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Draft EU rules announced September 15 will require a broad range of connectable devices—such as TVs, printers, thermostats, door locks, alarms, and fridges - to be assessed for their cybersecurity risks. Such digital products create a myriad of connection points for hackers to enter IoT ecosystems, access customer information, or even penetrate manufacturers’ back-end systems.
The European Commission’s proposal for a new Cyber Resilience Act aims to safeguard consumers and businesses buying or using products or software with a digital component. A study by EU regulators shows that only half of the makers of hardware and software used in connected devices apply adequate safeguards against cyber attacks. The research also found that two-thirds of cyber attacks come from previously detected breaches that makers had failed to fix. The new rules will address both of these weaknesses by establishing requirements for products granted access to the EU market.
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In cybersecurity and robotics adapting to changing environments requires real-time decision making. The trouble is that computing algorithms still have major limitations. They require intensive training to learn how to complete tasks and can’t “think on their feet.”

The biologists and hardware and software engineers behind a startup called Cortical Labs has developed what they say is a potential solution: the fusion of silicon with neurons. The venture capital-backed company, which is registered in Singapore but operates out of Melbourne, Australia, believes its hybrid chips could be the key to the kinds of complex reasoning that elude today’s computers and machine learning algorithms. Cortical Labs’ approach, which will be outlined during a talk at the Puzzle-X conference in Barcelona November 15-17, gives a glimpse of what the future of computing might look like and how it could impact sectors such as drug discovery, robotics, and cybersecurity.

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Instabase’s platform helps corporates in financial services, insurance, health and automotive, transform unstructured data into structured data so that processes, such as client onboarding and mortgage processing, can be automated end-to-end. The U.S. company’s clients include the banks NatWest and Standard Chartered, insurance company AXA and Sonic Automotive, a Fortune 500 Company and one of the U.S.’s largest automotive retailers. Instabase is one of the startups and scale-ups that will present at the AI For Finance Summit in Paris September 20.

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Value of the company Patagonia which owner Yvon Chouinard says he has given away to combat climate change and protect undeveloped land around the world. A half century after founding the outdoor apparel maker, Chouinard and his family have transferred their ownership of Patagonia to a specially designed trust and a nonprofit organization to preserve the company’s independence and make sure all of its profits ($100 million+ a year) are used to fight climate change and keep wild lands wild.

In a letter to employees, Chouinard wrote that when searching for ways to put more money toward the climate crisis while keeping the company’s values intact, there weren’t any good existing options so he came up with his own innovative approach.