National Cyber Shield Could Be Ready in Five Years
The UK’s signals intelligence agency GCHQ announced a five‑year plan to deploy an AI‑driven "national cyber shield" that will automatically detect and remediate threats to critical infrastructure such as energy, water, health, transport and finance. The system will embed agentic AI capable of machine‑speed defence, a response to sophisticated attacks like the £1.5 bn (≈$1.9 bn) Jaguar Land Rover breach. GCHQ also highlighted parallel work on quantum‑ready encryption, space‑based security assets, and responsible AI development with industry partners. The initiative reflects a shift from off‑the‑shelf solutions toward sovereign, AI‑enhanced cyber resilience.
UAE Retailers Turn to AI Agents to Drive Faster Decisions and Smarter Automation
Retailers and manufacturers in the UAE are accelerating AI‑driven automation to combat shrinking margins and complex supply chains. Companies are deploying AI agents that connect disparate systems, analyze real‑time sales and inventory data, and autonomously adjust pricing, promotions, and replenishment....
Realities of the AI Age Force Sustainability to the Fore
The piece warns that generative AI’s surge has turned energy, water and carbon footprints into concrete balance‑sheet items. New UK Sustainability Reporting Standards and ISO updates force firms to prove hourly, location‑based clean‑energy use rather than rely on offsets. Extending...
Challenging AI Hype Narratives with Director Valerie Veatch
Valerie Veatch’s documentary *Ghost in the Machine* premiered at Sundance 2026 and challenges the polarised AI booster‑doomer narratives that portray artificial intelligence as either a messianic saviour or an existential threat. The film argues that AI hype masks power structures, exposing how...
CISO Burnout: How to Prevent Contagion Across the Team
CISO turnover is accelerating, with average tenure now between 18 months and three years—far shorter than the 5.2‑year average for other C‑suite executives. Burnout manifests as decision‑making delays, micro‑management, erratic behavior and a loss of empathy, which quickly spreads to...
Inside FDP - Part 5: Addressing the Objections
The final piece in Tom Bartlett’s five‑part series tackles the objections swirling around the NHS Federated Data Platform (FDP). It explains that the controversy – from trust CEOs to MPs – is largely a misunderstanding of FDP’s purpose as an...
UK Has ‘Narrowing Window’ to Stay Ahead of Tech Threats, Says GCHQ Chief Keast-Butler
GCHQ Director Anne Keast‑Butler warned that the UK and its allies face a narrowing window to outpace Russian and Chinese technology threats. She urged a ten‑fold increase in cyber‑security urgency, citing Russia’s expanding hybrid attacks on European critical infrastructure and China’s...
Datacentre Dive: Do AI Datacentre Physics Make On-Premise Unviable?
The surge in AI workloads is forcing datacenters to adopt direct‑to‑chip liquid cooling and 800 V DC power delivery, rendering traditional air‑cooled on‑premise facilities increasingly impractical. Schneider Electric emphasized that GPUs exceeding 700 W cannot be cooled with air, and modern AI racks...
The Gentlemen Emerging as Key Ransomware Player
The Gentlemen ransomware gang has quickly become a leading threat, accounting for 73 attacks in April 2026—about 10% of all ransomware incidents that month. The group leverages modern XChaCha20 and Curve25519 encryption to lock files at scale and employs SystemBC‑based SOCKS6...
What VTEX’s AI Push Really Means for European Retailers
At VTEX Day 2026 the Brazilian e‑commerce platform announced an AI Workspace that bundles four native agents for catalog management, promotions, search optimization and business intelligence, positioning the suite as a unified alternative to fragmented, composable stacks. Co‑CEO Mariano Gomide...
GCC Firms Rethink Cyber Defences as AI Phishing Surges
Artificial intelligence now powers 86% of phishing attacks targeting Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) firms, prompting a shift from traditional email‑centric defenses to protection of collaboration platforms, digital identities and AI deployments. KnowBe4 reports a 49% jump in calendar‑based phishing and...
Bulgaria Fires up Google Cloud for National Cyber Security
Bulgaria’s national systems integrator, Bulgaria Information Services (BIS), has launched Google Cloud’s Cybershield service across 54 government and public‑sector entities, backed by EU funding. The deployment creates a federated, AI‑driven security operations centre that consolidates cyber intelligence and telemetry, aiming...
What Did We Learn at Google Cloud Next 2026?
Google Cloud Next 2026 highlighted a rapid shift from chat‑based AI tools to autonomous agents that can act across telecom BSS and OSS workflows. Operators are experimenting with agents for network diagnostics, billing assistance, and service provisioning, but the move...
Assume Autonomy: Why Security Teams Need to Rethink Defence at Machine Speed
The article argues that the long‑standing belief that attackers and defenders operate at comparable speeds is obsolete. Advances in generative AI now let machines discover vulnerabilities and launch exploits with little human oversight, forcing a shift to an "Assume Autonomy"...
Interview: How Volvo Built Software for a Two-and-a-Half-Tonne Moving Object
Volvo’s chief engineering officer Anders Bell outlines a five‑year, software‑first overhaul that birthed HuginCore, the company’s single‑codebase platform powering the EX60, EX90 and ES90 electric models. The effort earned Volvo a S&P Global Mobility Level 5 rating—the only automaker to achieve...