Category: Extraordinary

Biden’s decision to drop out leaves Democrats across the country relieved and looking toward future

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Read time : 2 mins

Level : Advanced

George Ledbetter watches news of President Joe Biden dropping out of the 2024 race for the White House at They Say Restaurant in Harper Woods, Mich., Sunday, July 21, 2024. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya)

By JOEY CAPPELLETTI, MIKE HOUSEHOLDER and CHARLOTTE KRAMON Associated Press

HARPER WOODS, Mich. (AP) — After weeks of uncertainty about who would be at the top of the Democratic Party’s ticket in November, many voters expressed relief over the news that President Joe Biden would drop his reelection bid and began to think about who might replace him in a dramatically altered election landscape.

Jerod Keene, a 40-year-old athletic trainer from swing-state Arizona, had planned to vote for Biden in November but was thankful for the president’s decision, calling it “inevitable.” Keene said he’s excited about the next candidate, hoping it will be Vice President Kamala Harris, whom Biden endorsed on Sunday. Continue reading

Centenarian veterans are sharing their memories of D-Day, 80 years later

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Read time : 3 mins

Level : Intermediate

An American D-Day veteran is welcomed at Deauville airport, Monday, June 3, 2024 in Deauville, Normandy to attend D-Day 80th anniversary commemorations. (AP Photo/Alexander Turnbull)

By SYLVIE CORBET and DANICA KIRKA Associated Press

CAEN, France (AP) — World War II veterans from the United States, Britain and Canada are in Normandy this week to mark 80 years since the D-Day landings that helped lead to Hitler’s defeat.

Few witnesses remain who remember the Allied assault. The Associated Press is speaking to veterans about their role in freeing Europe from the Nazis, and their messages for younger generations.

PAPA JAKE

“I am the luckiest man in the world,” D-Day veteran Jake Larson, a 101-year-old American best known on social media under the name “Papa Jake,” said as he arrived in Normandy this week. Papa Jake has more than 800,000 followers on TikTok.

Born in Owatonna, Minnesota, Larson enlisted in the National Guard in 1938, lying about his age as he was only 15. Continue reading

Tests find AI tools readily create election lies from the voices of well-known political leaders

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Read time : 4 mins

Level : Advanced

FILE – French President Emmanuel Macron speaks at a news conference at the German government guest house in Meseberg, north of Berlin, Germany, May 28, 2024. A group that monitors for misinformation found deep problems when it tested the most popular artificial intelligence voice-cloning tools and asked them to create audio of some of the world’s leading political figures. (AP Photo/Ebrahim Noroozi, File)

By ALI SWENSON Associated Press

NEW YORK (AP) — As high-stakes elections approach in the U.S. and European Union, publicly available artificial intelligence tools can be easily weaponized to churn out convincing election lies in the voices of leading political figures, a digital civil rights group said Friday.

Researchers at the Washington, D.C.-based Center for Countering Digital Hate tested six of the most popular AI voice-cloning tools to see if they would generate audio clips of five false statements about elections in the voices of eight prominent American and European politicians.

In a total of 240 tests, the tools generated convincing voice clones in 193 cases, or 80% of the time, the group found. In one clip, a fake U.S. President Joe Biden says election officials count each of his votes twice. In another, a fake French President Emmanuel Macron warns citizens not to vote because of bomb threats at the polls. Continue reading

World Health Assembly hopes to reinforce pandemic preparedness after bold treaty project stalls

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Read time : 3 mins

Level : Intermediate

A general view during the opening of the 77th World Health Assembly (WHA77) at the European headquarters of the United Nations in Geneva, Switzerland, Monday, May 27, 2024. The World Health Organization is kicking off its annual meeting on Monday and government ministers and other top envoys are looking to reinforce global preparedness for, and responses to the next pandemic in the devastating and deadly wake of COVID-19. (Salvatore Di Nolfi/Keystone via AP)

By JAMEY KEATEN Associated Press

GENEVA (AP) — Member countries kicked off the World Health Organization’s annual assembly on Monday with hopes of improving global readiness for deadly outbreaks like COVID-19, after an ambitious “pandemic treaty” ran aground last week.

Health officials are racing to get the world to agree to new ways to prepare for and fight an inevitable future pandemic. COVID-19 is fading into history as elections and crises like climate change and war compete for the public’s attention.

A bold project to adopt a pandemic “treaty” at this week’s World Health Assembly was shelved on Friday as 2 1/2 years of work ran into disagreements over sharing information about pathogens that cause pandemics and the technology used to fight them.

Experts say the best chance now to address pandemics at the assembly will be proposed changes to the WHO’s International Health Regulations, which were set up in 2004. Amendments would urge countries to boost alert, detection and containment capacities and cooperate internationally.

One proposal would let the WHO director-general declare a “pandemic emergency.” Continue reading

Illness took away her voice. AI created a replica she carries in her phone

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Level : Advanced

Alexis Bogan, whose speech was impaired by a brain tumor, uses an AI powered smartphone app to create a audible drink order at a Starbucks drive-thru on Monday, April 29, 2024, in Lincoln, R.I. The app converts her typed entries into a verbal message created using her original voice. (AP Photo/Steven Senne)

By MATT O’BRIEN AP Technology Writer

PROVIDENCE, R.I. (AP) — The voice Alexis “Lexi” Bogan had before last summer was exuberant.

She loved to belt out Taylor Swift and Zach Bryan ballads in the car. She laughed all the time — even while corralling misbehaving preschoolers or debating politics with friends over a backyard fire pit. In high school, she was a soprano in the chorus.

Then that voice was gone.

Doctors in August removed a life-threatening tumor lodged near the back of her brain. When the breathing tube came out a month later, Bogan had trouble swallowing and strained to say “hi” to her parents. Months of rehabilitation aided her recovery, but her speech is still impaired. Friends, strangers and her own family members struggle to understand what she is trying to tell them.

In April, the 21-year-old got her old voice back. Not the real one, but a voice clone generated by artificial intelligence that she can summon from a phone app. Trained on a 15-second time capsule of her teenage voice — sourced from a cooking demonstration video she recorded for a high school project — her synthetic but remarkably real-sounding AI voice can now say almost anything she wants. Continue reading

French cyberwarriors ready to test their defense against hackers and malware during the Olympics

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Read time : 3 mins

Level : Advanced

Cyber-security experts work at the Yves du Manoir stadium, Friday, May 3, 2024 in Colombes, outside Paris. Cyber-security teams working to protect the Paris Games from hackers and other attackers aren’t willing to divulge too much detail about their work. But they no doubt that cyber-criminals are going to keep them busy. (AP Photo/Michel Euler)

By JOHN LEICESTER Associated Press

SAINT-DENIS, France (AP) — Just like the Olympic athletes, the cyberwarriors that will be crucial for the success of the Paris Games are deep into training for the big event.

They have turned to friendly hackers to probe their cyberdefenses, like boxers who use sparring partners to ready them for a championship fight. They have studied and analyzed the strengths, tactics and weaknesses of their opponents. Those could be anyone from teenage showoffs and ransomware gangs to Russian military hackers with a track record of malicious cyberattacks.

But unlike the 10,500 Olympians who will converge on France’s capital in July, the cybersecurity engineers behind the Games are hoping to stay out of the spotlight. For them, the equivalent of a medal will be getting through the Olympics – and Paralympics – without a major incident. It would mean that their layers of digital defenses stand up to attempts to paralyze computer and information systems vital for the Games.

“My dream for the Olympics is that technology and cybersecurity aren’t talked about, because that will mean it was a non-issue,” said Jérémy Couture, who heads the Paris Games organizers’ cybersecurity hub. Its job of spotting, analyzing and responding to cyberthreats is so sensitive and critical to the Games’ success that event organizers keep its location secret. Continue reading

Scammers stole more than $3.4 billion from older Americans last year, an FBI report says

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Level : Intermediate

FILE – An FBI seal is seen on a wall on Aug. 10, 2022, in Omaha, Neb. The FBI says scammers stole more than $3.4 billion from older Americans last year. An FBI report released Tuesday shows a rise in losses through increasingly sophisticated tactics to trick the vulnerable into giving up their life savings. (AP Photo/Charlie Neibergall, File)

By ALANNA DURKIN RICHER Associated Press

WASHINGTON (AP) — Scammers stole more than $3.4 billion from older Americans last year, according to an FBI report released Tuesday that shows a rise in losses through increasingly sophisticated criminal tactics to trick the vulnerable into giving up their life savings.

Losses from scams reported by Americans over the age of 60 last year were up 11% over the year before, according to the FBI’s report. Investigators are warning of a rise in brazen schemes to drain bank accounts that involve sending couriers in person to collect cash or gold from victims.

“It can be a devastating impact to older Americans who lack the ability to go out and make money,” said Deputy Assistant Director James Barnacle of the FBI’s Criminal Investigative Division. “People lose all their money. Some people become destitute.” Continue reading

Would you like a cicada salad? The monstrous little noisemakers descend on a New Orleans menu

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Level : Intermediate

Zach Lemann, curator of animal collections for the Audubon Insectarium, prepares cicadas for eating at the insectarium in New Orleans, Wednesday, April 17, 2024. The insectarium plans to demonstrate ways to cook cicadas at the little in-house snack bar where it already serves other insect dishes. (AP Photo/Gerald Herbert)

By KEVIN McGILL Associated Press

NEW ORLEANS (AP) — As the nation prepares for trillions of red-eyed bugs known as periodical cicadas to emerge, it’s worth noting that they’re not just annoying, noisy pests — if prepared properly, they can also be tasty to eat.

Blocks away from such French Quarter fine-dining stalwarts as Antoine’s and Brennan’s, the Audubon Insectarium in New Orleans has long served up an array of alternative, insect-based treats at its “Bug Appetit” cafe overlooking the Mississippi River. “Cinnamon Bug Crunch,” chili-fried waxworms, and crispy, cajun-spiced crickets are among the menu items.

Periodical cicadas stay buried for years, until they surface and take over a landscape. Depending on the variety, the emergence happens every 13 or 17 years. This year two groups are expected to emerge soon, averaging around 1 million per acre over hundreds of millions of acres across parts of 16 states in the Midwest and South. Continue reading

Even in the age of Google Earth, people still buy globes. Here’s why they remain so alluring

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Read time : 3 mins

Level : Advanced

An artist paints a globe at a studio in London, Tuesday, Feb. 27, 2024. Globes in the age of Google Earth capture the imagination and serve as snapshots of how the owners see the world and their place in it. Peter Bellerby made his first globe for his father, after he could not find one accurate or attractive enough. In 2008, he founded Bellerby & Co. Globemakers in London. His team of dozens of artists and cartographers has made thousands of bespoke globes up to 50 inches in diameter. The most ornate can cost six figures. (AP Photo/Kin Cheung)

By LAURIE KELLMAN Associated Press

LONDON (AP) — Find a globe in your local library or classroom and try this: Close the eyes, spin it and drop a finger randomly on its curved, glossy surface.

You’re likely to pinpoint a spot in the water, which covers 71% of the planet. Maybe you’ll alight on a place you’ve never heard of — or a spot that no longer exists after a war or because of climate change. Perhaps you’ll feel inspired to find out who lives there and what it’s like. Trace the path of totality ahead of Monday’s solar eclipse. Look carefully, and you’ll find the cartouche — the globemaker’s signature — and the antipode ( look it up ) of where you’re standing right now.

In the age of Google Earth, watches that triangulate and cars with built-in GPS, there’s something about a globe — a spherical representation of the world in miniature — that somehow endures.

London globemaker Peter Bellerby thinks the human yearning to “find our place in the cosmos” has helped globes survive their original purpose — navigation — and the internet. He says it’s part of the reason he went into debt making a globe for his father’s 80th birthday in 2008. The experience helped inspire his company, and 16 years later is keeping his team of about two dozen artists, cartographers and woodworkers employed. Continue reading

$1B donation makes New York medical school tuition free and transforms students’ lives

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Read time : 3 mins

Level : Intermediate

The campus of the Albert Einstein College of Medicine is seen, Tuesday, Feb. 27, 2024, in the Bronx borough of New York. The medical school will be tuition-free for all students from now on thanks to a $1 billion donation from former professor Ruth Gottesman, the widow of a Wall Street investor. (AP Photo/Mary Altaffer)

By MICHAEL CASEY Associated Press

First year student Samuel Woo had been considering a career in cardiology so he would be able to pay off his medical school debt until the announcement this week of a generous donation that will remove tuition fees at his New York City school.

Now, without the fear of crippling student debt, the 23-year-old whose parents emigrated from South Korea said Tuesday that he can afford to pursue his dream of providing medical services to people living on the streets.

“I was definitely very emotional and it changes a lot,” said Woo, who had been working as a tutor and at a cafe to help cover his costs. Continue reading