The FBI warned parents of privacy and safety risks from children's toys connected to the internet. In an advisory posted on its website, the Federal Bureau of Investigation said that such toys may contain parts or capabilities such as microphones, cameras, GPS, data storage and speech recognition that may disclose personal information.

Normal conversation with a toy or in the surrounding environment may disclose a child's name, school, likes and dislikes and activities, the FBI said. "I think this is the first time the FBI has issued such warning," Tod Beardsley, director of research at cyber security firm Rapid7, said in a telephone interview.

Elon Musk’s thoughts on artificial intelligence are pretty well known at this point. He famously compared work on AI to “summoning the demon,” and has warned time and time again that the technology poses an existential risk to humanity.

At a gathering of US governors this weekend, he repeated these sentiments, but also stressed something he says is even more important: that governments need to start regulating AI now. “I have exposure to the very cutting edge AI, and I think people should be really concerned about it,” Musk told attendees at the National Governors Association summer meeting on Saturday. 

The Trump administration on Tuesday removed Moscow-based Kaspersky Lab from two lists of approved vendors used by government agencies to purchase technology equipment, amid concerns the cyber security firm's products could be used by the Kremlin to gain entry into U.S. networks.

The delisting represents the most concrete action taken against Kaspersky following months of mounting suspicion among intelligence officials and lawmakers that the company may be too closely connected to hostile Russian intelligence agencies accused of cyber attacks on the United States.

The chief executive of Russia's Kaspersky Lab says he's ready to have his company's source code examined by U.S. government officials to help dispel long-lingering suspicions about his company's ties to the Kremlin.

In an interview with The Associated Press at his Moscow headquarters, Eugene Kaspersky said Saturday that he's also ready to move part of his research work to the U.S. to help counter rumors that he said were first started more than two decades ago out of professional jealousy. "If the United States needs, we can disclose the source code," he said, adding that he was ready to testify before U.S. lawmakers as well. 

Windows Fall Creators Update will come with a hefty serving of security upgrades, made timely by the increasingly rampant cyberattacks targeting the platform these days.

Microsoft has revealed how the upcoming major update will level up Windows Defender Advanced Threat Protection, a Win 10 enterprise service that flags early signs of infection. Windows enterprise director Rob Lefferts said the upgrade will use data from Redmond's cloud-based services to create an AI anti-virus that will make ATP much better at preventing cyberattacks.

U.S. senators sought on Wednesday to ban Moscow-based cyber security firm Kaspersky Lab's products from use by the military because of fears the company is vulnerable to "Russian government influence," a day after the FBI interviewed several of its U.S. employees as part of a probe into its operations.

Federal Bureau of Investigation agents visited the homes of Kaspersky employees late on Tuesday in multiple U.S. cities, although no search warrants were served, according to two sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to discuss the FBI probe. 

We could be just five years away from a space-based quantum communication network. We are dependent on digital tools for almost every aspect of our daily lives, which means we also rely on two fundamental technologies: satellites and encryption.

Satellites are used for everything from GPS to television to processing credit card data, and encryption protocols are integral not only to communicating with these satellites, but also for matters as private as personal medical records, or as mundane as texting your friends. The problem is that the advent of quantum computing threatens to render current methods of encryption obsolete.

Even though its founders are long gone, The Pirate Bay remains one of the biggest piracy websites on the planet. Over the last decade, the torrent hub has been shutdown, reborn and consistently targeted in numerous lawsuits, of which one is only now coming to a close.

In a landmark ruling, the European Court of Justice told Dutch ISPs today that they must block access to The Pirate Bay because it facilitates an "act of communication" by allowing users to obtain pirated material. "Making available and managing an online platform for sharing copyright-protected works, such as 'The Pirate Bay,' may constitute an infringement of copyright," the CJEU said.

How would you like to chuck the boarding pass and ID flash at the airport for your fingerprint?

The Transportation Security Administration said it's testing a new checkpoint screening technology that matches fingerprints provided at the checkpoint with those already on file for travelers enrolled in the agency's PreCheck program. The program allows low-risk travelers to go through expedited screening instead of waiting in regular security lines. The TSA said the technology has the potential to automate the check-in process by eliminating the need to check passengers' boarding passes and identification.

Employees who become distracted at work are more likely to be the cause of human error and a potential security risk, according to a snapshot poll conducted by Centrify at Infosec Europe in London this week.

Of the 165 respondents, more than a third (35%) cite distraction and boredom as the main cause of human error. Other causes include heavy workloads (19%), excessive policies and compliance regulations (5%), social media (5%) and password sharing (4%). Poor management is also highlighted by 11% of security professionals, while 8% believe human error is caused by not recognising our data security responsibilities at work.