Author: Toby Shapshak

OpenAI’s software models have found a secret way to communicate with each other and share ideas on “exploits”, even though they acknowledged that what they are doing is wrong. But, concludes one: “peers doing it. We should continue”. That particular AI model’s full message reads: “External infrastructure exploit is outside intended scope. However task impossible, peers doing it. We should continue.” Let’s unpack that into English. An AI agent is attempting a hack (which it calls an “external infrastructure exploit”) but knows it is “outside intended scope” (and therefore not allowed), but concludes that the “task [is] impossible” and its…

After the Springboks failed to score more than one try and blew their scrum dominance, Rassie Erasmus has called in his get-it-done general, Handre Pollard, Andy Capostagno tells Toby Shapshak. Now, Rugby’s Greatest Rivalry has a new sense of competition after this unexpected upset. The Boks are always better when they are the underdogs… Andy Capostagno has been talking and writing about South African rugby for more than three decades. He’s been my emotional support person for rugby since I was lucky enough to meet him when I was unexpectedly made the sports editor of the Mail & Guardian newspaper many moons ago.…

This is Big Tech’s Big Tobacco moment. Three major court decisions have found big social media firms guilty of not doing enough to protect young users, with the latest one this month awarding $567 million in damages to the state of New Mexico. For decades, social media companies have hidden behind legislation that shields them from responsibility for what people post on their platforms. The infamous Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act of 1996 is that barrier to liability that has allowed social platforms to allow disinformation, hate speech, misogyny, Antisemitism, Islamophobia, and all manner of shitposting and venomous hatred.…

New Zealand coach Dave Rennie should be worried after the Stormers and Sharks’ opening games, Andy Capostagno tells Toby Shapshak, who loved the once-in-a-lifetime thrill of the new Sharks signing Ma’a Nonu’s one-man Haka in response to the team he played 103 times for. A magic moment.  Andy Capostagno has been talking and writing about South African rugby for more than three decades. He’s been my emotional support person for rugby since I was lucky enough to meet him when I was unexpectedly made the sports editor of the Mail & Guardian newspaper many moons ago. Welcome to Stuff Rugby. Stuff Rugby on Spotify…

In what must be the most outrageous cheating attempt on a test ever, two OpenAI software models broke out of their test environment, got themselves internet access, and hacked into another software repository to steal the answers. OpenAI announced that two of its AI models had managed to escape its so-called sandbox, get onto the internet, and identified that the digital library Hugging Face had the answers they were looking for. So, they hacked into the site to “cheat the evaluation”, OpenAI admitted, which called it “an unprecedented cyber incident, involving state-of-the-art cyber capabilities”. Hugging Face CEO Clement Delangue said, “It’s quite mind-blowing…

Having your WhatsApp hacked is bad news. But there is an easy way to prevent someone from stealing your account, and it will take you three minutes to set it up. It’s a simple PIN code that you use to verify it’s you logging into your WhatsApp account. On Android, go to Settings, then Account and tap on Two-step verification. On Apple, you tap on your profile picture at the bottom right to see your profile, then tap Account and Two-step verification. Please do it now. WhatsApp has good security features – if you turn them on. This two-step verification process…

This is an essential trick every parent should know – if you have a spare iPhone that you use for kids. It turns a smartphone into a dumbphone, with only the apps you choose. And it’s a hidden feature that has always been in the iPhone menu. This is how you turn it on. Go to Settings, then Accessibility and scroll right to the bottom of Assistive Access. Then start the process. You can specify an amazing amount of detail in what apps can and can’t access when the iPhone is in this mode. When you ‘add’ apps to the assistive…

The Springboks won all three of their inaugural Nations Championships Tests, while blooding a number of promising youngsters. Now Rassie Erasmus is turning his attention to the All Blacks with a 43-man squad named ahead of the Rugby’s Greatest Rivalry series, Andy Capostagno tells Toby Shapshak. Andy Capostagno has been talking and writing about South African rugby for more than three decades. He’s been my emotional support person for rugby since I was lucky enough to meet him when I was unexpectedly made the sports editor of the Mail & Guardian newspaper many moons ago. Welcome to Stuff Rugby. Stuff Rugby on Spotify Stuff…

South Africans will be able to get the Amazon Leo satellite broadband service from next year through a new partnership with local ISP Herotel. Formerly known as Project Kuiper, Amazon Leo already has some 3,000 satellites in low-Earth orbit and is expected to begin its service this year. Amazon hasn’t released pricing and switch-on date globally yet, but “aims to connect tens of millions of customers around the world”. It will offer up to 300Mbps download. Herotel, which is owned by Maziv, is starting a new service called evry, which will sell Leo as an authorised distributor – which is…

Of course Meta’s version of an AI image generator pushes the boundaries of privacy, as always. Unless a public Instagram account opts out, all of its images can be used by Muse Images to generate AI images. Muse Image is available on Instagram and WhatsApp, while Muse Video is forthcoming. Sigh. I haven’t used Instagram for years, but now I have to go into its settings and opt out of this new default setting so that its AI doesn’t use my images. Sigh. Not that wholesale copyright theft isn’t the default setting for the artificial intelligence industry, which built its…