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Elon Musk Rumored To Soften Stance On TSMC For Terafab After Calling It A Subcontractor At Best, With Operational Control And Joint Investment On The Table

After initially outlining that TSMC could at best be a subcontractor for his Terafab chip manufacturing project, Elon Musk has reportedly softened his stance, according to a report from the Taiwanese publication DigiTimes. The report follows remarks by TSMC's CEO, C.C. Wei, during the firm's latest earnings call that the firm was in discussions with Musk and would have to run the plants for any deal to work.

via Wccftech

S-Game pushes Phantom Blade Zero past four million sales across PC and console in opening weekend

Chinese developer S-Game announced that its debut title, Phantom Blade Zero, sold more than 4 million copies across PlayStation 5 and PC in its first 72 hours. Available on PS5, Steam, and the China-exclusive Tencent WeGame PC launcher, the third-person action game surpassed pre-launch momentum after Alinea Analytics analyst Rhys Elliott estimated it had moved over 1m pre-release copies.

Summarized from 2 outlets
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FBI identifies North Korean hackers as perpetrators behind multi-billion-dollar Binance breach

The FBI announced that North Korean state-sponsored hackers operating under the moniker TraderTraitor were behind an unprecedented security breach at cryptocurrency exchange Binance around October 29. Most of the assets were drained within 20 minutes before Binance paused customer withdrawals.

Summarized from 12 outlets
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AI briefings

· 2 source reports

S-Game pushes Phantom Blade Zero past four million sales across PC and console in opening weekend

Chinese developer S-Game announced that its debut title, Phantom Blade Zero, sold more than 4 million copies across PlayStation 5 and PC in its first 72 hours. Available on PS5, Steam, and the China-exclusive Tencent WeGame PC launcher, the third-person action game surpassed pre-launch momentum after Alinea Analytics analyst Rhys Elliott estimated it had moved over 1m pre-release copies.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 2 source reports

Decentralized network Darkbloom cautions Mac owners that falling token prices threaten compute earnings

Darkbloom, a distributed compute project run by Seattle-based Eigen Labs, is warning roughly 800 participants to expect sharp drops in revenue from renting out their idle Mac hardware. For example, Anthropic token prices fell 77% from $2.65 per million on May 1, 2026, to $0.62 on October 22, 2026, which would push monthly earnings down to roughly $36.77.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 2 source reports

Volkswagen suspends work on electric Golf amid cost shortfalls at Wolfsburg plant

Volkswagen has temporarily paused preliminary development of the all-electric ID. Golf as the automaker wrestles with mounting financial constraints. Brand chief Thomas Schäfer stated internally that the company cannot afford to continue the compact car's development right now, citing a 300-million-euro budget deficit against cost-cutting targets at its primary Wolfsburg factory. The broader project remains active rather than cancelled, with engineers scheduled to return to the vehicle once fresh savings are realized.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 3 source reports

Microsoft folds Turn 10 into Playground Games as franchise creator Dan Greenawalt departs

Microsoft is fully integrating Forza Motorsport developer Turn 10 Studios into Playground Games under the new banner Playground Games Redmond. Alongside the studio consolidation, Turn 10 co-founder and vice president Dan Greenawalt is retiring from Microsoft after 27 years with the company, according to an internal memo obtained by The Verge.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 2 source reports

Cisco tasks a 27-year-old engineer with an ambitious two-year legacy code overhaul powered by artificial intelligence

Cisco President and Chief Product Officer Jeetu Patel has granted 27-year-old employee Padmanabhan Krishnamurthy unlimited artificial intelligence tokens to lead a massive software overhaul. Krishnamurthy, the cofounder of translation startup EzDubs, joined Cisco through an acquisition and initially proposed refactoring 98% of the company's legacy code with just one other person. The project kicks off with a four-week demonstration period, aiming to complete the transformation within 24 months.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 4 source reports

Fujifilm commits 10 billion yen to expand magnetic tape manufacturing for artificial intelligence archives

Fujifilm is investing 10 billion yen (roughly $63 million to $64 million) to multiply its magnetic tape manufacturing capacity fivefold by fiscal 2028. The multi-year project at its Odawara facility within the Kanagawa Factory runs from fiscal 2026 through 2028 and represents the company's largest tape storage investment in approximately two decades. Output will concentrate on advanced cartridges capable of holding up to 100TB each, primarily latest-generation FUJIFILM LTO Ultrium10 media, measured against fiscal 2025 production baselines.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 4 source reports

EA prioritized Star Wars Battlefront 3 over BioWare and the next Mass Effect

Electronic Arts decided to shut down BioWare and cancel the next Mass Effect title after executives were forced to choose between funding the role-playing game or developing Star Wars Battlefront 3. According to reporting from Bloomberg, the publisher faced mounting financial pressure following a recent buyout that left it saddled with $18bn in debt. When an opportunity emerged through Lucasfilm for DICE and Respawn to build a third Battlefront installment, EA leadership selected the licensed Star Wars project as a safer commercial investment over Mass Effect Universe, which remained years away from release.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 5 source reports

Mistral releases open weights for its trillion-parameter Large 4 model

French artificial intelligence lab Mistral AI has published the open weights for Mistral Large 4, a trillion-parameter multimodal model nicknamed "Le Chonk." The release on October 29, 2026, follows a three-week preview rollout that began on October 6. Outlets report varying figures for its active parameters, with SiliconANGLE citing 52 billion and Hugging Face noting 49 billion. According to Mistral, the model was trained from scratch in its European data centers over two months using 4,000 Nvidia Grace Blackwell GPUs.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 3 source reports

Chinese hackers breach US government firewalls using custom PHP2Shell exploit chain

Cybersecurity firm Dream reports that suspected Chinese threat actors compromised 25 servers, including Palo Alto Networks firewalls linked to US government-affiliated entities. The intrusions began on October 23, 2026, probing systems in the US, Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea before focusing on devices running vulnerable versions of PAN-OS, specifically versions 12.1 and 12.2. Palo Alto Networks' Unit 42 research team independently verified the findings and the tooling used in the attacks.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 4 source reports

General Motors agrees to 220 million dollar deal after quietly selling driving habits to insurers

General Motors has agreed to pay $220 million to settle a lawsuit led by a coalition representing 35 states and the District of Columbia. The action resolved claims that the automaker enrolled millions of motorists into its OnStar Smart Driver program without proper permission from 2016 through 2024. During that period, GM logged driving behaviors such as speeding, hard braking, and late-night travel before offloading the data to brokers, who then sold it to insurers that raised premiums for unsuspecting drivers.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 2 source reports

Intel pivots manufacturing toward data centers as rising component costs squeeze consumer PC demand

Intel plans to reallocate manufacturing capacity from its consumer Panther Lake processors to data center products as a severe memory crisis depresses computer sales. Speaking on the company's latest earnings call, Chief Executive Officer Lip-Bu Tan warned that the PC market faces challenging quarters ahead, prompting the company to shift 18A node wafer production toward enterprise hardware. Intel's stock fell 23% in after-hours trading following the announcement.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 3 source reports

Polymarket pledges full reimbursements after third-party script breach compromises user balances

Prediction platform Polymarket briefly suspended trading on its international website on Thursday after malicious code compromised user funds. Attackers exploited an integration with DebugBear, a website performance monitoring service, distributing rogue JavaScript that hijacked active user sessions. Security researchers at Hudson Rock identified an attacker-controlled wallet, and blockchain analysis by BleepingComputer traced about 28.6 million POL, worth roughly $2.57 million, sent to secondary wallets. Hudson Rock reported the primary wallet held roughly $2.19 million when investigated, while SecurityWeek reported over $2 million drained.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 5 source reports

DoorDash agrees to purchase rival Instacart in seventeen-billion-dollar grocery expansion

DoorDash announced on Thursday that it has agreed to acquire grocery delivery competitor Instacart in a deal valued at $17 billion, paying $65 for each Instacart share. The transaction has received approval from both companies' boards. Subject to potential regulatory hurdles, the takeover is projected to close in late 2027 or during the first half of 2028.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 2 source reports

Amazon shares slide after heavy spending on artificial intelligence triggers quarterly misses

Amazon missed analyst expectations for third-quarter revenue and earnings per share, sending its shares down more than 7% in late trading. Net sales rose 12% to $201.9 billion, falling just short of the $202.2 billion expected by analysts, while fully diluted earnings came in at $1.89 per share compared to estimates of $1.97. However, Amazon Web Services outperformed projections, expanding 39% year over year to reach $45.98 billion in sales and $17.8 billion in operating income.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 7 source reports

Reddit plans mandatory user logins to curb scraping and combat search traffic drops

Reddit is transitioning toward a logged-in experience, requiring visitors to sign in to access the platform. Chief executive Steve Huffman announced the shift during the company's third-quarter earnings presentation, explaining that Reddit lost an average of more than 1 million search engine referrals per week in October as AI search summaries reduce external web traffic. Initial testing will begin in select markets outside the United States before expanding more broadly, though Reddit has not set a definitive global launch date.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 2 source reports

Core 4 Solutions offers a 300-rack artificial intelligence cluster on eBay for nearly $60 million

Enterprise IT supplier Core 4 Solutions listed a massive 300-rack AI supercomputer on eBay for $59.7 million. The installation features 9,600 discontinued Nvidia A100 40 GB accelerators and 4,200 AMD EPYC Rome 64-core processors. Buyers in the United States were offered unusual delivery choices, including free shipping via FedEx Ground or an overnight delivery option for $50. The listing concluded on October 28 without immediate confirmation of a final sale.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 2 source reports

Apple expected to ship up to 1.5 million touchscreen OLED MacBook Pros as market expands

Apple is projected to ship 1.2 million to 1.5 million units of its new touchscreen MacBook Pro in 2027, according to research firm TrendForce. The newly announced laptop features a tandem OLED touchscreen with PROLED XDR, marking Apple's entry into the OLED laptop sector. The 14-inch model carries a premium starting price of US$2,899, and Apple plans to continue selling existing Mini-LED versions alongside it.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 3 source reports

Rivian raises delivery outlook after R2 quickly becomes its top-selling electric vehicle

Rivian announced on Thursday that its newly introduced R2 SUV became its best-selling model during the third quarter of 2026, leading delivery volumes ahead of the R1 and the Amazon delivery van. The company built 19,751 vehicles and delivered 19,248 during the quarter, generating $2.155 billion in revenue, up 38 percent from the same period last year. Buoyed by R2 demand, Rivian raised the low end of its full-year delivery guidance from 65,000 to 67,000 vehicles, keeping the upper target at 70,000.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 2 source reports

Thrive Holdings agrees to purchase home security provider ADT for $7.6 billion in cash

Thrive Holdings, a private equity offshoot of Joshua Kushner's venture firm Thrive Capital, has agreed to acquire physical security provider ADT for $10 per share in cash, amounting to approximately $7.6 billion in equity. ADT stated that the overall enterprise value of the transaction reaches $15.3 billion. The acquisition will take ADT private and is slated to close during the first quarter of 2027.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 3 source reports

SK Hynix projects global memory supply constraints will extend into 2030

SK Hynix reported record revenue and operating profit for the third quarter of 2026, but the South Korean chipmaker warned that global memory demand is projected to outstrip production capacity until 2030. The sustained crunch is largely driven by aggressive spending on artificial intelligence data centers, with further pressure expected as robotics and autonomous vehicles integrate AI hardware.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 5 source reports

Google widens AI Mode ads to 10 more countries and debuts multiturn formats

Google is expanding advertisements inside its AI Mode search experience beyond the United States to 10 additional countries, including Australia, Canada, India, Kenya, Malaysia, New Zealand, Nigeria, Pakistan, the Philippines, and Singapore. The company also announced plans to bring AI Mode ads to Brazil, Mexico, and the United Kingdom later in the fourth quarter of 2026. Simultaneously, Google is launching multiturn ads in the US, which will display sponsored results during follow-up questions.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 2 source reports

YouTube passes 150 million paid members as viewers push back against free-tier advertising

Alphabet announced that YouTube Premium and YouTube Music have surpassed 150 million subscribers combined, rising by 25 million from the 125 million members reported in March 2025. Alphabet chief executive Sundar Pichai revealed the milestone during the company's third-quarter earnings release, where he also shared that YouTube's quarterly advertising revenue climbed past $11.2 billion, up from $10.3 billion in 2025.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 2 source reports

Electronic Arts workers describe plummeting morale and aggressive artificial intelligence mandates after studio shutdowns

Electronic Arts announced plans to cut 400 positions across several studios, cancel projects, and close its BioWare subsidiary, letting go of most of the studio's remaining staff of around 50 people. The publisher is shifting focus toward its most profitable franchises following a $55 billion buyout by an investor group led by Saudi Arabia's Public Investment Fund, which left EA carrying $20 billion in debt.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

· 3 source reports

Sony Internet subsidiary suffers cyberattack compromising over 2.5 million customer records

Sony Network Communications revealed that an unauthorized party breached its So-net consumer internet provider database on October 19, 2026. The company detected the intrusion four days later on October 23, promptly shutting down compromised servers and blocking access. Investigations confirmed that more than 2.5 million records of current and former customers were compromised, encompassing 2,141,986 So-net entries and more than 440,000 records tied to plala services, which also affect partner internet provider NTT Docomo.

AI-generatedRead briefing and sources

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