Alabama Barker removed her profile picture and set her Instagram account to 'private' over the weekend

The Cabinet has approved Ireland’s participation in a European Defence Agency (EDA) project to improve cyber-threat response and information exchange with other member countries. Tanaiste and Minister for Defence Micheal Martin secured Government approval for the project which aims to facilitate information exchange and improve the response to cyber threats to EU member states’ defence structures. The duration of the Military Computer Emergency Response Team Operational Network (Micnet) project is four years with the possibility of an extension. The EDA said this network of national cyber-threat response teams will enhance the level of cooperation in the cyber domain at EU level, at a time when computer networks are increasingly contested and the number of cyber-attacks against the EU continues to grow. It said cyberattacks have increased exponentially in the past few years, having serious political, financial, and economic consequences across Europe and beyond. The objective is to develop a robust and coordinated response to cyber threats affecting defence systems in the EU, including those used in military common security and defence policy missions and operations. Mr Martin also secured approval for three other European Defence Agency projects relating to the procurement of Defence Forces equipment. This includes ammunition, soldier equipment and Chemical Biological Radiological and Nuclear (CBRN) items like hazmat suits. The projects are an opportunity to secure defensive equipment and ammunition after the Russian invasion in Ukraine impacted supply for smaller nations like Ireland. The overall EDA ammunition procurement project includes fast-tracked supply for Ukraine but Ireland will not be participating in this aspect as it has “constructively abstained” from the supply of lethal equipment. Ireland may still supply non-lethal soldier equipment and CBRN items to Ukraine. Ireland has participated in the European Defence Agency, which was set up to support the EU’s defence capabilities, since it was established in 2004. Ireland’s participation in these EDA projects will now be subject to Dail approval. Read More Charity boss speaks out over ‘traumatic’ encounter with royal aide Ukraine war’s heaviest fight rages in east - follow live Trust and ethics considerations ‘have come too late’ on AI technology Mitigating ‘extinction’ from AI should be ‘global priority’, experts say Teenager given criminal behaviour order apologises after TikTok ‘prank’

In response to growing demand for electric battery production, Japan is attempting to train tens

The new Warzone map for MW3, likely called Las Almas, sports a Verdansk design and drops in December 2023 alongside MW3 Season 1.

Google says it has made a major artificial intelligence breakthrough that could dramatically reduce the climate impact from flying. The company partnered with an airline and data provider to build a new artificially intelligent system that looks to reduce the amount of contrails produced by planes. Contrails are the long, white lines that appear behind planes, and can sometimes make the sky appear cloudy. They are formed as soot from planes’ exhausts turn into ice – and when they merge together, they trap heat in the atmosphere and warm the Earth. Those contrails account for more than a third of the global warming impact of flying, according to the UN. If planes are able to avoid flying through areas that create contrails, however, then they will reduce the amount of warming. If the human-made clouds can be stopped, then their warming effects can be reduced. In an attempt to do so, Google researchers gathered satellite imagery, weather and flight path data and fed it into an AI system. That was then used to try and generate routes for pilots that avoided creating those contrails. Pilots at American then flew some 70 test flights over a period of six months, Google said, following those AI-generated routes. The researchers then examined satellite imagery and found that the contrails produced were reduced by 54 per cent. “This is the first proof point that commercial flights can verifiably avoid contrails and thereby reduce their climate impact,” Google said. The company did also note that the flights burned 2 per cent additional fuel, though Google suggested that the flights could be selectively chosen. Google said it would be “working across the aviation industry to use AI to make contrail avoidance a reality over the coming years” in its announcement. It said it has the “potential to be a cost-effective, scalable solution to reduce the climate impact of flying”. Airlines are currently not charged for their climate impact, however, and there is therefore no indication that they would opt to use the routes that help reduce global warming. Read More Google will now alert you if people are talking about you Google Assistant will be ‘supercharged’ with AI like ChatGPT and Bard Google warns Gmail users they could be about to lose their account

GDANSK Polish games developer CD Projekt reported a 1% year-on-year rise in first-quarter net profit on Monday, as

Florida Governor Ron DeSantis wants to meet with Vice President Kamala Harris to discuss her criticism of the state’s Black history school curriculum standards after she joined widespread outrage over newly approved guidelines that diminish the impact of slavery and racist violence. “In Florida we are unafraid to have an open and honest dialogue about the issues. And you clearly have no trouble ducking down to Florida on short notice,” the governor wrote in a letter on 31 July, referencing her recent remarks in the state. “So given your grave concern (which, I must assume, is sincere) about what you think our standards say, I am officially inviting you back down to Florida to discuss our African American History standards,” he added. The administration also has invited William B Allen, one of the members of the working group that developed the standards who has a long history of inflammatory remarks and partisan rhetoric. The Independent has requested comment from the office of Ms Harris. The vice president travelled to Orlando on Tuesday to deliver remarks at the 20th Women’s Missionary Society of the African Methodist Episcopal Church Quadrennial Convention. Her visit follows remarks in the state on 21 July to condemn the state’s “propaganda” and the “extremist, so-called leaders” who support it. Though she did not name him or any other Florida officials, the vice president’s speech was directly aimed at the governor, whose administration has sought to radically overhaul public education and establish a “parents’ rights” agenda that restricts honest lessons of race and racism, threatens discussion of LGBT+ people and events, targets libraries and reshapes local school boards. A new set of standards for African American history in Florida schools will teach middle schoolers how enslaved people “developed skills” that could be “applied for personal benefit”. Another guideline instructs high schoolers to be taught that a massacre led by white supremacists against Black residents in Ocoee to stop them from voting in 1920 included “acts of violence perpetrated against and by African Americans.” Civil rights advocates, educators and lawmakers have warned that the guidelines present a distorted, revisionist picture of American history. “Adults know what slavery really was. It involved rape, it involved torture, it involved taking a baby from their mother, it involved some of the worst examples of depriving humanity of people in our world,” Ms Harris said in her remarks in Jacksonville. Members of the working group and the Florida Board of Education have defended the unanimously approved standards, assuring that they include comprehensive lessons on American history, including its darkest chapters. Mr Allen, a Black professor emeritus at Michigan State University who also sits on the national advisory board of the right-wing think tank Center for Urban Renewal and Education, has repeatedly defended the working group’s guidelines. A review of his past statements from Popular Information reveals a history of incendiary, contrarian remarks used to bolster and legitimise right-wing ideology. In 1989, he faced protests while participating in a panel titled “Blacks? Animals? Homosexuals? What is a Minority?” on which he claimed that special classes of protection for LGBT+ people and other minorities are a “fatal” mistake that heighten “tensions and antagonism”. Creating legal protections for minority groups “is the beginning of the evil of reducing American blacks to an equality with animals and then seducing other groups to seek the same charitable treatment,” according to prepared remarks. His speech was denounced by the US Civil Rights Commission – on which he was then serving as chair – as “disgusting” and “necessarily inflammatory”. That same year, he also was charged with kidnapping a 14-year-old girl from a Native American reservation in Arizona while she was the subject of a custody battle between her mother and a white couple who adopted her. Mr Allen also has opposed race-conscious admissions in higher education, including leading a campaign with a group that included members of the conservative Christian Hillsdale College and right-wing interest group the Heritage Foundation. He also has criticised The 1619 Project, which is explicitly banned from Florida schools, and has rejected concepts including “systemic racism, institutional racism [and] white privilege.” Mr DeSantis has routinely accused “the left” and Democratic officials of “indoctrinating” students in the state while he promotes an agenda that bans honest discussions of race and racism, sexuality and gender. The governor’s administration also recently approved materials from right-wing political advocacy group PragerU to be included in K-12 classrooms. The founder himself has said that those lessons are explicitly designed to indoctrinate. The campaign for Mr DeSantis, who is seeking the Republican nomination for president in 2024, has fired back at Black Republicans in Congress who have joined criticism of the African American history standards, including US Reps Byron Donalds and John James, as well as 2024 rival and South Carolina Senator Tim Scott. Both Mr James and Mr Donalds have endorsed Donald Trump. Read More Why Florida’s new curriculum on slavery is becoming a political headache for Ron DeSantis Most of Florida work group behind controversial new guidelines on African American history did not agree, report says The GOP primary is already decided. We’re just pretending it isn’t

A UK court on Wednesday found a teenager responsible for a hacking campaign that included one of the biggest breaches in the history of...

The viral TikTok Ktestone Personality Test, which originated on a Korean website, claims to provide you with your accurate personality type and traits

The years-in-the-making Oxford Dictionary of African American English will offer proper attribution to words and phrases that originated in Black culture.

Kobe Bryant is to honoured on the cover of NBA 2k24.

Have you been lurking on TikTok and are finally ready to dive in and post