Governance, Regulation, Legislation, Geostrategies

AI governance must move from principles to practical action, UN dialogue hears

(DigWatch) Bridging the global AI divide will require much more than expanding access to AI tools, participants heard during a thematic session of the United Nations Global Dialogue on AI Governance. Speakers argued that countries need digital infrastructure, reliable electricity, skilled workforces, trusted institutions and governance capacity if they are to shape AI on their own terms rather than simply consume technologies developed elsewhere. Throughout the discussion, governments, UN agencies, academics and industry representatives stressed that the next phase of AI governance should focus on implementation. They called for stronger international cooperation, investment in local capabilities and practical measures to ensure AI contributes to sustainable development instead of reinforcing existing inequalities. – https://dig.watch/updates/global-dialogue-session-ai-opportunities

Closing the AI divide means building capacity, not just expanding access

(DigWatch) The global AI divide is no longer simply about who has internet access or the latest AI tools. It is increasingly defined by who has the infrastructure, computing power, skilled workforce and institutional capacity to develop, govern and adapt AI and who does not. That was the central message of a discussion on bridging AI divides at the inaugural United Nations Global Dialogue on AI Governance, where governments, UN agencies and experts argued that narrowing AI inequalities will require a fundamental shift from expanding access to building long-term national capabilities. – https://dig.watch/updates/global-dialogue-session-bridging-ai-divides

Spain pushes UN coalition to protect children in the AI era

(DigWatch) Spain has proposed an international coalition to protect children from AI-related risks, using the first UN Global Dialogue on AI Governance in Geneva to seek wider support. Minister for Digital Transformation and Civil Service Óscar López said Spain wants governments to agree on common safeguards to ensure AI respects children’s rights, safety and development. The proposed coalition would operate under the UN framework. Spain said it already has support from France, the EU and Kenya in efforts to launch the initiative. – https://www.lamoncloa.gob.es/serviciosdeprensa/notasprensa/transformacion-digital-y-funcion-publica/Paginas/2026/060726-coalicion-proteccion-menores-ia.aspx

UNCTAD says digital divide goes beyond internet access

(DigWatch) UNCTAD has warned that closing the digital divide now requires more than expanding internet access, as AI reshapes trade, production and development prospects. The organisation said digital inclusion increasingly depends on whether developing countries can use digital tools and AI to build productive capacity, support local firms, create jobs and expand trade opportunities. Its analysis argues that digital skills, institutional capacity, data governance and fairer participation in the digital economy must match connectivity. – https://unctad.org/news/when-connectivity-isnt-enough-closing-digital-divide

UNCTAD calls for stronger global data governance for AI

(DigWatch) UN Trade and Development (UNCTAD) is urging governments, businesses and civil society to strengthen global data governance as AI becomes embedded across every sector of the economy. The organisation argues that data has become a strategic resource whose benefits should be shared more equitably, particularly with developing countries that generate growing volumes of valuable digital data but have limited influence over the rules governing its use. UNCTAD describes data as a shared resource that should be managed for the public good rather than treated solely as a commercial asset. Rather than advocating a single global regulatory framework, it supports an incremental approach based on common principles, safeguards and international cooperation. – https://unctad.org/news/data-new-natural-resource-who-decides-how-its-used

UNESCO highlights civil servants’ role in AI governance

(DigWatch) UNESCO’s AI literacy training for civil servants has highlighted the importance of public-sector capacity in responsible AI governance. The programme focuses on AI ethics, governance, risk management and responsible use, rather than only on productivity tools or prompt-writing skills. UNESCO said many participants initially expected practical training on AI tools, but later connected issues such as accountability, transparency, bias, procurement and oversight to their own public-sector responsibilities. – https://www.unesco.org/ethics-ai/en/articles/beyond-black-box-reducing-governance-blind-spots-through-ai-literacy-civil-servants?hub=701

What to Know About Chinese AI Models

(DigWatch) Chinese AI models are narrowing the gap with leading US systems, according to a new analysis by the Center for Strategic and International Studies. CSIS said recent releases from Z.ai, Moonshot, DeepSeek and Alibaba-backed Qwen show that China’s rapid progress in AI was not limited to DeepSeek-R1, but reflects a broader pattern of fast technical catch-up. The analysis points to Z.ai’s GLM-5.2 model, which performs close to the top US closed models in coding and agent-based tasks. It also highlights strong results from Moonshot’s Kimi, DeepSeek V4-Pro and Qwen3.7-Max across software engineering, reasoning and agent benchmarks. – https://www.csis.org/analysis/what-know-about-chinese-ai-models

Germany launches Agentic AI Hub for public administration

(DigWatch) Germany is testing agentic AI in public administration through a federal programme that brings startups and municipalities together to automate routine administrative work. The Federal Ministry runs the Agentic AI Hub for Digital Transformation and Government Modernization and DigitalService. The initiative focuses on autonomous systems that can review requests, analyse documents and prepare decision proposals. – https://digitalservice.bund.de/en/projects/agentic-ai-hub

Portugal links AI literacy to lifelong digital skills strategy

(DigWatch) Portugal has linked Europe’s new digital education agenda with its national efforts to expand AI literacy and lifelong digital skills. The government’s digital portal said digital education is becoming a strategic priority for both the EU and Portugal, as technology becomes more central to schools, work, public services and civic participation. The update follows the annual event of the European Digital Education Hub, an initiative of the European Commission under the Digital Education Action Plan. – https://digital.gov.pt/en/noticias/a-educacao-digital-na-europa-esta-a-entrar-numa-nova-fase

Portugal presents AMALIA as open European Portuguese language model

(DigWatch) Portugal has presented AMALIA, its first open language model developed in European Portuguese, as part of a wider effort to strengthen national AI capacity and modernise the public sector. Prime Minister Luís Montenegro said the project shows Portugal’s ability to develop advanced technology and contribute to Europe’s strategic autonomy. AMALIA, short for Automatic Artificial Intelligence Multimodal Language Assistant, was developed by a consortium of Portuguese universities and research centres. – https://portugal.gov.pt/en/gc25/communication/news/llm-amalia-shows-portugals-potential

Japan to establish AI council to drive national AI adoption

(DigWatch) Japan’s government has approved plans to establish a new council to accelerate AI adoption and review the legal frameworks governing its development and use. The initiative forms part of the country’s 2026 policy guidelines and reflects growing efforts to integrate AI into key sectors of the economy. The new body will replace a digital administrative and fiscal reform council established under former Prime Minister Fumio Kishida. Authorities said it will lead to what they describe as an ‘AI transformation’, a broad effort to reshape public services, business processes and working practices through AI. – https://www.nippon.com/en/news/yjj2026070700143/

UK FCA review warns agentic AI could reshape retail finance

(DigWatch) A new FCA-commissioned review has warned that agentic AI could reshape retail financial services by allowing consumers to delegate more financial decisions to autonomous  tools. The Mills Review examines how AI could transform retail finance by 2030 and beyond, including banking, payments, savings, investments, insurance and debt advice. The review says AI is moving financial services from human-led and episodic activity towards services that are AI-enabled, continuous and delegated. – https://www.fca.org.uk/publication/corporate/the-mills-review.pdf

UK launches toy safety review as AI-enabled toys emerge

(DigWatch) The UK government has launched a Call for Evidence on toy safety, including whether existing rules remain suitable as AI-enabled toys and online shopping create new risks for children. The review is led by the Department for Business and Trade and the Office for Product Safety and Standards. It aims to assess whether the UK’s toy safety framework is fit for modern products and purchasing habits. The government said the Call for Evidence will examine issues including chemical safety and toys that use AI features. – https://www.gov.uk/government/news/government-steps-up-action-to-protect-children-as-ai-enabled-toys-emerge

Security and Surveillance

Britain plans to build autonomous AI ‘Cyber Shield’ to defend nation

(Alexander Martin – The Record) Britain’s cyber agency laid out plans on Tuesday for what it called “a national scale, sovereign defense capability” that would use agentic AI systems to discover and fix cybersecurity weaknesses across government networks and critical national infrastructure. The capability, called Cyber Shield, is designed to counter a threat the National Cyber Security Centre (NCSC) said could see attackers “move at machine speed and greater scale, reducing opportunities for detection and response”. Adversaries aided by AI, the agency said in a blog post, can already compress reconnaissance and vulnerability discovery from weeks into minutes. –  https://therecord.media/britain-plans-autonomous-ai-cyber-shield

Reddit expands AI moderation to combat spam and harmful content

(DigWatch) Reddit has expanded its automated moderation systems to reduce spam, inauthentic activity and harmful content across the platform. The company said it is using AI to detect manipulated and spam-like behaviour through new signals and faster enforcement. Reddit said suspicious accounts can now be identified from the moment they are created, while large language models help detect coordinated fake behaviour and artificial hype that older systems may miss. – https://redditinc.com/news/how-were-keeping-reddit-real-and-safe-in-the-ai-era

Scattered Spider’s Structure More Like a Cybercrime Collective Than a Unified Gang

(Alessandro Mascellino – Infosecurity Magazine) Scattered Spider has been reclassified as a decentralized cybercrime collective composed of independent clusters rather than a single, organized threat group. Group-IB analysis, published on June 7, challenges the traditional view of the activity as one coordinated operation, arguing that multiple actors share tactics, tools and communities while operating separately. The firm said this model helps explain why activity attributed to Scattered Spider has continued despite arrests and disruption efforts targeting some alleged members. The group, also tracked under names including 0ktapus, Muddled Libra, Octo Tempest and UNC3944 by different security vendors, has been linked to several high-profile incidents since 2022. – https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/scattered-spider-as-cybercrime/

UK Government Launches Cyber Resilience Pledge, Claiming 60+ Signatories

(Phil Muncaster – Infosecurity Magazine) The UK government has claimed over 60 businesses have signed up to a new initiative designed to improve the cyber resilience of British organizations. The Cyber Resilience Pledge was first trailed at the government’s CYBERUK conference in Glasgow in April, alongside a £90m ($120m) cash injection. Signatories now include Marks & Spencer, Nationwide, ITV, Microsoft UK, Cloudflare, Deloitte LLP, Accenture UK and Vodafone Group, the government claimed. – https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/uk-gov-launches-cyber-resilience/

Google Cloud’s New CISO Chris Betz on Integrating AI in Cyber Defenses

(Kevin Poireault – Infosecurity Magazine) Chris Betz has officially taken the helm as the new CISO of Google Cloud. Transitioning from his previous role as Google’s VP of infrastructure security, Betz is stepping up to lead the company’s security posture at a critical turning point in the industry. In his very first interview since assuming the CISO title, he shared his vision on the role generative AI will play in defending global enterprises. Coinciding with his transition, Betz published a key blog post on the Google Cloud blog titled Cloud CISO Perspectives: The 4 lessons that guided AI threat defense. In the article, he lays out Google’s playbook for using AI to defend against AI, advocating for a multi-model approach, robust security harnesses and the irreplaceable value of human expertise in modern cyber defense. Under his leadership, Google Cloud’s Office of the CISO reports directly to him. This organizational alignment places Betz at the center of both Google’s internal security engineering efforts and its customer-facing security advisory initiatives. Betz previously served as the CISO of Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Capital One. He has also held senior security engineering and response roles at Microsoft, Apple and CenturyLink. His career began in the US Air Force, followed by intelligence and security work at the National Security Agency (NSA). – https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/interviews/google-cloud-new-ciso-chris-betz/

Where Organizations Fall Short with MFA

(Daniel Imber – Infosecurity Magazine) Multi-factor authentication (MFA) is effectively non-negotiable in 2026. It’s a key defense against account compromise, which is why MFA is almost universally recommended by security frameworks and required by many cyber insurance providers. That confidence isn’t misplaced, as MFA is highly effective at stopping automated attacks that rely on stolen or weak passwords. However, the threat landscape has evolved. An organization may check the MFA box for compliance purposes while still relying on authentication methods that attackers now know how to target. The question for security leaders is no longer whether MFA is enabled. It’s whether the type of MFA being used can withstand the attack techniques being deployed today. – https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/blogs/where-organizations-fall-short/

Hackers Exploit Maximum Severity Adobe ColdFusion Flaw

(Phil Muncaster – Infosecurity Magazine) Adobe has urged ColdFusion customers to patch their instances immediately after at least one maximum severity flaw was reported as being exploited by attackers. The software giant released patches for 11 CVEs on June 30 in the APSB26-68 bulletin. Six of these were given a CVSS score of 10. Security researchers flagged that CVE-2026-48282 was being targeted within hours of the vulnerability being made public. It’s a path traversal flaw in the popular web app development platform which could lead to arbitrary code execution. There are 775 exposed ColdFusion instances online, according to data from the ShadowServer Foundation. CVE-2026-48282, and the other vulnerabilities listed in APSB26-68 were not in CISA’s Known Exploited Vulnerabilities catalog at the time of writing, but that will surely change. The maximum severity bugs are particularly dangerous, as exploitation does not require user interaction. – https://www.infosecurity-magazine.com/news/exploit-maximum-severity-adobe/

AI-Generated Malware Powers New Armored Likho APT Campaign

(Pierluigi Paganini – Security Affairs) Kaspersky’s threat research team has documented a previously unknown APT group they’re calling Armored Likho, also tracked under the name Eagle Werewolf. The group runs two parallel tracks: financially motivated attacks against private individuals and targeted espionage against government agencies and electric power organizations in Russia, Kazakhstan, and Brazil. The combination is unusual. Most groups pick a lane. The toolkit is modular and actively evolving. Armored Likho deploys obfuscated RATs, a newly documented Python-based infostealer called BusySnake Stealer, and Go2Tunnel for remote access and network tunneling. “Their toolkit features obfuscated, modular RATs and infostealers specifically engineered to bypass dynamic analysis. Alongside these, they leverage simpler tools like Go2Tunnel for remote access and network tunneling.” states Kaspersky’s report. – https://securityaffairs.com/194854/apt/ai-generated-malware-powers-new-armored-likho-apt-campaign.html

Alberta uses Claude Code to review government systems

(DigWatch) The Government of Alberta has used Anthropic’s Claude Code to review and secure provincial government systems, according to a case study published by the company. Anthropic said Alberta’s Ministry of Technology and Innovation used Claude Code with its Opus and Sonnet models to analyse code, identify vulnerabilities and support remediation. According to Anthropic, the ministry scanned 466 million lines of code in about 20 hours, covering systems used across 27 provincial ministries. Around 50 AI agents worked in parallel to identify security vulnerabilities, infrastructure weaknesses and documentation gaps. – https://www.anthropic.com/news/alberta-government-claude-cybersecurity