❌

Normal view

'We hope to sign the agreement soon': White House calls on Meta to submit AI models for review, citing abilities and vulnerabilities evaluation

24 June 2026 at 16:00
  • The White House is worried about AI's cybersecurity implications
  • Meta urged to submit frontier AI models for review before release
  • OpenAI and other major developers have already signed up to do this

The White House is reportedly urging Meta to voluntarily submit its most advanced AI models to the government for security reviews before they get released publicly, per New York Times reporting.

Doing so would allow US policymakers to assess model capabilities, security risks and vulnerabilities, with the administration likely focusing on military implications like cyber warfare and attacks on critical national infrastructure.

According to the report, Meta is one of the few major AI developers that has not yet agreed to participate in the voluntary review program.

Meta pressed to submit AI models to US government for review

Companies like OpenAI, Anthropic, Google, Microsoft and xAI have already entered similar arrangements with the US government, and Meta could be next to sign up.

"We share the administration's goal of advancing U.S. leadership on robust and secure frontier AI," a company spokesperson said (via Reuters).

"While we are working through the details, we hope to sign the agreement soon."

The news follows the signing of an executive order to establish a framework for the government evaluation of advanced AI models before public deployment.

"Advanced AI capabilities make our Nation stronger, but also introduce new national security considerations that require coordinated action," the order reads.

The Five Eyes intelligence alliance (US, UK, Canada, Australia and New Zealand) also recently declared that AI systems are now more capable than ever at launching highly sophisticated cyber attacks. "Frontier Al models are anticipated to exceed current industry expectations," the alliance wrote.

If Meta signs up to participate, it means that virtually all major US frontier AI developers will be voluntarily submitting models for review prior to public release.

Google logo on a black background next to text reading 'Click to follow TechRadar'

'Way out of line': The US government is being sued for executive order restricting foreign access to Project Glasswing

24 June 2026 at 14:50
  • US government ordered Anthropic to pull frontier models for foreign nationals
  • Legal AI startup claims it had contractual access to those models
  • Anthropic doesn't agree with the White House – but complies

Legal AI startup Legion LegalTech Corp has filed a lawsuit challenging a June 12 government order that forced Anthropic to restrict access to its most advanced AI models, Fable 5 and Mythos 5, for foreign citizens (via Reuters).

According to the complain, the Bureau of Industry and Security (BIS) gave Anthropic around 90 minutes to comply with the order, or face civil and criminal penalties.

All foreign nationals, including those living inside and outside of the US, and even Anthropic's own employees, are said to be affected by the order.

Government order to ban Anthropic models internationally legally challenged

Legion LegalTech Corp acknowledges that the order was triggered because of concerns that users could jailbreak models into reviewing software code and identifying vulnerabilities, but the startup argues this is a common capability of all frontier models and doesn't just affect Anthropic's models.

The company says it had contractual access to Anthropic's Fable 5 model, and was actively integrating it into its products that draft and manage cases. Because the company employs Canadian developers working remotely from Canada, it lost access to the model once restrictions took effect.

"Anthropic took no independent action to restrict Legion’s access; it complied with the government’s command under threat of enforcement consequences," the lawsuit reads.

The lawsuit argues that no current export control classifications cover access to cloud-hosted AI models. It also references an independent reviewer, who sees the government's action as disproportionate and "way out of line."

Anthropic announced the frontier models on June 9. By June 12, it had released a statement in response to the government directive, criticizing the government for "not provid[ing] specific details of its national security concern."

"We are complying with the government’s legal directive and are removing access to Fable 5 and Mythos 5 for all users."

Google logo on a black background next to text reading 'Click to follow TechRadar'

An Apple Siri mystery has been solved by an audio engineer — spectrogram reveals how Apple stopped voice assistant setting off millions of iPhones and HomePods during its WWDC 2026 event

  • Apple avoids setting off your iPhone when its execs say “Hey Siri” at events
  • One enterprising engineer decided to find out why
  • By analyzing the keynote’s audio, they solved an intriguing mystery

Siri has just been given the brain transplant it's needed for years, but it's always been good at detecting the words "Hey Siri" — so much so that accidental summonings have been a common problem. But an audio engineer has just explained how Apple cleverly avoided Siri popping up on your phone during its recent WWDC 2026 keynote.

As revealed by Techexplain on Substack, it all comes down to the audio frequencies embedded in Apple’s keynote video. Once Apple’s audio engineers made a few subtle tweaks, the company’s presenters could say “Hey Siri” as much as they liked without risking millions of phones going off around the world.

To find out what was going on, Techexplain downloaded the audio and video from the WWDC event. They fed that into a spectrogram analyzer, which is an app that can visualize audio frequencies as colored graphs and bands. When the WWDC video was examined, it revealed that a few frequency bands in the 3kHz to 6kHz range had been removed from the audio.

And this is the key to the video not invoking Siri. Without those four frequency bands, the Siri assistant lurking on your device did not hear the phrase “Hey Siri” — even though Apple’s presenters said it repeatedly throughout the show.

Wait, how exactly does this work?

WWDC 2026 Screenshots

(Image credit: Apple)

Apple’s solution might sound odd. After all, doesn’t Siri listen out for the trigger words being spoken? If those words were present in Apple’s video, shouldn’t Siri have been activated?

Well, not quite. Your iPhone contains an “always-on processor” chip whose job is to constantly sample background audio, which is then fed into a neural network. The audio is converted into a spectrogram and the neural network analyzes it to look for a specific frequency pattern — in this case, the sibilant sound that occurs when you say “Siri.” And yep, you guessed it, those sibilant sounds mostly exist in the 3kHz to 6kHz range.

In other words, what Siri is actually listening out for is a frequency rather than the words being spoken. It means that if Apple’s engineers remove the 3kHz to 6kHz bands from the WWDC keynote, Siri won’t “hear” its name being spoken — even if that’s exactly what the presenters are doing.

It’s a clever trick that helps ensure Apple’s presenters can speak naturally without the need to avoid saying “Siri.” At the same time, it avoids setting off millions of iPhones and annoying their owners when “Hey Siri” is uttered. It’s an ingenious solution that solves a thorny problem in a satisfyingly elegant way — and we wouldn’t expect anything less from Apple.

Trump admin’s coal investments assist plants with repeated violations

In 2023, after years of pollution, equipment failures, and health concerns, the Cumberland Fossil Plant in Tennessee was slated to close within the decade.

The coal-fired plant had been part of a multibillion-dollar settlement in 2011 after its operator, the Tennessee Valley Authority, failed to install pollution control technology a decade earlier. Regulators cited the plant for more air-pollution violations in 2017 and 2023. TVA said it would shutter Cumberland’s units in 2026 and 2028.

Then the Trump administration replaced four of TVA’s board members, and the agency reneged on its retirement plan in February. Now, TVA has a federal pledge for $46 million to extend Cumberland’s lifespan—part of a nationwide push by President Donald Trump to keep older coal plants running.

Read full article

Comments

© Stephen A. Smith/Southern Alliance for Clean Energy

❌