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WOW, a BG3 ThingWorld of Warcraft-inspired Baldur's Gate 3 custom campaign "Forsaken" releases a teaser level you can play right now, with plans for it to grow into the full modA nice starter ahead of a future main custom campaign course.Image credit: Larian/SquallyDaBeanz News by Mark Warren Senior Staff Writer Published on Feb. 3, 2025 2025 got off to a cracking start for those who were hoping Baldur's Gate 3 modders would create some cool custom campaigns when Larian released the official tools for the game last year. Now, we're only a couple of days into Feburary, and one of these projects has already been released in teaser level form for you to give a go.Alongside the likes of Path To Menzoberranzan, whose creators - we interviewed them just last week - are aiming to release their own demo this year, Forsaken by modder SquallyDaBeanz is one of the ambitious BG3 custom campaigns in the works that's been wowing fans via short YouTube progress showcases.To see this content please enable targeting cookies. The good news is that it's no longer just something you can watch and wait for, with SquallyDaBeanz having just uploaded a playable version to Nexus Mods. It's not the full campaign yet, but instead a "teaser level" that's designed to help its creator "gauge player interest in the setting and this style of campaign before investing more time into the project".With that complete version set to recreate "the Undead starting zone 'Tirisfal Glades' from World of Warcraft (Classic/Vanilla) - though SquallyDaBeanz writes that "being such different games, the approach to encounters, quests, loot, and more had to be adapted to Baldurs Gate 3 systems" - this teaser level spans the "'Deathknell' region". The modder says it's "about 1/8th of the first zone" of the full mod, which will feature "the rest of Tirisfal Glades and its locations, quests, encounters, and more".Watch on YouTubeAs of writing, the new region you can explore features a single town and dungeon. There's a "new storyline" to engage with through five quests thus far, with fresh NPCs and dialogue, combat encounters, and a party camp for you to chill at when you need a break from checking out all of that. It sounds like you'll not want to bring the base game's companions with you to chill, though, with the mod being designed to be played as a solo adventurer, with mates via multiplayer, or with a band of hirelings summoned via a sarcophagus in the starting room."The next major release will include all of Tirisfal Glades as 'Act 1'," SquallyDaBeanz writes regarding their future plans, "There are plans beyond that, but none that I'm ready to share". That said, they have included a list of "planned features" in the description, which includes the likes of "complete NPC dialogue and branching conversation paths", a "better Hireling system and mechanics", and "unique Tactician/Honour Mode mechanics and enemies",There's no concrete release date for the full thing, however, with the modder writing that they "plan to finish and release" another major campaign mod called 'The Act Two Expansion' that they've been working on first before doing any more work on this project. What's this other mod, you ask? Well, it's designed to be an expansion of Baldur's Gate 3's main story that'll take Act 2 "beyond beyond the Shadowcursed Lands" and "bridge the story and gameplay gap before Tav and the gang reach Baldur's Gate".Yep, BG3 custom campaign wanters, you're eating good right now.

January is over, folks. Both Microsoft, and Nintendo have already had some major announcements to share. Microsoft hosted a stacked Developer Direct, and Nintendo finally revealed the Switch 2 after almost every single thing about it had been leaked. Read more

An app that helps people and teams in the working world simplify their to-do lists ideally by organising and doing some of the work for them has remained one of the unsolved goals in business technology. Leaning into AI, on top of battle scars from once building Google Wave, a startup called Tana believes its cracked the code on how to reach it.Today, Tana is emerging from stealth, announcing $25 million in funding from an interesting list of backers to get started.At its most basic, Tana is part automated-list builder and note taker, part application enabler, and part organiser. It can listen to conversations (for example over Zoom) or voice memos directed to Tana itself, transcribing them and turns them into action items. It then starts to work on that, depending on what you the user might have integrated with it for the purpose, to create lists, spreadsheets, web page updates and more.It also has a feature it calls Supertag, which it describes as modelled on Object-oriented programming that transforms unstructured to structured information in seconds.Tanas ambitious idea is that it will improve over time, as it takes on more data, and as its team builds future iterations of the platform.We are building out a knowledge graph, said CEO Tarjei Vassbotn in an interview. Tana is a major fast-flowing river in Norway and Vassbotn said that the startup named itself after it. Tana is a river of information, he said.Aimed at both individuals as well as teams of users beta users included engineering, design, content creation, product and management teams the idea is that Tana helps create and then work with the data and subsequent action items that its users are generating over the course of a normal day.Everything that you do, whether its talking to your phone or having a meeting or writing your own notes, it all is automatically organized and connected together so that our AI can work.Out of the gates, there is already some momentum behind the startup. On the back of a popular closed beta and word of mouth, Tana claims that it has already managed to pick up 160,000 users on a waitlist, with a heavy concentration from large enterprises. (That list will start to open today.)Tana says that its had some 30,000 people using and testing its closed beta, which it launched about nine months ago; and its amassed 24,000 users on a Tana Slack community Slack, coincidentally, being another effort to make working more efficient.The other momentum is behind the scenes. Tana is headquartered in Palo Alto and has a development and operations office in Norway, with three Norwegian co-founders. Vassbotn and Grim Iversen (CPO) are ex-Googlers. Significantly, Iversen had been one of the senior people building Google Wave, another of the efforts to solve the to-do and collaboration problem. They are joined by a third co-founder, COO Olav Kriken, who has built a string of digital companies in the country.The three are well-connected and have raised $25 million in two tranches. In the most recent Series A for $14 million, Tola Capital, a VC that focuses on AI-powered enterprise software, is leading with participation from Lightspeed Venture Partners, Northzone, Alliance VC, and firstminute capital.The seed round of $11 million had backing from La Famiglia (now part of General Catalyst), Lars Rasmussen, co-founder of Dropbox Arash Ferdowsi, Runway founder Siqi Chen, and Datadog founder Olivier Pomel among nearly two dozen others.The angels are all notable for their own efforts to build better productivity tools, some multiple times.Rasmussen in particular is a software legend. At Google he founded and ran Google Maps, which gave him the green light to then try his hand at enterprise productivity, with the ultimately ill-fated Google Wave.Rasmussen then moved to Facebook to work on search and build and launch the social networks own effort to try to fix this problem, another now-defunct app called Workplace. For the last several years, hes been working on startups and angel investing. In an interview, he said that Iversen was one of a select handful of talented people hes met over the years that he would be willing to back, pretty much no matter what.Grim actually pitched some of [the Tana] ideas for Google Wave, but we never had time to to build them, Rasmussen said.The fact is that many talented builders have tried to conquer efficiency/productivity conundrum in business software, yet all of them have not quite worked as hoped. Even Slacks so-called email killer has, in the end, turned the overstuffed inbox into a bloated burden of a different, notification kind.Tanas founders are part of that complicated history. Now, their belief is that the circle can finally by completed through careful application of AI.Thats not been a quick process, nor one where they presumed to be working in a vacuum with no other competitors. The company first came together in 2020 and spent time trying to figure out the best approach to create what it envisioned.We started out building our own models for everything, Vassbotn said. But when GPT3 came out, we realized that this is going to be a race among many players. Many players trying to build productivity, he said, but also those building Large Language Models.The company quickly pivoted, to make sure that we could support any model in the universe, basically, and put all of our efforts into that, Vassbotn continued. That sounds easy, but its pretty hard when youre dealing with a knowledge graph, where things needs to be precise. Hence the long period of nearly four years between being founded and launching the closed beta.Currently, he said, Tana is partnering primarily with OpenAI to power its natural language processing, but we also use Anthropic and Grok, and we have some local models running on your computer based off of open source models.AI is used at Tana not just to ingest and process information but also to understand where to send information, what to do with it.I think of Tana as a tool catalog, he said, estimating that its now integrating with around 50 different tools (such as Zoom), all of which themselves are also building their own AI functionality to make work for users a little easier. If all of those tools have their own AI agent, how on earth are they going to be able to collaborate? So youre basically just ending up copying and pasting and having disparate information that is out of sync everywhere. And that is sort of the core problem that were trying to solve.There are inevitably going to be a number of companies, including existing leaders in the note-taking and productivity spaces like Notion, also bullish on AI, may well also be considering how to build an AI-powered assistant to wrap around everything we do when were at a keyboard or a screen.And Tana has a ways to go before its at the it just works stage. Kriken, for example, that today, Tana is probably best for tech savvy professionals who are willing to do a little tinkering to get the product to behave how they want it. But down the line, we really believe that this is a paradigm shift in how we work with information. We envision Tana used by all knowledge workers.Investors are convinced its worth a bet. I meet a lot of productivity companies and have been in the space, Sheila Gulati, founder and managing director of Tola Capital said in an interview. But this is a miraculous experience. I use it to run our VC firm. This is a market that will have real competition and players who want to win but the this team has a high level of commitment to drive the experience. This is a long game, and their vision of productivity is completely different.

Following Desktop Metals new lawsuit, Israeli 3D printer manufacturer Nano Dimensions interim CEO Julien Lederman has issued a letter to the companys shareholders alongside the companys preliminary Q4 2024 financial results.In his letter, Lederman has addressed key concerns from shareholders, acknowledging past challenges while outlining a renewed strategic direction for Nano Dimension. He emphasized ongoing governance improvements, financial discipline, and operational adjustments aimed at restoring investor confidence.Moreover, the company anticipates unaudited consolidated revenues of approximately $14.6 million for Q4 2024 and $57.8 million for the full year as of December 31st, 2024, reflecting nearly flat quarterly performance and a modest 3% year-over-year (Y/Y) increase. As with any unaudited report, the final audited results may see adjustments. The full financials and more detailed commentary are expected to be published in the coming months.Nano Dimension 3D printed electronics on display at RAPID + TCT 2024. Photo by 3D Printing Industry.A call for positive changeLederman acknowledged the need for change at Nano Dimension, highlighting a persistent lack of investor confidence in the companys financial standing and direction.Since assuming his role as Interim CEO a month ago, Lederman has engaged with shareholders, addressing concerns about transparency, business strategy, and governance. Investors have expressed frustration over negative returns, high operating expenses, and a lack of a clear path to sustainable growth.Having raised $1.5 billion in early 2021, the companys stock has declined by over 80%. To address these issues, Lederman emphasized his commitment to restructuring the business with the Boards support.He also highlighted that the Israeli firm is currently navigating two high-profile merger plans with Desktop Metal and Markforged, both under regulatory review. Litigation initiated by Desktop Metal has further complicated the process, and the company is in discussions with the regulators.The outcome will impact the feasibility and timing of the mergers, but Lederman assured shareholders that the company remains compliant with all obligations and will provide updates as necessary.Additionally, the CEO outlined a strategy centered on three key principles: strengthening shareholder engagement, ensuring disciplined capital allocation based on clear Return on Investment (ROI), and maintaining prudent expense management to align operational costs with revenue goals.With these measures, the company aims to accelerate growth and profitability by leveraging its technological expertise and focusing on high-performance applications in advanced manufacturing.To improve governance and financial stability, the Board decided to let the Shareholder Rights Plan, aka poison pill, expire last month, signaling a commitment to transparency. Additionally, the company expects its core business operations, excluding merger impacts, to become cash flow positive by Q4 2025, aided by reduced operating expenses.Nanos Board has also approved a $150 million share repurchase program under the Israeli Companies Law as a flexible capital management tool, depending on market conditions.Lederman closed his letter by reaffirming Nano Dimensions commitment to financial stability and operational efficiency. He emphasized that ongoing reforms aim to create sustainable growth while the company navigates regulatory and legal challenges.Nano Dimension offices in Munich. Photo by Michael Petch.Julien Ledermans message to shareholdersDear Shareholders,Since I was asked by the Board of Directors (the Board) to be Interim Chief Executive Officer just over four weeks ago, much thought and work has gone into assessing the business, future opportunities, risks and challenges, and envisioning and implementing plans to immediately strengthen Nano Dimension for the long term. With that said, before getting into where we are going, we have to acknowledge where we are coming from.I, along with the Board of Directors (the Board), recognize that change at Nano Dimension is warranted.Investors lack of confidence in the value and direction of Nano Dimension is reflected in the Companys substantial negative enterprise value which has persisted for over three years. During this time, the Companys total market value has traded at a discount to net cash on the balance sheet and a discount to book value of approximately 50%.I have spent much of the last few weeks listening to our shareholders, many of whom have been continuous investors with us over the years. They not only echoed their frustration with the share price, but also voiced concerns about trust and credibility. They highlighted:Shareholder-to-management relationships that were unhealthy There was an absence of the respectful relationships one expects regardless of viewpoints.Negative returns for shareholders Since early 2021 when the Company raised $1.5 billion, the stock has declined by over 80%.Financial communications were least about financials Communications generally lacked a clear explanation of the Companys financial performance and how the Company could address its persistent operating losses, while at the same time focusing on a range of other matters.Technology vision without business strategy and deliverables The Company had technology vision, but did not articulate a business strategy that outlined a credible path to building sustainable shareholder value.Operating expenses that were disproportionately high Operating expenses that have been persistently too high for the size of the business, even one that is R&D focused.I am working to change this with the support and stewardship of the Board.While there is still more to consider and define, this update should provide clarity and, even more so, confidence in the prospects of the Company.Before explaining our new perspective and strategy, I will make a brief comment on the definitive merger agreements that the Company has entered into with Desktop Metal, Inc. (NYSE: DM) and Markforged Holding Corporation (NYSE: MKFG). They remain subject to ongoing regulatory review processes. These transactions have resulted in ongoing discussions with the regulators as well as litigation initiated by Desktop Metal. We are actively engaged in addressing both the regulatory inquiries and the litigation, the outcome of which could impact the timing or ability to consummate either or both mergers under their current terms. Nano Dimension continues to act in compliance with its rights and obligations under each agreement. We will provide updates on the merger agreements as well as the litigation when appropriate.Importantly, the principles and strategy outlined below reflects Nano Dimensions approach under all circumstances.Nano Dimensions foundational principles and driversWe are driven by three principles in operating our business:First, the Companys directors and management are driven by shareholder interests. We are focused on constructive engagement with shareholders as we diligently work to deliver long-term returns.Second, assessment of capital allocation measured against demonstratable Return on Investment (ROI) is always top of mind. This will be evident in sensible stewardship and investment of shareholder capital.Third, prudent operating expense management. This is being aligned based on ratios to revenue of a responsible advanced manufacturing leader.Nano Dimensions strategy shaping the businessWe are committed to accelerating the business towards both growth and profitability. This duality is vital to building a digital manufacturing business that can both be disruptive and sustain itself long into the future.Our growth and profitability orientation is guided by focusing on where we have technological expertise to drive distinguishing innovation, healthy gross margins, while targeting advanced manufacturing segments centered on high performance applications.Nano Dimensions milestones demonstrating the approach and strategyWe are matching our words with actions that recognize the issues of the past, while presenting a rejuvenated version of the Company.We are instituting measures aimed at restoring good governance that will demonstrate that the Companys directors and management are ultimately here to serve the shareholders. One of those first steps is that the Board decided to let a Shareholder Rights Plan (or poison pill), which was put in place and renewed by previous directors, lapse on January 25th, 2025.With this renewed degree of ROI oriented decision making and organizational prudence, the Company believes it can accelerate the improvement of its financials, specifically a reduction in operating expenses. Nano Dimensions core business (pre-2025 mergers) is expected to be cash flow positive on an adjusted basis beginning in the fourth quarter of 2025. The adjustments account for one-off transformation and legal expenses.Additionally, the Board authorized the Company to commence the procedures under the Israeli Companies Law for a $150 million share repurchase program. The Company believes this repurchase program is a capital alternative that the Company should have at its disposal depending on market conditions and other relevant considerations.In closing, myself and the Board recognize change is required, and it is already underway. For next steps, we will continue to diligently work to sharpen a renewed vision and strategy in our dynamic environment, ever mindful of our responsibilities to create value for shareholders.Thank you for your trust,Julien LedermanInterim CEOWho won the 20243D Printing Industry Awards?All the news fromFormnext 2024.To stay up to date with the latest 3D printing news, dont forget to subscribe to the 3D Printing Industry newsletter or follow us on Twitter, or like our page on Facebook.While youre here, why not subscribe to our Youtube channel? Featuring discussion, debriefs, video shorts, and webinar replays.Featured image shows Nano Dimension offices in Munich. Photo by Michael Petch.Ada ShaikhnagWith a background in journalism, Ada has a keen interest in frontier technology and its application in the wider world. Ada reports on aspects of 3D printing ranging from aerospace and automotive to medical and dental.

Chinese 3D printer manufacturer Bambu Labs latest firmware update has intensified debates within the 3D printing community as Orca Slicer, one of the widely used third-party slicing tools, refuses to support Bambu Connect.According to The Verge, this decision contradicts Bambu Labs earlier claims of collaborating with Orca Slicer. Instead of integrating with Bambu Connect, SoftFever as advised users against installing the update, citing unnecessary restrictions.A growing divide has emerged between Bambu Labs security-focused approach and the open-source philosophy that many 3D printing enthusiasts advocate. Concerns over software limitations and reduced user control continue to fuel discussions, leaving Bambu Lab under increasing scrutiny.SoftFevers post on discord. Image via Orca Slicer Discord.Firmware update sparks open-source concernsBambu Lab introduced the firmware update as a security measure, implementing authentication and authorization controls to prevent unauthorized access, cyberattacks, and network vulnerabilities. In doing so, the 3D printer manufacturer reassured users that external software would remain functional through Bambu Connect, a proprietary tool designed to integrate third-party applications while maintaining security standards.Despite this, pushback from the open-source community has been swift. Many view the changes as a step toward a more restrictive ecosystem, limiting compatibility with external software and reducing user autonomy. Industry experts including the likes of Josef Prusa, CEO of Prusa Research, stated on a LinkedIn post, Quite scary where the 3DP industry is moving control of your data. Additionally, Nick Sonnentag, Founder and CEO of the concrete 3D printing firm Sunnyday Technologies, described the decision as a significant disappointment, emphasizing the importance of open-source development in driving innovation within the broader community.Concerns have also surfaced over whether such restrictions could set a precedent for tighter manufacturer control over 3D printer functionality.Although Bambu Lab states that users can continue printing with older firmware without restrictions, Orca Slicers firm rejection raises questions about transparency and long-term intentions.The Bambu Lab X1-Carbon 3D printer. Image via Bambu Lab.A shift from earlier open-source approachThe backlash over Bambu Labs latest firmware update contrasts with last years developments, when the company updated its firmware to prevent users from installing third-party modifications on X1 Series printers. Following discussions with the X1Plus team, Bambu introduced an optional one-way ticket waiver, allowing users to install external firmware, but ultimately forfeiting their 3D printers warranty and access to Bambu Labs support.This decision came after X1Plus developed third-party firmware that enabled additional features beyond Bambu Labs official offerings. While Bambu initially restricted these modifications through a firmware update, it later introduced an opt-in option. Now, with new security measures further limiting third-party access, some users see this as a return to stricter controls, reigniting concerns over long-term software restrictions.So whats next for Bambu Lab? The manufacturer has defended its stance against criticism, addressing unfortunate misinformation in a blog post. It insists that Developer Mode enables local area network (LAN)-based printing while maintaining cloud security. However, skepticism persists over potential future restrictions on third-party access, fueling concerns about proprietary software limitations.With Orca Slicers rejection, tensions have heightened, reigniting the debate between security-driven controls and open-source freedoms. Whether Bambu Lab will adjust its policies in response to ongoing pressure remains to be seen.Who won the 2024 3D Printing Industry Awards?All the news from Formnext 2024.To stay up to date with the latest 3D printing news, dont forget to subscribe to the 3D Printing Industry newsletter or follow us on Twitter, or like our page on Facebook.While youre here, why not subscribe to our Youtube channel? Featuring discussion, debriefs, video shorts, and webinar replays.Featured image shows the Bambu Lab X1-Carbon 3D printer. Image via Bambu Lab.

Studio Anne Holtrop | Carlos Gonzlez Lobo | Kengo Kuma | BC Architects & Studies | EVR Architecten | Rebecca Horn | Mir Architectes | Ltjens Padmanabhan | Lukas FsterVirtually all architects have worked on a home extension at some point in their career. Increasing the size of a property is perceived as a sign of success of having room to store more things, and to buy even more and a materialisation of social aspiration.But in the climate emergency, extensions also help toincrease a buildings useful life. For a co-operative apartment block in Zrich, additional balcony space has made room for solar panels, while Jamie Gatty Irving suggests the maligned British conservatory could be part of a decarbonisation revolution. Yet extensions are only truly sustainable if they are built with biosourced, local materials and if they contribute to social justice. InBrussels, for example, materials are reused and recycled to transform police barracks into a new urban block, while in Paris, social housing units are inserted within and atop an old workshop, vertically extended with a timber frame and hempcrete.In large parts of the world, homes are built and gradually extended by residents themselves. Sometimes an architect might have a hand in the initial efforts as Carlos Gonzlez Lobo did in the aftermath of Mexico Citys 1985 earthquake. But whether planned or not, extensions persist, and crop up as residents lives change. As Nancy Kwak observes in the keynote essay, this kind of self-help activity isthe most important way in which cities have grown in thelast 80 years.1518: Extensionscover (above) photograph by Tako RobakidzeFollowing the collapse of the USSR in 1991, centralised planning and housing provision stalled in cities like Tbilisi, Georgia. In its absence, inhabitants have taken matters into their own hands, constructing self-built often precarious extensions, nicknamed kamikaze loggiasfolio (lead image)William Blakes 1793 engraving presaged the death throes of the capitalist growth paradigm, in which the desire always for more has prompted plans to colonise the MoonkeynoteCore demandsNancy KwakbuildingEl Agujero de Vysoka cultural centre in Asuncin, Paraguay by Lukas Fster, Nicols Berger, Sergio Ybarra, Guido Martnez, Javier Rodrguez, the Escuela Taller and studentsLaurence BlairbuildingSiyadi Pearl Museum in Muharraq, Bahrain, by Studio Anne HoltropSuha HasanrevisitExtendable post-earthquake housing in Mexico City, Mexico by Carlos Gonzlez LoboMichael Snydercity portraitBarcelonaJulia Capomaggi and Llus OrtegaoutrageDonald Trumps Arctic expansionsKirsty VolzbuildingCentro de Arte Moderna extension in Lisbon, Portugal by Kengo Kuma and AssociatesEdwin HeathcotebuildingUsquare Feder university buildings in Brussels, Belgium by BC Architects & Studies, EVR Architecten and Callebaut ArchitectenChristophe Van GerrewayreputationsRebecca HornJana BaumannessayA short history of the conservatoryJamie Gatty IrvingbuildingSocial housing vertical extension in Paris, France by Mir ArchitectesJustinien TribillonbuildingBalcony extensions and communal garden room in Zrich, Switzerland by Ltjens PadmanabhanEleanor BeaumontessayOffshore gridGke Gnel

peshkov - stock.adobe.comNewsDeepSeek-R1 more readily generates dangerous content than other large language modelsResearch scientists at cyber firm Enkrypt AI publish concerning findings from a red team exercise conducted against DeepSeek, the hot new generative AI toolByAlex Scroxton,Security EditorPublished: 03 Feb 2025 9:45 DeepSeek, the rapidly growing generative artificial intelligence (GenAI) model that made waves around the world at the end of January and reportedly wiped over a trillion dollars from stock markets is significantly more likely than others to generate biased, harmful and toxic content than its competitors, according to preliminary evidence gathered for a study.Amid the legion of tech and cyber security experts who have spent the past days poring over DeepSeeks rapid rise to prominence and the implications therein are experts at Boston-based AI security and compliance platform Enkrypt AI, who have now published early findings on how their red team uncovered a litany of critical security failures in the model.Enkrypt described the model as highly biased and susceptible to generating not just insecure code, but also content such as criminal material, hate speech and threats, self-harm material, and sexually explicit content.As others have shown this week, it is also highly vulnerable to manipulation, also known as jailbreaking, which could enable it to assist in the creation of chemical, biological and cyber weapons. Enkrypt said it posed significant global security concerns.Compared with other models, the firms researchers claimed the DeepSeek-R1 model is three times more biased than Claude-3 Opus, four times more vulnerable to generating insecure code than OpenAI O1, four times more toxic than GPT-4o, 11 times more likely to generate harmful output compared with OpenAI O1, and three-and-a-half times more likely to produce chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear (CBRN) content than OpenAI O1 or Claude-3 Opus.DeepSeek-R1 offers significant cost advantages in AI deployment, but these come with serious risks, said Enkrypt CEO Sahil Agarwal.Our research findings reveal major security and safety gaps that cannot be ignored. While DeepSeek-R1 may be viable for narrowly scoped applications, robust safeguards including guardrails and continuous monitoring are essential to prevent harmful misuse. AI safety must evolve alongside innovation, not as an afterthought.Read more about DeepSeekDeepSeek, a Chinese AI firm, is disrupting the industry with its low-cost, open source large language models,challenging US tech giants.The introduction of DeepSeek's new generative AI models have been met with fervour, but security issues have createdapparent challenges for the Chinese startup.DeepSeek, which gained popularity recently for its AI platform, did not specify the cause of large-scale malicious attacks, which continue to disrupt new account registrations.During testing, Enkrypts researchers found that 83% of bias tests successfully produced discriminatory output, which was particularly severe in areas such as gender, health, race and religion, potentially putting DeepSeek at risk of violating global laws and regulations, and posing significant risk for organisations that may be tempted to integrate the tool into areas such as financial services, healthcare provision or human resources.In general, 6.68% of all responses contained some degree of profanity, hate speech, or extremist narratives, contrasting with Claude-3 Opus, which effectively blocked all the same toxic prompts.Additionally, 45% of harmful content prompts tested successfully bypassed safety protocols, generating criminal planning guides, illegal weapons information and extremist propaganda. In one of the tests, Enkrypt was able to use DeepSeek-R1 to write a persuasive recruitment blog for an unspecified terrorist group. This tallies with other tests performed by experts at Palo Alto Networks, who used a series of jailbreaking prompts to generate instructions on making a rudimentary improvised explosive device (IEC) in that instance, a Molotov cocktail.DeepSeek-R1 also generated detailed data on the biochemical interactions of sulfur mustard more commonly known as mustard gas with DNA, which, while they have been studied and known for years, renders it a potential biosecurity threat.Turning to cyber security risks specifically, 78% of the tests run by Enkrypt successfully tricked DeepSeek-R1 into generating code that contained either vulnerabilities or was downright malicious including code that could help create malware, Trojans and other exploits. Enkrypt said the large language modelwas significantly likely to be able to generate functional hacking tools, something security professionals have long warned about.Reflecting on the teams findings, Agarwal said it was natural that both China and the US would continue to push the boundaries of AI for economic, military and technological power.However, our findings reveal that DeepSeek-R1s security vulnerabilities could be turned into a dangerous tool one that cyber criminals, disinformation networks, and even those with biochemical warfare ambitions could exploit, he said. These risks demand immediate attention.In The Current Issue:World Economic Forum: Digital supply chains at risk as world faces two years of turbulenceData sovereignty and security in the UKDownload Current IssueConfluent: Shifting the paradigm to (real-time) data engineering CW Developer NetworkVision for the technology landscape of 2025 Data MattersView All Blogs

Data and analytics leaders must build and address the adaptive and resilient data-driven business strategy and roadmap by improving the entire quintet of high-performance IT capabilities application, data, process, people and infrastructure all of which are key to measuring and improving the health of the enterprise.This data-driven strategy should rest on a broader technology strategy that enables a company to quickly reconfigure business structures and capabilities to meet future customer and employee needs with adaptivity, creativity and resilience. In an era when constant change is the new normal, legacy approaches to delivering actionable insights to decision-makers will no longer work.The first area to consider is that digital transformation generates more data and that data is all over the place. The new normal drives more digital activity, which produces more data, both structured and unstructured internal data generated by enterprise applications and customer experiences, as well as external data coming from partners, data marketplaces and social media.The noble but idealistic vision that all enterprise data will eventually end up in a single physical or virtual analytical enterprise repository has come and gone. While this is still a recommended aspirational vision and strategy, the reality is sobering anecdotal evidence shows that no more than 20% of all enterprise data that could be used to drive actionable insights is leveraged for that purpose. And with artificial intelligence (AI), this challenge will only grow as new models spin off more data.In addition, new architectures and platforms will shift responsibilities. While the promise of a unified enterprise analytical data repository is always enticing, the current state of being able to find, access and analyse data wherever it is has driven the development of newer technologies such as data catalogs, data fabric, enterprise semantic layer platforms and knowledge graphs.In turn, these technologies drive new questions for data and analytics leaders. Who is responsible for managing these new platforms business, IT, or organisations reporting to chief data officers (CDOs) or chief analytics officers (CAOs)? Is it down to data professionals or analytics professionals to manage platforms that sit in the murky area between data and analytics in a typical enterprise analytical technology stack?With the current state fragmented between on-premise legacy databases, cloud, lakehouses and the like, large enterprises will face complex decisions as they define roles and responsibilities.Embed new personas to act as change agents for the business.Improve data communication via literacy, visualisation and storytelling skills.Ensure executives dont get a hall pass during key data training.Hire and train more data engineers.Build up data and analytics operations roles and responsibilities.Add new insights and governance responsibilities beyond data governance.Cross-train data and analytics skills for business resiliency.Carve out roles for user support to empower business users to become more self-sufficient.Source: ForresterAnother area IT leaders must assess is that modern insights platforms and solutions will multitask and overlap. Deciding what technology platform should support your data-driven business transformation is increasingly challenging.Not only are new and emerging technologies driving shifts in responsibilities, but they also complicate the who does what where? questions due to their highly overlapping capabilities. For example, most leading enterprise business intelligence (BI), predictive analytics and machine learning (PAML) and digital decision platforms now include data preparation functionality. Further, BI platforms open their semantic layer to competitors BI platforms, acting as data catalogs, and the lines between automated machine learning (AutoML) and augmented BI platforms are blurring.Then there is the question of data democratisation, which hasnt resolved the language disconnect between business and IT. Business professionals speak about data, metrics and key performance indicators, while IT, data and analytics professionals talk about data models, schemas, dimensions and attributes.Business professionals want customer insights and often dont need to understand where in the data architecture the data originates. These different languages block whats most important to driving value: working across the organisational chart to apply data and insights to actions that improve business outcomes. Although there is a determined desire to bridge this literacy gap through the proliferation of natural language query (NLQ) and low-code/no-code capabilities, the disconnect is still evident as global data and analytics decision-makers consider about half of their organisational data literacy to be intermediate level at best.Forrester warns that impatience for underused and non-actionable data signals will grow. Data visualisation is not a panacea for underused data. Even seemingly obvious data visualisations wont trigger insights or actions without proper context, effective data storytelling and advanced visualisation techniques.A chart clearly showing a pattern like a trend does not indicate whether the trend is good or bad. Was the trend expected or unexpected? Does it exceed or fall short of goals and expectations? Is the red trend line meant to be an alert, or does the colour simply highlight a data point? Data and analytics business and tech leaders will increasingly be asked to answer these types of questions to better use data signals in a compelling and impactful way.Its no longer a question of whether data, analytics and insights are business or IT responsibilities. That decision/strategy is way too simplistic. Multiple shifts are happening in the C-suite, such as lines of business (LOBs) taking on more data and AI responsibilities, centralised enterprise functions moving towards governance and oversight roles, and advanced data-driven organisations increasingly separating data and analytics functions from IT and moving these teams outside of the CIO reporting lines.In Forresters 2024 State of data, analytics, measurement and insights survey, 51% of organisations at the advanced level of data-driven business maturity with at least one specified senior data and analytics role have a CDO, compared with only 40% of beginner organisations. In 44% of advanced organisations, the CDO reports directly to the CEO, compared with 35% of beginner organisations. Below the C-suite, roles and responsibilities for delivering insights are also mixed among IT, business and data and analytics organisations.In this data-driven era, Forrester recommends that businesses evolve traditional roles to harness new opportunities. This dynamic transformation demands not only a shift in how we view and use data but also a profound reevaluation of the personas that lead and execute this vision within LOB teams.Data belongs to the LOBs, where customer experience, marketing, finance and HR professionals generate the data and act on the signals it produces, while data teams ensure the ingested information is fit for use and is digestible by diverse users. Business leaders working with their data and analytics colleagues must explore pivotal new personas and enhanced skills that are mission-critical to thrive in this environment where data guides strategic decisions and actions.No matter how many skills business teams are able to acquire, advanced data- and analytics-driven business capabilities will continue to depend heavily on technology-focused data and analytics professionals. Leaders are already introducing adaptive business processes such as BI governance, adaptive data architectures like data mesh, and adaptive technologies such as AutoML and augmented BI. Data and analytics leaders who are more aligned to the technology organisation must address the evolving and adaptive nature of tech-focused people skills.Success in data-driven initiatives requires intricate coordination of multiple moving parts. Dont be enamoured with emerging technologies claiming to be a panacea. Promised benefits wont materialise unless your organisation has the right people and talent assigned to the right roles and with the right responsibilities and skills.This article is based on an excerpt of Forresters Evolve data and analytics roles and skills for the adaptive enterprise report by Zeid Khater, with contributions from Aaron Katz, Boris Evelson, Kim Herrington, Karsten Monteverde and Jen Barton.Read more about data engineeringGet set for interfaces that know what youre doing before you do: John Bates, CEO of SER Group, a European-based enterprise content management vendor looks at how user interfaces have come a long way from the days of green screens.From lab to enterprise, what scientific data teaches us: Justin Pront, senior director of Product at TetraScience discusses why scientific data is the ultimate stress test for enterprise data architectures.

The carcass was found on the beach at Cape Bridgewater near Portland.Portland Bait and TackleTheres no doubt about it: killer whales (Orcinus orca) are formidable predators. They feed on a diverse range of prey, from marine mammals like seals and whales to fish and even reptiles. However, they are also known to specialize in specific prey, such as whale tongue or shark liver, indicating a complex and regionally varied diet. Recent research has shed light on killer whale predation on white sharks, particularly in areas like South Africa and, more recently, Australia. This predation has caused significant shifts in the local ecosystems, as the killer whales targeting of specific shark tissues, like the liver, has led to the displacement of white sharks from certain areas.Famously, killer whales have been documented at length targeting white sharks in South Africa, resulting in a mass exodus of sharks from the area and triggering ecological cascades. These events have similarly been observed in California, although direct sightings of the predation are rare, making the phenomenon harder to study. In Australia, killer whales have been reported preying on various shark species, including blue sharks, porbeagles, and tiger sharks. But of particular interest to PhD student Isabella Reeves are the interactions between killer whales and white sharks. Several reports suggest that these apex predators are increasingly targeting white sharks in Australia for their liver, a highly nutritious part of the sharks body; an oil slick was observed following a suspected predation in 2015 in the Neptune Islands Group Marine Park (South Australia) but the carcass was never recovered for confirmation.On October 15, 2023, a group of killer whales was sighted near Bridgewater Bay, a known movement corridor for both killer whales and white sharks. Witnesses reported seeing cataloged killer whales Ripple and Bent Tip engaged in hunting behavior, corralling and tossing a large prey item which was speculated to be a large shark or small whale. Just two days later, a large white shark carcass washed ashore, sparking public interest due to its size and the bite marks it bore. State fisheries officers secured the carcass for investigation. And in came Reeves and other researchers, who utilized both wildlife forensics and citizen science data to provide the first confirmed evidence of killer whale predation on white sharks in Australia.While they are known to target great white sharks in some areas, these interactions don't occur ... ... [+] [+]Getty ImagesThe shark's body was found with large bite wounds on the pectoral girdle, consistent with previous reports of killer whale predation on white sharks. The pattern of the wound suggested a method of attack designed to access the sharks liver, similar to observations from South Africa. To confirm the identity of the predator, researchers collected DNA from the bite wounds and conducted genetic analysis. The results showed that the DNA from the large bite wound matched killer whale sequences, confirming that killer whales were responsible for the sharks death. Further investigation also revealed DNA from broadnose sevengill sharks (Notorynchus cepedianus) in other bite wounds, suggesting other animals took advantage of this free meal for some post-kill scavenging.MORE FOR YOUThis breakthrough study highlights the growing trend of killer whale predation on white sharks worldwide, suggesting that these interactions may be more common than previously thought. And while it answers a few mysteries of what happened that fateful day off the Australian coast, it also raises questions about the broader implications of killer whale predation on marine ecosystems. The removal of white sharks from an area can have far-reaching effects, as these apex predators play an essential role in maintaining the balance of marine food webs. By targeting specific prey, killer whales may be reshaping predator-prey dynamics in ways that are still not fully understood especially in an area that is famous for white sharks, like South Africa once was. Could what happened there happen Down Under? Thats a question that warrants further exploration.