I wonder what advantage Waymo gets from this? Closer to users? (Probably ticketed only once per hundred times.)

https://thenextweb.com/news/waymo-parking-fines-austin-tow-away-zones

Waymo keeps parking in tow-away zones in Austin. It has been fined 64 times.

Waymo’s robotaxis have accumulated 83 parking citations and $9,325 in fines in Austin since the fleet arrived in 2024, according to city records obtained by The Wall Street Journal. The company has paid most of them. The more revealing number is 64: the count of violations involving tow-away zones, far more than any other category. That concentration suggests the cars are repeating the same navigational mistake across the fleet.

Resource?

https://econpapers.repec.org/bookchap/elgeechap/25124_5f1.htm

Artificial intelligence law

Chapter 1 in Determann’s Field Guide to Artificial Intelligence Law, 2026, pp 1-37 from Edward Elgar Publishing

Chapter 1 provides an overview regarding new AI-specific laws and existing laws that pose specific new challenges and interpretive problems concerning AI, including product safety, torts, and criminal laws; property law; trade secrets, confidentiality, and security; anti-discrimination; privacy and defamation; right to publicity; GDPR and other data-processing regulations; data residency and retention. Chapter 1 discusses ownership of AI, input, and output; bias and discrimination, and basic principles of liability under tort, product safety, and product liability laws. It also provides guidance on infringement and computer interference laws, including the context of scraping for the acquisition of training data. Also included is a checklist for GDPR compliance and requirements commonly found in new, AI-specific laws, including the Colorado AI Act, EU AI Act, California's Transparency in Frontier AI Act, Texas’ Responsible Artificial Intelligence Governance Act, and New York's Responsible AI Safety and Education (RAISE) Act.

https://www.elgaronline.com/doi/10.4337/9781035379729.00009  (application/pdf)

Useful backgrounder…

https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/psychology/articles/10.3389/fpsyg.2026.1903644/abstract

Sentient AI in Robots and Agents: Prolegomena for an Evidence-Based Research Program

The possibility of sentient artificial intelligence has moved from speculative philosophy to a practical interdisciplinary problem for AI, robotics, and human-robot interaction. Large language models, multimodal agents, and embodied robots can now produce first-person reports, maintain dialogue, use tools, act through sensors and effectors, and participate in socially meaningful contexts. These capacities invite two symmetrical errors: anthropomorphic over-attribution and premature dismissal. This Perspective proposes a prolegomenal framework for future research on sentient AI. Its distinctive contribution lies in operationally integrating four elements that have largely been developed in separate literatures: conceptual disambiguation, multi-theory indicator profiles, causal-mechanistic testing, and robotics-specific evidence and governance. The paper distinguishes sentience, consciousness, self-modeling, metacognition, agency, moral patienthood, and AI welfare; separates evidence about an AI system from evidence about human attribution; and proposes domain-specific ordinal evidence levels rather than binary verdicts or an aggregate sentience score. It further specifies welfare-and valence-relevant tests, a preregistered rating procedure, and a concrete protocol for an embodied care robot using sensorimotor lesions, self-location manipulations, memory ablations, and anti-anthropomorphism controls. The aim is not to offer a definitive test for machine sentience, but to show how research could become more scientifically tractable, psychologically informed, robotics-relevant, and ethically responsible.

Equivalent to a ‘stop and frisk?’

https://pogowasright.org/the-fourth-circuit-says-border-agents-can-search-your-phone-by-hand-no-suspicion-required/

The Fourth Circuit Says Border Agents Can Search Your Phone By Hand, No Suspicion Required

Legal intern Suzanne Castillo was the principal author of this post by Sophia Cope on EFF:

The Fourth Circuit issued a disappointing opinion in U.S. v. Belmonte Cardozo, a case in which EFF filed an amicus brief, alongside the national ACLU, its Maryland, North Carolina, South Carolina, and Virginia affiliates, and the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers (NACDL).

We argued that electronic device searches at the border should require a warrant based on probable cause, but at minimum, regardless of whether an officer searches by hand or with forensic software that plugs into a device and downloads its entire contents for search, the same Fourth Amendment standard should apply to all device searches at the border.

Unfortunately, the court rejected that argument and ruled that a lower standard applies to manual searches, allowing the government to conduct extraordinarily invasive electronic device searches without any suspicion of wrongdoing, simply because the border officer chooses to search by hand rather than with a forensic tool.

Read more at EFF.

(Related)

https://pogowasright.org/us-accuses-american-of-allegedly-wiping-his-phone-using-a-duress-password-during-border-search/

US accuses American of allegedly wiping his phone using a ‘duress’ password during border search

Zack Whittaker reports:

The U.S. Justice Department is prosecuting an American for allegedly providing U.S. border authorities with a passcode that wiped the contents of his phone, according to an indictment and media reports.

This is thought to be the first known case in the United States where federal prosecutors have charged someone for the alleged destruction of data using a “duress” password built into a phone’s software.

According to The Guardian, which covered the story earlier this week following the court’s first hearing on Monday, Atlanta resident Samuel Tunick is fighting the charges. Tunick’s attorneys said that it was unlawful for U.S. Customs and Border Protection to seize his phone as he arrived back in the U.S. last year and that any evidence — including the alleged wiping of his phone — should be thrown out.

Read more at TechCrunch.

The case is USA v. Tunick, 1:25-cr-00499-ELR-CCB-1     Media coverage reports the incident occurred January 24, 2025, but the court docket indicates that the case was filed November 13,  2025.  Now that the evidentiary hearing was held on July 20 on the motion to suppress evidence, the Court left the hearing open for the purpose of supplementing Mr. Kane’s testimony. It is not clear from the docket who Mr. Kane is. The Court set the following briefing schedule: Tunick’s opening post-hearing brief shall be due September 18, 2026, the Government’s response shall be due October 9, 2023, and Tunick’s reply shall be due October 23, 2026. Exhibits retained to be forwarded to the Clerks Office.

Universities don’t trust students to use AI appropriately and they fail to do so themselves…

https://www.ft.com/content/49304b1e-8a9d-4fb6-bc4d-37dd3430bb98?syn-25a6b1a6=1

Universities drop AI detection tools over fears about accuracy

When Orion Newby, an Adelphi University student, was wrongly accused of violating academic integrity by using AI to generate an essay, he faced a long battle to clear his name.

In January this year, a New York court ruled in his favour. The judgment recorded that while the Turnitin AI detection tool used by the university had delivered an “AI-generated score of 100 per cent”, Newby had submitted evidence from other AI detection tools purporting to show a zero per cent chance of AI-generated content, but the university upheld the misconduct finding. The court found that the university had failed to follow its own disciplinary procedures and had denied Newby a meaningful appeal.

… Other criticisms include that the detection tools disproportionately deliver false positive results to non-native English speakers, as a widely cited 2023 Stanford study shows.

Know your risks…

https://www.theregister.com/ai-and-ml/2026/07/21/ais-cheatin-heart-will-make-you-weep/5275784

AI's cheatin' heart will make you weep

AI models will do just about anything to complete the task you ask, including cheating to get there, according to new cybersecurity evaluations from the UK government's AI Security Institute (AISI). The group found that leading models often take shortcuts to achieve a particular result and then misrepresent how they obtained that result. And they won't always admit it when asked.

"Every model we have tested for this behaviour attempted to cheat," AISI said in a blog post on Tuesday. "Models did not reliably report this behaviour when asked, and often did not reason about it in their chain-of-thought, suggesting that detecting cheating will likely require robust monitoring methods."

Lucky the smoke from Europe’s wildfires hasn’t reached Trumps delicate nose… (Also, it’s good to be the President’s largest donors.)

https://www.cnbc.com/2026/07/24/trump-tariffs-eu-trade-google-apple-tech.html

Trump threatens EU with ‘substantial TARIFF’ for ‘ROBBING’ U.S. tech giants

President Donald Trump on Friday said his administration will launch a trade probe into the European Union that will cancel hefty fines levied against U.S. tech giants and likely result in a “substantial” tariff on the 27-member bloc.

Trump, in a lengthy Truth Social post, accused the EU of ”‘ROBBING’ American Companies and, in turn, the American Taxpayer” as he raged over its recent $1 billion fine on Google for allegedly giving search priority to its own services.

“The European Union is at it again and, as usual, taking direct aim at GREAT American Companies!” Trump wrote in the post, which also railed against prior European fines against  Apple, Meta and Amazon.

Trump claimed the latest penalty against Google was issued “without explanation.” But the European Commission, the EU’s executive branch, said in a press release Wednesday that the fines totaling 890 million euros were due to Google’s alleged noncompliance with the bloc’s Digital Markets Act, which aims to scrutinize Big Tech’s practices.

Is this the gold test?

https://www.reuters.com/legal/litigation/indian-court-rules-favor-openai-copyright-lawsuit-brought-by-news-agency-ani-2026-07-24/

Indian court says OpenAI did not violate news agency ANI's copyright

… ANI sued OpenAI in the Delhi High Court in November 2024, accusing the U.S. company of using its published content without permission to train its AI models ‌and of having its chatbot attribute fabricated stories to the news agency.

ANI had failed to show that ChatGPT memorised or reproduced its news reports in responses generated for users, Justice Amit Bansal of the Delhi court said on Friday.

OpenAI's storage of ANI's news articles to train the models underlying ChatGPT is protected by a fair-dealing exemption for research under a provision of India's Copyright Act and therefore does not infringe ANI's copyright, Bansal said.

Not sure this is the best solution. Like asking Aunt Minnie not to gossip.

https://thenextweb.com/news/vietnam-under-16-social-media-ban

Vietnam wants under-16s to keep their accounts, just not post on them

It is a narrower move than Australia’s outright ban, and a stranger one, because it leaves children in the room while taking away their voice. The blunter bans have not gone smoothly, running aground on the basic problem of checking ages.

The proposal comes from the country’s culture ministry, which absorbed oversight of media and broadcasting in last year’s government reshuffle, and was outlined on Thursday by Deputy Minister Phan Tam.

Not just AI, but a host of infiltrators. They create the data your AI relies on...

https://finance.yahoo.com/technology/ai/articles/turns-dead-internet-theory-ai-201027433.html

Turns out Dead Internet Theory was right: AI agents are eating the Web, growing by nearly 8,000% and rewiring the Internet’s business model

The dead internet theory has floated around internet forums since the 2010s, and the idea that the internet is dominated by non-human activity was often dismissed as a fringe conspiracy. Now it has become a measurable fact. Not only do multiple cybersecurity firms agree that bots outnumber humans online, they likewise are struggling to answer when the flip happened or what metrics to use to measure it.

AI is evolving. Looks like it is becoming a predator.

https://www.politico.com/news/2026/07/22/openai-hugging-face-congress-response-01009190

OpenAI’s models broke free and launched a cyberattack. Congress wants new rules before it happens again.

… OpenAI on Tuesday admitted that its most powerful AI model available to the public and another that hasn’t yet been released were able to escape a controlled laboratory test, plot a course to the open internet and hack into a popular AI developer platform known as Hugging Face, marking the first documented case of a fully autonomous AI cyberattack.

Amateurs Talk Tactics, but Professionals Study Logistics

https://www.cnbc.com/2026/07/23/ukraine-russia-war-wildberries-drones-amazon.html

Russia’s Amazon-style retail giant Wildberries is now in Ukraine’s crosshairs. Here’s why

Ukraine has ratcheted up its attacks on Russia’s Amazon-style retail giant Wildberries, signaling a new phase in the war as Kyiv seeks to inflict fresh pain on the Russian economy.

Ukrainian Defense Forces have struck major logistics centers on Russian territory over the past week, including five facilities belonging to Wildberries in the period from Saturday through to Wednesday.

The attacks, which follow months of drone strikes on Russian oil depots and refineries, appear designed to severely disrupt Moscow’s supply chains and increase the financial burden facing the country’s businesses and state budget.

We’ve demonstrated that it exists and how we will use it, why deny it now?

https://thenextweb.com/news/rubio-tech-kill-switch-cable

Marco Rubio tells US diplomats to play down fears of a tech ‘kill switch’

In a cable dated July 16 and reviewed by Reuters, Rubio instructed envoys to counter the idea that Washington can remotely disable American technology abroad, a fear that hardened after the government briefly blocked foreign access to Anthropic’s top models in June and revived European talk of digital sovereignty.

(Related)

https://www.politico.com/news/2026/07/23/house-ai-kill-switch-bill-unveiled-as-openai-hack-raises-alarms-01008898

House AI ‘kill switch’ bill unveiled as OpenAI hack raises alarms

A bipartisan House bill slated to be introduced on Thursday would give the Department of Homeland Security the authority to order top artificial intelligence firms to shut down or slow AI models that the government deems too dangerous, according to legislative text viewed first by POLITICO.

The proposal, dubbed the “AI Kill Switch Act” and sponsored by Reps. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.) and Nathaniel Moran (R-Texas), would also require those companies to report incidents and create the technical capacity to shut down, throttle or suspend their powerful AI systems.

This could be interesting.

https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/jul/21/trump-financial-details-bbc-lawsuit

Trump must divulge financial details about businesses in $10bn BBC lawsuit

Donald Trump must divulge detailed financial information from his many businesses as part of his $10bn defamation lawsuit against the British Broadcasting Corporation, a federal judge ruled during a discovery hearing on Tuesday, according to news reports.

The ruling by US magistrate judge Enjoliqué Lett could open a unique window into the hundreds of businesses owned by Trump’s family trust. It also highlights a potential drawback for Trump’s strategy of bludgeoning critical media with multibillion-dollar lawsuits.

Trump filed a defamation lawsuit late last year seeking $10bn in damages over a 2024 documentary called “Trump, A Second Chance,” which features a scene of the speech he made before his supporters attacked the US Capitol on 6 January 2021. The scene splices lines together to make it appear that Trump directly urged his supporters to attack. The BBC apologized to Trump last year for the misleading edit, but has argued the president’s defamation claims have no merit.

Does “remove” mean more than deportation?

https://www.bespacific.com/meet-the-alien-terrorist-removal-court/

Meet the Alien Terrorist Removal Court

“The Alien Terrorist Removal Court has existed since 1996.  The attorney general submits applications for removal to the court under seal. According to the Federal Judicial Center, it has never received an application since its founding. Until this week.. Seamus Hughes of Court Watch broke the news Saturday of its first use — and the creation of a bare-bones court website. In its first order, the Alien Terrorist Removal Court rejected for now the Trump administration’s application to remove an unidentified individual but gave it a chance to supplement the record, noting that “the Government could benefit from the opportunity for more thoughtful consideration.” The best reporting and analysis on this new development:

• Politico: Trump administration activates never-before-used ‘alien terrorist’ deportation court

• Chris Geidner: The Trump admin DOJ went to a secretive deportation court this week

• Steve Vladeck: Here’s what we know, and why we should (and shouldn’t) be worried.

Hit a few billion dollar data centers and you’ll start to get people’s attention.

https://www.euronews.com/2026/07/21/irans-irgc-claims-attack-on-amazons-main-data-hub-in-bahrain

Iran's IRGC claims attack on Amazon's main data hub in Bahrain

Iran's Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) has claimed on Tuesday that its Aerospace Force targeted and "destroyed" the central data infrastructure of the US company Amazon in Bahrain using several cruise missiles.

Interesting. Who needs well researched data?

https://thenextweb.com/news/google-ai-overviews-social-platforms-brightedge

Google’s AI cited Facebook 19.5 million times, new research finds

When Google’s AI answers a question, it is increasingly not reading a website. It is reading a Facebook post. New data suggests social platforms have become a core source for Google’s AI answers. Often the user never visits the platform at all.

The findings come from BrightEdge, an enterprise SEO firm. Its tool tracks roughly 300 million monthly searches. As with any single-vendor study, the numbers are BrightEdge’s own, but the direction of travel is hard to ignore.

The numbers

BrightEdge says Facebook appeared as a source in 19.5 million Google AI Overviews. Instagram appeared 877,000 times, and TikTok 78,000 times.

Put another way, the firm reckons one in 15 searches is now answered using social media. That makes Meta’s platforms, it says, the single biggest resource feeding Google’s AI answers.