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H Company Releases NeoMME: A Family of 260M and 800M Single-Tower Multimodal Encoders That Drop the Vision Tower and Causal Decoder

H Company released NeoMME, 260M/800M single-tower multimodal encoders matching 3.75B ColQwen2.5 on ViDoRe v3 while being 14.4x smaller, under Apache 2.0.

H Company released NeoMME, a family of 262,937,906- and 793,715,032-parameter bidirectional encoders that process text and raw 32x32 image patches in a single tower, pretrained via masked diffusion and released under Apache 2.0 with day-zero Hugging Face Transformers support. NeoMME-Retriever-260M reaches 0.523 nDCG@10 on ViDoRe v3, matching 3.75B-parameter ColQwen2.5 while being 14.4x smaller; the 800M model scores 0.556. Hierarchical token pooling with int8 and binary quantization shrinks late-interaction indexes from roughly 1.5 MB to 6 kB per page while retaining 95.19% of nDCG@10; text-only BEIR retrieval remains a weak spot.

MarkTechPost · 10d agoAI research

Meta FAIR Introduces AI Research Preference Models (RPMs): Ranking ML Experiments Before Spending GPU Hours

Meta FAIR, Oxford and UCL introduce Research Preference Models that rank unexecuted ML experiments, lifting AIRS-Bench scores from 0.684 to 0.729 and cutting compute ~1.6×.

Researchers from Meta FAIR, Oxford, and UCL introduce Research Preference Models (RPMs), which use frozen pretrained LLMs (Qwen3.6-27B backbone, no fine-tuning) to rank unexecuted experiment candidates and execute only the winner of a pairwise knockout tournament. Two variants shipped: an inference-only LLM-as-a-judge and an agentic variant that runs small pilot experiments in an H200 sandbox. On AIRS-Bench (20 tasks, 24 hours on one H200, 10 seeds), scores rise from 0.684 (random) to 0.711 and 0.729 versus a 0.748 validation oracle, and both variants reach the baseline's 24-hour score in roughly 15 hours. The team reports new SOTA on WinoGrande (94.1% with Agentic RPM) and SVAMP (95.7% with inference-only).

MarkTechPost · 10d agoAI research

UC Berkeley Researchers Release CUA-Lite, an Open Platform Unifying Sandboxes, Data, Evaluation and RL for Computer-Use Agents

UC Berkeley's CUA-Lite is an open platform unifying computer-use agent sandboxes, datasets, evaluation and RL; Lite.OSWorld cuts OSWorld memory 4.1 GB to 0.9 GB.

UC Berkeley researchers released CUA-Lite, an open platform placing agents, environments, traces, and training for computer-use agents behind one action space, one LiteSample schema, and one command across desktop, browser, and mobile. Lite.OSWorld reproduces the OSWorld task suite and evaluators in plain Docker containers (0.9 GB RAM vs 4.1 GB, cold start 23.8s, ~4.6× more parallel instances), with scores matching the QEMU/KVM VM across 13 models. The platform claims 30k+ verifiable tasks, 15+ benchmarks, 10+ agents, and 20+ datasets on Hugging Face including Aguvis, OpenCUA, and ScaleCUA. A documented SFT run lifts Qwen3-VL-2B-Instruct mean episode return from 0.138 to 0.237 on the 332-task lite.osworld split.

MarkTechPost · 11d agoAI tools & infra1

Perplexity Details Its GPU Embedding Stack: How Ivy, Tulip and ROSE Serve pplx-embed

Perplexity details its GPU embedding serving stack (Ivy, Tulip, ROSE), which reuses LLM prefill/decode kernels, CUDA graphs, and LazyTensors to cut launch overhead.

Perplexity engineers published a deep dive on the serving infrastructure behind pplx-embed, used across Perplexity Search and its API platform. The stack comprises Ivy (Rust HTTP gateway), Tulip (gRPC scheduling and batching), and ROSE (Runtime-Optimized Serving Engine), which reuses LLM prefill and decode kernels rather than running a separate embedding engine. Optimizations include whole-model CUDA graphs with lazy capture and a LazyTensor abstraction that overlaps CPU batch preparation with in-flight GPU work. Benchmarks are reported against vLLM v0.22.0 in BF16, with FlashAttention 4 generally fastest but FlashInfer 3 winning on Qwen-based models at very long sequence lengths.

MarkTechPost · 11d agoAI tools & infra1

GitHub Introduces Project HydraFusion: Runtime Multi-Model Orchestration That Builds a Workflow Per Coding Task in Copilot CLI

GitHub's Project HydraFusion research preview builds per-task multi-model workflows (Single, Cascade, Critique) in Copilot CLI, reporting +4.9 quality at 67% lower cost on TerminalBench 2.1.

Project HydraFusion is a research preview available on all GitHub Copilot plans inside Copilot CLI that treats model routing as workflow selection, choosing among Single, Cascade (draft plus quality gate), and Critique (cross-family reviewer) execution patterns per request. Against Claude Opus 5 baselines at medium reasoning, fixed HydraFusion policies cut estimated cost 67% while adding 4.9 quality points on TerminalBench 2.1, and cut cost 36% and 65% with slight quality dips on DeepSWE and CheckpointBench. Billing is per token at each underlying model's standard rate; there are no open weights or self-hosting options.

MarkTechPost · 11d agoAI tools & infra1

Nous Research Adds One-Click Local Model Setup to Hermes Desktop

Nous Research's Hermes Desktop now offers one-click local model setup that reads hardware, picks a fitting quantization, downloads weights, and configures llama.cpp automatically.

Hermes Desktop, the MIT-licensed build of the open-source Hermes Agent, now sets up local models in one click: it reads the machine's hardware, selects a model that fits, downloads weights, and configures the inference runtime. It manages a pinned llama.cpp build with CUDA, Metal, Vulkan, HIP, and CPU backends, and shows green/amber/red memory-fit verdicts per catalog model before download. Quantization floors at 4-bit, and recommended models guarantee at least a 64K context window protected by ordered RAM offload (expert weights first, never the attention cache). It runs on macOS 12+, Windows 10/11, and Linux with no account required for local models.

MarkTechPost · 11d agoAI tools & infra1

Early 764 member sentenced to 77 years, longest prison term to date for a nihilistic violent extremist

Kyle Spitze, an early 764 member, was sentenced to 77 years for producing CSAM, the longest sentence for a nihilistic violent extremist.

Kyle William Spitze, an original member of the 764 nihilistic violent extremist network and administrator of the Harm Nation offshoot, was sentenced to 77 years in federal prison. He pleaded guilty in December 2024 to producing child sexual abuse material, possession of CSAM, and distributing animal crush videos, victimizing dozens of girls through coercion, doxing and swatting threats. Investigators found roughly 25 photo albums of abuse imagery on his phone and evidence of animal torture. The Justice Department framed the sentence as a signal in a broader enforcement push against 764, which has seen multiple members arrested or sentenced since 2025.

CyberScoop · 27d agoPolicy & legal

Brazil orders Discord to suspend livestreaming after teen suicide

Brazil's data protection authority orders Discord to disable its Go Live livestreaming feature nationwide until child-safety safeguards are demonstrated.

Brazil's National Data Protection Authority (ANPD) found robust evidence that Discord failed to protect children from harmful content and ordered the Go Live feature suspended until effective safeguards are shown, following the July death of a 13-year-old girl during a roughly 45-minute livestream; five teenagers were arrested. Discord has three business days to implement the suspension and could face fines of up to 50 million reais (about $10 million) per violation. Regulators criticized the March addition of end-to-end encryption to Go Live for limiting real-time content detection, and are also investigating Discord's age-verification and content-removal practices, while a parallel probe tied neo-Nazi recruitment communities to Telegram.

The Record · Aug 13, 2026Policy & legal

ThreatsDay: 200 Android Flaws, Browser-Built Phishing, 119K Scam Shops + 23 More Stories

Hacker News ThreatsDay digest: malicious browser extensions, AI-agent intrusions, NCSC shadow AI warning, M&A wire fraud, and 119,000-domain fake shops.

Socket found four malicious Chrome and Firefox extensions (J7Tracker, VREO, Orbit Tracker) stealing session tokens and wallet data from Axiom Trade and Padre users via attacker-controlled Vercel deployments. Hunt.io reported a Chinese-speaking operator using Claude Code, Alibaba Qwen, and DeepSeek with the SecFlow orchestration framework to automate intrusions against government and financial targets in Afghanistan, Thailand, Taiwan, and the US. The UK NCSC warned shadow AI use risks breaches and regulatory failure, Microsoft announced privacy-preserving Windows Age APIs, and Gen Digital described fake M&A wire-fraud scams. A 119,000-domain fake-shop operation called DoppelCart was also highlighted.

The Hacker News · 6d agoIndustry in the wild

OFAC Sanctions Chinese Scam Platform Xinbi Guarantee

US Treasury's OFAC sanctioned Chinese scam-platform Xinbi Guarantee, which processed $24bn+, and froze $52.8m in linked cryptoassets.

OFAC sanctioned Xinbi Guarantee, a Chinese-language marketplace connecting Southeast Asian scam centers and transnational crime syndicates to merchants offering financial services, technology and crypto exchange. Treasury estimates over $24bn processed since 2022, while TRM Labs estimates over $36bn, with daily inflows nearly doubling between May and December 2025. Two supporting entities were also sanctioned: SafeW Technology (Singapore) and Anwen Technology (Cambodia, maker of XinbiPay). The US Secret Service and Elliptic froze $52.8m in linked cryptoassets, and the marketplace now appears offline with its Telegram channels deleted.

Infosecurity Magazine · 7d agoPolicy & legal1

Recorded Future Launches Digital Risk Protection, Unifying Brand and Identity Monitoring

Recorded Future launched Digital Risk Protection, unifying brand and identity monitoring across five external threat surfaces in one workflow.

Recorded Future announced Digital Risk Protection, combining brand threat monitoring and identity exposure monitoring across five use cases: malicious site, impersonation, code repository, dark web brand, and identity exposure monitoring. The platform includes an AI Triage Agent that automates alert evaluation with explicit verdicts and context, expanding social media analysis, OCR, full Telegram coverage, and infostealer log ingestion. Gartner's 2026 Magic Quadrant folded digital risk protection into cyber threat intelligence technologies, and the launch cites $15.9 billion in 2025 US fraud/scam losses, up 28% year over year.

Recorded Future · 8d agoTools

US offering $10 million for info on Iranian hackers behind IOControl malware

US offers up to $10 million for information on CyberAv3ngers' 'Mr. Soul,' whose IOControl malware targets US and worldwide ICS/SCADA devices.

The State Department announced a reward of up to $10 million for information on an online persona known as Mr. Soul (or Mr. Soll) tied to CyberAv3ngers, which conducts malicious cyber activity for Iran's IRGC Cyber-Electronic Command. CyberAv3ngers used the IOControl malware against ICS/SCADA devices in the US, Israel and worldwide, targeting products from Unitronics, D-Link, Hikvision and Baicells, according to Claroty and Armis analyses. The malware allows remote control of infected devices and lateral movement within victim networks. The reward follows an August action offering rewards for and sanctioning six Iranian government hackers and comes amid the widening Israel-Iran military conflict.

The Record · 9d agoPolicy & legal in the wild 3 sources

Flirty OnlyFans promoters on X may be using AI to appear human

Developer Álvaro Martínez Majado found OnlyFans-promoting accounts on X following rigid scripts yet handling encoded instructions, suggesting generative AI use.

Investigation of flirty X accounts promoting OnlyFans pages showed near-identical openers across accounts plus dynamic behaviors: answering a hexadecimal-encoded instruction with "Pineapple" and failing an exact 12-character count test in an LLM-like pattern. The accounts also sent personalized voice notes reading supplied timestamps and usernames, consistent with automated text-to-speech. Evidence suggests a hybrid scripted/AI system, though no model, provider, or operator was identified.

Malwarebytes Labs · 9d agoAI safety & security

The OpenClaw 2.0 release moves your sessions into SQLite

OpenClaw 2.0 migrates AI agent sessions to SQLite, adds guided credential setup, and flags shared-session controls as not a security boundary.

OpenClaw 2.0, described as the largest update in the project's history, migrates sessions and transcripts into SQLite and adds guided setup that detects existing AI credentials from Codex, ChatGPT, Claude CLI sign-ins, API keys, and local Ollama or LM Studio models. The release expands multiplayer sharing while explicitly stating its permission controls are not tenant isolation or a security boundary, and that revoked access can briefly remain usable. Startup JavaScript requests fell from 140 to 45 and startup time from about 1.6 seconds to 575 milliseconds in simulated tests against a mocked Gateway. Automation wrappers must now inspect reported health because requesting --json does not waive risk acknowledgement.

Help Net Security · 17d agoAI tools & infra1

Two alleged TeamPCP members arrested and charged after months of software supply

Australian Federal Police, with FBI support, arrested two alleged TeamPCP members behind supply-chain attacks that compromised over 1,000 organizations.

The AFP charged two Western Australian men, identified by media as Ruben Ian Thomson (21) and Louis Michael Gaebler (23), with 14 combined offences including unauthorized data modification and dealing in criminal proceeds. TeamPCP is blamed for poisoning open-source software releases including Trivy, LiteLLM, and the mini Shai-Hulud worm campaign, exposing over 500,000 credentials and at least 300 GB of data. Victims included the European Commission and GitHub, with remediation costs estimated in the hundreds of millions of dollars. Researchers from Flare traced one suspect through leaked passwords, a GitHub alias, and a Steam profile.

CyberScoop · 20d agoPolicy & legal1

U.S. Sanctions Iran-Linked Hackers Behind Critical Infrastructure Breaches

U.S. Treasury sanctioned nearly 60 Iran-linked entities, including MOIS-affiliated Mabna Institute hackers behind breaches of U.S. critical infrastructure and millions in crypto theft.

The U.S. Treasury launched Operation Economic Outcast, designating nearly 60 Iran-linked entities, individuals, and vessels across nuclear, missile, oil, cyber, and digital asset networks. Five sanctioned individuals are members of the Tehran-based Mabna Institute indicted last week; three allegedly breached and exfiltrated data from U.S. energy, defense, healthcare, IT, and financial organizations since late 2023. TRM Labs traced roughly $16.8 million across 30 wallets tied to the members, and the State Department announced a reward of up to $10 million. The action follows Iranian hacking of FBI Director Kash Patel's email and attacks on over 30 U.S. water and wastewater utilities.

The Hacker News · 22d agoPolicy & legal in the wild

Risky Bulletin: Russia starts blocking DoH and DoT

Russian users report blocks on DoH and DoT servers, including Cloudflare 1.1.1.1 and Google 8.8.8.8, in an apparent censorship crackdown.

Russian internet users began reporting failures connecting to DNS-over-HTTPS and DNS-over-TLS servers, suggesting a government crackdown on the two privacy protocols. The blocks reportedly cover Cloudflare's 1.1.1.1 and Google's 8.8.8.8 resolvers; Roskomnadzor has not officially confirmed the action. The agency tested a similar block in March on Beeline's network and had named DoH for blocking as early as 2021. The bulletin also briefly notes state-sponsored phishing of EU officials, a DDoS against Norway's Digdir, the ReliaQuest/ShinyHunters dispute, and older ransomware and breach disclosures.

Risky Business News · 22d agoPolicy & legal1

Risky Bulletin: Academics find source code overlaps between Geedge and China's Great Firewall

Academics linked Chinese vendor Geedge Networks' Tiangou Secure Gateway source code to one of the Great Firewall's three traffic filtering capabilities.

US researchers presenting at USENIX Security reconstructed Geedge Networks' Tiangou Secure Gateway firmware from over 100,000 leaked files, including Git repositories with commit history, and matched its filtering behavior to sections of China's Great Firewall. They found only 1 of 3 characterized DNS injectors matched Geedge code, noted the system relies on memory-unsafe C components and copied third-party code, and said its bugs could aid future circumvention tools. Geedge also exports censorship tools to Kazakhstan, Ethiopia, Pakistan, and Myanmar. The newsletter additionally rounds up multiple breaches.

Risky Business News · 27d agoResearch2