Sam's News — tech — 2026-08-24¶

Security¶

8.5 Nvidia senior manager indicted in Supermicro AI server smuggling scheme to China¶

An Nvidia senior manager has been indicted in connection with an illegal scheme to smuggle AI servers to China, following CEO Jensen Huang's public rebuke of Supermicro.

Nine indicted including one NVIDIA and two Super Micro Taiwan employees
130 Super Micro B300 servers ordered; 74 exported to China, 56 intercepted in Japan
Charged with breach of trust and document forgery
Violated US export controls in effect since 2022
Exports routed through Indonesia, Japan, Hong Kong to reach Chinese customers

Sources: Ars Technica RSS Update to: Taiwan indicts NVIDIA employees for illegal AI server exports to China

8 Iran-Linked Hackers Shut Down UK Power Plant for Four Days¶

Iran-linked hackers shut down a UK power plant for four days in July 2026, as reported on August 22, 2026. The attack raised concerns about operational resilience of smaller UK power operators and represents an expansion of Iranian cyber operations into British critical infrastructure.

Four-day operational shutdown in July 2026
Attack attributed to Iran-linked hackers
Facility was a smaller power plant, not major national infrastructure
Expansion of Iranian cyber activity into UK following pattern of GCC, US, and European targeting
UK power plant offline for four days from Iranian cyberattack
First disruptive Iranian cyberattack on UK critical infrastructure of this kind
Concurrent breaches of U.S. water utilities across 12+ states assessed as Iran-linked
Attackers using AI-generated exploitation scripts against Siemens S7 Series PLCs
Targets include water, manufacturing, and energy infrastructure
First reported successful Iranian cyberattack on UK power plant (July 2026)
Iranian actors targeted water systems in 12 US states (New Jersey, Minnesota, Georgia, South Dakota)
Attacked programmable logic controllers (PLCs)
12–70 million PLCs worldwide; many lack modern cybersecurity
CISA: attackers used simple techniques—scanning and default credentials, no zero-days

Sources: SecurityWeek AI Web Searched, The Register AI Web Searched, CBS News AI Web Searched

Apollo Global Management, a $1 trillion investment firm, disclosed a breach of its cloud platforms between July 6–10, 2026 caused by social engineering attacks that harvested employee credentials. The breach exposed names, dates of birth, contact information, home addresses, and Social Security numbers of an unspecified number of individuals, though the company found no evidence the data was publicly posted or used for fraud.

$1 trillion asset manager affected
July 6–10, 2026 breach window
Social engineering used to obtain credentials
Exposed: names, DOB, addresses, SSNs
24 months credit monitoring offered
No evidence of public posting or identity theft

Sources: The Register AI Web Searched

7.5 Blackstone real estate company exposes sensitive personal data through GraphQL vulnerability¶

A Beam Living property management system owned by Blackstone exposed sensitive applicant data through an unsecured GraphQL endpoint. The vulnerability allowed attackers to retrieve Social Security numbers, dates of birth, addresses, credit scores, and other personal information by querying with another user's email address, requiring no authentication bypass. The exposure affected multiple communities including Stuy Town and Peter Cooper Village.

Vulnerability discovered August 24, 2026
Exposed Social Security digits, dates of birth, addresses, credit scores, emergency contacts
Affected Stuy Town, Peter Cooper Village, and other Beam Living communities
No authentication required—users could query other applicants' emails directly
GraphQL endpoint: pd-dlcore.beamliving.com/graphql

Sources: Alex Schapiro AI Web Searched, Hacker News (front page) RSS

Science & Space¶

8 NASA's Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope Positioned to Discover Exoplanets and Dark Matter¶

The Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope is expected to discover up to 200,000 new exoplanets and provide insights into dark matter and dark energy.

Sources: Wired RSS

AI Safety & Abuse¶

7.5 Teachers Targeted by AI-Generated Sexual Deepfakes in Schools¶

Teachers are becoming targets of sexualized AI-generated deepfake content, with limited accountability mechanisms available to address the abuse.

Sources: Wired RSS

Funding¶

7.5 Hugging Face in Talks for $13 Billion Acquisition¶

Hugging Face, an AI platform for sharing and deploying open-source models, is fielding acquisition offers valued at $13 billion or higher, but CEO Clem Delangue expressed hesitation about a sale due to community concerns. The company previously rejected a $500 million Nvidia investment and is nearing profitability.

Acquisition offers valued at $13 billion or higher
CEO cited responsibility to community and long-term sustainability concerns
Previously turned down $500 million Nvidia investment (valued at $7 billion) in 2026
Last valuation: $4.5 billion post-money (2023), led by Salesforce Ventures

Sources: TechCrunch AI Web Searched

Hardware¶

7.5 Memory Chip Prices Surge; Gartner Forecasts $1.6 Trillion Semiconductor Year Ahead¶

Semiconductor revenue is projected to reach $1.6 trillion in 2026, nearly doubling from 2025, driven by surging AI infrastructure demand and memory chip production. DRAM revenue expected to grow 246.6% and NAND flash 371.9%, with memory revenue projected to surpass non-memory chip revenue by 2027.

2026 semiconductor revenue projected $1.6 trillion (vs. $809 billion in 2025)
DRAM revenue growth: 246.6%; NAND flash: 371.9%
Memory revenue expected to exceed $1 trillion by 2027 for first time
AI datacenter ecosystem: 36.5% of 2026 semiconductor revenue, rising to over 53% by 2030
Average memory unit prices raised through long-term supply deals locked in June–July 2026

Sources: The Register AI Web Searched

7.5 Xiaomi announces custom CPU matching Apple single-thread performance with superior multi-thread speed¶

Xiaomi unveiled its Xring O3 custom CPU built on TSMC's 3nm process, achieving single-threaded performance parity with Apple cores while delivering superior multi-threaded speed. The processor features 44 MB cache, prime cores at 4+ GHz, and includes matrix and data parallelism acceleration, enabling high parallelism through multiple independent arithmetic units.

Xring O3 built on TSMC 3nm process
Matches Apple in single-thread performance; surpasses in multi-thread
Geekbench scores: 3,945 single-core, 15,221 multi-core
44 MB total cache; 21 execution ports on C1-Ultra big cores
Includes SME2 (matrix acceleration) and SVE2 (data parallelism)

Sources: Daniel Lemire on X AI Web Searched, Hacker News (front page) RSS

Tech¶

7.5 General Intuition raises $6 billion at pre-money valuation from Valor and Point72 for robotics AI¶

General Intuition, a New York AI startup building foundation models for generalized agents, raised funding at a $6 billion pre-money valuation from Valor Ventures, Point72 Ventures, and Seven Seven Six. The round follows a $320 million raise at $2.3 billion valuation just eight weeks prior.

$6 billion pre-money valuation; $320 million raised 8 weeks prior at $2.3B
Founded Oct. 2025 by Pim de Witte, spun from Medal gaming platform
Training leverages hundreds of millions of gameplay hours with action labels
CoreWeave partnership for compute; capital for talent and robotic embodiments