Aisha Down

A trial brought by 29 U.S. states against Meta has begun in Oakland, with prosecutors seeking up to $200bn and alleging that Facebook and Instagram were deliberately designed to be addictive and targeted at children. The case focuses on recommender algorithms and engagement-driven design, following earlier verdicts that held Meta liable for harms to young users and child sexual exploitation. A ruling against Meta could force changes to its algorithms and reduce user engagement and advertising revenue, although experts consider the most extreme financial estimates unlikely and doubt that regulators want to destroy the company. Meta denies the allegations and calls the states’ financial demands disproportionate. The proceedings are part of growing global scrutiny, including regulatory pressure from the European Union.

The Free Speech Union, founded by Toby Young, raised more than £60,000 for Julian Foulkes’s legal action against Kent police, despite the case being handled by a solicitor on a pro-bono basis. Internal communications and former staff sources raised questions about how the money was used, while Young said surplus funds were ringfenced and redirected to external legal costs for similar cases. The FSU has also faced scrutiny over larger fundraisers, including one for Graham Linehan, and over a proposed US government grant to its international offshoot, which appears inconsistent with the UK organization’s claim that it accepts no government funding.

Anthropic plans to watermark text generated by Claude by altering the model’s small, random word-selection decisions, in response to an EU requirement taking effect in December. Technology blogger John Gruber argues that the change could constrain Claude and lead to less precise writing, but University College London professor Steven Murdoch says the watermark should have no noticeable effect because the model will remain statistically unpredictable. Watermarking could also help identify AI-written work and reduce the risk of model collapse caused by training future systems on synthetic content.

A Guardian investigation finds an apparent gap between Microsoft’s public claims about rapidly expanding AI datacentre capacity and internal figures indicating it had about 2.2 million AI chips installed nearly two years after targeting 1.8 million. Analysts estimate that Microsoft’s reported power capacity could imply several million more chips, but differences may reflect unfinished facilities, non-AI workloads, inventory, or infrastructure associated with its OpenAI partnership. Microsoft disputes the calculations without identifying the specific errors, while evidence from the Fairwater project and sustainability reports suggests that bringing announced power capacity online is taking longer than the company’s announcements imply. The central constraint may be electricity and usable datacentre space rather than chip supply.

Police Scotland has warned that robust security will be needed at a proposed AI datacentre in Larbert because significant public opposition and possible disruption are expected. Nearly 7,000 objections have been submitted, with campaigners citing the site’s 200 diesel backup generators, potential pollution and noise, and its proximity to a care home and hospital. Opposition is growing across Scotland as the Scottish National Party backs a motion to freeze new datacentre projects, potentially complicating the UK’s AI strategy. Developer Apatura says it will comply with safety and environmental standards and engage with the community.

Demis Hassabis is stepping down from day-to-day leadership of Google DeepMind to become chair while serving as chief scientist at Alphabet. Koray Kavukcuoglu will oversee the unit operationally, a change former executives interpret as evidence that DeepMind has lost independence and is being brought more firmly under US-based Google control. The transition comes amid concerns about Gemini's competitiveness, the delayed Gemini 3.5 Pro, the departures of Jeff Dean and other leading researchers, and the broader commercialization of AI. Employees and campaigners also fear that Google's work with the Pentagon and other government bodies could undermine DeepMind's ethical commitments. Google rejects claims that the leadership change reflects Gemini's performance and says it will allow Hassabis to focus on scientific breakthroughs, while emphasizing continued investment, product integration and lower AI-talent attrition.

The US embassy in London is offering grants of up to $500,000 for public education and civic-engagement programs promoting the shared Anglo-American legal tradition, including free speech, limited government and the rule of law. Critics, including Liberal Democrat MP Lisa Smart and former US State Department officials, say the initiative could export MAGA-aligned narratives and interfere in British democracy. The embassy says the grants are intended to strengthen US-UK ties and support constitutional principles. A separate grant program also invites projects designed to build UK support for US policies on Israel, China and economic resilience, prompting concern that US public diplomacy is shifting from explaining policy to actively persuading foreign audiences.

A 411 analysis found that Russia-linked social media accounts, including channels connected to Rybar and the Pravda network, rapidly amplified far-right, Islamophobic and antisemitic narratives after tens of thousands of migrants crossed into Ceuta from Morocco. The content allegedly portrayed the influx as a coordinated assault, reached more than 720,000 views in six hours and helped mobilize nationalist groups. The analysis also found largely organic peer-to-peer exchanges among prospective migrants about how to make the crossing. Researchers said the speed and coordination of the propaganda represented a significant escalation from the 2021 Ceuta crisis, warning that established relay networks could quickly exploit future border incidents across the Mediterranean.

UK company Skyral is part of a consortium awarded a £2bn Ministry of Defence contract to help train British soldiers through detailed virtual simulations. Its platform creates digital twins of real cities such as Riga and models the cascading effects of battlefield decisions on infrastructure, logistics and civilian populations. The technology builds on military gaming and simulation but aims to go beyond individual combat scenarios by integrating multiple systems and social data. Experts note that simulations are cheaper and easier to repeat than live exercises, while research on their effectiveness and transferability to real combat remains limited. Related companies are also using digital models to test military energy systems and equipment choices.

Global AI-linked stocks experienced severe volatility after China’s CXMT surged on the Shanghai exchange and reports indicated that Chinese researchers had developed deep-ultraviolet lithography tools previously monopolized by ASML. The memory-chip advance threatens companies such as SK Hynix and Micron more than Nvidia, while Chinese lithography could eventually support rival GPUs, although commercial-scale competition remains years away. Analysts describe the market sell-off as an overreaction to short-term developments but warn that China’s advances could reshape the industry over time, particularly as US export controls encourage domestic innovation. Investor anxiety has also been intensified by Nvidia’s reported potential $250bn financing backstop for an OpenAI data-centre project, highlighting the AI economy’s dependence on opaque, circular deals and Nvidia’s outsized market influence.

The Guardian’s live coverage reports that election experts have cast doubt on Homeland Security Secretary Markwayne Mullin and Donald Trump’s claim that more than 250,000 noncitizens are registered to vote in California, New Jersey, Nevada and Pennsylvania. Experts say the DHS methodology is opaque, may confuse outdated immigration records with current citizenship status, and does not establish that any individuals voted illegally. The coverage also fact-checks Trump’s claims about Chinese interference in the 2020 election, noting that the declassified intelligence assessment focused more heavily on Russia’s efforts to help Trump by spreading allegations about Joe Biden and Ukraine. Other developments include Trump’s pressure on Darline Graham Nordone to run for her late brother Lindsey Graham’s Senate seat, criticism of Canada over wildfire smoke, a shooting involving a GEO Group employee outside an ICE facility, Trump’s FIFA World Cup appearances, and plans by his media company to sell priority access to Truth Social posts.

The Trump administration’s State Department intends to allocate $12m to UK-based organizations founded or led by conservative figures Jacob Rees-Mogg and Toby Young. The proposed grants include $7m for the newly established 878 think tank, $5m for Free Speech Union International, and a separate $3m allocation for the Jobs Foundation. The funding, structured as noncompetitive sole-source awards, is intended to support causes including opposition to mass immigration, censorship, digital regulation and supranational governance. Former State Department officials called the process an abuse of public funds and a departure from normal competitive safeguards, while the department said the grants remained under review. The organizations involved said they had not yet received awards or were still under consideration.

Germany’s chancellor Friedrich Merz warned the US against interfering in upcoming German elections after the State Department announced multimillion-dollar grants aimed at supporting groups aligned with nationalist and socially conservative causes in Europe. The initiative, viewed by former officials as an attempt to boost rightwing parties, raised concerns due to ambiguous eligibility criteria and legal restrictions on foreign funding of German political parties. The move follows broader tensions driven by US criticism of European policies and efforts to build ties with conservative groups across the continent. European organisations, including the UK’s Free Speech Union and groups affected by political shifts in Hungary, may benefit from the grants, which are being administered by a State Department bureau repurposed under the Trump administration.

Microsoft, Amazon and Google emitted a combined 119 million metric tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent in the financial year ending March 2026, nearly one-fifth more than the previous year and about one-third of France’s emissions. The increases were driven largely by datacentre construction and supply-chain expansion linked to cloud computing and artificial intelligence. Microsoft’s emissions rose 25%, Google’s 18% and Amazon’s 16%, even as all three maintain net-zero targets. Experts argue that cloud migration can shift or obscure companies’ environmental footprints, while growing AI investment may also face a shortage of carbon credits. Global datacentre construction is expected to accelerate sharply, creating substantial additional electricity demand.

Hundreds of large-scale datacentre projects supporting the expansion of artificial intelligence are being delayed, cancelled or challenged because of grid constraints, high construction costs, supply-chain bottlenecks, water and energy demands, and opposition from local communities and environmental groups. The Uptime Institute estimates that about half of 250 projects announced between 2021 and 2024 may not be completed on schedule or at all, despite demand from companies such as Google, Microsoft, OpenAI and Anthropic. Planned projects would create enormous new electricity requirements, particularly in North America, while existing grids are already strained. Some developers and analysts, including JLL, remain confident that onsite generation, battery storage and other innovations will enable continued growth, but the infrastructure race is intensifying conflicts over scarce power and the broader social and environmental tradeoffs of building AI capacity.

The Scottish National party has passed a motion calling for a moratorium on new datacentres, which the Scottish government will now consider. The measure could halt projects without planning permission, including a proposed Lanarkshire AI growth zone, amid concerns that 24 planned hyperscale facilities would exceed Scotland’s peak electricity demand and constitute overdevelopment. The move threatens the UK government’s strategy of using Scotland’s renewable energy resources to build AI infrastructure. Wider scrutiny is also growing over allegedly inflated investment and jobs claims, while Commons science and technology committee chair Chi Onwurah has called for a clearer plan to secure UK AI sovereignty after foreign export restrictions highlighted the country’s dependence on overseas technology firms.

Residents of Newarthill and nearby Airdrie fear that a planned Lanarkshire AI growth zone will consume green-belt land, threaten property values and deliver far fewer benefits than promised. The development, involving CoreWeave and DataVita, was promoted as a multibillion-pound project that would create 3,400 jobs, fund up to £543m in community programmes and run on extensive on-site renewable energy. Public documents and a Scottish government audit indicate that the site may instead depend on the strained national grid, while DataVita appears to have far less renewable capacity than would be needed for its stated 1GW power plan. Residents also report opaque consultations and informal offers from energy companies, and an investigation by Action to Protect Rural Scotland found that the jobs estimate was extrapolated from another site and may be vastly inflated. The government maintains that its employment figure includes construction, supply-chain and regional roles, but local people remain concerned that they will bear the project's land and environmental costs without receiving its promised investment or lasting employment.

A Guardian investigation finds that the £8.2bn Lanarkshire AI datacentre project, promoted by the UK government, CoreWeave, and DataVita as being powered entirely by on-site renewables by 2030, lacks credible plans to deliver that promise. DataVita’s proposed 400MW of solar and 800MW of wind would require an estimated 40–100 sq km of land, while current planning applications cover only about 2 sq km and a proposed 19-turbine energy park would provide roughly 5% of the claimed generation. The site also lacks the required grid connection, leaving it dependent on a lengthy queue or preferential treatment. Government and developer documents show that power provision was known to be a problem, raising doubts about the credibility of the AI growth-zone designation and the UK’s wider plans for energy-intensive AI infrastructure.

The UK government’s five AI growth zones are intended to attract datacentres of at least 500MW, create jobs in former industrial areas and strengthen Britain’s position in artificial intelligence. An investigation finds major feasibility problems: Lanarkshire’s proposed renewable-energy supply appears far too small and the site may rely on the strained national grid; projected employment and community-fund figures are questioned; and the North Tyneside Stargate UK project lacked clear grid capacity and was reportedly shaped by political pressure before OpenAI withdrew. With grid connections taking up to a decade, prioritizing datacentres could also place them ahead of homes and hospitals, casting doubt on the government’s broader AI infrastructure ambitions.

Analysis of Elon Musk’s activity on X shows he focused far more on UK race and immigration issues than on SpaceX in the lead-up to the company’s IPO. His posts frequently engaged with contentious political events in the UK, including reactions to the Henry Nowak case and unrest in Belfast, drawing criticism from Prime Minister Keir Starmer for inflaming divisions. Musk amplified far‑right figures and commentary, significantly increasing their reach. Experts warn that his wealth and influence distort democratic discourse, while research links his engagement to increased calls for violence. Meanwhile, SpaceX’s IPO proceeded with strong investor interest, raising over $85bn.

OpenAI’s planned Stargate UK datacentre project appears to have been advanced without basic groundwork, with neither OpenAI nor Nscale visiting the key Cobalt Park site and much of the touted £30bn investment revealed to be hypothetical. Only Nvidia engaged with local authorities, and Freedom of Information disclosures indicate the site lacked a grid connection and relied on a redacted alternative power proposal. Local officials and transparency advocates criticised the government for implying £20bn in potential investment despite it representing only estimated infrastructure needs. The findings suggest the project, announced during Donald Trump’s UK visit, was largely a political showcase rather than a developed investment plan, with growing doubts about its viability due to energy costs, inadequate infrastructure and limited preparatory coordination.

President Trump generated over $2bn in the past year through cryptocurrency-related ventures and branded merchandise as the US positions itself as a leading global crypto hub. The episode features discussion of how Trump and his family leveraged digital tokens, meme coins and other commercial products to build significant revenue while he remains in office, raising questions about the financial limits for a sitting president.

Slough, one of Europe’s largest datacentre hubs, is experiencing intense summer heat that residents say is worse than in surrounding areas. Emerging Cambridge-led research suggests datacentres can create a local heat-island effect, raising nearby temperatures by an average of 2C and potentially as much as 9C, although the evidence remains preliminary. Researchers say Slough’s approximately gigawatt-scale concentration of facilities could have larger effects than earlier datacentres studied. Residents attribute the heat variously to datacentres, extensive concrete and the broader climate crisis, while acknowledging that the facilities provide local jobs. The UK government is considering using waste heat from datacentres to warm homes.