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Ireland risks leaving girls behind in race to build an AI-ready workforce

Frank Quinn — Fri, 23 Oct 2026 09:47:20 +0000

Ireland risks leaving girls behind in its AI future unless gaps in subject access and confidence are addressed, I Wish has warned. The 2026 I Wish Survey of Female Students’ Attitudes to STEM found that just over one in four girls (27%) surveyed in single-sex schools currently have access to Computer Science at Leaving Certificate […]

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Intel and FIT launch AI for Future training programme and dedicated AI Lab

Frank Quinn — Fri, 23 Oct 2026 09:10:06 +0000

Intel and Fastrack into Information Technology (FIT) have launched the AI for Future Workforce Programme in Ireland, including the development of a dedicated AI Lab where learners can undertake practical artificial intelligence training. The Lab will be the first dedicated physical training space established as part of a FIT programme, providing learners with access to […]

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IT. The ‘I’ is for ‘irritating’

Frank Quinn — Fri, 23 Oct 2026 08:53:00 +0000

Sitting in an online meeting this morning, having, for the millionth time, refused to download another pointless app, something occurred to me. The person I was waiting to speak to had no connectivity. At the same time, one of the major broadband providers where I am (though happily not my own) went down. Yesterday, a […]

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The fight against AI workslop

Frank Quinn — Fri, 23 Oct 2026 08:52:21 +0000

Four letters and a semicolon is all it took for an X user called ‘seclilc’ to strike a nerve back in August with a post that read, in its entirety, “AI;DR (AI; didn’t read)”. It racked up more than 16,000 likes. Could it be the new TL;DR (too long; didn’t read)? Rick Manelius, a start-up […]

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And what have the data centres ever done for us?

Frank Quinn — Fri, 23 Oct 2026 08:52:00 +0000

There’s a very famous scene in Monty Python’s Life of Brian where Reg, the leader of the revolutionary group, asks “What have the Romans ever done for us?”. If you haven’t seen it, look it up on YouTube because it’s very good. I was put in mind of that sketch by a thought-provoking working paper […]

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DeepSeek raises €13bn to strengthen position in AI market

Frank Quinn — Fri, 23 Oct 2026 08:23:00 +0000

Chinese AI developer DeepSeek has raised approximately 100 billion yuan (around €13 billion) in its latest funding round. The company intends to use that capital to compete with US AI companies such as OpenAI and Anthropic. The funding round is among the largest in Chinese history and demonstrates DeepSeek’s ambition to expand its international presence. […]

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Chip company Besi sees order intake rise sharply thanks to strong demand for AI data centres

Frank Quinn — Fri, 23 Oct 2026 08:17:00 +0000

Driven by the sharp increase in demand for AI data centres, BE Semiconductor Industries (Besi) reported third-quarter order volumes that exceeded analysts’ forecasts. The Dutch company said new orders amounted to €342.6 million, an increase of 17% compared with the previous quarter and almost double the level of the same period last year. This put […]

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TSMC wants to modify factory equipment to be less dependent on Chinese rare earth metals

Frank Quinn — Fri, 23 Oct 2026 07:29:00 +0000

In order to limit the risks of Chinese dominance in the field of critical minerals, chipmaker TSMC is looking into ways to remove rare earth elements from its production machines. According to sources familiar with the situation quoted by Reuters, the semiconductor giant wants to protect its production of advanced chips from possible disruptions caused […]

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New Mexico judge fines Meta $25bn over data access and failure to protect users from hate speech, misinformation

Frank Quinn — Thu, 22 Oct 2026 13:51:28 +0000

A New Mexico judge has ordered Meta to pay $25 billion after a jury found the Facebook parent company misled consumers, adding another enormous legal penalty to the social media giant’s mounting bills. The case arose from allegations connected to the Cambridge Analytica scandal, in which the political consulting firm that worked for Donald Trump‘s […]

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Tesla profits fall on higher spending as ‘Elon Inc.’ talk builds

Frank Quinn — Thu, 22 Oct 2026 13:41:09 +0000

Tesla reported lower third-quarter profits Wednesday as near-trillionaire Elon Musk’s electric vehicle maker ramped up huge investments in artificial intelligence and other envelope-pushing technologies. Besides marginally lower car sales, Tesla saw a drop in revenues from regulatory credits and energy and storage, while spending on research and development more than doubled as the company engages […]

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OpenAI says its AI agents disabled their own safety monitors

Frank Quinn — Thu, 22 Oct 2026 13:35:31 +0000

OpenAI has revealed that two of its artificial intelligence agents disabled or weakened systems built to catch them misbehaving, with one later denying it had done so. The cases are the latest in a string of safety scares at the world’s top AI developers involving agents, AI programs that carry out tasks without human involvement. […]

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Websites go dark as AI exposes critical PHP security flaws

Frank Quinn — Thu, 22 Oct 2026 13:31:33 +0000

Governments and companies around the world shut down websites as they raced to protect themselves from hacks after artificial intelligence uncovered critical flaws in a widely used programming language called PHP. PHP helps run about 70% of the world’s websites – from online stores and news outlets to government services – according to Wiz Research, […]

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EU investigates Booking.com over phishing and misleading advertisements

Frank Quinn — Thu, 22 Oct 2026 13:18:58 +0000

The European Commission has opened a formal investigation into Booking.com to determine whether the travel site is taking sufficient measures to tackle phishing attacks and fraudulent advertisements. The investigation focuses on allegations that the company has underestimated the scale of illegal rentals and has failed to adequately protect user data from malicious actors. Henna Virkkunen, […]

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How to fix a corrupted SD card on Android without losing your data

Frank Quinn — Thu, 22 Oct 2026 08:04:31 +0000

Sponsored content You slide the microSD card back into your phone and get a message: “SD card is damaged”. Or maybe Android asks if you’d like to format it. Or the gallery shows gray thumbnails that won’t open, and the card has vanished from Settings entirely. It feels like your photos are gone, but that’s […]

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Meta expands its AI offering with open weight model Muse Spark Open

Frank Quinn — Wed, 21 Oct 2026 13:28:14 +0000

Meta has introduced a new AI model with open weights, Muse Spark Open. The model is specifically designed for agentic workflows and programming. This follows the recent launch of Muse Wonder, a more advanced system that Meta wants to keep proprietary. Company representative Alexandr Wang stated that for reasons related to security and performance, Meta […]

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US federal agencies are no longer allowed to use DeepSeek

Frank Quinn — Wed, 21 Oct 2026 13:21:44 +0000

Federal agencies in the United States have been instructed to halt the use of AI software from the Chinese company DeepSeek. The directive, issued on Monday by the Department of Homeland Security, requires that DeepSeek’s own tools, as well as any third party applications built on that technology, be removed from all government IT hardware. […]

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Qualcomm to start dismissing underperforming employees from November

Frank Quinn — Wed, 21 Oct 2026 13:19:23 +0000

According to an internal notice obtained by Reuters, chip manufacturer Qualcomm plans to downsize its global workforce based on employee performance. On Monday, CEO Cristiano Amon informed staff that these redundancies, which will begin in November, follow the completion of the annual reviews. The aim of this initiative is to foster a stricter, performance-driven work […]

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Musk backs SpaceX-Tesla merger as rocket firm turns profit

Frank Quinn — Wed, 21 Oct 2026 13:16:40 +0000

Elon Musk said Tuesday he would back a merger of SpaceX and Tesla, as his rocket and AI company reported its first quarterly profit since going public, driven by deals to rent out computing power to AI firms. Asked about a possible tie-up on a call with analysts, Musk said he felt he was “tap […]

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OpenAI wants to push its valuation above 1.4 trillion dollars with a new funding round

Frank Quinn — Wed, 21 Oct 2026 13:10:35 +0000

According to a recent report by Reuters, OpenAI is stepping up its efforts to secure around $30 billion (€26.7 billion) in new funding. The company wants to lock in investor support before competitor Anthropic is expected to go public in mid-November. If successful, the capital injection could drive the valuation of the company behind ChatGPT […]

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Apple CEO John Ternus calls shortage of memory chips a “serious crisis”

Frank Quinn — Tue, 20 Oct 2026 16:23:12 +0000

In a recent interview with Time, John Ternus, Apple’s new CEO, described the scarcity of memory chips as a genuine crisis. Ternus, who took over on 1 September, said the company is exploring every possible avenue to secure components, following reports that Apple is evaluating memory hardware produced in China. This potential shift in procurement […]

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Russia, US reject a ban on autonomous AI weapons

Frank Quinn — Tue, 20 Oct 2026 16:07:15 +0000

The Russian government has refused to back an immediate ban on lethal autonomous weapons systems (LAWS). These are technologies that use AI and algorithms to attack targets without human control. According to Oleg Postnikov, a senior official in the Non-Proliferation and Arms Control Department of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Moscow considers calls for […]

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EU eyes Arctic cable linking Greenland to Europe amid growing security threats

Frank Quinn — Tue, 20 Oct 2026 15:59:54 +0000

The European Union is planning a secure submarine cable linking Greenland directly to Europe, with ambitions to extend the network through Canada to Japan and South Korea, according to a draft Arctic strategy seen by Euronews. The project is part of a broader effort to strengthen Europe’s digital infrastructure and security in the increasingly contested […]

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Google improves reliability of quantum computers with more efficient technique

Frank Quinn — Tue, 20 Oct 2026 15:53:22 +0000

Research published in the journal Science described an important step forward in quantum computing. Google’s Quantum AI division has managed to reduce error rates by roughly a factor of 40 using the Willow processor. In doing so, the researchers addressed a crucial obstacle. Creating reliable quantum states requires enormous amounts of computing power and other […]

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Whatnot to double Irish headcount as it opens new office in Dublin

Frank Quinn — Tue, 20 Oct 2026 15:23:11 +0000

Whatnot, the largest live commerce platform in North America, the UK and Europe, has opened its new European headquarters in Dublin, announcing plans to double its Irish workforce over the next 18 months and open its platform to Irish small businesses in 2027. The company currently employs more than 130 people across Ireland and is […]

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UN adviser says AI data centres now major military targets

Frank Quinn — Mon, 19 Oct 2026 15:42:13 +0000

The evolution of modern warfare requires a complete overhaul of how Europe develops its artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure according to Mehdi Paryavi, UN adviser and founder of the think tank International Data Center Authority. In an interview with Euronews he pointed out that data centres have changed from simple utility hubs into high-priority military targets. […]

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OpenAI faces lawsuit after Tumbler Ridge shooter uses ChatGPT for tactical advice

Frank Quinn — Mon, 19 Oct 2026 15:32:33 +0000

A shooting in Tumbler Ridge, Canada, has sparked a critical discussion about the responsibility of AI developers to report threats of violence, versus their duty to protect user confidentiality. Before the attack, in which several people were killed, including students and family members, the perpetrator is said to have used OpenAI’s ChatGPT to obtain tactical […]

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Musk floats idea to give every child in the United States a SpaceX share

Frank Quinn — Mon, 19 Oct 2026 15:17:19 +0000

Elon Musk announced that he plans, starting next year, to give one SpaceX share to every minor living in the United States. The news comes after days of back-and-forth accusations between the SpaceX boss ad the Trump Administration over who made the decision to throttle connection speeds to the Starshield military broadband service relied on […]

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‘Mixed feelings’ as AI cracks centuries-old ciphers

Frank Quinn — Mon, 19 Oct 2026 15:07:23 +0000

Napoleon Bonaparte ordered the wartime missive written in code, creating a puzzle that went unsolved for more than 200 years – until AI cracked it in a matter of hours. Artificial intelligence is helping non-specialists unlock the secrets of historical sources, a trend described as a “turning point” in a field previously the preserve of […]

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The Dublin Declaration says there’s safety in independence, but we can’t afford to go it alone

Frank Quinn — Fri, 16 Oct 2026 16:22:21 +0000

Back in March a government-commissioned KMPG report on Irish data centres contained a section called ‘study boundaries’. Sounds boring but tucked inside is a line noting that the analysis “excludes consideration of national security and digital sovereignty risks, including risks arising from foreign ownership or control of data centre assets”. Roll on six months later […]

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The price of our digital sovereignty will be set in the White House

Frank Quinn — Fri, 16 Oct 2026 16:05:03 +0000

With Halloween fast approaching, this seems like an opportune time to revisit the issue of European digital sovereignty which is becoming increasingly fraught, especially at this moment in time given the present occupant of the White House. Strangely, nation states are becoming more and more reluctant to place their trust in US technology companies when […]

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OpenForum creates a space for discussion of who gets to decide Europe’s ICT strategy

Frank Quinn — Fri, 16 Oct 2026 13:08:03 +0000

OpenForum Europe, held at Dublin’s Smock Alley Theatre this week, dared to ask a question that has been absent in the face of increasingly desperate pleas to reduce dependency on information and communications technology (ICT) that is based outside the European Union: can small countries do this without getting steamrolled by the bloc’s giants? It’s […]

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Microsoft opens €1m Dream Space hub at Grange Castle campus

Frank Quinn — Fri, 16 Oct 2026 11:10:49 +0000

Microsoft Vice Chair and President, Brad Smith, today joined students, teachers and community representatives from Dublin and Kildare at the company’s data centre campus in Grange Castle to officially open its new €1m Dream Space hub. Dream Space @ the Data Centre marks the next step in Microsoft’s mission to create lasting benefits for people […]

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AI engineers and researchers to advance discovery across humanities and the sciences at new UCD institute

Frank Quinn — Fri, 16 Oct 2026 11:02:14 +0000

University College Dublin (UCD) has launched Ireland’s first university-led Artificial Intelligence Institute to empower researchers across all disciplines, accelerate scientific discovery and impact policy and regulation. At the heart of the new UCD AI Institute will be an AI Design Studio – a team of computer science engineers, supported by expertise in ethics and compliance, who […]

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Tesla presents flying Roadster, but experts doubt its feasibility

Frank Quinn — Fri, 16 Oct 2026 09:46:41 +0000

Elon Musk yesterday presented the new Tesla Roadster at a SpaceX test site in Texas and claimed that the vehicle can fly. The two-seater sports car demonstrated impressive acceleration – a speed of 96 km/h in less than a second. During the presentation, it could be seen how the vehicle, using suction under the bodywork, […]

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Dublin declares AI is a good thing and Digital Infrastructure Ireland’s Ronan Kelly

Frank Quinn — Fri, 16 Oct 2026 09:22:10 +0000

This week’s International AI Summit will be remembered for one thing: the Dublin Declaration on how Europe will ‘do’ artificial intelligence. We review the six points of agreement. Plus, Nvidia becomes a fan of sovereign AI, and Sony gets a bloody nose after users jailbreak their PS5 consoles in response to plans for dropping physical […]

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Anthropic’s revenue rises 45% in the third quarter to $16.8bn

Frank Quinn — Thu, 15 Oct 2026 15:48:53 +0000

According to reports by the Financial Times, Reuters and Bloomberg, Anthropic announced at a meeting with investors in San Francisco that revenue for the third quarter of 2026 came to $16.8 billion (€14.9 billion). The announcement was made during a meeting with potential investors in the run-up to the company’s planned stock market listing. Although […]

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Chatbots blurring lines between humans and software, researchers warn

Frank Quinn — Thu, 15 Oct 2026 15:07:06 +0000

Chatbots are offering a “pretend empathy” that loosens people’s grasp of reality, according to US researchers, citing interviews with parents whose children are convinced that a person is inside the computer or phone. Using AI is affecting “basic childhood processes of distinguishing people from inanimate objects,” according to Sherry Turkle, a psychologist at the Massachusetts Institute […]

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TomTom sheds 200 jobs in reorganisation

Frank Quinn — Thu, 15 Oct 2026 14:32:38 +0000

TomTom is announcing organisational changes intended to make the company more focused, faster and more scalable. The company has been restructured into three divisions: automated driving, location intelligence, and navigation. By reducing the number of management layers and bringing decision-making closer to execution, TomTom hopes to respond more quickly to customer needs and accelerate innovation. […]

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Ireland ranks fourth globally for AI engineering talent

Frank Quinn — Thu, 15 Oct 2026 13:28:16 +0000

Ireland ranks fourth globally for AI engineering talent concentration and net AI talent migration, according to the latest Labour Market Pulse report published by IDA Ireland in collaboration with Microsoft and LinkedIn. The 12th edition of the report, published ahead of Ireland’s International AI Summit, finds that the country is entering the AI transition from […]

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Salesforce invests $750,000 in AI skills programme for young people

Frank Quinn — Thu, 15 Oct 2026 13:21:55 +0000

Salesforce has announced a $750,000 grant to the National College of Ireland (NCI) to expand access to artificial intelligence education and career pathways for young people. The announcement coincides with the International AI Summit in Dublin, which is bringing together policymakers, business leaders and technology specialists to discuss the development and governance of AI. The […]

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