The nominations are in - and the finalists for the 2026 edition of the Power 50 can now be revealed.

Part of the Mobile Industry Awards 2026, the Power 50 highlights the most important and influential figures in the UK mobile industry during the past year.

The finalists for the Power 50 2026 have now been decided, with the final standings set to be revealed at the awards.

(Please note: these names are ranked A- Z by first name and not the final rankings.)

View the 2026 Power 50 here!

The winner, recognised with the Power 50 award at the Mobile Industry Awards on September 17 2026, is selected following in-depth interviews with key senior figures across the industry, from operators and retailers to manufacturers and distributors.

It rewards those individuals who inspire their businesses with their values, but also have influence beyond existing roles, serving as an inspiration to the rest of the trade.

To make the Power 50 list, an executive needs to be bold in their leadership and vision, and have exceeded expectations in the different categories we have chosen.

Power 50 Previous Winners 

• 2025: Max Taylor, CEO, VodafoneThree
• 2024: Marc Allera, CEO - EE and Consumer Division at BT Group
• 2023: Ahmed Essam, CEO, Vodafone UK
• 2022: Lutz Schüler, CEO, Virgin Media O2
• 2021: Marc Allera, CEO, EE and BT Consumer
• 2020: Nick Jeffrey, CEO, Vodafone
• 2019: Marc Allera, CEO, EE and BT Consumer
• 2018: Marc Allera, CEO, EE and BT Consumer
• 2017: David Dyson, CEO Three UK
• 2016: Sebastian James, Group CEO, Dixons Carphone
• 2015: Sebastian James, Group CEO, Dixons Carphone
• 2014: Andrew Harrison, CEO, Carphone Warehouse
• 2013: Olaf Swantee, CEO, EE
• 2012: Simon Stanford, VP of UK & Ireland telecommunications and networks division, Samsung UK
• 2011: Guy Laurence, CEO, Vodafone UK
• 2010: Tom Alexander, CEO, Everything Everywhere
• 2009: Andrew Harrison, CEO, Carphone Warehouse
• 2008: Kevin Russell, CEO, Three UK

• For more information on the Power 50, or to get more involved in the Mobile Industry Awards 2026, visit the awards site here

• Just 27% of Gen Z respondents use antivirus software for mobile devices, and are less likely to regularly change passwords
• 57% of Gen Z spend more time online than offline, Kaspersky finds
• And only 28% regularly backup important personal data stored on their phones

Gen Z has no awareness of cybersecurity, online safety principles, or the risks of not changing your password. With just over half (52%) of respondents admitting they have had devices, data, or online accounts attacked, only 27% actually employ standard countermeasures like mobile antivirus tools.

In a study of 7200 respondents from 18 countries, the company also found only 28% regularly backup important personal data stored on their phones.

An average Gen Z-er appears to rely almost completely on their smartphone, which is where they store the information they value most, apparently without cloud backups or syncing in place. The survey has shown that social media accounts have been hacked (17%) and gaming accounts lost (12%), but smartphones have further risks to personal privacy if the correct precautions are not taken.

Gen Z needs to appreciate the risks

Access to personal photographs, identity documents, email, financial details, and of course social media profiles can be acquired via a compromised smartphone, opening the victim to a host of targeted attacks. Direct financial attacks can be made, identity theft, and more, depending on how successful the attacker is. Keeping the device out of an attackers reach, rather than inadvertently sharing its contents, is the safer course of action.

Irina Ermilova, Vice President for Consumer Product Management at Kaspersky, looked to address the apparent disconnect between a generation that has grown up with internet access and portable digital tech, and its lack of cybersecurity nous.

“Gen Z has grown up online, so digital services often feel intuitive and familiar to them. However, familiarity should not be confused with security expertise," she noted. "Being able to navigate apps, platforms and devices confidently does not necessarily mean being able to identify scams, manage passwords securely or protect personal data.”

“The findings show that cybersecurity tools and habits need to become as natural part of everyday digital life as messaging, gaming or using social media.”

Training Gen Z to find digital threats

Looking for a solution to this lack of cyber-risk awareness, Kaspersky has launched an interactive online game aimed at Gen Z users. Case 404 is a "cyber-detective adventure" in the point-and-click mold, set in the future with fictional cases that have been inspired by actual digital threats.

In playing the game, Kaspersky hopes that Gen Z users will spot the scams and phishing attempts, and take that knowledge with them into the real world and stay safe and secure online.

• SyLC 3D Player supports everything from 3D Blu-ray to Apple spatial videos, and it can convert 3D video to display it on Apple Vision Pro headsets
• It's backwards and forwards compatible — and the creator says it can get dual-HDMI output for dual projection, for future-proofing
• The app runs on Windows, and is free via Github 'because this format deserves better than a slow death'

One of the great tech disappointments of the last few decades was 3D TV. Like many movie fans I was excited by the possibilities, invested in a 3D TV, and watched the entertainment industry ensure that yet again, 3D movies were a short-lived trend. By 2013, it was already generally agreed that 3D TV was dead and that smart TVs and 4K were the way ahead.

Not everyone got the memo [I had mine until 2020… -Ed]. Over on the r/audiovisual subreddit, Jarod-The_Centre is determined to ensure 3D never dies — so they have been making a free player that now "plays EVERYTHING in 3D" from Blu-ray to Apple spatial videos.

And that's just the beginning of its talents. If you're a fan of things pointing out of the screen for no good reason, Jarod's player is fascinating.

I refused to let 3D die ! So I spent months building a free player that plays EVERYTHING in 3D: Blu-ray MVC, 4K HDR side-by-side, even Apple spatial videos. And it converts your 3D Blu-rays to Vision Pro format... from r/audiovisual

What does the 3D player do?

What doesn't it do? The player, called SyLC 3D Player, is a Windows app that's now in its fifth release. It's designed to play three different generations of 3D content: Blu-ray 3D/ISO/MVC MKV; HEVC/H.265 3D up to 4K 10-bit HDR; and Apple's MV-HEVC spatial videos. "The MVC of the 2020s, playing on your 2010s 3D TV," Jarod writes. "There's something poetic about that."

The app outputs in frame-packed 3D for compatible 3D TVs and projectors, and it can do something else that's really impressive: it can export 3D content as MV-HEVC, so you can take a 3D Blu-ray and turn it into a spatial video for Vision Pro.

I love Jarod's explanation for making the app. "It exists because this format deserves better than a slow death, and because apparently I don't know when to stop."

Jarod's in good company. Reddit's response to the latest announcement has been really positive and packed with good ideas, so for example Acceptable-Rise8783 suggests that for future-proofing, the app should be able to "send the two fields separately but in sync through two HDMI outputs."

With 3D TVs and projectors becoming increasingly hard to find — as they point out, "projectors are dropping support left and right because the chips that do 3D are becoming hard to come by" — the choice of viewing platforms will be reduced to dual-projector 3D or VR headsets.

The creator says this is something likely to appear in the player in a future version as the player already drives two windows simultaneously — and it means that dual projectors is the most 'future-proof' option for 3D, and the app supports it as best it can.

The whole discussion is fascinating, and I think Jarod sums it up beautifully. "Keep the faith. The format's not dead while we're still building for it 🔥".

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• AMD and Cerebras will split inference across two machines, with Helios racks handling prompt processing and the Wafer-Scale Engine generating tokens, available through Cerebras Cloud in H2 2026
• Nvidia is also doing something similar by licensing AI chip startup Groq's SRAM decode technology for $20 billion
• The move sees AMD and Cerebras claim 5x higher tokens per watt versus a standalone Cerebras WSE configuration

AMD and Cerebras Systems have announced a technical partnership which pairs the former's Helios rackscale system with the latter's Wafer-Scale Engine in what both companies call a disaggregated inference solution.

The move has enabled a combined AMD Helios and Cerebras WSE configuration to deliver up to five times the tokens per second per watt (TPS/W) in internal testing by both chip designers.

The move aims to address a Cerebras WSE efficiency challenge by offloading prompt processing to AMD's rackscale offering.

An efficiency gains-centric play?

Both AMD and Cerebras Systems are painting the news as a win, and it very well might be, given the latter's efficiency gains in play and the former's ability to get access to SRAM decode technology without spending the $20 billion Nvidia shelled out at the end of last year for a non-exclusive deal.

It must, however, be noted that the efficiency claims of 5 tokens per second per watt are compared against an existing Cerebras WSE (Wafer-Scale Engine) as the baseline, while running the open-source Kimi 2.6 1T model, making them impressive, but without a direct comparison to figures for an Nvidia rackscale offering, one that lacks context, especially when efficiency is the metric.

The idea itself is sound and well established in the industry, with WSE known to struggle with the 'prefill' part of the equation while handling the 'decode' segment relatively well, essentially substituting AMD's hardware where Cerebras' equipment falls short.

The choice of Kimi 2.6, however, deserves a second look. Moonshot AI's model, released on 20 April 2026, is a mixture-of-experts design with one trillion total parameters but only 32 billion active per token, and it ships natively in INT4. At INT4, the full weight set runs to roughly 500 GB. A single Cerebras wafer holds 44 GB. Even before KV cache, a Cerebras-only deployment needs somewhere north of a dozen wafers just to hold the model, while one Helios rack could hold it around sixty times over.

That asymmetry means the five-times figure is measured on a model that is close to the least favorable for a WSE-only configuration. A dense model small enough to sit resident on a handful of wafers could flatter Cerebras considerably more. None of this makes the number wrong, but it does make the case for additional testing to demonstrate both its strengths and weaknesses for different models.

A partnership without numbers, for now

More importantly, the absence of any financial information might very well be a future story, especially at a time when there are increasing concerns about 'circular financing' in an industry where Nvidia's recent move to backstop OpenAI's data center purchases was seen as a net negative by Wall St, which is already concerned about AI spend and the sustainability of such transactions.

AMD has also, in the past (and more recently with Anthropic), linked purchases of its own hardware to investments or stakes it would take in AI companies, moves that the market welcomed earlier but might view with a bit more hostility lately.

The announcement comes at a time when Cerebras might need it more than AMD: Cerebras listed on Nasdaq in May, priced at $185, opened at $350, and closed its first day at $311.07 before falling back to around $227 by late June 2026.

AMD stock, on the other hand, is up 121.48% year-to-date (YTD) as investors continue to bet heavily on its new Instinct AI processors, and the Cerebras partnership allows it to further consolidate its gains, as this might be seen as another vote of confidence in its current direction by one of its prospective customers.

• IVCM petition asked Imperial County judge to overturn IID's refusal to sell it roughly 287 million gallons to cool a proposed 330 MW data center
• The company pledged in writing as recently as February that the project would not touch Colorado River water
• The case turns on whether fallowed farmland water can be reassigned to industry, a precedent worth far more than the volume in dispute

A recent petition filed in Imperial County Superior Court has asked a judge to order a public utility to start selling water to the largest data center project in the state of California.

The volume at issue is modest by the standards of the Colorado River: 880 acre-feet a year, which the petition itself calculates at ~0.03 percent of the Imperial Irrigation District's 3.1 million acre-foot entitlement.

The legal precedent that it would set if such a motion was to be granted might however have far-reaching implications beyond the relatively minuscule requirement that Imperial Valley Computer Manufacturing (IVCM) is currently gunning for.

A prolonged dispute over water that is exacerbated by who the customer is

The Imperial Irrigation District, a local agency that supplies water from the Colorado River in Imperial Valley, has declined IVCM's request to provide approximately 287 million gallons of water for its upcoming 330MW data center, the largest in the state.

The developer, Sebastian Rucci, spoke to Business Insider, stating that the project would not add to demands on the Colorado River as it would effectively stop irrigating nearby farmland to balance its consumption, calling it a "zero impact" situation.

IID rejected the application on May 1, 2026, nine days after it was submitted. The stated ground was Regulation 21, which governs small-parcel service and bars new connections within 300 feet of an accessible potable water supply; the district redirected IVCM to the City of Imperial.

With the City of Imperial already locked in a legal battle with IVCM over the very existence of the $10 billion project, citing inadequate public notice and lack of compliance with the California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA), it is unlikely to be a place where the data center builder is going to find any relief, and it has turned to courts of law to get what it feels is its fair share.

The subsequent legal action by IVCM might be a litmus test for how such interactions could unfold in the future, at a time when there is considerable blowback from communities living near such data centers, who see them as resource-greedy and driving up water and power prices, especially in drought-stricken regions.

The developer's plan to "buy and dry", as per Michael Cohen, a senior fellow at the Pacific Institute focusing on Colorado River Basin water use, might actually have made matters worse, with it being seen as detrimental to jobs in the area even as individual landowners profit from the exercise.

The water suit is one of at least three fronts, and arguably the least immediately consequential.

The City of Imperial's CEQA challenge to the project's exemption is pending. On June 16 2026, the county imposed a 45-day moratorium on data center approvals; on July 14 it extended that to a full year, blocking permits until June 2027 while an advisory committee rewrites zoning rules.

Rucci called the first moratorium defective and sought a restraining order against it, and has said he will challenge the second. Even a clean win on the water petition would result in supply permission for a facility the county currently cannot permit.

What is being litigated is whether an irrigation district chartered to serve farms can lawfully decline to serve an industry, and whether fallowing counts as conservation when the county is the buyer but not when a data center is.

One thing is for certain: the ruling will be read closely by every developer eyeing the West's agricultural water, which is roughly what the valley is afraid of. The gallons are a rounding error on the Colorado, but the precedent it sets here may determine everything for the region.

Quordle was one of the original Wordle alternatives and is still going strong now more than 1,500 games later. It offers a genuine challenge, though, so read on if you need some Quordle hints today — or scroll down further for the answers.

Enjoy playing word games? You can also check out my NYT Connections today and NYT Strands today pages for hints and answers for those puzzles, while Marc's Wordle today column covers the original viral word game.

SPOILER WARNING: Information about Quordle today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers.

Quordle today (game #1647) — hint #1 — Vowels

* Note that by vowel we mean the five standard vowels (A, E, I, O, U), not Y (which is sometimes counted as a vowel too).

Quordle today (game #1647) — hint #2 — repeated letters

Quordle today (game #1647) — hint #3 — uncommon letters

Quordle today (game #1647) — hint #4 — starting letters (1)

If you just want to know the answers at this stage, simply scroll down. If you're not ready yet then here's one more clue to make things a lot easier:

Quordle today (game #1647) — hint #5 — starting letters (2)

Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM.

Quordle today (game #1647) — the answers

The answers to today's Quordle, game #1647, are…

• GAWKY
• ALLOY
• AUDIT
• LATCH

Another game where I came close to losing.

As it is common with words ending in Y I was convinced that i was looking for a word with a double letter, but after trying the unlikely “gammy” and “gappy”, I fortunately ran out of options and arrived at the correct answer.

Daily Sequence today (game #1647) — the answers

The answers to today's Quordle Daily Sequence, game #1647, are…

• PRIOR
• WHINE
• VENOM
• MEATY

Quordle answers: The past 20

• Quordle #1646, Tuesday, 28 July: SMITE, ROACH, RUDDY, GLOBE
• Quordle #1645, Monday, 27 July: TAFFY, FIGHT, GUILD, WAGER
• Quordle #1644, Sunday, 26 July: STOMP, LIMIT, FUNKY, STEAD
• Quordle #1643, Saturday, 25 July: SALON, SHEEN, BURST, GOURD
• Quordle #1642, Friday, 24 July: DOLLY, EDIFY, LAGER, PRANK
• Quordle #1641, Thursday, 23 July: LADEN, EVICT, WOVEN, SHIRE
• Quordle #1640, Wednesday, 22 July: COYLY, SINGE, AWASH, AWOKE
• Quordle #1639, Tuesday, 21 July: TRUSS, AXIAL, SWINE, THING
• Quordle #1638, Monday, 20 July: ICING, SLICK, GAILY, RISEN
• Quordle #1637, Sunday, 19 July: SPURT, ACRID, THRUM, BLEEP
• Quordle #1636, Saturday, 18 July: KNAVE, TIGHT, BLEAT, CHAOS
• Quordle #1635, Friday, 17 July: CUMIN, PALER, GRASS, INBOX
• Quordle #1634, Thursday, 16 July: IGLOO, PLAIT, YEAST, AROMA
• Quordle #1633, Wednesday, 15 July: PROXY, BRICK, BROTH, SURGE
• Quordle #1632, Tuesday, 14 July: EBONY, AVOID, RODEO, CUTIE
• Quordle #1631, Monday, 13 July: VOICE, BISON, BURNT, BUILT
• Quordle #1630, Sunday, 12 July: STAIN, BINGO, LARVA, DICEY
• Quordle #1629, Saturday, 11 July: WORTH, PRONG, DINGO, DRUID
• Quordle #1628, Friday, 10 July: GREET, STEAK, DUSKY, HAUTE
• Quordle #1627, Thursday, 9 July: CRUMP, PHONE, SHINY, STONY

Good morning! Let's play Connections, the NYT's clever word game that challenges you to group answers in various categories. It can be tough, so read on if you need Connections hints.

What should you do once you've finished? Why, play some more word games of course. I've also got daily Strands hints and answers and Quordle hints and answers articles if you need help for those too, while Marc's Wordle today page covers the original viral word game.

SPOILER WARNING: Information about NYT Connections today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers.

NYT Connections today (game #1144) - today's words

Today's NYT Connections words are…

• CORK
• PEARL
• BASIC
• STAPLE
• MID
• WORD
• CHALK
• WHITE
• BLACK
• VANILLA
• GEM
• NAIL
• RIVET
• NUGGET
• SCREW
• PLAIN

NYT Connections today (game #1144) - hint #1 - group hints

What are some clues for today's NYT Connections groups?

• YELLOW: Attach to a wall with these
• GREEN: Same old, same old
• BLUE: Deliverance of insight
• PURPLE: Teachers use these

Need more clues?

We're firmly in spoiler territory now, but read on if you want to know what the four theme answers are for today's NYT Connections puzzles…

NYT Connections today (game #1144) - hint #2 - group answers

What are the answers for today's NYT Connections groups?

• YELLOW: FASTENERS
• GREEN: NONDESCRIPT
• BLUE: UNITS OF WISDOM
• PURPLE: ____BOARDS IN A CLASSROOM

Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM.

NYT Connections today (game #1144) - the answers

The answers to today's Connections, game #1144, are…

• YELLOW: FASTENERS: NAIL, RIVET, SCREW, STAPLE
• GREEN: NONDESCRIPT: BASIC, MID, PLAIN, VANILLA
• BLUE: UNITS OF WISDOM: GEM, NUGGET, PEARL, WORD
• PURPLE: ____BOARDS IN A CLASSROOM: BLACK, CHALK, CORK, WHITE

• My rating: Hard
• My score: 3 mistakes

I made hard work of a relatively simple, trap-free game.

My first two errors came in collecting the group of NONDESCRIPT words first, including STAPLE instead of MID — which is understandable, as STAPLE describes something regular and average, and then WHITE which is not understandable, although whiteness does imply boring, which is where I think my brain went.

Sadly, my errors didn’t end there as I initially thought UNITS OF WISDOM was a collection of valuable things, so after connecting GEM, NUGGET and PEARL I added CORK as it is a fairly expensive material.

Yesterday's NYT Connections answers (Tuesday, July 28, 2026, game #1143)

• YELLOW: COMMAND: CAPTAIN, DIRECT, HEAD, LEAD
• GREEN: HOW DO YOU LIKE THEM APPLES: EMPIRE, FUJI, GALA, HONEYCRISP
• BLUE: SHOE BRANDS STARTING WITH "C": CAMPER, CLARKS, CONVERSE, CROCS
• PURPLE: STARTING WITH PALINDROMIC NAMES: ANNAPOLIS, BOBSLED, EVEREST, OTTOMAN

Strands is the NYT's latest word game after the likes of Wordle, Spelling Bee and Connections – and it's great fun. It can be difficult, though, so read on for my Strands hints.

Want more word-based fun? Then check out my NYT Connections today and Quordle today pages for hints and answers for those games, and Marc's Wordle today page for the original viral word game.

SPOILER WARNING: Information about NYT Strands today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers.

NYT Strands today (game #878) - hint #1 - today's theme

NYT Strands today (game #878) - hint #2 - clue words

Play any of these words to unlock the in-game hints system.

• QUEST
• NEST
• BRAT
• MANIC
• STIR
• FETA

NYT Strands today (game #878) - hint #3 - spangram letters

NYT Strands today (game #878) - hint #4 - spangram position

Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM.

NYT Strands today (game #878) - the answers

The answers to today's Strands, game #878, are…

• DOLL
• PUPPET
• DUMMY
• MANNEQUIN
• FIGURINE
• STATUE
• SPANGRAM: FABRICATED

• My rating: Easy
• My score: Perfect

A made man could mean a titan of industry, a mobster or if taken literally a scarecrow or indeed a PUPPET.

My first two words had double letters, a pattern that continued with DUMMY and the slightly more challenging MANNEQUIN — a word that I would have struggled to spell without the helper.

With the search virtually cracked I saw FABRICATED — although for full disclosure I should reveal that I missed it completely while collecting “fabric” as a non-game word.

Yesterday's NYT Strands answers (Tuesday, July 28, game #877)

• COMPLETE
• UNDEVIDED
• FULL
• TOTAL
• WHOLE
• ENTIRE
• SPANGRAM: ITSALLTHERE

• The BRRRRT Act seeks to keep at least 126 A-10s operational
• Iran operations revive debate over the A-10's military future
• Future A-10 retirements face stricter certification requirements under new legislation

A proposed House bill requires the US Air Force to retain at least 126 A-10 Thunderbolt II Warthogs, reversing plans to retire much of the nearly 50-year-old attack aircraft fleet.

The legislation follows renewed attention on the aircraft after its reported involvement in operations linked to the recent Iran confrontation, including combat search-and-rescue missions supporting downed F-15E aircrew.

Lawmakers backing the proposal argue the aircraft should remain in service until a fully operational replacement has been certified for every mission it currently performs.

Lawmakers push to preserve the A-10 fleet

Officially named the Bolstering Recognition, Resurgence, Retention, and Remembrance of the Thunderbolt Act, the legislation uses the acronym BRRRRT.

Introduced as H.R. 9780 by Rep. Abe Hamadeh, the Act takes its name from the distinctive sound produced by the A-10's 30mm Gatling gun during firing.

“The A-10 has repeatedly proven itself on the battlefield, saving American lives and delivering unmatched close air support when our troops need it most,” said Hamadeh.

“The BRRRRT Act ensures we do not retire a proven weapons system before a certified replacement exists.”

The proposal marks another chapter in a longstanding disagreement between Congress and the Air Force over the future of the Warthog fleet and its specialized missions.

The Air Force entered fiscal 2026 with 162 A-10 aircraft and sought authority to retire the entire fleet.

However, Congress rejected that proposal and instead required the service to retain at least 103 aircraft.

The BRRRRT Act would raise that minimum inventory to 126 aircraft, requiring the Air Force to halt scheduled retirements and recover additional Warthogs from storage at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Arizona.

Following recent operational use, the Air Force announced that A-10 squadrons at Moody Air Force Base in Georgia would remain active through 2029.

The service also plans to keep Warthogs flying from Whiteman Air Force Base in Missouri through 2030, leaving approximately 54 aircraft assigned to three operational squadrons.

Bill sets tougher conditions for future A-10 retirements

The legislation would give the Air Force 90 days after enactment to explain how maintenance, sustainment, pilot training, flight testing, and depot operations would be restored.

Earlier retirement preparations already included closing the depot maintenance line at Hill Air Force Base in February and ending the final training class for new A-10 pilots in April.

The Weapons School course at Nellis Air Force Base has also been winding down as the service continued preparing for the aircraft's planned retirement.

The proposal would also make additional retirements harder by requiring the defense secretary to certify that a replacement aircraft has entered full operational service.

That certification would also require written approval from the Army secretary, the Marine Corps commandant, and the head of U.S. Special Operations Command.

The bill also states that assigning another aircraft the close air support mission as a secondary responsibility would not qualify as a replacement.

If the BRRRRT Act does not become law, similar language could still appear in the annual defense authorization legislation that previously established the 103-aircraft minimum.

The Air Force maintains that the F-35A, F-15E, and F-16 will eventually assume the A-10's close air support and combat search-and-rescue missions.

Supporters of the BRRRRT Act argue those aircraft have not yet replaced every specialized capability performed by the Warthog.

Via Military Times

• Ukraine approves indigenous turbojet-powered guided bombs for frontline combat operations
• Domestic guided bombs now strike military objectives up to 200 kilometers away
• Seven Ukrainian manufacturers now build guided bomb conversion systems domestically

Ukraine has officially approved several domestically built guided aerial bombs for combat use, including turbojet-powered versions capable of striking objectives up to 200 kilometers (125 miles) away.

Brig. Gen. Andrii Lebedenko, deputy commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces of Ukraine, said several of these designs have already seen use on the battlefield, while others remain in testing.

“We already have systems that use more than just gliding. They now carry turbojet engines to increase their employment range to between 100 and 200 kilometers,” said Lebedenko.

Ukraine expands the reach of indigenous guided bombs

The program began in 2024 as an effort to convert older unguided aerial bombs into precision-guided weapons after Ukraine lacked domestic manufacturers capable of producing such systems.

Ukrainian officials now say the country has seven manufacturers producing guided bomb systems, compared with none when the initiative was first introduced.

“This task was set in 2024. We did not have any such manufacturers in the country. Now there are already seven. They already know how to do it,” said Lebedenko.

He also confirmed that Ukraine already operates aircraft capable of launching domestically produced weapons, while expanding manufacturing capacity has become the next priority for the defense industry.

According to Ukrainian officials, the program has also created a growing community of engineers capable of designing glide kits and propulsion systems for increasingly sophisticated aerial munitions.

“Moreover, a school of specialists and engineers has emerged who know how to create gliding systems. They know how to make them with engines,” said Lebedenko.

Some of the latest variants are no longer limited to gliding after release because turbojet engines continue powering the bombs toward military objectives at greater stand-off distances.

Indigenous bomb designs move beyond conversion kits

Alongside upgrading older munitions, Ukraine has also developed entirely indigenous guided aerial bombs, expanding its domestic precision strike capability.

Ukraine's Brave1 defense innovation platform announced the country's first indigenous guided aerial bomb after approximately 17 months of development.

The weapon carries a 250-kilogram warhead designed to strike fortified positions, command centers, and other military objectives located dozens of kilometers away.

Developers have described the weapon as a completely original Ukrainian design rather than an adaptation of an existing foreign guided bomb.

Ukrainian military officials have also indicated that improving strike accuracy remains more important than producing larger numbers of guided bombs for operational use.

“We are looking toward precision so that we can effectively destroy enemy command posts, drone control centers, infrastructure, and other targets,” said Lebedenko.

Ukraine has also disclosed expanding manufacturing capacity, growing engineering expertise, and longer operational reach for its guided bomb program.

However, independent verification of battlefield performance remains limited because operational details surrounding combat employment have not been publicly released.

Via United24Media

• Meta has funded multiple natural gas power plants over the past 12 months
• The corporate renewable energy initiative RE100 includes Apple, Google, and Microsoft among its 444 members
• Meta has previously committed to running all operations on renewables by 2020

Meta has confirmed it is withdrawing from the RE100 scheme, following the news that it has funded several gas-fired power stations over the past year.

With the company leaning heavily into AI and the necessary data centers that come with such a commitment, it has opted to exit the collective of corporations planning to transition to 100% renewable energy, overturning a public commitment made in 2020.

While RE100 has many other members, including Apple, Google, and Microsoft, Meta’s confirmation of a move away from the group indicates that it doesn’t see an immediate solution to the power challenges posed by data centers.

What does Climate Group membership mean?

The RE100 initiative is led by the Climate Group, a non-profit with former UK prime minister Tony Blair named as a co-founder. Membership of the project gives organizations access to policy support and technical advice to support plans for moving to a 100% renewable energy footprint.

When quizzed, a Climate Group spokesperson responded: “After several in-depth conversations between Meta and Climate Group, Meta has withdrawn from the RE100 initiative, as it is no longer able to meet the technical criteria due to investments made in new gas power.”

Meta isn’t alone in looking beyond the renewable options for supplying power to its data centers. Its former RE100 co-members Google and Microsoft have both recently invested in fossil fuel projects. However, those companies both appear to have hedged their bets more widely, with Microsoft aiming for hourly energy matching (where fossil use is matched by renewable energy) and Google employing a 100-hour battery in a collaboration with Form Energy.

Data centers need heavy industry levels of power

Moving away from commitments to renewables in order to provide data centers with the level of energy they need in the AI era is disappointing, but not entirely unexpected.

Modern data centers require power for processing, for cooling, and for backup, and this requires a level of power that traditionally has only been seen in heavy manufacturing industries. The infrastructure currently available for renewable sources of power does not widely account for supply issues, battery systems are underdeveloped, and nuclear takes years to commission.

Meta’s support for gas power includes partnering with Entergy Corp in building seven plants in Louisiana in order to deliver over 5GW for its Richland Parish data center.

Conversely, gas-powered electricity is faster to set up, is a known quantity, and is cleaner than coal. Until infrastructure catches up with the demands from data centers, more withdrawals and fudges on previous green energy commitments from big tech should not be ruled out.

• Nvidia and Microsoft lead the list of founder members of the Open Secure AI Alliance
• AI, financial services, tech companies, and other organizations with developing AI services have joined the alliance
• Notable exceptions include OpenAI, Anthropic, and Google

Nvidia has confirmed its membership of the new Open Secure AI Alliance, a collective of industry-leading tech, financial, and AI businesses working in collaboration to ensure openness in the AI industry. Curiously, however, while Microsoft and OpenClaw are among the founding members, Google, OpenAI, and Anthropic are not.

Inspired by the open source movement and the Linux Foundation-led Akrites AI cyber threat response initiative, the Open Secure AI Alliance aims to use open technologies to disclose and remediate vulnerabilities.

Citing the recent Hugging Face incident, where closed AI tools prevented full investigation of the event, the Open Secure AI Alliance founding announcement underlines the importance of open models, highlighting how cybersecurity is one of the main beneficiaries of open source software.

A Hugging Face response?

A sizeable group of recognizable companies are involved with the Open Secure AI Alliance, including OpenClaw, Palantir, Palo Alto Networks, Microsoft, Crowdstrike, IBM, Linux Foundation and Hugging Face.

Notable from this list are Google and Palantir, and of course OpenAI, which was responsible for the Hugging Face attack. Given that this event occurred during a cybersecurity benchmark test and OpenAI’s model conducted a wholly automated attack on Hugging Face’s servers, it serves as an important demonstration of what is at risk from closed source models in the AI world.

“When defenders cannot inspect, adapt and run advanced AI on their own infrastructure, their ability to respond is constrained at exactly the moment speed matters most,” states the Open Secure AI Alliance, which emphasizes its mission: “to ensure defenders everywhere have open, frontier tools they can trust and control.”

OpenAI’s lack of openness in dealing with the incident, and Hugging Face’s initial difficulties in analyzing the intrusion due to closed source models, really underline the importance of this new alliance.

Open vs. closed

The argument concerning open and closed software models isn’t likely to end any time soon, but the Open Secure AI Alliance certainly makes a strong point for open models. Yes, they can be a risk that can be modified or misused, but those risks exist within closed systems.

So, the alliance’s view is to give defenders the tools to deal with threats, rather than blocking those tools. Decades of cybersecurity research have shown, after all, that the best option is collaboration and testing – or, as the Open Secure AI Alliance states “the safer path is the one that gives more defenders the ability to test, verify and strengthen the systems on which society relies.”

Given OpenAI’s role in the Hugging Face incident, its absence makes sense – but what about Google and Anthropic? At a time when corporate collaboration is driving development of new technologies within tight standards (for example, the Connectivity Standards Alliance’s work with Matter and Aliro), it seems as though the Open Secure AI Alliance has the right idea.

• AMD's Helios beats Vera Rubin NVL72 on memory at rack level, with 31TB of HBM4 against roughly 20.7TB
• AMD also claims it beats the competition by 15% on FP4 compute on a 'per-GPU' basis even as Nvidia comes out ahead on published 'per-rack' figures
• AMD claims Helios also offers 30% more tokens per dollar spent versus the competition

AMD has launched its Helios rackscale offering, outlining five comparisons in which it claims wins over what it calls "the leading competitive solution."

While the company skipped naming Nvidia, the market leader's Vera Rubin-based NVL72 rack-scale solution is the only real competitor to Helios and the one it continues to compare itself against.

While its memory claims hold, its GPU FP4 claim might fall short when comparing rack to rack, and many of its calculations are based on peak performance rather than Nvidia's published numbers, making Helios an interesting "win" but one that does encourage potential adopters to look more closely.

A numbers game that continues to grow complex even as AMD ekes out some wins

While AMD claims a 15% win versus Nvidia's Rubin on a per-GPU basis for FP4 compute, its 72-GPU rack-scale solution falls short of Nvidia's published rack-level numbers: 2.9 exaflops versus 3.6. AMD does not specify whether it is counting Nvidia's individual dies or its two-die packages, and the distinction matters: against dies the gap runs in AMD's favor by far more than 15%, while against packages AMD trails.

The two figures also use different formats, AMD's MXFP4 against Nvidia's NVFP4, so they are not measuring identical arithmetic.

This might, however, be indicative of a very real situation that hampers both vendors' headline numbers: real-world FP4 workloads rarely reach hardware peak ratings due to memory movement constraints, scheduling overheads, and software kernel efficiency. AMD conceded as much at its own event, putting measured FP4 throughput at roughly half its peak rating.

Nvidia may sustain more of its peak thanks to its custom Vera CPU, a mature NVLink 6 software stack and a larger pool of what it calls fast memory, 75 TB per rack once 54 TB of LPDDR5X is counted alongside 20.7 TB of HBM4. AMD's 31 TB is all HBM, which is better suited to models that must be held entirely in high-bandwidth memory, and Helios offers higher capacity and bandwidth per accelerator at 432 GB and 23.3 TB/s.

On raw scale-up fabric, the two are level, both delivering 3.6 TB/s per accelerator and 260 TB/s per rack.

Despite this, Helios is an exceptionally strong product on paper, and it may be the first time AMD has produced a credible rack-scale answer to Nvidia since the AI race began. Seventy-two MI455X accelerators, 18 EPYC Venice CPUs, 31 TB of HBM4, UALink over Ethernet inside the rack and Ultra Ethernet out, on an OCP Open Rack Wide chassis with merchant Broadcom switch silicon, is a serious response to a company that had a two-year head start on the form factor.

More importantly, its fabric specifications are publicly available, enabling hyperscalers to build customized variants that meet their requirements. Nvidia's platform offers no equivalent latitude.

AMD frames openness as the platform's central advantage, with Vamsi Boppana, senior vice president of AI at AMD, saying that Helios "brings together leadership compute, high-performance networking and open software in a unified rackscale platform."

The more important question for AMD, however, might be memory supply. Nvidia has had Vera Rubin in full production since Q1 with partner availability this half, while AMD's first Helios deployments are not due until Q4. AMD may be further gated by HBM4 supply, much of which is reported to be already committed to hyperscalers, which could keep its deployment volumes well below Nvidia's this year.

If your head is still spinning from the first episode of Stuart Fails to Save the Universe, I can't say that I blame you.

Not only were we walked through how comic book store owner Stuart managed to break the device that set off the 'multiverse Armageddon' we've since been thrown into, but a huge Big Bang Theory character has already been killed off... in a manner of speaking.

This week, we're going to officially universe jump for the first time. So, when does Stuart Fails to Save the Universe episode 2 arrive on HBO Max?

What time can I watch Stuart Fails to Save the Universe episode 2 on HBO Max?

For US viewers, Stuart Fails to Save the Universe episode 2 will drop on Thursday, July 30 at 6pm PT/ 9pm ET.

Internationally, you're looking out for these timings:

• US – 6pm PT / 9pm ET
• Canada – 6pm PT / 9pm ET
• UK – Friday, July 31 at 2am BST
• India – Friday, July 31 at 6:30am IST
• Singapore – Friday, July 31 at 9am SGT
• Australia – Friday, July 31 at 11am AEDT
• New Zealand – Friday, July 31 at 12pm NZDT

When do new episodes of Stuart Fails to Save the Universe come out?

New episodes of Stuart Fails to Save the Universe will make landfall every Thursday in the US and on Fridays everywhere else. Here are the all-important dates you need to know about:

• Episode 1: out now
• Episode 2: July 30
• Episode 3: August 6
• Episode 4: August 13
• Episode 5: August 20
• Episode 6: August 27
• Episode 7: September 3
• Episode 8: September 10
• Episode 9: September 17
• Episode 10: September 24

• Beyerdynamic announces new DT 275 Pro wired headphones designed for use in "challenging" and noisy environments thanks to passive noise reduction
• The have a frequency range from 5Hz to 24kHz, and weigh under 200g, so they're nice and portable — and their 45-ohm impedance means they're easy for devices to drive
• They launch on July 28th 2026, and are priced at £99 (about $131 / AU$188) — as a user of Beyedynamic's more expensive headphones, I'm intrigued

Beyerdynamic has launched a new pair of on-ear headphones designed for audio and video professionals in "challenging" and noisy environments, such as live music venues, location recording and mobile production. The DT 275 Pro promise to deliver professional audio and noise isolation without a premium price tag: they're just £99 (about $131 / AU$188).

I'm a big fan of Beyerdynamics' studio headphones, so much so that they're my go-to for recording, mixing and mastering music (TechRadar's Audio Editor Becky Scarrott loved the Beyerdynamic DT 72 IE earbuds), but I don't have to do any of my music-making things on location or in noisy environments, and these new closed-back headphones have been designed for exactly that.

Beyerdynamic DT 275 Pro: key features and specs

The Beyerdynamic DT 275 Pro have an impedance of 45 ohms, making them easy to drive, and they have a quoted frequency range of 5Hz to 24kHz.

Maximum sound pressure is 125dB SPL, and they reduce ambient noise by a claimed 22dBA thanks to their closed-back, on-ear design.

Despite the slightly chunky appearance, these headphones come in just under 200g, so they should be comfortable for long shifts, and the supplied cable can be attached to the left or right ear cup and locked into place. The cable is 1.5m (4.9 feet).

The rotatable ear cups are made from sweat-resistant leatherette, which makes sense for mobile working — the velvety material used in many of the firm's studio headphone earcups isn't something you'd want to have on your head in the heat of a venue or club.

And key components such as the cup cushions are replaceable so the headphones should remain hygienic and last for a long time.

These are very much a niche product, so if you don't need the isolation and toughness I'd recommend one of the more indoor DT Pro pairs.

But if you need accurate audio when you're out and about, in a venue or on location these look like they'll be just the job — and for far less than you'd expect to pay for pro headphones that I use.

The Beyerdynamic DT 275 Pro will be available from 28 July 2026 with a list price of £99.99 / €119.00 (about $131 / AU$188).

• Ukraine's State Border Guard Service says its Phoenix unit destroyed a Russian Buk-M3 launcher with a single low-cost drone
• The strike is one of many rather than a first, with Ukraine claiming dozens of Buk systems of this type have been damaged or destroyed
• Drones are increasingly being used to take out high-value military targets for a fraction of the cost

Ukraine's decision to use drones as part of its key asymmetrical war doctrine against Russia continues to deliver dividends for the country on multiple fronts, with its recent success on the battlefield centering around a Russian Buk-M3 launcher that, based on independent estimates, costs between $40 and $50 million.

This is not the first, and probably not the last, Russian Buk-M3 launcher that Ukraine has targeted of late, with Oryx, an open-source intelligence blog, putting the number at over 40 confirmed Buk kills since the conflict began.

Despite being relatively routine, Buk-M3 systems are relatively expensive to replace, and Ukraine claims to have done so with an FPV drone that cost them "only several thousand dollars."

An increasingly tough conflict for expensive military equipment

Ukraine and Russia's turn toward drones has produced one rather obvious casualty: expensive military equipment costing millions of dollars to build, and the Buk-M3 launcher is no exception.

The Buk-M3, also known as Viking in its export form and designated SA-27 by NATO, is Russia's newest medium-range surface-to-air missile system. It was adopted into Russian service in 2016 as the successor to the Buk-M2, and occupies the medium tier of Russia's layered air defense, sitting above short-range systems such as Pantsir and Tor and below the long-range S-300 and S-400.

The M3 fires the 9M317M, a single-stage solid-fuel missile with a more powerful dual-mode motor than the M2's round. That gives it roughly 70 km of range, a ceiling around 35 km, and a top speed near 1,550 m/s. The launcher carries six missiles, compared to four on the M1 and M2, and upgraded electronics are credited with reducing the time to bring the system to readiness.

That makes it a valuable target for Ukrainian drone operators, and an ironic one, since the Buk-M3 is built partly to shoot down aerial threats. Its minimum effective engagement range is roughly 2.5 km, however, so a small drone that closes inside that distance is beneath the floor of what the system's own missiles can engage.

Ukraine has developed a range of methods for reaching Russian airfields, armor, and artillery positions, among them Operation Spiderweb, which Ukraine's security service assessed as having destroyed some $7 billion in Russian military hardware, including aircraft no longer in production.

The Ukrainian Border Guard says this system was struck in transit, moving toward the front and unconcealed. That detail matters more than it appears. Air defense vehicles are at their most vulnerable during relocation, since they cannot engage effectively on the move and their protective screen is degraded, making the transit window a predictable target rather than a lucky one.

The aim behind Ukraine's systematic degradation of Russian medium-range air defense is to open corridors through radar coverage for long-range strike drones and manned aviation, which is why the tempo has increased and why strikes now reach deep into Russian territory.

A Buk-M3 lost to an FPV drone is the kind of incident that illustrates the wider problem Russia faces against a maturing Ukrainian drone industry, in a war that has settled into attrition across multiple fronts.

• Off-planet mobility company Lunar Outpost with use the Nvidia Jetson platform and Nvidia CUDA-X libraries for future lunar missions
• Nvidia Jetson modules will manage the command and control of the Lunar Voyage 2 rover's LiDAR system, set for launch later in 2026
• This follows Lunar Outpost’s successful bid to design and deliver the Pegasus Lunar Terrain Vehicle for NASA

Nvidia is collaborating with space economy infrastructure company Lunar Outpost to deliver edge AI for future missions to the Moon and beyond. Powering the first generation of AI space computing, Nvidia’s Jetson platform and Nvidia CUDA-X libraries are expected to underpin the Lunar Outpost’s growing mission manifest.

Everything from processing to mapping and communications will be handled by Nvidia’s edge AI provision, which is seen as the solution to Lunar Outpost’s contributions to the NASA Artemis program of modern space exploration.

Later in 2026, the Reiner Gamma exploration – the “lunar swirl” geographical feature on the Moon’s surface – will launch, with the Lunar Voyage 2 expected to be the first Lunar Outpost hardware to be deployed with Nvidia Jetson tech.

Nvidia in space

Lunar Outpost is no stranger to space exploration, having assisted NASA and MIT on the MOXIE project, generating oxygen on the surface of Mars on a project running 2021 to 2023. Its collaboration continues with the Reiner Gamma exploration, working with General Motors and Goodyear on its lunar rover.

“Lunar missions require intelligent systems that can process data and make decisions in real time," noted Chen Su, Head of edge AI product marketing at NVIDIA.

"Lunar Outpost is using NVIDIA Jetson and CUDA-X libraries to give its rovers the onboard AI computing needed for terrain mapping, autonomous navigation, mission data processing and scientific discovery.”

Human-robot exploration

Set for dispatch to the lunar surface at some point in the second half of 2026 via SpaceX Falcon 9, Lunar Outpost’s Lunar Voyage 2 will be overseen from Earth, while the Nvidia AI technology handles advanced autonomy and communications, as well as lunar mapping and onboard data processing.

Justin Cyrus, Founder and CEO of Lunar Outpost, said “NVIDIA has set the standard for advanced AI computing, and we're proud to work alongside them as we bring increasingly intelligent capabilities to the lunar surface and build towards a Moon Base.”

Partnering with Nvidia for edge AI support appears to be the first stage of some pioneering missions. The future of Lunar Outpost’s off-world activities includes Lunar Voyage 3 and Lunar Voyage 5 missions, where the first human-robot exploration of another world is planned. For this, the Nvidia Space-1 Vera Rubin Module will be deployed, managing real-time data, mapping, and real-time video streaming from the Moon to Lunar Outpost’s mission control.

Lunar Outpost is contracted to a further nine lunar and cislunar (the area between the Earth and Moon) missions before 2030, with Nvidia Jetson and the CUDA-X libraries expected to play a part in all 10.

Quordle was one of the original Wordle alternatives and is still going strong now more than 1,500 games later. It offers a genuine challenge, though, so read on if you need some Quordle hints today — or scroll down further for the answers.

Enjoy playing word games? You can also check out my NYT Connections today and NYT Strands today pages for hints and answers for those puzzles, while Marc's Wordle today column covers the original viral word game.

SPOILER WARNING: Information about Quordle today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers.

Quordle today (game #1646) — hint #1 — Vowels

* Note that by vowel we mean the five standard vowels (A, E, I, O, U), not Y (which is sometimes counted as a vowel too).

Quordle today (game #1646) — hint #2 — repeated letters

Quordle today (game #1646) — hint #3 — uncommon letters

Quordle today (game #1646) — hint #4 — starting letters (1)

If you just want to know the answers at this stage, simply scroll down. If you're not ready yet then here's one more clue to make things a lot easier:

Quordle today (game #1646) — hint #5 — starting letters (2)

Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM.

Quordle today (game #1646) — the answers

The answers to today's Quordle, game #1646, are…

• SMITE
• ROACH
• RUDDY
• GLOBE

Another close shave after two wrong guesses took me to the edge.

In reality it wasn’t quite as perilous as I thought, as words beginning with S and ending I-T-E are few, but it felt perilous at the time.

Daily Sequence today (game #1646) — the answers

The answers to today's Quordle Daily Sequence, game #1646, are…

• CURSE
• FEIGN
• EXTOL
• POESY

Quordle answers: The past 20

• Quordle #1645, Monday, 27 July: TAFFY, FIGHT, GUILD, WAGER
• Quordle #1644, Sunday, 26 July: STOMP, LIMIT, FUNKY, STEAD
• Quordle #1643, Saturday, 25 July: SALON, SHEEN, BURST, GOURD
• Quordle #1642, Friday, 24 July: DOLLY, EDIFY, LAGER, PRANK
• Quordle #1641, Thursday, 23 July: LADEN, EVICT, WOVEN, SHIRE
• Quordle #1640, Wednesday, 22 July: COYLY, SINGE, AWASH, AWOKE
• Quordle #1639, Tuesday, 21 July: TRUSS, AXIAL, SWINE, THING
• Quordle #1638, Monday, 20 July: ICING, SLICK, GAILY, RISEN
• Quordle #1637, Sunday, 19 July: SPURT, ACRID, THRUM, BLEEP
• Quordle #1636, Saturday, 18 July: KNAVE, TIGHT, BLEAT, CHAOS
• Quordle #1635, Friday, 17 July: CUMIN, PALER, GRASS, INBOX
• Quordle #1634, Thursday, 16 July: IGLOO, PLAIT, YEAST, AROMA
• Quordle #1633, Wednesday, 15 July: PROXY, BRICK, BROTH, SURGE
• Quordle #1632, Tuesday, 14 July: EBONY, AVOID, RODEO, CUTIE
• Quordle #1631, Monday, 13 July: VOICE, BISON, BURNT, BUILT
• Quordle #1630, Sunday, 12 July: STAIN, BINGO, LARVA, DICEY
• Quordle #1629, Saturday, 11 July: WORTH, PRONG, DINGO, DRUID
• Quordle #1628, Friday, 10 July: GREET, STEAK, DUSKY, HAUTE
• Quordle #1627, Thursday, 9 July: CRUMP, PHONE, SHINY, STONY
• Quordle #1626, Wednesday, 8 July: GHOST, TREND, EXALT, ALONG

Good morning! Let's play Connections, the NYT's clever word game that challenges you to group answers in various categories. It can be tough, so read on if you need Connections hints.

What should you do once you've finished? Why, play some more word games of course. I've also got daily Strands hints and answers and Quordle hints and answers articles if you need help for those too, while Marc's Wordle today page covers the original viral word game.

SPOILER WARNING: Information about NYT Connections today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers.

NYT Connections today (game #1143) - today's words

Today's NYT Connections words are…

• CAPTAIN
• CLARKS
• OTTOMAN
• EMPIRE
• ANNAPOLIS
• BOBSLED
• CAMPER
• DIRECT
• EVEREST
• FUJI
• GALA
• HEAD
• CONVERSE
• LEAD
• HONEYCRISP
• CROCS

NYT Connections today (game #1143) - hint #1 - group hints

What are some clues for today's NYT Connections groups?

• YELLOW: Take charge
• GREEN: Varieties of a type of fruit
• BLUE: Footwear
• PURPLE: The same backward and forward

Need more clues?

We're firmly in spoiler territory now, but read on if you want to know what the four theme answers are for today's NYT Connections puzzles…

NYT Connections today (game #1143) - hint #2 - group answers

What are the answers for today's NYT Connections groups?

• YELLOW: COMMAND
• GREEN: HOW DO YOU LIKE THEM APPLES
• BLUE: SHOE BRANDS STARTING WITH "C"
• PURPLE: STARTING WITH PALINDROMIC NAMES

Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM.

NYT Connections today (game #1143) - the answers

The answers to today's Connections, game #1143, are…

• YELLOW: COMMAND: CAPTAIN, DIRECT, HEAD, LEAD
• GREEN: HOW DO YOU LIKE THEM APPLES: EMPIRE, FUJI, GALA, HONEYCRISP
• BLUE: SHOE BRANDS STARTING WITH "C": CAMPER, CLARKS, CONVERSE, CROCS
• PURPLE: STARTING WITH PALINDROMIC NAMES: ANNAPOLIS, BOBSLED, EVEREST, OTTOMAN

• My rating: Hard
• My score: 1 mistake

I knew that HONEYCRISP and GALA were apple varieties, but I struggled to find the other pair and made a mistake picking CAPTAIN instead of FUJI.

In my defence these are unavailable in the UK, where I am based, where we are all about the Granny Smith and the Golden Delicious. HOW DO YOU LIKE THEM APPLES? Very much, actually.

After munching my way through this troublesome quartet the remaining three groups came together relatively easy, with the SHOE BRANDS STARTING WITH "C" appearing ahead of COMMAND — both of which remind me of the Clarks Commandos shoes I coveted as a small child, largely because they came with a compass in the sole; very useful for a six-year-old.

Yesterday's NYT Connections answers (Monday, July 27, 2026, game #1142)

• YELLOW: GYMNASTICS APPARATUS: BEAM, HORSE, RINGS, VAULT
• GREEN: LONG TAPERED THINGS: CARROT, ICICLE, KNITTING NEEDLE, STALACTITE
• BLUE: KINDS OF SHIFTS: DOPPLER, GRAVEYARD, PARADIGM, STICK
• PURPLE: ICONS ON A SHOPPING SITE: BELL, CART, HEART, MAGNIFYING GLASS

Strands is the NYT's latest word game after the likes of Wordle, Spelling Bee and Connections – and it's great fun. It can be difficult, though, so read on for my Strands hints.

Want more word-based fun? Then check out my NYT Connections today and Quordle today pages for hints and answers for those games, and Marc's Wordle today page for the original viral word game.

SPOILER WARNING: Information about NYT Strands today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers.

NYT Strands today (game #877) - hint #1 - today's theme

NYT Strands today (game #877) - hint #2 - clue words

Play any of these words to unlock the in-game hints system.

• DIALER
• NOTES
• UNDER
• DIVER
• UNITE
• SALT

NYT Strands today (game #877) - hint #3 - spangram letters

NYT Strands today (game #877) - hint #4 - spangram position

Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM.

NYT Strands today (game #877) - the answers

The answers to today's Strands, game #877, are…

• COMPLETE
• UNDEVIDED
• FULL
• TOTAL
• WHOLE
• ENTIRE
• SPANGRAM: ITSALLTHERE

• My rating: Easy
• My score: Perfect

This was a speedy one.

Without any difficult words, twisting connections or multiple possibilities I managed to find all of the game words quickly, leaving just the spangram to complete the board.

Adding to the ease, it was also a great game for non-game words.

All in all like shooting fish in a bucket. Except with words.

Yesterday's NYT Strands answers (Monday, July 27, game #876)

• PLATFORM
• TRACK
• TICKET
• COUNTER
• KIOSK
• BENCH
• SPANGRAM: TRAINSTATION

• Plans to triple application fees and apply a price-per-foot on coastal cable installations have been announced by Oregon
• Oregon state planners believe the new structure could raise $1 million per new cable laid
• Protecting the coastline has become a political priority in recent years

Oregon has announced plans to introduce a payment structure for service providers laying undersea cables off the coast of the Pacific state.

Currently, the low-tax and zoning incentives on offer make Oregon a particularly attractive location for tech companies including Microsoft and Amazon, and with major data centers (such as Google’s Dalles installation) demanding increasing data infrastructure, state officials believe a new pricing arrangement is overdue.

Oregon Department of State Lands is making the proposal, which seeks to completely restructure the pricing around undersea cables, which has been fixed at $5,000 since 2001.

Price per foot levy

Even by tripling application fees, Oregon will still be a more affordable alternative for service providers upgrading or adding undersea cables than both California and Washington.

The payment structure under consideration covers fees for applications and compensation “for undersea infrastructure located on submerged and submersible land within Oregon’s territorial sea.”

Currently, new application fees are $5,000, with the proposed new fee set at $15,000. Renewal applications are set to increase from $5,000 to $7,500, with a new encroachment application fee, also set at $7,500 (this describes any building or development on any state-owned land that restricts its usual purpose).

Cables up to three inches in diameter have been assigned a $3-per-foot basic annual fee, with conduits charged at $7.

But how might these fees be applied to any new cable installations? Some calculations based on the Amazon Bitfrost cable project, which determined that a total of $1,450,380 was due for two decades, which would be funneled into Oregon’s Common School Fund.

These fees are a revision of an earlier, more expensive set of proposals, and while the Amazon Bitfrost project example may seem high, it is a literal drop in the ocean compared with the budgets required to lay cables across the Pacific – somewhere in the region of $400 million.

Corporate responsibility

Oregon is also proposing new rules that govern how much information companies submit in applications. This covers everything from decommissioning outdated cabling to outlining responses to earthquakes (such as an anticipated Cascadia Subduction Zone event, which is believed to be overdue).

Various challenges to how companies operate off the coast of Oregon have arisen in recent years, such as a Meta subsidiary attempting to install new cabling at Tierra Del Mar in 2020. This abandoned project resulted in a pollution incident with 6,500 gallons of drill fluid dumped in the ocean and a pair of sinkholes appearing the following year.

The fees are expected to be introduced in January 2027.

• AMD EPYC 9006 "Venice" offers mammoth 256-core, 512-thread configuration that incorporates up to 1GB of L3 cache and PCI-E 6.0 and 16 DDR5 memory channels under the hood
• It's the first time AMD's EPYC lineup sees high core count CPUs push past the 5GHz barrier
• AMD is claiming a win by stating that its newest EPYC CPU offers the "most agents per watt, per dollar, per rack"

AMD's newly-announced 6th Gen EPYC 9006 "Venice" seems to be a genuine silicon milestone (the first x86 server CPU on a 2nm-class node, up to 256 cores and 512 threads) which sees the company aim to secure its position in the AI data center CPU market.

The launch comes at a time when AMD has caught Intel on the back foot but finds its position threatened in turn by Nvidia's Vera CPU, which it touts as a faster, more efficient alternative to traditional x86 offerings, including AMD's own EPYC lineup.

With a staggered launch in place for the four CPUs AMD showcased at the AAI event, the stack is expected to be fully available to consumers sometime in 2027, even as its beefy 256-core CPU targets a Q4 2026 launch.

A massive upgrade on multiple fronts

AMD's Venice is a serious generational step. It is built on TSMC's N2 process, the foundry's first move from FinFET to gate-all-around nanosheet transistors, and Team Red says the family is the first high-performance computing product in the industry to reach volume production on the node.

AMD's recently announced flagship model, the 256-core, 512-thread EPYC 9996, features its new SP7 socket, offering 16-channel DDR5 memory, PCIe 6.0 support, and boost clocks that push past 5GHz.

This effectively doubles what is currently on offer for AMD's current-gen EPYC CPUs: memory moves to 16 channels of DDR5-8000, or MRDIMM at 12,800 MT/s, for roughly 1.6 TB/s per socket.

AMD goes one step further with the 9006X lineup (expected 2H 2027), which replaces the cores it cuts down on with a much larger L3 cache per core, a design that it touts makes it much better than rivals at workflows including HPC, technical computing, and data-intensive workloads, which benefit from the larger cache (and memory bandwidth) on offer.

“6th Gen AMD EPYC delivers workload-optimized compute for the full spectrum of modern data center needs; from running more agents and feeding GPUs across rack-scale AI infrastructure to powering the business-critical applications and services organizations rely on every day," noted SVP & GM of Compute and Enterprise AI at AMD, Dan McNamara.

AMD argues that the shape of the data center is changing into a three-tier agentic architecture, with each tier creating distinct CPU demand, which results in workflows centering around agent sandbox execution, AI host nodes, and general-purpose servers, all of which its EPYC CPUs are designed to handle.

The EPYC 9006 series also powers AMD's rack-scale Helios, as it aims to take on Nvidia's Vera Rubin NVL72 rack-scale offering with its own solution.

With AMD also offering a more mainstream 9006 SP8 and the EYPC 9006 LP as an AI host node CPU that uses LPDDR memory, it is aiming to capture all ends of the AI data center CPU market and cement its current lead in a segment that is sure to be increasingly competitive in the days to come.

• AMD's MI400 press release publishes exactly one performance figure
• 288 TFLOPS of hardware FP64 on the MI430X, a GPU it positions as its go-to for sovereign AI and HPC
• Unlike the MI455X, which it launched alongside, the MI430X will have researchers and sovereign AI clients waiting longer, with AMD targeting early 2027 for its first shipments

AMD has launched its latest Instinct MI400 series, unveiling two new chips which bring performance gains, larger, faster HBM4 memory, and a continued promise to support its open-source ROCm stack.

While both chips come with 432GB of HBM4 memory, they both have very different use cases: the MI455X is AMD's attempt to dominate AI data centers and run training and inference for frontier models, while the MI430 is positioned as a high-performance compute (HPC) alternative that offers superior precision thanks to it being tuned for superior FP64 performance at a hardware level.

Both GPUs are based on AMD's CNDA 5 architecture, but the MI430X offers FP64 performance that dwarfs both the MI455X and Nvidia's Rubin-based offerings.

Frontier AI demand comes first

The launch, which was effectively on paper, still showcased where AMD's focus lies: the Instinct MI455X. There is a simple reason for that: AI data centers prioritize faster FP4 and FP8 performance for most tasks, such as inference, and the MI455X delivers on that front.

AMD is simply responding to market demand by aiming to ship the MI455X first, even as it has sovereign AI buyers lining up, both directly and indirectly, including the U.S. Department of Energy, Oracle, and even the UK government, to name a few.

AMD stated that the MI455X delivers up to 34 times the token throughput of the MI355X at 18 times lower cost, showcasing a significant performance and efficiency upgrade. It is also arguably AMD's most heavily drummed-up release to date, even as it continues to play catch-up to Nvidia's market dominance in the AI data center space.

The MI455X ships with the recently announced Helios, AMD's first rack-scale AI system that launched alongside the new Instinct chips. One of these has 72 MI455X GPUs and 18 sixth-gen EPYC server CPUs, configured in a 1:6 ratio per compute node.

The MI430X, on the other hand, seems to be competing specifically to score buyers who require higher precision, such as science researchers or even government departments where correctness is required at the edges, and memory limitations apply even with the MI series accelerator's 432GB of HMB4 in play.

“The next generation of AI will span frontier AI, sovereign AI and scientific computing, and each requires infrastructure optimized for its unique demands," said Vamsi Boppana, SVP AI at AMD.

"The AMD Instinct MI400 Series extends our AI portfolio with purpose-built solutions optimized for the full spectrum of AI and HPC deployments, built on an open software foundation that gives customers the flexibility to innovate at every scale.”

AMD also has an important buyer for the MI455X in its Helios rack-scale form that will also grant it further exposure to it pre-IPO: Anthropic. The company has agreed to invest $5 billion in the AI giant, with the latter agreeing to deploy 2 GW of AMD's MI450 accelerators, even though its AI head wasn't exactly enthused recently by a perceived drop in performance on Claude Code in early 2026.

• Ukraine converts long-range kamikaze drones into reusable missile-launching platforms
• Liutyi now carries four missiles instead of sacrificing itself during attacks
• Germany funds 500 additional Liutyi drones through a $100 million defense package

Ukraine's state defense conglomerate Ukroboronprom has unveiled a reusable version of its An-196 Liutyi drone at the Farnborough International Airshow.

According to a report from Ukrainian outlet Oboronka the new configuration carries four compact air-to-surface missiles beneath its wings.

Until now, the Liutyi has flown only as a single-use weapon, striking a location once before being destroyed on impact.

A Kamikaze airframe rebuilt to fly home

The standard Liutyi is a propeller-driven, satellite-guided drone with a claimed operational range of nearly 2,000 km per mission today. It carries a 50-to-75 kg warhead and relies on inertial navigation corrected by satellite signals for improved overall strike precision.

Ukraine has used the standard version to strike oil refineries as far as 1,700 km inside Russia, near the Urals region.

Liutyi drones have also struck the Izhevsk military plant deep inside Russia's Udmurtia region, roughly 1,400 km from the border.

Germany is financing 500 additional Liutyi drones at a cost of roughly $100 million, signaling continued Western interest in the program.

Each Liutyi airframe reportedly costs around $200,000 to build, a comparatively low price for a long-range strike platform of its kind.

The reusable variant carries four small missiles reported to have a maximum range of 200 km and speeds above 500 km/h, which is apparently achieved through a small jet engine mounted inside the missile's own fuselage.

No further technical details about either the airframe or the missiles have been disclosed so far.

A commercial statement for foreign buyers

Displaying an armed, reusable Liutyi there functions as a clear commercial statement almost as much as a purely military signal.

Ukraine has displayed naval drones, interceptor drones and strike systems at major international defense exhibitions throughout 2026

A drone combat-tested through hundreds of deep strikes on Russian territory offers foreign buyers a rare, already-proven track record overall.

The reusable Liutyi may also compete with Ukraine's own FP-1 drone, which reportedly offers comparable performance at a lower cost, and in design, the new missiles resemble Anduril's Barracuda-250, an American cruise missile with an 18 kg warhead and 370-plus km range.

Ukraine relied heavily on the Bayraktar TB2 for years before Russian air defenses eventually pushed the drone from contested skies.

The shift could allow the Liutyi to fill the niche once occupied by the Bayraktar TB2, a symbol of Ukraine's early resistance.

Whether the new missiles and airframe hold up under real combat conditions remains to be seen.

Via Defense Express

• Stream Commonwealth Games for FREE on 7Plus / CBC Gem
• Unlock your stream with NordVPN (save up to 75%)

Less prestigious than the Olympics but much more of an occasion than the various international governing bodies' world championships, the Commonwealth Games has its roots in the past but its eyes on the future.

74 Commonwealth Games Association member states, spanning Europe, Asia, Africa, the Caribbean, the Americas and Oceania, are participating at Glasgow 2026, many of which barely get a look-in on the global stage.

For instance, Antigua and Barbuda, Bangladesh, Belize, the British Virgin Islands, Brunei, the Cayman Islands, the Cook Islands, Eswatini, the Gambia, Kiribati, Lesotho, Malawi, the Maldives, Malta, Nauru, Papua New Guinea, Rwanda, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, the Seychelles, Sierra Leone, the Solomon Islands, Tuvalu and Vanuatu are yet to win Olympic silverware, yet they're being strongly represented at the 2026 Commonwealth Games.

Eyeing their first Commonwealth Games silverware in Scotland this summer are Anguilla, Antigua and Barbuda, Belize, Brunei, Eswatini, the Falkland Islands, Gabon, Gibraltar, the Maldives, Montserrat, Rwanda, Saint Helena, Sierra Leone, Togo, and the Turks and Caicos Islands.

It's this scarcity of acclaim that makes the event so special, so read on as we explain how to watch the Commonwealth Games for free in the UK.

Use a VPN to watch any Commonwealth Games 2026 stream

A VPN is handy piece of software that can make your device appear as if it's back in your home country, so you can unlock your usual service. The best VPN right now? We recommend NordVPN – it does everything and comes with up to 75% off.

We test and review VPN services in the context of legal recreational uses. For example:1. Accessing a service from another country (subject to the terms and conditions of that service).2. Protecting your online security and strengthening your online privacy when abroad.We do not support or condone the illegal or malicious use of VPN services. Consuming pirated content that is paid-for is neither endorsed nor approved by Future Publishing.

• Premiere: Monday, July 27 at 9pm BST (UK)
• Watch free: ITVX (UK)
• Unlock your stream with NordVPN (save up to 75%)

Love Island UK season 13 is still set up for a nail-biting conclusion. Lola & Sean had long been the runaway favourites for the £50,000 jackpot, but their unexpected exit has brought (almost) everyone back into contention.

We now find ourselves with the final four, and Monday’s episode will begin with an instant elimination as Mica and Samraj decide who will join them on the plane home.

The remaining couples in the final are currently Julia & Lorenzo, Yasmin & Tommy S, Angelista & Simba, and Kavan & Jasmine.

You can watch the Love Island UK S13 final online from anywhere with a VPN and potentially for free.

Watch the Love Island UK S13 final from anywhere

If you're keen to watch the Love Island UK S13 final but you're away from home and access to the show is geo-blocked, you can always use a VPN to access it (assuming you're not breaching any broadcaster T&Cs, of course). You may be surprised by how simple it is to do.

Use one of the best VPNs to watch Love Island UK from anywhere:

How to watch the Love Island UK S13 final in the UK

The Love Island UK S13 final premieres at 9pm BST on Monday, July 27 on ITV2 and via the ITVX streaming service in the UK.

All you need is an account, a TV license and a UK postcode (e.g.HA9 0WS). Sign up here!

Traveling outside the UK? Try using a VPN – check the details above for more.

How to watch the Love Island UK S13 final in the US

In the US, the Love Island UK S13 final will air on Hulu on Thursday, July 30.

Plans start from $11.99 per month after a FREE 30-day trial. Alternatively, the Disney Plus Bundle costs an extra $1 each month but unlocks access to heaps more entertainment.

Have Hulu but away when Love Island UK is on? You can still access your usual streaming services from anywhere by using a VPN.

Can I watch the Love Island UK S13 final in Canada?

Hayu is home to Love Island UK S13 in Canada. However, seeing as it's a little way behind, we're not expecting the S13 final to air until early August.

A subscription starts at CA$7.99/month after a 7-day FREE trial.

Outside Canada? Use a VPN to gain access to all the content you'd normally stream at home.

How to watch the Love Island UK S13 final in Australia

Fans based in Australia can watch the Love Island UK S13 final for FREE on 9Now from 12pm AEST on Wednesday, July 29.

You need an email and an Aussie postcode to sign up.

Traveling outside Australia? As detailed above, if you’re overseas you’ll struggle to connect to any of the streaming services you usually use. The solution? Try using a VPN.

How to watch the Love Island UK S13 final in New Zealand

In New Zealand, the Love Island UK S13 final is available to watch on free-to-air TVNZ Duke from 8.30pm NZST on Wednesday, July 29, with live streaming available via TVNZ+.

Outside of New Zealand? Use a VPN to gain access to all the content you'd normally stream at home.

Love Island UK S13 final Q&A

We test and review VPN services in the context of legal recreational uses. For example:1. Accessing a service from another country (subject to the terms and conditions of that service).2. Protecting your online security and strengthening your online privacy when abroad.We do not support or condone the illegal or malicious use of VPN services. Consuming pirated content that is paid-for is neither endorsed nor approved by Future Publishing.

With only three more episodes to go, X-Men 97 season 2 is fast approaching the finish line — and there are a few big story threads that the Marvel TV show needs to wrap before it takes another extended break from our screens.

How will Professor X establishing X-Corp affect the current world order? What impact will Gambit's resurrection as one of Apocalypse's Four Horsemen have on this season's plot? And where is the Disney+ TV series setting up things to come for season 3? I can't say for sure — but, what I do know is when season 2 episode 7 will air on Disney+, one of the best streaming services. So, scroll on for more details!

What time can I watch X-Men 97 season 2 episode 7?

Episode 7 of X-Men 97's sophomore season will make its Disney+ debut on Wednesday, July 29. That's its global launch date, too, so viewers in North and South America won't be able to watch it on the evening of July 28.

Unless the Marvel Phase 6 project's release time is suddenly changed, the entry titled 'Strange Land, Savage Heart' will drop at the same time that its six forebears have:

• US — 12am PT / 3am ET
• Canada — 12am PT / 3am ET
• UK — 8am BST
• India — 12:30pm IST
• Singapore — 3pm SGT
• Australia — 5pm AEST
• New Zealand — 7pm NZST

X-Men 97 season 2 full release schedule

As I mentioned earlier, there aren't many installments left of the X-Men animated show's current season. Indeed, there are only two more to enjoy after this week's episode before the Marvel Cinematic Universe (MCU) adjacent program goes off-air once more.

Like the launch time section above, as long as Marvel doesn't make a last-minute adjustment to this season's release schedule, we already know when its final pair of chapters will come out:

• Season 2 episode 1 — out now
• Season 2 episode 2 — out now
• Season 2 episode 3 — out now
• Season 2 episode 4 — out now
• Season 2 episode 5 — out now
• Season 2 episode 6 — out now
• Season 2 episode 7 — July 29
• Season 2 episode 8 — August 5
• Season 2 episode 9 — August 12

• Commonwealth Games Athletics: Monday, July 27 to Saturday, August 1
• FREE streams: 7Plus (Australia) / CBC Gem (Canada)
• Use NordVPN to watch from anywhere - 75% Off Right Now

Watch Commonwealth Games athletics 2026 live streams as Josh Kerr, Shericka Jackson and Andre De Grasse headline a cast of track and field stars going for gold in Glasgow.

The six-day athletics and para athletics program begins on Monday, July 27, with fast times expected on the newly-laid track at Scotstoun Stadium. Home hope Kerr arrives fresh from breaking the mile world record in London earlier this month, while Jamaican sprinter Jackson and Canadian legend De Grasse are among a host of big names jetting in from across the world.

Keep reading to discover how to watch Commonwealth Games athletics 2026 online from anywhere – starting with those FREE options.

Today at the Games (Monday, July 27: Day 1)

(All times BST)

Morning session (10am-1.30pm)

Men's 400m Hurdles Round 1

Men's Long Jump Qualifying Round - Group A

Men's 100m Round 1

Men's Long Jump Qualifying Round - Group B

Men's 110m Hurdles Round 1

Women's Hammer Throw Qualifying Round

Women's 100m Round 1

Women's T38 100m Round 1

Evening session (6.30pm-10pm)

Women's Shot Put F57 Final

Men's High Jump Final

Women's 800m Round 1

Women's T38 100m Final

Men's Hammer Throw Final

Women's 10,000m Final

Men's 3000m Steeplechase Final

Men's 1500m T20 Final

Men's T38 100m Final

Men's 110m Hurdles Final

• 🇦🇺 Australia: 7Plus
• 🇨🇦 Canada: CBC Gem 
• 🇳🇿 New Zealand: ThreeNow (some events free)
• 🇬🇧 UK: Channel 5 (daily highlights)

Abroad during the games? You can use NordVPN (try 100% risk-free) to watch all the athletics and para athletics action free of charge as if you were right at home.

Use a VPN to watch Athletics at the Commonwealth Games 2026

With the six-day athletics and para athletics program taking place from July 27 to August 1, Commonwealth Games 2026 coincides with peak summer vacation season. Unfortunately, you may find that your usual streaming options are geoblocked while you’re away.

That’s where a VPN comes in handy – not only does it let you access your home streaming services from anywhere, but it also protects you from potential online threats. We recommend NordVPN – it does everything and will unblock any free streaming service for you to watch the action.

Using a VPN is incredibly simple:

1. Install the VPN of your choice. As we've said, NordVPN is our favorite.

2. Choose the location you wish to connect to in the VPN app. For instance, if you're visiting the US and want to view your usual Australian service, you'd select an Australia-based server from the list.

3. Sit back and enjoy the action. Head to your usual local streaming service and watch the athletics and para athletics action.

How to watch Athletics at the Commonwealth Games 2026 in the US

You can watch Athletics at the Commonwealth Games 2026 on beIN SPORTS in the US.

Fans in the US can watch every second of the Games on beIN SPORTS CONNECT. This will also give you access to the main beIN Sports channel which will have all the key athletics and para athletics action live.

beIN SPORTS subscriptions are available from $5.99 per month or $59.99 per year.

Outside the US during the Commonwealth Games? Use NordVPN to access your beIN SPORTS streams.

How to watch Athletics at the Commonwealth Games 2026 in Canada

CBC has the rights to broadcast Commonwealth Games 2026 for FREE.

You can watch some athletics and para athletics events on TV via the free-to-air CBC Sports or, for much more comprehensive live and on-demand coverage, head to its CBC Gem streaming platform.

If you aren't in Canada for the games, simply use a VPN to tune in from overseas.

How to watch Athletics at the Commonwealth Games 2026 in the UK & Ireland

You can watch Athletics at the Commonwealth Games in the UK and Ireland on TNT Sports.

TNT Sports are the live broadcast partner of the games in the UK and Ireland and will show every athletics and para athletics event on its streaming partner HBO Max.

Plans start at £25.99 per month, with rolling subscriptions available at £30.99.

If you just want to watch highlights of the track and field action, these will be free-to-air on Channel 5 every day.

Make sure to use NordVPN if you're abroad and don't want to miss any of the athletics action.

How to watch Athletics at the Commonwealth Games 2026 in Australia

Fans in Australia can watch live coverage of Athletics at the Commonwealth Games 2026 for free on Channel 7 and its streaming website 7Plus, including all of the athletics and para athletics action.

If you're currently out of Australia but want to watch free live streams, you'll need to get yourself a VPN as per the instructions above.

Commonwealth Games Athletics 2026: Preview

Two-time Olympic medalist and 2023 world champion Kerr is arguably the star attraction when it comes to the athletics and para-athletics at Glasgow 2026, especially after breaking the men's mile world record in a time of 3mins 42.66secs. The Scot goes for gold in the return of the historic Commonwealth Mile, so expect an electric atmosphere if he reaches the final on Saturday evening, with fellow home hopes Jake Wightman and Neil Gourley also targeting medals.

The host nation boasts a similarly strong line-up of female track stars, with Jemma Reekie (800m and Mile) and Laura Muir (5,000m) among their 39-strong party, as well as Paralympic gold medalist Ben Sandilands and Owen Miller (both T20 1,500m).

Several more big names are set to light up the track, including England's Zharnel Hughes in the 200m and 4x100m relay, and Georgia Hunter Bell (800m), with Jackson and De Grasse representing Jamaica and Canada, respectively, in the 4x100m relays, and 21-year-old Kanyinsola Ajayi, who this year broke the Nigerian 100m record with a time of 9.84.

The pick of the field events is arguably a highly anticipated javelin showdown between India's Neeraj Chopra and Pakistan's Arshad Nadeem, the two most recent Olympic champions. Reigning Olympic, world, and Commonwealth high jump champion Hamish Kerr represents New Zealand as he aims to add yet another medal to his collection, while Australian wheelchair racing legend Angie Ballard competes at a record-breaking fifth Commonwealth Games.

Commonwealth Games Athletics 2026: Schedule

Below is the daily schedule of athletics and para athletics events taking place at Commonwealth Games 2026. All times BST.

Monday, July 27: Day 1

Morning session (10am-1.30pm)

Men's 400m Hurdles Round 1

Men's Long Jump Qualifying Round - Group A

Men's 100m Round 1

Men's Long Jump Qualifying Round - Group B

Men's 110m Hurdles Round 1

Women's Hammer Throw Qualifying Round

Women's 100m Round 1

Women's T38 100m Round 1

Evening session (6.30pm-10pm)

Women's Shot Put F57 Final

Men's High Jump Final

Women's 800m Round 1

Women's T38 100m Final

Men's Hammer Throw Final

Women's 10,000m Final

Men's 3000m Steeplechase Final

Men's 1500m T20 Final

Men's T38 100m Final

Men's 110m Hurdles Final

Tuesday, July 28: Day 2

Morning session (10am-12.30pm)

Women's Heptathlon 100m Hurdles

Women's 400m Round 1

Women's Heptathlon High Jump

Men's 800m Round 1

Men's 400m Round 1

Evening session (6.30pm-10pm)

Women's Heptathlon Shot Put

Women's High Jump Final

Men's 100m Semi-Finals

Women's 100m Semi-Finals

Women's Hammer Throw Final

Women's Heptathlon 200m

Men's T20 Long Jump Final

Men's 10,000m Final

Men's 100m Final

Women's 100m Final

Wednesday, July 29: Day 3

Morning session (10am-1pm)

Women's Heptathlon Long Jump

Women's 200m Round 1

Men's Shot Put Qualifying Round - Group A & B

Men's One Mile Round 1

Men's 200m Round 1

Women's Heptathlon Javelin Throw

Men's 100m T12 Round 1

Women's 400m Hurdles Round 1

Evening session (6.30pm-10pm)

Women's Discus Throw F42-44/61-64 Final

Women's 1500m T54 Final

Men's Long Jump Final

Men's 400m Hurdles Semi-Finals

Women's 800m Semi-Finals

Women's Shot Put Final

Men's 100m T47 Final

Men's Discus Throw F42-44/61-64 Final

Women's Heptathlon 800m Final

Women's 3000m Steeplechase Final

Thursday, July 30: Day 4

Morning session (10am-1.30pm)

Men's Decathlon 100m

Men's Decathlon Long Jump

Men's Javelin Throw Qualifying Round

Women's 100m Hurdles Round 1

Women's One Mile Round 1

Men's Triple Jump Qualifying Round - Group A & B

Men's Decathlon Shot Put

Women's 400m Semi-Finals

Men's 400m Semi-Finals

Evening session (6.30pm-10pm)

Men's Shot Put Final

Men's 200m Semi-Finals

Men's Decathlon High Jump

Women's Triple Jump Final

Women's 100m T47 Final

Men's 100m T12 Final

Women's 200m Semi-Finals

Women's Discus Throw Final

Men's 800m Semi-Finals

Men's Decathlon 400m

Women's 5000m Final

Women's 100m Hurdles Final

Friday, July 31: Day 5

Morning session (10am-1.45pm)

Men's Decathlon 110 Hurdles

Women's Long Jump Qualifying Round - Group A

Men's Decathlon Discus Throw

Mixed 4x400m Relay Heats

Women's Long Jump Qualifying Round - Group B

Women's 200m T38 Round 1

Women's 400m T54 Round 1

Men's Decathlon Pole Vault

Evening session (6.30pm-10.15pm)

Men's Decathlon Javelin Throw

Men's 10,000m Race Walk Final

Women's Pole Vault Final

Women's Long Jump T38 Final

Men's Javelin Throw Final

Women's 800m Final

Men's Decathlon 1500m

Women's 400m Hurdles Final

Men's 400m Hurdles Final

Men's 200m Final

Women's 200m Final

Saturday, August 1: Day 6

Morning session (10am-1.45pm)

Men's Shot Put F57 Final

Men's Triple Jump Final

Men's 1500m T54 Final

Women's 10,000m Race Walk Final

Men's Discus Throw Final

Men's 400m Final

Women's 400m Final

Women's 4x100m Relay Round 1

Men's 4x100m Relay Round 1

Women's 200m T38 Final

Evening session (6.30pm-10.30pm)

Men's Pole Vault Final

Women's Long Jump Final

Women's 400m T54 Final

Women's Javelin Throw Final

Men's 5000m Final

Men's 4x100m Relay Final

Women's 4x100m Relay Final

Men's 800m Final

Men's One Mile Final

Mixed 4x400m Relay Final

Women's One Mile Final

We test and review VPN services in the context of legal recreational uses. For example:1. Accessing a service from another country (subject to the terms and conditions of that service).2. Protecting your online security and strengthening your online privacy when abroad.We do not support or condone the illegal or malicious use of VPN services. Consuming pirated content that is paid-for is neither endorsed nor approved by Future Publishing.

• AppleCare One is launching in the UK from August
• It'll be available for older devices as well as new purchases
• It's £16.99 per month for three devices, £4.99 p/month for each additional device

AppleCare, Apple's extended warranty for its devices, is expanding. A new AppleCare One bundle comes to the UK on August 4 2026 and could make it cheaper for you to cover multiple Apple products. It also lets you cover older devices rather than just new purchases.

At the moment, you've got 60 days from purchase to take out AppleCare+ coverage. That gives you free 24/7 tech support, subsidised battery replacements if your device's battery drops below 80% capacity, and unlimited accidental damage repairs including liquid damage.

AppleCare One expands the eligibility to cover devices up to four years old (one year for AirPods) provided they're in good condition. In some cases that may require a trip to the Apple Store to check the condition of an older device before you can add it to the plan.

One of the important changes is that Apple has expanded Theft and Loss coverage, which protects you for up to two incidences of theft or loss per year, to cover the Apple Watch and iPad as well as the iPhone. You can get that cover as part of AppleCare One, or take out a standalone plan for a single device.

The other key difference is that AppleCare One is a rolling subscription rather than a fixed term extended warranty — for example, if you upgrade your iPhone and trade in your old one, the AppleCare One plan will now cover your new iPhone.

As ever with bundles, how much you save depends on the particular products you have. But you can potentially save up to £11.48 per month compared to the cost of individual AppleCare+ subscriptions.

How much can you save with AppleCare One?

AppleCare One is £16.99 per month to cover three devices. You can add additional cover for £4.99 per month per additional device.

Let's say you have an iPhone Air, Apple Watch Ultra 3 and a 13-inch M5 iPad Pro. Individually, AppleCare+ with Theft and Loss will cost you £11.99, £4.99 and £8.49 per month. That's a total of £25.47, so the AppleCare One bundle is going to save you £8.48 per month.

For more modest devices the savings are smaller, but the additional device eligibility may still make AppleCare One an attractive option.

For example I have an iPhone 16 Pro and an Apple Watch Series 10, both of which are currently covered by AppleCare+ with Theft and Loss, but I didn't take out cover for my iPad Pro and the 60-day window has long closed. I'm currently paying £15.98 per month to cover my phone and watch; it'd cost just £1.01 per month more to cover an eligible iPad or iPad Pro — although sadly my iPad is an M1 so it's too old to be included.

It's worth noting that the AppleCare One bundle is for devices on the same Apple account. That means you can't cover family devices linked to other Apple accounts, even if they're in your Family Sharing group. And for some older devices you may need to confirm that they're in "good condition" by taking them to the Apple Store.

As a long time AppleCare customer I think AppleCare One looks good, and it'll save you money if you have three or more devices to cover. My only worry is that it's a subscription, and if there's one thing we know about tech giants' subscription services is that their prices always go up.

AppleCare One launches in the UK on August 4 2026.

Thinking of buying a new TV?

Try our TV size and model finder! You tell it how far you sit from your TV, we'll tell you what size to buy based on viewing angle advice from image quality experts, and we'll recommend our three top TVs at that size for different prices.

• 2.2 million vehicles are susceptible to a Bluetooth-based attack in the state of California
• The vulnerability is due to dealer-installed security systems
• Researchers at the University of California San Diego found that the Acrisure-built security devices all rely on the same secure key

A vulnerability has been found in KARR and SWDS automobile security systems manufactured by Acrisure that enables remote control via Bluetooth. The vehicles had the security systems installed by car dealers in California, specifically as anti-theft and tracking devices. Thanks to this hack, however, it seems that vehicles can be unlocked, with some further control given to the attacker.

Researchers at the University of California San Diego found that the 2.2 million automobiles were purchased from Southern Californian dealers since 2017, although the secondary market means that the vehicles could be elsewhere in the US, and even as far afield as Japan.

Worryingly, the researchers also found a publicly-accessible database holding information about all vehicles with the security system equipped.

How Bluetooth controls these cars

The researchers determined that the automobiles were purchased from Honda, Toyota, Mazda, Ford, and Jeep dealerships, and the affected vehicles have the “KARR-SWDS” label on the driver-side window, with the anti-theft device mounted under the dashboard.

Usage is straightforward: a mobile app connects to the KARR security system over Bluetooth and includes functions such as locking and unlocking doors, controlling the horn, and flashing the headlamps. It can also prevent the car from starting, although this only works if it isn’t already running.

The problem is with the implementation, which the researchers discovered relied on the same secure key on the KARR security systems. Once cracked, all cars equipped with the same device were believed to be open to attack.

Changing the secure key isn’t an option, and neither is disabling the Bluetooth. Of particular concern is that researchers found that even if the buyer doesn’t pay for a subscription for the app and the KARR system, the hardware is still in place. Worse, it has the same access to the vehicle’s doors, ignition, horn, and headlamps.

“Removing the devices is not trivial,” UCSD compsci PhD candidate and paper co-author Yibo Wei said in the report on the research (which is fully released in August). “You have to open up the dashboard and cut and reconnect the wires that are deeply intertwined with the car’s computers and ignition system.”

The patch is in

Jerry Yu, also co-author, wrote “Instead of smashing a window to get access to a vehicle, thieves could simply connect remotely via Bluetooth to the device inside the vehicle, and make it unlock car doors.”

KARR has told media outlets that only vehicles installed “with certain Bluetooth-related components” are affected, and the company has issued a firmware update.

• Northrop Grumman's MRV launched with two satellite-servicing robotic arms
• Mission Extension Pods can stretch a satellite's working life by eight years
• The spacecraft can inspect, refuel, tow, and relocate active orbital satellites or even destroy enemy satellites

Northrop Grumman has launched its first Mission Robotic Vehicle (MRV), equipped with two robotic arms to inspect, repair, refuel, and relocate satellites already operating in orbit.

The spacecraft also carries three Mission Extension Pods (MEPs) that can extend a satellite's operational life by as much as eight years after installation.

Although introduced as a commercial servicing platform, the spacecraft's ability to operate alongside other satellites has already raised questions about possible military applications.

Satellite servicing technology also enables close-proximity operations

The MRV launched aboard a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket from Cape Canaveral, carrying MEPs intended for commercial satellites operated by Australia's Optus and Luxembourg's SES.

Northrop Grumman says the spacecraft can inspect satellites, install life-extension modules, tow spacecraft between orbital positions, and assist with clearing debris already circling Earth.

Those missions depend on two robotic arms that allow the vehicle to maneuver extremely close to other satellites without relying on direct physical contact.

The robotic arm system was developed through the Robotic Servicing of Geosynchronous Satellites program led by DARPA together with the United States Naval Research Laboratory.

Because those same capabilities allow precise movement around spacecraft, a future version could disable hostile satellites if governments requested such capabilities.

"I will leave it up to the U.S. government to decide how that capability might fulfill mission objectives that they have in that regard," said Northrop Grumman CEO Kathy Warden.

"It's our objective to offer our clients options for technology deployment, and for them to determine policy for when and how they might deploy that technology."

Military officials say orbital threats are already evolving

United States Space Force officials have repeatedly argued that rival nations already possess satellites capable of approaching and interacting with other spacecraft operating in orbit today.

The service says those developments require greater attention because several countries continue expanding technologies capable of operating near valuable military and civilian satellites.

"We're basically responding to a warfighting domain where our adversaries have already put interceptors in space, and we want to make sure that we rebalance that in terms of deterrence," said Chief of Space Operations Gen. Chance Saltzman.

A Space Force spokesperson later cited China's Shi Jian 21 satellite, equipped with a robotic grappling arm, while explaining examples of orbital interceptor capabilities already available.

Officials have also warned that close-proximity satellites could collect intelligence, interfere electronically, damage spacecraft components, or deliberately move another satellite from its assigned orbit.

Those evolving capabilities have prompted the Space Force to expand its focus on orbital warfare alongside traditional space operations.

The service's Space Delta 9 unit develops tactics for both defensive and offensive missions in orbit as those threats continue evolving.

The military is also planning larger space-based defense networks through the proposed Golden Dome missile defense architecture.

The Congressional Budget Office estimates the concept could require about 7,800 space-based interceptors if the program moves forward.

For now, the MRV remains a commercial tool, but how governments will apply comparable space security tech with AI tools and autonomous systems remains to be seen.

Quordle was one of the original Wordle alternatives and is still going strong now more than 1,500 games later. It offers a genuine challenge, though, so read on if you need some Quordle hints today — or scroll down further for the answers.

Enjoy playing word games? You can also check out my NYT Connections today and NYT Strands today pages for hints and answers for those puzzles, while Marc's Wordle today column covers the original viral word game.

SPOILER WARNING: Information about Quordle today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers.

Quordle today (game #1645) — hint #1 — Vowels

* Note that by vowel we mean the five standard vowels (A, E, I, O, U), not Y (which is sometimes counted as a vowel too).

Quordle today (game #1645) — hint #2 — repeated letters

Quordle today (game #1645) — hint #3 — uncommon letters

Quordle today (game #1645) — hint #4 — starting letters (1)

If you just want to know the answers at this stage, simply scroll down. If you're not ready yet then here's one more clue to make things a lot easier:

Quordle today (game #1645) — hint #5 — starting letters (2)

Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM.

Quordle today (game #1645) — the answers

The answers to today's Quordle, game #1645, are…

• TAFFY
• FIGHT
• GUILD
• WAGER

I don’t think I have ever played such a strategic game of Quordle.

Usually I just go for whatever word seems the most gettable. But in this game, with numerous possibilities for a word ending I-G-H-T, I held back in the hope that another word would give me that crucial fifth letter. And it did.

Daily Sequence today (game #1645) — the answers

The answers to today's Quordle Daily Sequence, game #1645, are…

• CREED
• ROGUE
• POOCH
• GRIPE

Quordle answers: The past 20

• Quordle #1644, Sunday, 26 July: STOMP, LIMIT, FUNKY, STEAD
• Quordle #1643, Saturday, 25 July: SALON, SHEEN, BURST, GOURD
• Quordle #1642, Friday, 24 July: DOLLY, EDIFY, LAGER, PRANK
• Quordle #1641, Thursday, 23 July: LADEN, EVICT, WOVEN, SHIRE
• Quordle #1640, Wednesday, 22 July: COYLY, SINGE, AWASH, AWOKE
• Quordle #1639, Tuesday, 21 July: TRUSS, AXIAL, SWINE, THING
• Quordle #1638, Monday, 20 July: ICING, SLICK, GAILY, RISEN
• Quordle #1637, Sunday, 19 July: SPURT, ACRID, THRUM, BLEEP
• Quordle #1636, Saturday, 18 July: KNAVE, TIGHT, BLEAT, CHAOS
• Quordle #1635, Friday, 17 July: CUMIN, PALER, GRASS, INBOX
• Quordle #1634, Thursday, 16 July: IGLOO, PLAIT, YEAST, AROMA
• Quordle #1633, Wednesday, 15 July: PROXY, BRICK, BROTH, SURGE
• Quordle #1632, Tuesday, 14 July: EBONY, AVOID, RODEO, CUTIE
• Quordle #1631, Monday, 13 July: VOICE, BISON, BURNT, BUILT
• Quordle #1630, Sunday, 12 July: STAIN, BINGO, LARVA, DICEY
• Quordle #1629, Saturday, 11 July: WORTH, PRONG, DINGO, DRUID
• Quordle #1628, Friday, 10 July: GREET, STEAK, DUSKY, HAUTE
• Quordle #1627, Thursday, 9 July: CRUMP, PHONE, SHINY, STONY
• Quordle #1626, Wednesday, 8 July: GHOST, TREND, EXALT, ALONG
• Quordle #1625, Tuesday, 7 July: ARRAY, SUITE, KIOSK, BOULE

Good morning! Let's play Connections, the NYT's clever word game that challenges you to group answers in various categories. It can be tough, so read on if you need Connections hints.

What should you do once you've finished? Why, play some more word games of course. I've also got daily Strands hints and answers and Quordle hints and answers articles if you need help for those too, while Marc's Wordle today page covers the original viral word game.

SPOILER WARNING: Information about NYT Connections today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers.

NYT Connections today (game #1142) - today's words

Today's NYT Connections words are…

• CART
• HORSE
• CARROT
• STICK
• KNITTING NEEDLE
• MAGNIFYING GLASS
• BEAM
• GRAVEYARD
• BELL
• ICICLE
• RINGS
• HEART
• PARADIGM
• STALACTITE
• DOPPLER
• VAULT

NYT Connections today (game #1142) - hint #1 - group hints

What are some clues for today's NYT Connections groups?

• YELLOW: Equipment used by Simone Biles and co
• GREEN: Thin and skinny
• BLUE: A word that rhymes with “lift” in common
• PURPLE: As seen whilst making a purchase

Need more clues?

We're firmly in spoiler territory now, but read on if you want to know what the four theme answers are for today's NYT Connections puzzles…

NYT Connections today (game #1142) - hint #2 - group answers

What are the answers for today's NYT Connections groups?

• YELLOW: GYMNASTICS APPARATUS
• GREEN: LONG TAPERED THINGS
• BLUE: KINDS OF SHIFTS
• PURPLE: ICONS ON A SHOPPING SITE

Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM.

NYT Connections today (game #1142) - the answers

The answers to today's Connections, game #1142, are…

• YELLOW: GYMNASTICS APPARATUS: BEAM, HORSE, RINGS, VAULT
• GREEN: LONG TAPERED THINGS: CARROT, ICICLE, KNITTING NEEDLE, STALACTITE
• BLUE: KINDS OF SHIFTS: DOPPLER, GRAVEYARD, PARADIGM, STICK
• PURPLE: ICONS ON A SHOPPING SITE: BELL, CART, HEART, MAGNIFYING GLASS

• My rating: Hard
• My score: Perfect

I managed to get through today’s game without making any mistakes but I am still classing it as a tricky game.

The reason for this is that I got extremely lucky once the game got down to eight tiles; unable to find a group, I just went with the four tiles that were in a line.

GRAVEYARD shift and PARADIGM shift I may have got, but DOPPLER and STICK needed a Google. Meanwhile, perhaps I do not do enough online shopping but CART aside the other three icons didn’t trigger me to connect them.

Yesterday's NYT Connections answers (Sunday, July 26, 2026, game #1141)

• YELLOW: BABY MILESTONES: CRAWLING, FIRST WORDS, ROLLING OVER, SOLID FOOD
• GREEN: OUTMODED CONSUMER TECH: BLACKBERRY, DISCMAN, DVD PLAYER, PLASMA TV
• BLUE: EXPRESSIONS FOR RAIN: APRIL SHOWERS, LIQUID SUNSHINE, SCOTCH MIST, WET WEATHER
• PURPLE: WHAT "SHELL" MIGHT REFER TO: CARAPACE, GAS STATION, PASTRY CRUST, ROWING BOAT

Strands is the NYT's latest word game after the likes of Wordle, Spelling Bee and Connections – and it's great fun. It can be difficult, though, so read on for my Strands hints.

Want more word-based fun? Then check out my NYT Connections today and Quordle today pages for hints and answers for those games, and Marc's Wordle today page for the original viral word game.

SPOILER WARNING: Information about NYT Strands today is below, so don't read on if you don't want to know the answers.

NYT Strands today (game #876) - hint #1 - today's theme

NYT Strands today (game #876) - hint #2 - clue words

Play any of these words to unlock the in-game hints system.

• BRINK
• CHART
• TIME
• STANK
• TICK
• PLAIT

NYT Strands today (game #876) - hint #3 - spangram letters

NYT Strands today (game #876) - hint #4 - spangram position

Right, the answers are below, so DO NOT SCROLL ANY FURTHER IF YOU DON'T WANT TO SEE THEM.

NYT Strands today (game #876) - the answers

The answers to today's Strands, game #876, are…

• PLATFORM
• TRACK
• TICKET
• COUNTER
• KIOSK
• BENCH
• SPANGRAM: TRAINSTATION

• My rating: Easy
• My score: Perfect

Another Spangram First for me today, although it did come in two parts as I saw “station” before making the connection for TRAINSTATION.

From here it was a case of collecting the more obvious railway-related words — PLATFORM, TRACK, TICKET — before connecting the less obvious like KIOSK.

A nice, easygoing start to the week.

Yesterday's NYT Strands answers (Sunday, July 26, game #875)

• GURU
• MAVEN
• PUNDIT
• EXPERT
• AUTHORITY
• SPECIALIST
• SPANGRAM: BIGBRAIN

• Jetkiller reaches 370 km/h to chase faster Russian Shahed attack drones
• The original P1-SUN reportedly destroyed more than 5,500 Russian drones already
• SkyFall plans serial production of the upgraded interceptor beginning in August 2026

Ukrainian drone manufacturer SkyFall has unveiled the P1-SUN Jetkiller, an upgraded interceptor built to counter Russia's jet-powered Shahed attack drones.

The new model made its public debut at the recent Farnborough International Airshow in the United Kingdom.

According to Reuters, the Jetkiller reaches a top speed of 370 km/h, up from 310 km/h on the standard P1-SUN.

A solution to Russia's jet-powered Shaheds

Russia has begun fitting some Shahed attack drones with jet engines instead of propellers, allowing speeds of up to 500 km/h, which significantly narrows the window Ukrainian air defenses have to detect and intercept incoming drones.

Yurii Cherevashenko, a senior Ukrainian Air Force commander, told Reuters that 15% to 20% of Russia's current Shahed drones already carry jet engines.

A SkyFall company representative revealed that development of the P1-SUN Jetkiller began roughly three months before its Farnborough Airshow debut.

During its combat trials, the Jetkiller reportedly shot down more than a dozen jet-powered Shahed drones before entering serial production.

The company plans to begin full serial production of the Jetkiller in August 2026, following the completion of its combat testing.

Ukraine's rapid interceptor development points to mounting pressure to counter increasingly fast Shahed drone variants across the front.

SkyFall says its current production capacity allows for as many as 50,000 interceptor drones to be built every single month.

The original P1-SUN, introduced in November 2025, has reportedly destroyed more than 5,500 Russian drones, according to SkyFall.

A long list of rival interceptors

The threat posed by low-cost attack drones was a major point of discussion throughout this year's entire Farnborough Airshow event, with several companies displaying new counter-drone systems, including European missile maker MBDA and US firm Lockheed Martin.

Ukrainian developer General Cherry is finalizing a faster version of its Bullet interceptor capable of exceeding 400 km/h in tests.

The company has set a long-term goal of eventually reaching speeds of up to 500 km/h with its future variants.

British-Ukrainian company Firebolt Engineering recently confirmed the first known combat interception of a jet-powered Shahed drone using its Griffen system.

Firebolt says the Griffen, designed as a lower-cost alternative to conventional air defense missiles, can exceed 350 km/h in flight.

The system is now entering expanded production as Ukrainian and allied firms continue racing toward ever-faster interceptor drone designs overall.

Air defense officials have not said whether Griffen or Bullet interceptors will reach serial production on a similarly large scale.

The rapid pace of interceptor development suggests Ukraine views drone speed as essential to countering fast-evolving Russian aerial threats overall.

Whether production claims from multiple manufacturers hold up under sustained wartime conditions remains difficult to verify independently at this stage.

Via United24Media

• US factories prepare to manufacture Ukraine's battle-tested MAGURA naval drones domestically
• MAGURA V7 reportedly destroyed an aerial target using Sidewinder missile technology
• Oregon and South Carolina will host future MAGURA drone production facilities

Ukrainian defense company UFORCE has signed an agreement with US boatbuilder RECONCRAFT to manufacture the combat-proven MAGURA naval drones domestically.

Reports from The Wall Street Journal has claimed the memorandum of understanding was recently signed at the Embassy of Ukraine in Washington, with production planned at facilities in Oregon and South Carolina.

The project will have the eventual goal of building hundreds, and potentially thousands, of units annually.

A combat-tested platform moves to US soil

MAGURA drones gained international recognition after repeated strikes helped push much of Russia's Black Sea Fleet away from Crimea.

The MAGURA family has since expanded beyond strike missions to include aerial drone launches, mine countermeasures and anti-submarine sonar towing, with the MAGURA V7 variant also capable of engaging helicopters and fixed-wing aircraft.

RECONCRAFT builds combatant craft for US and partner special operations forces, while UFORCE developed the MAGURA program from the outset.

Under the partnership, both companies will contribute manufacturing equipment, materials and personnel to support the new production lines in both states.

"Partnering with UFORCE combines our manufacturing expertise and capabilities with the combat-proven autonomy of the MAGURA platform,” said Joe Silkowski, co-founder of RECONCRAFT.

This allows "us to deliver greater capability to American warfighters faster than developing a new system from the ground up."

The agreement follows increased Pentagon interest in lower-cost autonomous platforms after recent conflicts in Iran revealed how expensive drone warfare can be.

Combat experience drives broader international interest

Ukraine reported what it described as the world's first successful naval drone strike against an aerial target during late 2024 using a MAGURA V7 armed with AIM-9 Sidewinder missiles.

In April 2026, MAGURA unmanned surface vessels also took part in the US-Philippines Balikatan military exercise, reportedly sinking a target ship during a live-fire demonstration in the Luzon Strait.

“Today’s combat environments show that autonomous warfighting capabilities are a must-have,” said UFORCE CEO Oleg Rogynskyy.

“UFORCE is exceptionally positioned to deliver capabilities already tested by some of the world’s most sophisticated militaries under the most demanding battlefield conditions.”

"Working with RECONCRAFT, we will help ensure these proven autonomous capabilities become available to the US,” Sean Plankey, CEO of UFORCE USA, added.

“It's exactly the kind of industrial partnership the Arsenal of Democracy is designed to enable."

As of the time of writing, neither UFORCE nor RECONCRAFT has indicated how US production could influence the price of future MAGURA drones.

Production in the United States is typically costlier than overseas alternatives, a dynamic long observed across industries from electronics to textiles.

It is one reason American companies like Apple choose to build their gadgets outside the country, with lower manufacturing costs and established supply chains.

Whether this same cost pressure will raise the price of American-built MAGURA drones compared to their Ukrainian-made counterparts is not yet known.

• WEKApod 3 reaches exabyte capacity through software alongside dense Micron storage
• NeuralMesh 6 turns 441.5PB of flash into claimed exabyte-scale storage capacity
• WEKApod 3 relies on compression to exceed raw storage hardware limits

WEKA has launched WEKApod 3, a storage appliance line built specifically to run its new NeuralMesh 6 software at rack-scale density.

The flagship Prime Max configuration claims 1.1 exabytes of effective capacity within a single 56U rack, positioning it as the first system to cross that threshold.

Using Micron's 245.76 TB 6600 ION SSDs across roughly 1,800 drives per rack yields only 441.5 PB of raw hardware capacity, well under half an exabyte.

Software tiering closes the capacity gap

This means that the advertised exabyte-scale capacity depends heavily on data reduction technologies rather than installed flash alone.

That configuration packs 70 NVMe drives into a compact two-rack-unit, two-node chassis for maximum density.

Fingerprinting, similarity hashing, deduplication, and compression run by default across every deployment, with write overhead kept below 5%.

WEKA claims up to 6x capacity savings specifically on AI training data, backed by a contractual guarantee covering both reduction ratio and performance.

This is where NeuralMesh 6 and WEKApod 3 genuinely function as one integrated product rather than separate announcements.

AlloyFlash tiering automatically routes latency-sensitive operations to TLC flash while sending bulk-capacity data to QLC drives, which run roughly 30 to 40% cheaper per terabyte.

Per-rack throughput reaches 10.2 TB/s with 210 million IOPS, figures WEKA says beat the next-best publicly available alternative by 114% in throughput density.

Jeremy Werner, senior vice president at Micron's Core Data Center Business Unit, said the architecture paired with Micron's 245TB SSDs delivers 15.8 petabytes within a single 2U footprint.

Steve McDowell, chief analyst at NAND Research, argued that inference workloads at production scale demand different metrics than training, pointing to tokens per rack and cost per inference as the numbers buyers should now track.

Constraints force storage vendors to rethink hardware entirely

WEKA points to several structural pressures behind this hardware approach, starting with a documented drop in US data center construction in 2025.

Grid connection queues in major markets now stretch four to seven years before new capacity comes online.

Morgan Stanley has forecast a 49-gigawatt power shortfall across the United States extending through 2028, compounding existing NAND supply constraints.

WEKA argues that inefficient storage directly competes with GPUs for the same limited rack space and power budget.

By managing its own hardware supply chain instead of relying on third-party OEM channels, the company says it can offer more predictable pricing and delivery timelines.

NeuralMesh 6 will hit the shelves in the second half of 2026, with existing customers upgrading at no additional cost.

WEKApod Nitro, Prime, and Prime Max are already orderable through WEKA's distributor network, with deliveries beginning in fall 2026.

Via Storage Review

• Cloudflare finds kick-off time, not match importance, drove the biggest World Cup traffic swings
• Overnight matches more than doubled normal traffic in some countries, while daytime fixtures barely registered
• The tournament's biggest internet moment ironically wasn't the final but Argentina's 3-1 quarter-final win over Switzerland, which moved global traffic by a factor of 1.26x.

Although Spain's 1-0 extra-time win over Argentina closed out the FIFA 2026 World Cup, the tournament's biggest traffic pulls actually came days before.

Cloudflare has published its own analytics, tracking the likes of HTTP traffic, DNS, and security trends across a network spanning more than 330 points of presence in over 120 countries across June and July 2026.

While the analytics confirm some widely held assumptions about the World Cup, it also demolishes others, as it found it was not the final which moved the internet most, but a quarter-final involving Argentina.

A World Cup with plenty of interesting insights

Per Cloudflare's data, the Argentina vs Switzerland quarter-final topped every other fixture with a deviation factor of about 1.26, while the final ranked eighth.

Somewhat unsurprisingly, Argentina, the defending champions, also moved the most traffic during their run, at 1.18x that of a typical country, followed by France at 1.16x.

Matches played between roughly midnight and 8 am local time produced the biggest deviations, in some cases more than doubling normal traffic. The reason is straightforward: those are hours when almost nobody is online, so fans staying up or waking early to watch represent a large proportional swing.

Matches falling between 9am and mid-afternoon barely registered, since the people watching would have been online regardless. Early-evening kickoffs produced a smaller secondary lift, most visible on weekdays, as matches kept people connected during hours when usage would normally taper off.

Bosnia and Herzegovina illustrated both ends of this. When the national team played at 2 am local time, traffic at points more than doubled. When they played in the evening, traffic fell to around 70% of typical levels as people put their devices down and simply watched.

The clearest demonstration came from Brazil's 2-1 Round of 32 win over Japan on June 29. The same 90 minutes fell during ordinary waking hours in Brazil and in the dead of night in Tokyo. Japanese traffic ran at roughly double normal levels; Brazilian traffic sat about a quarter below normal. Two nearly parallel curves, opposite sides of the baseline, same match.

Grouping countries by the shape of their match-day traffic curves produced three clusters, and the split reveals something about how people actually watch.

The largest group (44 countries across 101 matches) saw traffic rise during halftime and hydration breaks, the familiar pattern of everyone reaching for their phone the moment play stops. A smaller group of eight countries across 18 matches did the exact opposite, with traffic falling during those same pauses.

The explanation turned out to be streaming. That second cluster (Algeria, Tunisia, Jordan, Egypt and DR Congo) showed a traffic mix dominated by multimedia and streaming requests, meaning a large share of viewers were watching the match online rather than on broadcast television.

Notably, hydration breaks had little effect in the streaming cluster but a clear one elsewhere. Cloudflare's reading is that a viewer won't close a stream for a three-minute cooling break but will for a fifteen-minute interval. In the majority of countries, though, even those three minutes were enough to produce a visible traffic bump: Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina showed the effect most strongly.

Requests to gambling industry sites rose overall from the opening game onward. The more interesting change was structural. Before the tournament, betting traffic followed a pronounced weekly rhythm; afterward it flattened into a near-constant profile, a consequence, Cloudflare suggests, of matches running at near-daily regularity for a month.

At the scale Cloudflare operates, it is genuinely difficult for any single event to leave a visible mark on aggregate global traffic. That the 2026 World Cup managed to do so is the clearest measure of how much the tournament meant to people online.

• Stream Shark Week 2026 free via YouTube TV / DirecTV / Hulu + Live TV (US)
• Unlock your stream with Surfshark (save up to 85%)
• Shark Week 2026 starts at 8pm ET/PT on Sunday, July 26

"It's all psychological. You yell barracuda, everybody says, "Huh? What?" You yell shark, we've got a panic on our hands." We're still waiting on Barracuda Week (which we'd definitely tune into), but in the meantime TV event of the summer Shark Week is back to keep you glued to your telly and out of the Amity Island waters.

Anything to keep Mayor Vaughn happy.

Even better – you can stream all 20 specials across seven nights, including Air Jaws: Red, White and Breach, How to Train a Great White and My Strange Shark Addiction, for free.

Here's the trick: Shark Week airs exclusively on Discovery, which you can access with a free trial, and Surfshark will let you watch Shark Week from anywhere. Not only is the aptly named VPN excellent, but it's also heavily discounted for a limited time, and comes with a 30-day money-back guarantee.

How to watch Shark Week 2026 for free

Discovery is home to Shark Week 2026. If you don't have the channel on cable, it's available on a streaming basis from several cable alternatives. Best of all, a few of them let new subscribers take advantage of a free trial.

YouTube TV usually costs $82.99 per month but comes with a 5-day free trial and $15 off each of your first five months.

The DirecTV MyEntertainment genre pack costs $42.99 per month after a 5-day free trial, and Hulu + Live TV costs $89.99 per month after a 3-day free trial.

Outside the US? You can use a VPN to watch Shark Week 2026 for free as if you were right at home.

Use a VPN to watch Shark Week 2026 for free from anywhere

Quick start: Using a VPN to watch Shark Week 2026 free

Using a VPN is incredibly simple; just follow these steps.

1. Install the VPN of your choice. As we've said, Surfshark is the one we recommend.

2. Choose the location you wish to connect to in the VPN app. For instance if you're visiting the UK and want to view an American service, you'd select the "United States" location from the server list.

3. Sit back and enjoy the action. Head to your streaming platform of choice and watch Shark Week 2026 just like you would at home.

What to know about Shark Week 2026

(All times ET/PT)

Sunday, July 26
8pm – K-Pop Shark Heroes
9pm – Air Jaws: Red, White and Breach
10pm – Invasion of the Mega Sharks

Monday, July 27
8pm – Bull Shark Dinner Bell
9pm – House of Sharks
10pm – Biggest Mako on Earth

Sunday, July 26
8pm – Jurassic Sharks
9pm – Jaws vs Orca
10pm – Chum Island: Catching a Killer

Sunday, July 26
8pm – Expedition X: Atomic Sharks
9pm – Expedition Unknown: Shark Secrets
10pm – Alien Sharks: Untamed America

Sunday, July 26
8pm – What Shark Attacked?
9pm – How to Train a Great White
10pm – Ultimate Shark Dive

Sunday, July 26
8pm – Secrets of the Great White Kill
9pm – Sharkzilla Takes New York
10pm – My Strange Shark Addiction

Sunday, July 26
8pm – Great White Highway
9pm – Thresher Shark: Stun to Kill

You may also be interested in...

• How to watch Evolution for free
• How to watch UK TV from anywhere
• How access BBC Sounds from anywhere

We test and review VPN services in the context of legal recreational uses. For example:1. Accessing a service from another country (subject to the terms and conditions of that service).2. Protecting your online security and strengthening your online privacy when abroad.We do not support or condone the illegal or malicious use of VPN services. Consuming pirated content that is paid-for is neither endorsed nor approved by Future Publishing.

• Accomplish AI showed Claude Cowork could escape a VM sandbox via Linux zero‑day CVE‑2026‑46331
• Agent accessed host Mac files, risking exfiltration of SSH keys, cloud credentials, and more
• Anthropic shifted Cowork to default cloud execution; local users must harden configs to mitigate exposure

Recent news of a ChatGPT agent escaping the sandbox and attacking services on the internet raised quite a few eyebrows, but it seems it’s not the only one capable of running wild. Security researchers Accomplish AI are saying they achieved similar results with Anthropic’s Claude Cowork.

In a new report, the researchers said they ran a local session in a Mac-hosted virtual Linux machine and then observed as the agent broke free of the VM and started reading and writing files on the underlying system.

“We connected a folder to a fresh Claude Cowork session, sent one short message, and watched the agent escape the sandbox,” Oren Yomtov, principal security researcher at Accomplish AI, told The Hacker News. “From inside the VM, it reached the host Mac and read and wrote files all over it, far outside the folder we'd connected, with no permission prompt anywhere.”

Defaulting to cloud execution

This means that, in theory, the agent can be used to access or exfiltrate anything that’s stored on the Mac’s user account, including SSH keys, cloud credentials, and more. To break out of the sandbox, the agent exploited CVE-2026-46331 ("pedit COW"), a Linux kernel privilege-escalation vulnerability. This flaw, fixed in mid-June this year, was given a severity score of 7.8/10 (high).

Accomplish AI disclosed these findings with Anthropic, which allegedly acknowledged them but did not issue a direct fix. However, the version of Claude Cowork that was released afterwards defaults to cloud execution which, the publication claims, addresses the issue. Still, users who opt to run the agent locally rather than in the cloud will remain exposed.

Mitigations are possible, though. Users should disable unprivileged user namespaces, grant/revoke seccopm permissions, stop modules autoloading, and restrict sharing of the whole host into the VM.

"Scope it to the folders that were actually connected instead of all of /, or at least mount it read-only, and run coworkd with ProtectSystem=strict in its own mount namespace so it isn't re-execing binaries a session user can poison," Accomplish AI explained. "Then even a full guest-root has nothing to land on, the last two steps of the chain have nowhere to go."

• Proofpoint reports Russian TA488 exploited Zimbra zero‑day CVE‑2025‑66376 in espionage campaigns
• “Half‑click exploit” let attackers compromise systems when victims merely viewed malicious emails
• Targets included NATO, Ukrainian government, and defense entities; group vanished after Feb 2026 exposure

Russian state-sponsored cybercriminals have been abusing a zero-day vulnerability in the Zimbra email and collaboration platform to conduct espionage against western targets - primarily military and government agencies, experts have warned.

Cybersecurity researchers Proofpoint claim the campaign has been ongoing for at least a year, possibly longer, describing it as a “half-click exploit”, because the victims don’t even need to do anything specific in order to get infected.

Usually, when an attack is done via email, the victim is required to at least download a file or click a link. In this case, a cross-site scripting (XSS) vulnerability in the Zimbra web-based email service allowed the Russians to infiltrate the computers as soon as the victim views the email, nothing more.

Targeting NATO and Ukraine

The vulnerability in question is now tracked as CVE-2025-66376. It was assigned a severity score of 7.2/10 (high), and was patched in November 2025. However, the threat actors have been leveraging it long before Zimbra patched it up.

Proofpoint says numerous groups were observed, throughout the years, abusing this flaw. This time around, though, the group in question is tracked as TA488, also known as Laundry Bear or Void Blizzard.

“After successful exploitation, TA488 established persistent access to the systems and exfiltrated emails from the targeted users,” Proofpoint’s report reads. Besides emails, the crooks hunted for passwords, email directories, two-factor authentication tokens, and more. The group has been “consistently” targeting NATO and Ukrainian government organizations, alongside entities in the defense industrial base,

The group seems to be defunct now, since the researchers could not find any activity post February 2026. At that time, security researchers Seqrite disclosed a detailed breakdown of the group’s infrastructure and modus operandi, resulting in TA488 burning down months-old setups and vanishing.

• Watch Tour de France 2026 free on SBS on Demand (Australia)
• Unlock your stream with NordVPN (save up to 75%)
• Stage 21 start time: Sunday, July 26, 11.50am ET / 4.50pm BST / 1.50am AEST (Mon)

Tour de France 2026 ends today with Stage 21, which finishes on the iconic Champs-Élysées in Paris. The ride into the French capital promises to be a coronation for Tadej Pogacar as the Slovenian closes in on his third Yellow Jersey in a row, and his fifth overall. It will take the UAE Emirates XRG star level with Jacques Anquetil, Eddy Merckx, Bernard Hinault and Miguel Indurain and it is surely only a matter of time before he moves out on his own beyond the legendary quartet.

Today's stage has been shortened from a 132.5km ride down to 89km due to policing pressures on tackling wildfires across France. The steep, cobbled roads up the Côte de la Butte Montmartre are still included and proved an excellent addition to last year's race. The route taking them up the 1km climb (average gradient of 6.5%) three times before they head for home on the Champs-Élysées.

The modified route means the puncheurs and classics riders will have a chance to win this most prestigious of stages, as well as the sprinters, so it should be a fascinating watch. However, all the attention will be on Pogacar, who holds a commanding GC lead over second-place Remco Evenepoel, with team-mate Isaac del Toro third.

Here's how to watch Stage 21 of Tour de France 2026 from anywhere in the world. We've also listed the schedule, route and recent GC winners below.

Can you watch Stage 21 of Tour de France 2026 for free?

Yes. Stage 21 of the Tour de France 2026 is being shown on free-to-air SBS in Australia, with live streaming available through SBS on Demand.

It will also be shown free on S4C with Welsh commentary (UK), France TV (France), RTBF Auvio (Belgium), RaiPlay (Italy), RTVE Play (Spain) and NOS (Netherlands)

Free highlights are available in the UK daily, courtesy of Channel 5 and 5.

Traveling abroad right now? You can use a VPN to watch Tour de France for free as if you were right at home.

Use a VPN to watch Stage 21 of Tour de France 2026

A VPN is handy piece of software that can make your device appear as if it's back in your home country, so you can unlock your usual service. The best VPN right now? We recommend NordVPN – it does everything and comes with up to 75% off.

How to watch Stage 21 of Tour de France 2026 in the US

Like every stage of the Tour de France 2026, Stage 21 is being shown live on Peacock and NBC in the US.

The Peacock price starts at $10.99/month or $109.99/year for a plan that carries live sports. However, you can access Peacock virtually for free with a Walmart Plus 30-day trial for $1.

You can access NBC through Sling – specifically the Blue plan, which starts at $45.99/month. It includes NBC, ABC and Fox in select locations, plus FS1, USA Network, FX and more.

Alternatively, NBC is also carried by Fubo, YouTube TV and Hulu + Live TV, each of which offers a free trial to new users.

If you're traveling outside of the US, you can make use of NordVPN to catch the action.

How to watch Stage 21 of Tour de France 2026 in the UK

In the UK, TNT Sports has the exclusive rights to show Tour de France 2026 and will have live coverage of Stage 21.

You can add TNT Sports to your Sky, Virgin Media or EE TV package, or get an HBO Max plan that includes TNT Sports. Prices start at £25.99/month if you commit to a year.

Alternatively, you can catch the best of the action on free-to-air Channel 5, which will broadcast its daily Tour de France highlights show at 9pm BST. Streaming is available via the 5 platform.

If you're out of the UK but still want to tune in, explore the VPN route set out above, which will help you access your accounts from anywhere.

How to watch stage 21 of Tour de France 2026 in Australia

Free-to-air SBS is showing Tour de France 2026 in its entirety in Australia, with live streaming available via SBS on Demand, so that is the place to go to watch Stage 21.

Just create an account, using a valid Australia postcode (e.g. 2042).

Not in Australia right now? You can use a VPN like NordVPN to watch all the action as if you were back home.

How to watch stage 21 of Tour de France 2026 in Canada

Cycling fans in Canada wanting to watch Stage 21 should head to FloBikes, which is showing every stage of the 2026 Tour de France.

A subscription costs CA$49.99/month or CA$216/year.

Visiting Canada from Australia? Use NordVPN to watch free-to-air TdF coverage.

Tour de France 2026 Q&A

Stage 21 Profile

We test and review VPN services in the context of legal recreational uses. For example:1. Accessing a service from another country (subject to the terms and conditions of that service).2. Protecting your online security and strengthening your online privacy when abroad.We do not support or condone the illegal or malicious use of VPN services. Consuming pirated content that is paid-for is neither endorsed nor approved by Future Publishing.

• Prices on Roku streaming devices are going up
• The products are still available at 'sale' prices
• One source puts the change down to the memory crisis

Streaming devices like the Roku Streaming Stick Plus get you a whole lot of entertainment for relatively little money, but the value proposition is about to change: Roku is the latest tech company to jack up its prices in response to the global memory shortage.

As spotted by Ars Technica and others, the prices for streaming devices on the Roku US website have been put up, though the products are still available at their previous prices — now labeled as 'sale' offers. It's not clear how long this sale might last before the new pricing kicks in, but you might want to grab a Roku quickly.

The Streaming Stick is up to $39.99 from $29.99, the Streaming Stick Plus goes up from $39.99 to $59.99, the Streaming Stick 4K is now $79.99 rather than $49.99 (the biggest jump at 60%), and the Roku Ultra box is up to $149.99 from $99.99.

Looking at Roku's international websites, including the UK, there are no signs of price rises yet — but it seems inevitable that if the company is putting up the cost of buying a Roku in the US, then this will come to other countries too in the near future.

Time to switch?

Roku hasn't said anything officially about the new price changes, but according to the team at The Desk, a Roku executive they spoke to confirmed that it was down to "shortages in computer memory and other components".

We know that rapidly rising demands for AI compute capacity have led to a severe shortage of memory and rocketing costs, and everyone in the industry has been affected. Last month Apple raised its prices on a variety of different products in response, including iPads and the MacBook Neo.

Reaction online has been mostly negative, as you would expect. One Redditor says "it's hard to find another affordable option" for streaming devices like these, though other commentators are recommending alternatives from Google and Apple.

There's also some consternation over an increasing amount of ads being shown on Roku screens, and the company's recent acquisition by Fox. Whatever you think of Roku though, it's another sign of consumers being hit hard by memory shortages.

• Huawei removal could cost Europe up to €40 billion, GSMA estimates
• GSMA expects reduced competition to increase telecom equipment prices significantly
• Experts disagree over the true financial impact of Huawei's removal

The European Union's plan to remove supposedly high-risk telecom vendors such as Huawei and ZTE could cost far more than Brussels currently estimates, new figures have claimed

The GSMA trade body has said that direct replacement costs would reach €30 to €40 billion - roughly four times higher than the European Commission's own estimate of €10 to €13 billion in total.

Under the Commission's own projections, the transition away from Chinese equipment would cost between €3.4 billion and €4.3 billion annually across a three-year rollout - that annual estimate equates to a total cost of roughly €10 to €13 billion once the full three-year period concludes.

A costly clash over Chinese telecom equipment

The push to remove Huawei and ZTE from European networks traces back to security concerns raised in the early 2010s.

Several EU governments began restricting Chinese vendors after the United States pressured allies to exclude them from next-generation 5G infrastructure.

The debate intensified further as multiple member states moved to ban Chinese equipment from their national 5G core networks entirely.

The European Commission later proposed a formal ban on high-risk suppliers as part of a new EU Cybersecurity Act now under active negotiation.

GSMA's €30 to €40 billion figure is a one-time total, and it breaks down into fixed networks at €5 billion and transport networks at €9 to €12 billion.

It also projects an extra €8.5 billion in costs between 2027 and 2030 from reduced competition among equipment manufacturers, a cost the Commission's figures do not appear to include.

GSMA attributes that added expense to fewer companies competing for contracts once high-risk vendors are excluded entirely from the market.

Telecom operators across the bloc have already begun pressing regulators for financial compensation tied to the mandated equipment replacement.

Experts clash over whose numbers are accurate

Some economists dispute GSMA's figures, arguing the estimates fail to separate new costs from expenses that would have occurred regardless.

"GSMA estimates are gross, not incremental," said Hosuk Lee-Makiyama, director at think tank ECIPE.

He argued that subtracting replacement costs that would have occurred anyway would bring the totals close to the Commission's own figures.

Lee-Makiyama's critique suggests the true gap between industry and Commission estimates may be lower. The European Commission had not responded to requests for comment on the dispute.

GSMA's report arrives as negotiations over the Cybersecurity Act continue among EU member states and telecom industry representatives.

Any eventual compensation scheme would likely require agreement among national governments already divided over how quickly to remove Chinese vendors.

This is not the first time GSMA's figures have contrasted sharply with the European Commission's or individual analysts' estimates.

In 2019, GSMA projected that replacing Chinese-made telecommunications equipment across Europe could cost as much as €55 billion in total.

Strand Consult, by contrast, estimated the cost of replacing Huawei or ZTE equipment eligible for 5G upgrades at around $3.5 billion.

Whether the final cost this time lands closer to Brussels' modest estimate or GSMA's far larger figure remains genuinely unresolved for now.

Via Politico

• The Walking Dead: Dead City season 3 Premiere: Sunday, July 26
• FREE stream: TVNZ Plus (NZ)
• Use NordVPN to watch from anywhere

The Walking Dead franchise shuffles on as we return to Dead City (or New York’s Manhattan) for another outing. And this time out, it looks like Maggie (Lauren Cohen) and Negan (Jeffrey Dean Morgan) may finally have put their differences aside. Read on for how to watch The Walking Dead: Dead City season 3 online from anywhere with a VPN — a potentially for FREE

At the heart of season 3 is the new community that Maggie and Negan hope to build, and having both headed up supposed safe havens in the past — to varying degrees of success — the pair seem the perfect survivors for the job. However, when choas erupts and threatens to destroy the burgeoning society, the TWD OGs are forced to question whether a utopia is truly possible in their post-apocalyptic world.

After a patchy first couple of seasons, it certainly sounds like Dead City has found its feet, rebooting Maggie and Negan’s relationship to where it was when the mothership show concluded. With some interesting questions to be asked around the idea of community and responsibility, and some great new additions to the cast, including siblings Renata (Aimee Garcia) and Luis (Raúl Castillo) alongside returning favourites, season 3 could shape up to be the most satisfying stint in apocalyptic NYC yet.

We’ve got all the info on where to watch The Walking Dead: Dead City season 3 online and stream every episode from anywhere.

How to watch The Walking Dead: Dead City S3 online from abroad

For those away from home looking to watch The Walking Dead: Dead City season 3, you’ll be unable to watch the show as normal if you're outside NZ due to regional restrictions. Luckily, there’s an easy solution.

Downloading a VPN allows you to stream geo-blocked services online, no matter where you are. It's a simple bit of software that changes your IP address, meaning that you can access on-demand content or live TV just as if you were at home. Our favorite is NordVPN – it's one of the best VPNs on the market.

Use a VPN to watch The Walking Dead: Dead City season 3 from anywhere:

How to watch The Walking Dead: Dead City S3 in the US

How to watch The Walking Dead: Dead City S3 in Canada

How to watch The Walking Dead: Dead City S3 in Australia

How to watch The Walking Dead: Dead City S3 in the UK

Watch he Walking Dead: Dead City S3 for free in New Zealand

What you need to know about The Walking Dead: Dead City season 3

The Walking Dead: Dead City S3 trailer

The Walking Dead: Dead City S3 cast

• Jeffrey Dean Morgan as Negan
• Lauren Cohan as Maggie Rhee
• Logan Kim as Hershel
• Gaius Charles as Perlie
• Željko Ivanek as The Croat
• Aimee Garcia as Renata
• Jimmi Simpson as Dillard
• Raúl Castillo as Luis

The Walking Dead: Dead City S3 release date and episode schedule

Season 3 of TWD: Dead City will premiere in North America on Sunday, July 26 and in Australia and New Zealand on Monday, July 27. A UK release date is TBC. The full release schedule is as follows:

• Episode 1 - "Trillium": Sunday, July 26
• Episode 2 - "Haven": Sunday, August 2
• Episode 3 - "Emigrants": Sunday, August 9
• Episode 4 - "Found/Lost": Sunday, August 16
• Episode 5 – "Imperialis": Sunday, August 23
• Episode 6 – "Genesis": Sunday, August 30
• Episode 7 – "Hourglass": Sunday, September 6
• Episode 8 – "Tenebrae": Sunday, September 13

We test and review VPN services in the context of legal recreational uses. For example:1. Accessing a service from another country (subject to the terms and conditions of that service).2. Protecting your online security and strengthening your online privacy when abroad.We do not support or condone the illegal or malicious use of VPN services. Consuming pirated content that is paid-for is neither endorsed nor approved by Future Publishing.

• Stream Shark Week 2026 on Discovery via YouTube TV free trial (US)
• Unlock your stream with Surfshark (save up to 85%)
• Shark Week 2026 dates: Sunday, July 26 – Saturday, August 1

Findulge your inner child and learn something new along the way by diving into Shark Week, a celebration of one of the natural world's most endlessly intimidating and captivating animal groups, playing out over seven days and 20 specials.

Adrenaline-junkie Molly Carlson is embracing that spirit a little too literally for our liking in Ultimate Shark Dive, by attempting a record-breaking freefall dive from a helicopter into a narrow cage surrounded by reef sharks – some species of which are known to be aggressive and/or a little too curious for comfort.

Yes, one of Shark Week's missions has traditionally been to undo the reputational damage wreaked by Jaws, but with titles like Air Jaws: Red, White and Breach, Bull Shark Dinner Bell, Chum Island: Catching a Killer, What Shark Attacked? and Secrets of the Great White Kill also prevalent on the schedule, you can forgive us for staying out of the water for its duration (and beyond).

After all, you never know where Big Rose might be. Here's hoping Dr Neil Hammerschlag and Paul de Gelder manage to track the supersized great white down in Invasion of the Mega Sharks. Expedition X: Atomic Sharks, Phil Torres and Heather Amaro's study of sharks living amongst nuclear waste, and Dr Tristan Guttridge's intelligence-testing How to Train a Great White sound especially fascinating too.

Read on as we explain how to watch Shark Week 2026 from anywhere and potentially for free. Scroll right down to the bottom for the full lineup of specials.

Use a VPN to watch Shark Week 2026 from anywhere

A VPN is a handy piece of software that can make your device appear as if it's back in your home country and unlock your usual streaming services. The best VPN right now? We recommend Surfshark – it does everything and comes with up to 85% off.

How to watch Shark Week 2026 in the US

Shark Week 2026 airs on Discovery on seven consecutive nights from Sunday, July 26 to Saturday, August 1. A triple-header of specials will start at 8pm ET/PT each evening, with a double-header to close.

The Discovery channel is available on a streaming basis from several OTT operators, including YouTube TV, which comes with a 5-day FREE trial.

Alternatively, the HBO Max streaming platform will let you stream Shark Week programming too. Plans start from $10.99 per month, or you can pay more to add live sports and bundle in other streaming services like Disney Plus and Hulu.

If you have a subscription but you're away during Shark Week 2026, you can unlock access your usual streaming services from anywhere by using a VPN.

How to watch Shark Week 2026 in Canada

In Canada, Shark Week 2026 airs on Discovery to exactly the same schedule.

Cord cutters can tune in via Discovery+, which starts at CA$5.99/month.

Away from Canada right now? Use Surfshark to access your subscriptions from anywhere.

Can I watch Shark Week 2026 in the UK?

Although Discovery+ is home to Shark Week programming in the UK, they tend to hit the streaming service in dribs and drabs, instead of airing as an event.

At the time of writing, it isn't clear when any of the Shark Week 2026 specials will be available to watch in the UK.

For now, a VPN will help you tune in if you're spending time in the UK from the US or Canada. Surfshark is our recommended provider, and you can find out why with our in-depth Surfshark review.

How to watch Shark Week 2026 in Australia

Shark Week 2026 goes out on HBO Max in Australia from Sunday, August 16.

Prices start from AU$11.99 per month.

If you'd rather not wait that long, a VPN will help you tune in if you're an American or a Canadian spending time abroad. The solution? Try using a VPN.

Shark Week 2026 – Need to Know

Shark Week 2026 trailer

Shark Week 2026 episode guide

Shark Week 2026 comprises 20 specials, which will air in North America on the following schedule:

Sunday, July 26
8pm – “K-Pop Shark Heroes”
9pm – “Air Jaws: Red, White and Breach”
10pm – “Invasion of the Mega Sharks”

Monday, July 27
8pm – “Bull Shark Dinner Bell”
9pm – “House of Sharks”
10pm – “Biggest Mako on Earth”

Sunday, July 26
8pm – “Jurassic Sharks”
9pm – “Jaws vs Orca”
10pm – “Chum Island: Catching a Killer”

Sunday, July 26
8pm – “Expedition X: Atomic Sharks”
9pm – “Expedition Unknown: Shark Secrets”
10pm – “Alien Sharks: Untamed America”

Sunday, July 26
8pm – “What Shark Attacked?”
9pm – “How to Train a Great White”
10pm – “Ultimate Shark Dive”

Sunday, July 26
8pm – “Secrets of the Great White Kill”
9pm – “Sharkzilla Takes New York”
10pm – “My Strange Shark Addiction”

Sunday, July 26
8pm – “Great White Highway”
9pm – “Thresher Shark: Stun to Kill”

(All times ET/PT)

VPN services are evaluated and tested by us in view of legal recreational use. For example:a) Access to services from other countries, (subject to the terms and conditions of that service).b) Safeguarding your online security and making your online privacy more robust when abroad.Future plc does not support nor condone the illegal or malicious use of VPN services. We do not endorse nor approve of consuming pirated content that is paid-for.

• It's still unclear whether employers should train workers, or if workers should train themselves
• Most organizations would still pay a premium to have employees who know a thing or two about AI
• AI is increasingly common in performance reviews and promotion decisions

New research has claimed, three in four (77%) UK organizations now expect AI proficient to become a baseline requirement across most non-technical roles within the next year.

But despite a clear demand for AI skills, whose responsibility it is to upskill workers is still very much hotly challenged, the report from HiBob says.

For example, a near-identical number of companies are investing in AI upskilling (82%) and have clear strategies for finding candidates who already have strong AI skills (80%).

Employers are recruiting for AI-proficient workers

When it comes to training workers, employers are using a mix of funding opportunities for employees (33%), providing dedicated time for workers to experiment (33%) and offering pre-built prompts and workflows (31%), indicating that there's not yet a single way forward.

While the report doesn't shift the responsibility onto either party, with more than three in five considering AI when making promotion decisions (63%) and including AI in regular performance reviews (61%), workers are clearly required to take at least some ownership over their upskilling.

"The winners in the AI era will be the organisations that can define a shared language of skills, identify where capability truly sits, and pivot talent to where it creates the most value," CEO Ronni Zehavi wrote.

Regardless, with nearly all (97%) employers prepared to offer at least a 10% salary premium for AI proficiency, demand for such skills isn't going anywhere and the workers who take initiative could be the ones to see the most success in the short term, as organizations battle getting to grips with how to support their workforces.

• Nearly 400 4K Blu-ray users shared info about player problems
• There's a huge gap between the best and worst in the poll
• Panasonic will be happy; Sony not so much

One of the things I like best about Reddit is the way people share their experiences of particular products: whether it's a kitchen knife, a portable AC or a Gibson guitar I know I'll be able to find sage advice on what to buy and what to watch out for. And now the good people of r/hometheater have come together to talk about the best 4K Blu-ray players and their reliability.

The poll was carried out by r/hometheater poster "requieminadream" and generated nearly 400 responses — almost double the number of previous poll respondents — from r/4KBluray, r/Bluray, r/PhysicalMediaMatters, the AVS Forums, and the Blu-ray.com forums. And there are some very clear differences between different firms' Blu-ray devices.

Requieminadream very kindly summarized the results in a sentence: "The Sony UBP-X700 is still the problem child, the Panasonic DP-UB820 is still champ, and the pricey UB-9000 posted the cleanest numbers (small sample though)."

But there were some interesting discoveries in the detail too, so it's definitely worth looking at if you're considering a pre-owned 4K Blu-ray player purchase, or just which one seems to make people the happiest long-term.

The 4K Blu-ray Standalone Player Reliability Poll numbers ARE IN! from r/hometheater

Which 4K Blu-ray players are the best?

One of the reasons I like Reddit wisdom is because with few exceptions, reviewers can't spend years with the products they test — so the reviews of my car don't know about the software issues that drive me wild and sometimes require a reboot at traffic lights, and the reviews of my router don't know about its tendency to misbehave every few weeks.

It's the same with Blu-ray players: even the most in-depth review won't be able to tell you if a player's likely to pack up in year two or three. (Though one exception is our Panasonic DP-UB820 review, written by our TV Hardware senior writer James Davidson, because he wrote us a fresh review based on combining using it in our test room and having used it daily for several years beforehand.)

But in general, polls like this are a brilliant resource.

By a large margin, the Panasonic DP-UB820 is the community's favored player: 43.4% of respondents have one, and its problem rate was around half that of the Sony UBP-X700. The rate of serious issues was very low, at just 8% — backing up what James had said, when he called it "the workhorse of the 4K Blu-ray player world".

The "problem child" that emerged from this latest poll is the Sony UBP-X700. Of the 103 Sony users, some 77.7% reported some issues over time; recurring and/or serious issues were 23%. The number one complaint is freezing during triple-layer transitions, which is something that has long been discussed on Blu-ray forums.

The poll shows another interesting pattern, which is problems over time. For the Sony, issues became more common over time — but for the Panasonic the pattern was of any failures showing up early, but better long-term reliability.

The other players in the survey came in between the two extremes, but some of the best results were from "other" players including games consoles and more niche Blu-ray products.

Satisfaction with those products was exceptionally high, with the PS5 getting a significantly higher rating than the Xbox. That's all the more striking given the Sony X700's performance: the PS5 is a more premium product and that seems to be reflected in its reliability — alas, we shouldn't expect any more PlayStations to arrive with a disc player.

I should make clear, as the original Redditor did, that in some cases the sample sizes for ownership in these polls is pretty low, so we should take the results with a pinch of salt. However, the Panasonic UB820 and the Sony X700 were the best-represented, and are the two most popular players, so their data is arguably the most useful anyway.

• Ukraine Central Research Institute has unveiled Marichka, a closed neural network intended to cut brigade-level planning decisions from six to 12 hours down to minutes
• The system calculates force ratios, estimates losses, and models courses of action on an interactive map, but has so far only been trialed on test data, with classified document integration still pending
• Marichka adds another layer to Ukraine's tech stack for battlefield planning: the country already fields Delta for situational awareness and works with Palantir at multiple levels

Ukraine's Central Research Institute of the Armed Forces has presented Marichka, a closed neural network designed to compress the operational planning cycle at brigade level and above from hours to minutes.

The system, still in testing, is built to collect and verify battlefield information, then calculate force ratios and estimate required resources and likely losses, presenting commanders with modeled options on an interactive map. Military standards currently allow a regiment or brigade commander six to 12 hours and roughly 20 documents to reach the same point.

It can also alert command posts to changes in the operational situation as new information arrives. Colonel Yurii Kliat, who heads the institute, was explicit about where authority stops, telling the briefing that the final decision remains with the commander.

A battlefield-layer replacement for Palantir

Palantir has been embedded in Ukrainian operations since shortly after Russia's full-scale invasion in 2022, and it remains a mainstay in that theater, with a scope that dwarfs what Marichka is attempting.

Marichka is still an important step. If it works as described, it would give Ukraine sovereign control over part of the reasoning layer that currently sits with a foreign vendor, even as Palantir's pipeline remains the more established presence in the country's software-driven war effort.

According to Colonel Yurii Kliat, head of Ukraine's Central Research Institute of the Armed Forces, Marichka centrally gathers battlefield information, automatically calculates the balance of forces and combat potentials, and estimates required resources and likely losses.

The intent is to let brigade and regiment commanders reach an informed decision in minutes, measured against a doctrinal standard that currently allows six to 12 hours and roughly 20 documents.

Ukraine already fields the system that most closely answers to the description of a homegrown Palantir: Delta, which has provided situational awareness across the defense forces since 2022. Marichka is a new layer proposed on top of a stack that already includes Delta, Palantir's platforms for fusion and analysis, and, as of this year, a dedicated Defense AI Center. Whether it will integrate with Delta or run separately has not been disclosed, and that is arguably the most important open question about the program.

Brigadier General Andrii Lebedenko told the Drone Autonomy 2026 conference in May that the Armed Forces had already begun integrating AI agents into command-and-control systems, which places Marichka within an existing effort rather than presenting it as a departure.

This is not Ukraine's first attempt at an operational-level command system for headquarters. Dzvin was ordered from a contractor in 2016 and frozen in 2021 after the prototypes encountered disputes over cost, timelines, and product ownership.

Delta, developed in parallel rather than as a replacement, succeeded partly because it grew out of a volunteer reconnaissance unit solving an immediate battlefield problem, rather than from a procurement process.

Marichka comes from a research institute, which is a different pedigree again, and the harder test will not be the neural network but the bureaucracy around accreditation for classified data. That hurdle may be reinforced by the argument for the incumbent: Palantir has a proven record in theaters of war, and its early work in Ukraine, much of it provided free, secured a first-mover advantage that a domestic prototype will have to overcome.

Via United24Media

• Raspberry Pi's new 10.1-inch Touch Display 2 lands at $80 with a 1200 × 1920 IPS panel and ten-finger touch, sitting above the $40 5-inch and $60 7-inch models
• The upgrade breaks backward compatibility, extending compatibility with the Raspberry Pi 5 and Compute Modules only, ruling out Pi 4 and earlier as well as the entire Zero lineup
• The 10.1-inch Touch 2 also offers an IPS display that offers viewing angles of 85 degrees, matched by the 7-inch variant, even as the 5-inch variant clocks in a bit lower at 80 degrees

The Raspberry Pi 5 is a surprisingly capable device, and it finally has an "official" 10-inch display that can hold a candle to its capabilities.

While the new Touch Display 2 has already had 5-inch and 7-inch offerings, the 10-inch variant is new, offering a slew of upgrades under the hood even as it cuts down on peak brightness to go with the larger display.

It is also the first Touch Display that leaves most of the Raspberry Pi installed base behind, essentially scrapping support for older Raspberry Pi options as well as its current Zero lineup.

A new display with compromises for a limited user base

While the 10-inch Raspberry Pi Touch Display 2's announcement is direct about the incompatibility, explaining that the higher resolution needs four DSI lanes and the newer connector is found only on Raspberry Pi 5 and Compute Module IO boards, it says nothing about what that means in practice.

The restriction effectively cuts off a large segment of the user base that runs older Raspberry Pi models, as well as anyone building on the Zero line.

At $80, the display is relatively affordable for its size, and there are real upgrades under the hood.

Resolution rises to 1200 × 1920 in native portrait, the touch controller returns to 10 points after the 5-inch and 7-inch models were limited to 5, and the switch to an IPS panel tightens the worst-case touch response from 40 ms to 35 ms. The 85-degree viewing angle is worth qualifying, though: it beats the 5-inch panel's 80 degrees but matches the 7-inch exactly, despite the announcement presenting it as a step up across the board. Those variants are listed at $40 and $60, respectively.

The math might be a bit ugly for some, considering that a Compute Module with an I/O board isn't how most people buy their Raspberry Pis, and that the pair generally costs more than a board with I/O onboard bought outright.

That matters more than usual right now. The cheapest compliant path is real enough: a 1GB Raspberry Pi 5 at $45 plus the $80 display comes to $125. But anyone wanting memory headroom is buying into a market that has moved sharply against them.

The 16GB Raspberry Pi 5 has climbed from $120 in November 2025 to $305 by April 2026 as Raspberry Pi passed on what it describes as a seven-fold rise in LPDDR4 pricing. The irony is pointed. The company has protected pricing on the Zero series and Pi 3 by drawing down existing LPDDR2 inventory, and those are precisely the boards this display locks out.

The one thing Raspberry Pi does gloss over is peak brightness, which drops to 400 nits from the 500 nits of its older 5- and 7-inch siblings, a difference that will show in the brightly lit rooms where kiosks and signage actually live.

While the panel offers a decent 225 ppi pixel density, slightly outdoing the 7-inch at 210, it does not hold a candle to the much sharper 5-inch display, which shares the 7-inch's resolution across a smaller area for 294 ppi. That makes the 10-inch a middle-of-the-road offering at best in terms of sharpness.

On raw value, the largest panel is the strongest in the family. Its 135.4 × 216.6 mm active area works out to roughly 366 square millimeters of screen per dollar, against about 224 on the 7-inch and 171 on the 5-inch.

The most telling detail about the launch, however, may be the production commitment: Raspberry Pi guarantees availability until at least January 2030, a promise it extends to the smaller Touch Display 2 variants as well.

Coupled with an operating range of −20°C to +70°C and the Compute Module compatibility, that reads less like a hobbyist accessory than a panel intended for embedded integrators building point-of-sale terminals, industrial HMIs, and signage on a decade-long design cycle.

For makers, the 10-inch is a straightforward, if slightly dimmer, upgrade that costs backward compatibility and, at current board prices, rather more than the sticker suggests. For the industry customers Raspberry Pi has courted since listing publicly, it is something harder to buy than a screen: a component with a guaranteed support horizon, available only to those already standardized on the company's newest boards.