AI
OpenAI opens Decisions API to all developers after METR and Redwood Research safety pilot
OpenAI announced that its Decisions API is now generally available, letting developers build apps and agents that classify text and images, evaluate inputs, and route logic without generating a full model response — designed for near real-time, cost-efficient decisions. New capabilities added since the beta include native GPT-Live integration for voice apps that react as people speak, prompt caching, and native JSON inputs for structured data.
The launch follows a separate disclosure that OpenAI invited safety evaluators METR and Redwood Research this past summer to conduct a three-week embedded evaluation of its internal monitoring infrastructure, granting deep access to the system. OpenAI said the findings have already strengthened safeguards as the monitoring system was expanded and will inform how future evaluations are structured.
Google DeepMind publishes 10-metre global forest map built on AlphaEarth AI model
Google DeepMind released Forest Typology (ForTy), a 10-metre resolution global map that classifies every patch of land into distinct forest and tree-crop types — distinguishing natural forests from planted or farmed ones. Built on AlphaEarth Foundations, DeepMind's foundational AI model for planetary data, ForTy analyses years of satellite imagery across 1.7 million sites to track how forests change over time. The ForTy 2020 map and a 2017–2025 time series were published in Scientific Data and are freely available on Google Earth Engine for governments, companies, and researchers building deforestation-free supply chains.
Microsoft publishes Science paper showing AI diagnostic orchestrator cuts medical testing costs while improving accuracy
Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella highlighted a new paper published in Science Magazine showing that Microsoft's diagnostic orchestrator — an AI system designed to reason through complex medical cases — achieves greater diagnostic accuracy than prior baselines while simultaneously reducing the cost of testing. The result adds peer-reviewed weight to the company's push into AI-assisted clinical decision-making.
Consumer Tech & Gadgets
Delta 2.0 emulator adds iPhone Duo support and Sega Genesis games
The popular Delta game emulator has released version 2.0, bringing support for Apple's new iPhone Duo form factor alongside an expanded library that now includes Sega Genesis titles. The update signals growing mainstream legitimacy for iPhone-based retro gaming, and the Duo's larger or dual-screen layout appears to be attracting real developer attention — Engadget noted that consumer interest in the Duo is higher than skeptics expected.
Amazon relaunches Kindle Unlimited as Kindle+, bundling more audiobooks
Amazon has rebranded its Kindle Unlimited reading subscription as Kindle+, expanding the offering to include a larger selection of audiobooks alongside its existing library of e-books, magazines, and comics. Both 9to5Mac and Engadget noted the move, with Engadget confirming the core book-and-magazine catalog remains intact while the audiobook tier gets a meaningful boost — a clear push to compete more directly with Audible and other audio-first services.
Design
Framer launches official MCP, letting AI tools like Claude and ChatGPT edit sites directly
Framer has released an official Model Context Protocol server, enabling AI assistants including ChatGPT, Claude, Cursor, and Grok to design, build, and update Framer sites without leaving those tools. The company says the integration preserves Framer's existing flexibility and version control. Early users report connecting it to Claude and making full site edits from a single prompt — or from a phone, bypassing the Framer interface entirely.
Webflow brings live agent presence to the canvas and partners with Grok Build on MCP publishing
Webflow rolled out two AI-workflow updates on the same day. First, users can now watch an AI agent's cursor move across the Webflow canvas in real time, mirroring the live-collaboration experience of a human teammate — available immediately to all users. Second, Webflow announced a partnership with Grok Build, formerly Cursor, allowing developers to build, manage, and publish Webflow projects through its MCP server while keeping permissions intact; Webflow is also listed as a SpaceX AI launch partner.
Figma opens Code Layers to open beta, merging design and live code on a single canvas
Figma has pushed Code Layers into open beta, a feature that lets designers convert any design layer into an interactive code layer, capture live website elements as code layers via a Chrome extension, and place or duplicate those layers directly alongside design components on the same canvas. The move is Figma's most direct attempt yet to close the handoff gap between design and production code within a single document.
Dev Tools & Infrastructure
Critical Brotli RCE vulnerability hits Node.js; Bun v1.4.4 ships security fixes same day
A critical remote code execution vulnerability in Node.js, CVE-2026-111497, was disclosed Thursday — an out-of-bounds write in the Brotli decoder that ThePrimeagen described as reason enough to need a drink. The timing compounded an already painful week for teams running stacks reliant on Brotli compression, with ThePrimeagen noting that any developer who both avoids updating and those who do update face exposure to either known or newly surfaced vulnerabilities. The situation drew particular sympathy for teams running PHP on Railway with Node microservices using Brotli — a configuration squarely in the blast radius.
Bun shipped v1.4.4 the same day, explicitly including a security fix for Brotli alongside patches for TLS certificates, HTTP/3, and other issues, while also closing out 271 reported bugs. The release added a Prettier-compatible bun fmt formatter and delivered a 1.4x–7.8x speedup to bun check, making it one of the more substantive Bun point releases in recent memory. A bun lint command, initially targeted for this release, was held back and is available via the canary channel.
Vercel signals full-stack hosting ambitions, teases next capability after broad backend build-out
Vercel CEO Guillermo Rauch publicly listed the platform's now-assembled backend primitives — WebSockets, Queues, Workflows, Cron, Containers, Daemons, long-duration Functions, Blob storage, and more — framing them as a complete foundation for at-scale backend hosting and inviting speculation about what comes next. He followed up by describing a strategic split AI agents are forcing on software: deep, persistent backends on one end and disposable just-in-time frontends on the other. The tmp.now deploy feature, announced at Vercel's Ship event, lets agents publish live software with no signup required, removing the last friction point from automated deployment pipelines.
Gaming
Final Fantasy Resonance launches today on PS5, Xbox, and PC
Final Fantasy Resonance, the new HD-2D RPG from Square Enix, is out now across PlayStation 5, Xbox, and PC. Both Sony and Microsoft promoted the launch simultaneously, with PlayStation highlighting the game's party-based adventure and Xbox underscoring its crystal-driven storyline. On PC, the game is available via Steam with third-party storefronts offering it for as low as $40.99 through discount programs.
Valve developer accidentally name-drops Half-Life 3's rumored codename at conference
A Valve developer inadvertently revealed the long-rumored codename for Half-Life 3 during a recent industry conference, reigniting speculation that the sequel is in active development. IGN flagged the slip as a notable moment of unintended disclosure, noting the codename has circulated in rumor circles for years. Valve has not issued a comment or confirmation.
EA's BioWare closure ripples outward as Skate studio also reports layoffs
The fallout from EA's closure of BioWare continued to widen, with staff at the studio developing the new Skate game separately reporting layoffs. The closures have drawn an emotional response from within the industry: the lead writer of Star Wars: The Old Republic publicly expressed sadness that BioWare's official farewell statement made no mention of the MMO, which defined a significant era for the studio.
The omission of The Old Republic from BioWare's send-off statement was described by the game's lead writer as a painful slight, underscoring how the studio's legacy remains a source of unresolved grief for many who worked there.
Security
Two unpatched CVSS 9.0 RCE flaws in Linux KSMBD disclosed publicly before fixes exist
Two critical remote code execution vulnerabilities in Linux's KSMBD SMB server, each scoring CVSS 9.0, were publicly disclosed on kernel mailing lists before any mainline fix was available. One of the flaws can be triggered without authentication, meaning any attacker with network access to an exposed KSMBD instance could potentially take full control of the host. Neither vulnerability has a patch in the mainline kernel, leaving administrators with no straightforward remediation path beyond disabling the service.
Arista patches VeloCloud Orchestrator SQL injection zero-day actively exploited in the wild
Arista Networks has confirmed active exploitation of a critical SQL injection flaw in VeloCloud Orchestrator, tracked as CVE-2026-114625 with a CVSS score of 9.9. The vulnerability allows even read-only users to escalate to full operator privileges, making it exceptionally dangerous in multi-tenant or managed SD-WAN environments. Arista has issued a patch, and administrators are urged to apply it immediately given that attacks are already underway.
eMudhra exits SSL/TLS business after researcher exposes eight guessable CA private keys
Indian certificate authority eMudhra is shutting down its global SSL/TLS operations just five days after a security researcher publicly exposed eight easily guessable private keys belonging to the CA. Google Chrome and Mozilla Firefox are moving to distrust eMudhra's ECC root certificate, a decision that will force replacement of approximately 30,000 certificates currently in use. The collapse of trust follows a pattern regulators have warned about for years: CA key management failures that cannot be remediated without full market exit.
Startups & Funding
a16z Crypto rebrands as a16z Frontier to cover broader frontier tech beyond blockchain
Andreessen Horowitz announced that a16z Crypto, the firm's dedicated digital-assets fund led by Chris Dixon since 2018, is being renamed a16z Frontier. Dixon and Ben Horowitz framed the change as a recognition that the lines separating crypto from other deep-tech bets have blurred: the new mandate covers any "outer planet" founders building things that don't fit existing categories, with past investments in Oculus, Skydio, Zipline, Coinbase, Solana, and Uniswap cited as examples of the continuity of vision.
Dixon elaborated that the fund's philosophy remains unchanged — being too early is preferable to being too late — and that every compelling technology idea the firm has ever encountered has eventually worked or will work. The name change formalizes a mandate that has quietly been expanding beyond pure crypto for several years.
YC alum Tractian raises $130M Series D at $1.4B valuation for industrial AI sensors
Tractian, a YC Winter 2021 company, closed a $130 million Series D round valuing the startup at $1.4 billion. The company builds sensor hardware and AI software that predict industrial machine failures before they happen, targeting factories where most equipment has historically had no instrumentation at all — meaning breakdowns are discovered only after costly downtime has already begun.