Ars Technica
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Original news, reviews, analysis of tech trends, and expert advice on the most fundamental aspects of tech.
Valve told Ars that, while the hardware itself actually supports HDMI 2.1, the company is struggling to offer full support for that standard due to Linux drivers that are “still a work-in-progress on the software side.”
Why won’t Steam Machine support HDMI 2.1? Digging in on the display standard drama.
Valve tells Ars its “trying to unblock” limits caused by open source driver issues.
arstechnica.com
December 5, 2025 at 7:36 PM
Valve told Ars that, while the hardware itself actually supports HDMI 2.1, the company is struggling to offer full support for that standard due to Linux drivers that are “still a work-in-progress on the software side.”
The European Commission announced that X would be fined nearly $140 million, with the potential to face “periodic penalty payments” if the platform fails to make corrections.
Elon Musk’s X first to be fined under EU’s Digital Services Act
The biggest changes Musk made to Twitter trigger a $140 million fine under DSA.
arstechnica.com
December 5, 2025 at 7:35 PM
The European Commission announced that X would be fined nearly $140 million, with the potential to face “periodic penalty payments” if the platform fails to make corrections.
To see if conversational LLMs can really sway the political views of the public, scientists at the UK AI Security Institute, MIT, Stanford, and other institutions conducted the largest study on AI persuasiveness to date.
Researchers find what makes AI chatbots politically persuasive
A massive study of political persuasion shows AIs have, at best, a weak effect.
arstechnica.com
December 5, 2025 at 6:07 PM
To see if conversational LLMs can really sway the political views of the public, scientists at the UK AI Security Institute, MIT, Stanford, and other institutions conducted the largest study on AI persuasiveness to date.
The findings raise questions about Kohler’s use of the term “end-to-end encryption” and the inherent privacy limitations of a device that films the goings-on of a toilet bowl.
Engineer proves that Kohler’s smart toilet cameras aren’t very private
Kohler is getting the scoop on people’s poop.
arstechnica.com
December 5, 2025 at 6:07 PM
The findings raise questions about Kohler’s use of the term “end-to-end encryption” and the inherent privacy limitations of a device that films the goings-on of a toilet bowl.
OpenAI’s scramble to tweak ChatGPT to be less sycophantic came before the man’s alleged attacks, which suggests the updates weren’t enough to prevent the harmful validation.
ChatGPT hyped up violent stalker who believed he was “God’s assassin,” DOJ says
Podcaster faces up to 70 years and a $3.5 million fine for ChatGPT-linked stalking.
arstechnica.com
December 5, 2025 at 4:37 PM
OpenAI’s scramble to tweak ChatGPT to be less sycophantic came before the man’s alleged attacks, which suggests the updates weren’t enough to prevent the harmful validation.
Despite their brazen attempt to steal and destroy information from multiple government agencies, the men lacked knowledge of the database commands needed to cover up their alleged crimes.
In comedy of errors, men accused of wiping gov databases turned to an AI tool
Defendants were convicted of similar crimes a decade ago. How were they cleared again?
arstechnica.com
December 5, 2025 at 4:37 PM
Despite their brazen attempt to steal and destroy information from multiple government agencies, the men lacked knowledge of the database commands needed to cover up their alleged crimes.
Security defenders are preparing themselves against a recently disclosed maximum-severity vulnerability in React Server, an open-source package that’s widely used by websites and in cloud environments.
Admins and defenders gird themselves against maximum-severity server vuln
Open source React executes malicious code with malformed HTML—no authentication needed.
arstechnica.com
December 5, 2025 at 3:43 PM
Security defenders are preparing themselves against a recently disclosed maximum-severity vulnerability in React Server, an open-source package that’s widely used by websites and in cloud environments.
The decision to delay the vote came abruptly yesterday afternoon when the panel realized it still did not understand the topic or what it was voting on.
CDC vaccine panel realizes again it has no idea what it’s doing, delays big vote
Today’s meeting was chaotic and included garbage anti-vaccine presentations.
arstechnica.com
December 5, 2025 at 3:24 PM
The decision to delay the vote came abruptly yesterday afternoon when the panel realized it still did not understand the topic or what it was voting on.
There’s plenty of interest in local AI, but so far, that hasn’t translated to an AI revolution in your pocket.
The NPU in your phone keeps improving—why isn’t that making AI better?
Shrinking AI for your phone is no simple matter.
arstechnica.com
December 4, 2025 at 9:01 PM
There’s plenty of interest in local AI, but so far, that hasn’t translated to an AI revolution in your pocket.
30 years ago today, Netscape announced a new programming language, one that emerged from a frantic, week-and-a-half-long sprint. It ended up sticking around far longer than anyone could've expected.
In 1995, a Netscape employee wrote a hack in 10 days that now runs the Internet
Thirty years later, JavaScript is the glue that holds the interactive web together, warts and all.
arstechnica.com
December 4, 2025 at 9:01 PM
30 years ago today, Netscape announced a new programming language, one that emerged from a frantic, week-and-a-half-long sprint. It ended up sticking around far longer than anyone could've expected.
