mSpy data breach: mSpy, a phone surveillance app, was hit with a data breach that affected not only millions of its customers who bought access over the past decade, but also the Ukrainian company behind it. Read more
Robots do the darndest things: In a series of videos, Google's DeepMind employees work with a smart assistant-style "OK, Robot" before asking the system to perform different tasks around the 9,000-square-foot office space. Read more
YouTube shares the love with creators: The streaming service has a suite of new features designed to make its short-form video product, YouTube Shorts, more compelling. Six to be exact, including one that will automatically transform longer videos into Shorts. Read more
Are visual AI models actually blind? That's what a new study is saying. Read more
"Wild Wild Space": The new HBO documentary premieres Wednesday and follows the early days of the new space race by focusing on three of its most colorful companies: rocket makers Rocket Lab and Astra, and Earth observation company Planet Labs. Read more
Copy cats: You know you've made it as a startup when the Big Tech companies start ripping you off. That appears to be the case with Retro, the popular photo-sharing app that's gained a following among those who appreciate the ability to share photos and videos more privately with friends and family. Read more
What's up with WhatsApp?
📱 WhatsApp Business is changing its per-conversation rates for businesses — a conversation is a 24-hour thread between sellers and users. It's also reducing rates for utility messages and raising rates for marketing messages. Read more
🇮🇳 WhatsApp is also enabling businesses to send authentication and login codes through its API to users in India. Read more
MONEY, MONEY, MONEY 💰
Helsing raises $487M Series C: Defense AI startup Helsing plans to expand its presence in European nations bordering Russia. Read more
Alma raises $5.1M seed: Company co-founder Aizada Marat had such a bad immigration experience, she founded a legal AI startup to fix it. Read more
Medal raises $13M: Medal is best known for its video game clipping product; however, with this new round of funding, it unveiled Highlight, a new cross-platform desktop app that acts as a contextual AI assistant for users. Read more
HerculesAI raises $26M Series B: HerculesAI has been working at automating professional services since 2017, originally concentrating on the legal industry. In fact, it has actually been building large language models for several years, long before it was cool and long before ChatGPT. Read more
Exein raises $15M Series B: What would happen if a robotic arm on a production line was hacked and instructed to kill its human co-worker? That "device security" is the kind of thorny problem that Rome-based startup Exein is tackling. Read more
