Geostrategies

From India, Guterres calls for $3 billion fund to ensure AI benefits all

(UN News) The future of Artificial Intelligence “cannot be decided by a handful of countries or left to the whims of a few billionaires,” the UN Secretary-General told the AI Impact Summit in New Delhi on Friday, calling for a Global Fund to help developing nations to better access these technologies. António Guterres highlighted the need to build skills, data capacity, affordable computing power and inclusive ecosystems. He expressed concern that without investment many countries will be “logged out” of the AI age. “Our target is $3 billion,” he said. “That’s less than one per cent of the annual revenue of a single tech company.”. He called this “a small price for AI diffusion that benefits all – including the businesses building AI.” – https://news.un.org/en/story/2026/02/1166996

The Sovereignty Gap in U.S. AI Statecraft

(Pablo Chavez – Lawfare) As the India AI Impact Summit kicks off this week, the Trump administration has embraced the language of “sovereign AI.” Through the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy and the emerging American AI Exports Program, the administration is seeking to position the United States as a partner that can help countries build sovereign artificial intelligence capabilities using American technology. But there is an irony to this: The concept of AI sovereignty is one that many countries are developing specifically to reduce their reliance on the United States. The traction that sovereign AI is gaining around the world reflects, in significant part, unease about U.S. policy. Many countries developing AI systems are hedging against the possibility that Washington will change the rules, restrict access, or use technology dependence as leverage. That hedging is pushing partners toward notions of sovereignty that may be incompatible with what the administration is prepared to offer. That offer might look like a reasonable middle ground in a more stable policy environment, but it’s less attractive in a period marked by tariff disputes with allies and partners, questions about multilateral commitments, and rising tensions within alliances. Whether partners will accept Washington’s version of AI sovereignty is a central question for U.S. AI statecraft. The answer will shape whether U.S. sovereign AI efforts reinforce reliance on the United States or accelerate other countries’ hedging strategies. – https://www.lawfaremedia.org/article/the-sovereignty-gap-in-u.s.-ai-statecraft

Governance and Regulation

EU needs to abandon AI ‘doomerism,’ White House official says

(Pieter Haeck – Politico) A top United States official on Wednesday told the European Union to focus more on innovation in artificial intelligence — and less on rules. “I do think the atmosphere in the EU needs to change and be more focused on innovation, less focused on governance and less focused on doomerism,” said Sriram Krishnan, the White House’s senior policy adviser on artificial intelligence, at an event of the Tony Blair Institute on the sidelines of the India AI Impact Summit. Krishnan reiterated the U.S. opposition to the EU’s Artificial Intelligence Act, which was adopted in 2024 and aims to mitigate risks associated with the technology. – https://www.politico.eu/article/eu-needs-to-abandon-ai-doomerism-us-top-official-says/

Germany eyes social media ban for kids

(Eliza Gkritsi and Milena Wälde – Politico) German Chancellor Friedrich Merz has expressed his “sympathy” for a proposal to ban social media for children ahead of a discussion among governing politicians starting Friday. Calls for a social media ban are gathering pace in Germany as other European countries move ahead with similar measures in a bid to protect children’s mental and physical health. Merz told the Machtwechsel podcast published Wednesday that he has “a lot of sympathy” for a proposal by the Social Democratic Party to ban social media for under-14s — a proposal floated in a discussion paper reported by POLITICO. – https://www.politico.eu/article/germany-social-media-ban-children/

AI is playing a bigger role at the 2026 Olympics

(Ina Fried – Axios) This year’s Winter Olympics are doubling as a proving ground for how artificial intelligence can help athletes train, organizers shuffle events, and fans experience a centuries-old celebration of what humans can physically do. Why it matters: The same technology reshaping the world is also transforming an event that brings the world together. AI’s most important role is also its least glamorous: logistics. Pulling off two weeks of precisely timed, globally broadcast competition requires orchestrating tens of thousands of athletes, staff and spectators — all at the mercy of winter weather. That’s exactly the kind of rapid contingency planning that AI excels at: running simulations, weighing options and helping officials adjust quickly without derailing the broader program. – https://www.axios.com/2026/02/18/artificial-intelligence-2026-olympics-replays

Intersections

Hollywood’s copyright fight meets China’s AI boom

(Madison Mills, Sara Fischer – Axios) China’s unrelenting efforts to catch the U.S. in AI may have claimed its first significant casualty — Hollywood. Why it matters: Technology good enough to scare even the most seasoned filmmakers is prompting a legal fight that’s only the opening salvo in a broader war over intellectual property and market dominance. Chinese AI models that undercut U.S. rivals on price, speed and market share pose an existential threat to high-cost, high-risk industries like the film business. They also ship with fewer safety guardrails, especially around copyrighted material and likeness rights. – https://www.axios.com/2026/02/19/hollywood-chinese-ai-bytedance-seedance

Security and Surveillance

Ransomware gang threatens Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes after shutting down schools

(Jonathan Greig – The Record) The government of the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes is being extorted by cybercriminals after a ransomware attack shut down its schools and critical systems in January. The Rhysida ransomware gang took credit for the attack this week and demanded 10 bitcoin, or about $660,000, in exchange for not leaking information stolen from the systems of the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes, a federally recognized government headquartered in Concho, Oklahoma. Officials previously confirmed the ransomware attack in January. – https://therecord.media/cheyenne-arapaho-ransomware-rhysida

Fed agencies ordered to patch Dell bug by Saturday after exploitation warning

(Jonathan Greig – The Record) A Chinese state-backed hacking group is targeting Dell customers with a zero-day vulnerability impacting a popular line of operational and disaster recovery tools. Dell and Google released notices on Tuesday about CVE-2026-22769, warning that a sophisticated Chinese actor has been targeting the bug since at least mid-2024. Dell’s advisory said the vulnerability carries a severity score of 10 out of 10 and provided fixes for the issue. The advisory notes Google’s findings of “limited active exploitation.” Google-owned security firm Mandiant published its own lengthy blog about the vulnerability and the attacks that resulted from it. Mandiant said the activity was targeted at organizations across North America. – https://therecord.media/fed-agencies-ordered-to-patch-dell-bug-after-exploitation-warning

Texas sues TP-Link, alleging it allows China to hack into routers

(Suzanne Smalley, Jonathan Greig – The Record) Texas is suing networking equipment company TP-Link Systems for allegedly allowing the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) to hack into consumers’ devices even as it promised consumers strong security and privacy protections. Attorney General Ken Paxton announced the lawsuit on Monday and said it is the first of several that will be filed this week against companies affiliated with the CCP. In December, Paxton sued the Chinese television manufacturers Hisense and TCL, alleging that they capture what consumers watch in real time and could be allowing the data to be harvested by China. – https://therecord.media/texas-sues-tp-link-china-allegations

Nearly 1 Million User Records Compromised in Figure Data Breach

(Eduard Kovacs – SecurityWeek) Nearly 1 million user records have been compromised in a data breach at blockchain-powered lender Figure Technology Solutions. The company confirmed to TechCrunch that it suffered a data breach after an employee fell victim to a social engineering attack, saying the attackers obtained a limited number of files. The ShinyHunters hacker group took credit for the attack on Figure. On its Tor-based leak website the cybercrime group made available more than 2.4GB of archive files allegedly containing data stolen from the company. – https://www.securityweek.com/nearly-1-million-user-records-compromised-in-figure-data-breach/

German Rail Giant Deutsche Bahn Hit by Large-Scale DDoS Attack

(Eduard Kovacs – SecurityWeek) Deutsche Bahn, Germany’s national rail operator, has been dealing with a large-scale distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) attack that has disrupted some of its IT systems. Regular status updates from Deutsche Bahn indicated that the attack began on February 17 and continued into February 18. According to the rail giant, the attack came in waves and its scale is substantial. The DDoS attack disrupted Deutsche Bahn’s information and ticketing systems, including its websites and the DB Navigator app. – https://www.securityweek.com/german-rail-giant-deutsche-bahn-hit-by-large-scale-ddos-attack/

Intellexa’s Predator spyware infected Angolan journalist’s device, Amnesty reports

(Pierluigi Paganini – Security Affairs) Amnesty International reports that in May 2024, Intellexa’s Predator spyware infected the iPhone of Teixeira Cândido, an Angolan journalist and press freedom advocate, after he opened a malicious link sent via WhatsApp. This incident highlights how attackers actively target journalists for surveillance. Predator is a powerful mobile spyware by Intellexa, sold to governments for surveillance. Investigations over five years documented abuses worldwide, despite Intellexa rebranding and shifting its corporate structure. The Angola case marks the first confirmed Predator attack there, showing the spyware remained active through 2025. Amnesty International and partners exposed Intellexa’s operations, but the responsible customers remain unknown. – https://securityaffairs.com/188215/malware/intellexas-predator-spyware-infected-angolan-journalists-device-amnesty-reports.html

French Ministry confirms data access to 1.2 Million bank accounts

(Pierluigi Paganini – Security Affairs) A hacker gained access to data from 1.2 million French bank accounts using stolen credentials belonging to a government official, according to the French Economy Ministry. French authorities said affected account holders will be notified in the coming days. “The French Economy Ministry said on Wednesday, February 18, that a hacker gained access to a national bank account database and consulted information on 1.2 million accounts.” reports French daily newspaper LeMonde. “Since the end of January, the hacker used the stolen credentials of an official to access and consult “parts of the file of all of the accounts open in French banks and which contains personal data such as bank account numbers, name of the account holder, address and in certain cases the account owner’s tax number,” the ministry said in a statement.” – https://securityaffairs.com/188200/hacking/french-ministry-confirms-data-access-to-1-2-million-bank-accounts.html

Industrial Control System Vulnerabilities Hit Record Highs

(Phil Muncaster – Infosecurity Magazine) The number of industrial control system (ICS) security advisories published in 2025 topped 500 for the first time since records began, with the severity of vulnerabilities also increasing, according to Forescout. The security vendor revealed the findings in its new report, ICS Cybersecurity in 2026: Vulnerabilities and the Path Forward. It said there were a total of 2155 CVEs published across 508 ICS advisories last year. That’s an increase from 103 CVEs across 67 advisories in 2011 – when records began. The average CVSS score of advisories climbed from 6.44 in 2010 to above 8.0 in 2024 and 2025. – https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/industrial-control-system-vulns/

Starkiller: New ‘Commercial-Grade’ Phishing Kit Bypasses MFA

(Danny Palmer – Infosecurity Magazine) A newly uncovered phishing kit allows cybercriminals to steal usernames and passwords with a toolkit which spoofs live login pages and bypasses multi-factor authentication (MFA) protections, cybersecurity analysts have warned. Dubbed Starkiller, the phishing platform has been detailed by researchers at Abnormal, who have described it as “a commercial-grade cybercrime platform” and “a comprehensive toolkit for stealing identities at scale”. The tool is distributed on the dark web like a software-as-a-service (SaaS) product, complete with a subscription model, updates and customer support. – https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/starkiller-phishing-kit-bypasses/

Flaws in Popular Software Development App Extensions Allow Data Exfiltration

(Kevin Poreault – Infosecurity Magazine) Researchers at OX Security have detected four vulnerabilities in three of the most popular integrated development environments (IDEs) that could lead to cyber-attacks. In a report published on February 17, OX Security shared details about the four new flaws, including two high-severity and one critical, affecting Microsoft Visual Studio Code (VS Code). These vulnerabilities also impact Cursor and Windsurf, two forks of VS Code that provide AI-assisted software development tools (aka ‘vibe coding’ platforms). The affected extensions were collectively downloaded over 128 million times. – https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/vulnerabilities-vs-code-cursor/

Researchers Reveal Six New OpenClaw Vulnerabilities

(Phil Muncaster – Infosecurity Magazine) OpenClaw has patched six new vulnerabilities in its popular agentic AI assistant, covering server-side request forgery (SSRF), missing authentication and path traversal bugs, according to Endor Labs. The vulnerabilities, some of which do not have CVE IDs, range from moderate to high severity, the security vendor said in a blog post published on February 18. – https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/researchers-six-new-openclaw/

Defence and Intelligence

Pentagon-Anthropic battle pushes other AI labs into major dilemma

(Dave Lawler, Maria Curi – Axios) As the Pentagon and Anthropic wage an ugly and potentially costly battle, three other leading AI labs are also negotiating with the department — and deliberating internally — about the terms under which they’ll let the military use their models. Why it matters: Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth wants to integrate AI into everything the military does more quickly and effectively than adversaries like China. He’s insisting AI firms give unrestricted access to their models with no questions asked — and showing he’s willing to play hardball to force their hands. Driving the news: The Pentagon is threatening to sever its contract with Anthropic and declare the company a “supply chain risk” because it’s unwilling to lift certain restrictions on its model, Claude. The company is particularly concerned about Claude being used for mass domestic surveillance or to develop fully autonomous weapons. The use of Claude in the Nicolás Maduro raid deepened tensions. The Pentagon claims an Anthropic executive raised concerns after the operation, though Anthropic denies that. Administration officials say it’s unworkable for the military to have to litigate individual use-cases with Anthropic before or after the fact. “We’re dead serious,” a senior Pentagon official told Axios of the threat to cut off Anthropic and force its vendors to follow suit. State of play: Crucially, Claude is the only model available in the military’s classified systems through Anthropic’s partnership with Palantir. – https://www.axios.com/2026/02/19/anthropic-pentagon-ai-fight-openai-google-xai