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FinWise insider breach impacts 689K American First Finance customers

FinWise Bank is warning on behalf of corporate customers that it suffered a data breach after a former employee accessed sensitive files after the end of their employment.

“On May 31, 2024, FinWise experienced a data security incident involving a former employee who accessed FinWise data after the end of their employment,” reads a data breach notification sent by FinWise on behalf of American First Finance (AFF).

American First Finance (AFF) is a company that offers consumer financing products, including installment loans and lease-to-own programs, for a diverse range of products and services. Customers use AFF to apply for and manage the loans, with the company handling the services, account setup, repayment process, and customer support.

Culture is overtaking genetics in shaping human evolution, researchers argue

Researchers at the University of Maine are theorizing that human beings may be in the midst of a major evolutionary shift—driven not by genes, but by culture.

In a paper published in BioScience, Timothy M. Waring, an associate professor of economics and sustainability, and Zachary T. Wood, a researcher in ecology and environmental sciences, argue that culture is overtaking genetics as the main force shaping .

“Human evolution seems to be changing gears,” said Waring. “When we learn useful skills, institutions or technologies from each other, we are inheriting adaptive . On reviewing the evidence, we find that culture solves problems much more rapidly than genetic evolution. This suggests our species is in the middle of a great evolutionary transition.”

Why OpenAI’s solution to AI hallucinations would kill ChatGPT tomorrow

OpenAI’s latest research paper diagnoses exactly why ChatGPT and other large language models can make things up—known in the world of artificial intelligence as “hallucination.” It also reveals why the problem may be unfixable, at least as far as consumers are concerned.

Matryoshka doll-like robot changes its shape in real time and in situ

Until now, when scientists created magnetic robots, their magnetization profiles were generally fixed, enabling only a specific type of shape programming capability using applied external magnetic fields. Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems (MPI-IS) have now proposed a new magnetization reprogramming method that can drastically expand the complexity and diversity of the shape-programming capabilities of such robots.

They built a soft robot with a magnetization profile that can be altered in real time and in situ. Their findings are published in Nature.

Led by Prof. Dr. Metin Sitti in the Physical Intelligence (PI) Department at MPI-IS in collaboration with Koç University in Istanbul, Turkey, the team stacked several tubes inside each other like Matryoshka dolls.

New technique advances compact particle accelerator development

An international collaboration has developed a new diagnostic technique for measuring ultra-short particle beams at STFC’s Central Laser Facility. This collaboration is led by the University of Michigan and Queen’s University Belfast. The research addresses a key challenge in developing compact alternatives to kilometer-long particle accelerators.

Current X-ray free-electron lasers (XFELs), which produce laser-like X-rays for imaging at the viral scale, require facilities stretching for kilometers. These installations demand substantial resources and space that many institutions cannot accommodate.

Laser-wakefield acceleration technology offers the potential to create similar capabilities in devices small enough to fit on a laboratory bench. This approach works by focusing an intense, ultra-short laser pulse into plasma, matter where electrons and ions are separated.

Electrons that act like photons reveal a quantum secret

Quantum materials, defined by their photon-like electrons, are opening new frontiers in material science. Researchers have synthesized organic compounds that display a universal magnetic behavior tied to a distinctive feature in their band structures called linear band dispersion. This discovery not only deepens the theoretical understanding of quantum systems but also points toward revolutionary applications in next-generation information and communication technologies that conventional materials cannot achieve.

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