an origin story for He-Man.

It's not the first time someone has turned He-Man into a feature film: Dolph Lundgren starred in 1987's Masters of the Universe , a critical and box office bomb that also featured Frank Langella as arch-villain Skeletor. Its poor reception might have stemmed from the 1987 film deviating significantly from the original cartoon, angering fans. But frankly, it was just a bad, cheesy movie, though it still has its share of cult fans today.

This latest big-screen live-action adaptation has been languishing in development hell for nearly two decades. There were rumors in 2007 that John Woo would direct a He-Man feature for Warner Bros., but the project never got the green light. Sony Pictures gained the rights in 2009, and there were multiple script rewrites and much shuffling of possible directors (with John Chu, McG, and David S. Goyer among the candidates).

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Blue Origin confirmed Thursday that the next launch of its New Glenn rocket will carry a large communications satellite into low-Earth orbit for AST SpaceMobile.

The rocket will launch the next-generation Block 2 BlueBird satellite "no earlier than late February" from Launch Complex 36 at Cape Canaveral Space Force Station.

However, the update from Blue Origin appears to have buried the real news toward the end: "The mission follows the successful NG-2 mission, which included the landing of the 'Never Tell Me The Odds' booster. The same booster is being refurbished to power NG-3," the company said.

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Google believes AI is the future of search, and it's not shy about saying it . After adding account-level personalization to Gemini earlier this month, it's now updating AI Mode with so-called "Personal Intelligence." According to Google, this makes the bot's answers more useful because they are tailored to your personal context.

Starting today, the feature is rolling out to all users who subscribe to Google AI Pro or AI Ultra. However, it will be a Labs feature that needs to be explicitly enabled (subscribers will be prompted to do this). Google tends to expand access to new AI features to free accounts later on, so free users will most likely get access to Personal Intelligence in the future. Whenever this option does land on your account, it's entirely optional and can be disabled at any time.

If you decide to integrate your data with AI Mode, the search bot will be able to scan your Gmail and Google Photos. That's less extensive than the Gemini app version, which supports Gmail, Photos, Search, and YouTube history. Gmail will probably be the biggest contributor to AI Mode—a great many life events involve confirmation emails. Traditional search results when you are logged in are adjusted based on your usage history, but this goes a step further.

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