WWDC 2026 is Tim Cook’s final Swan Song ahead of him leaving the firm later this year, and it gives him one opportunity to scrub clean one of the biggest blemishes on his time at Apple: the botched launch of the redesigned, smarter Siri. 

Now don’t misunderstand me; Tim Cook has been a force to be reckoned with during his time at the helm, guiding the company through successive iconic product launches like the Apple Watch, AirPods, Apple Silicon and much more – but I’m sure that the botched Apple Intelligence rollout still haunts his dreams.

Announced at WWDC 2024 and scheduled for release sometime during the iOS 18 era, the redesigned Siri was the star feature of Apple Intelligence and was supposed to be much smarter, essentially putting it on par with competing LLM-based assistants like Google Gemini.

Well, that didn’t happen, and it didn’t appear the following year in iOS 26 either, with plenty of leaks suggesting that it just wasn’t up to Apple’s standards.

However, with Apple officially partnering with Google to use Gemini smarts to power Siri earlier this year, and plenty of leaks suggesting that Siri will be the true star of next week’s WWDC 2026, it looks like Tim Cook could finally right that wrong just before he hands the keys over to John Ternus. 

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The long-awaited launch of the improved Siri

If the leaks are correct – and given that we’ve seen multiple reports from multiple sources, some with screenshots, it seems that it’s pretty much on the money – the real star of WWDC 2026 won’t be iOS 27, macOS Big Bear (or whatever it’s called), iPadOS 27 or watchOS 27. 

No, it’ll be the long-awaited reveal of the smarter, more contextual Siri that Apple has been talking about for years at this point – and it might be the game-changer in AI that Apple has desperately needed to stay competitive in the space. 

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While Apple Intelligence has been available in some form since late 2024, it’s, on the whole, pretty lacklustre – both in its feature set and in how it actually performs – compared to Android alternatives. That’s true not only of writing tools and transcription but also of Apple’s performance in image-editing tech.

Really, it needed something smarter to reach the performance level of Android counterparts, and, well, it looks like the redesigned (and Gemini-powered) Siri could finally do that. Now, it’s not clear how much is from Apple and how much is from Google, but leaks suggest that the new Siri is going to be very capable indeed.

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You should expect all the staples of a modern AI assistant, including a much greater understanding of both you and what you want, by accessing things like emails, messages, files, photos, and more. That should allow Siri to help you find recent files, messages or general queries about files on your phone, all without knowing the exact specifics of what you’re looking for. 

It’ll also be able to ‘look’ at your screen and complete actions on your behalf, like asking Siri to add an address to a contact card, or send a photo you’re looking at in the Photos app to someone in iMessage. 

It’s not just locked down to first-party apps either; it’s said to be able to perform actions across third-party apps, and while we don’t yet have a full picture of what that could entail exactly, Apple has suggested in the past that it’ll be able to move files from one app to another, edit a photo and then share it to someone, or get directions home and send the ETA to someone in WhatsApp. 

It’ll also mark the first time that Siri has had an actual app; rumours suggest it’ll work in a similar way to the ChatGPT app, allowing for both text- and voice-based conversations, and just like the competition, you’ll be able to integrate services and apps into the chatbot to expand its feature set. 

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Siri’s ambitions go way further than answering queries

That already sounds like a massive improvement over the underwhelming Siri experience Apple is offering right now, but Siri’s ambitions go far beyond a new chatbot experience.

According to a bunch of leaked screenshots that have been doing the rounds on the web over the past few weeks, Siri is going to be deeply integrated into other Apple apps. 

That starts with the Camera app, which, in addition to offering photo and video modes, will supposedly offer a dedicated Siri mode. This would essentially replace the Visual Intelligence feature currently baked into the Camera Control button on iPhones, and would allow Siri to analyse the world and answer questions about what you’re seeing.

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More interesting is the Photos app; it’s rumoured to not only get two new Siri-powered features in Reframe and Extend – the former allows users to change the perspective of shots, while the latter would use generative image tech to expand the borders of the image – but also natural language photo editing, which would let users tell Siri what edits to make, either via voice or text.

Elsewhere, the Shortcuts app is said to be getting a significant Siri-powered overhaul that’ll allow users to create more complex shortcuts by simply describing what they want it to do, while Apple has also been dabbling in AI-generated wallpapers and a much-improved version of Image Playground for higher-quality images. 

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Apple’s also said to be integrating Siri into the Health app to provide something closer to the AI-powered experience in the new Google Health app – though likely without the added subscription.

And, there’s no single doubt in my mind that it’s only possible thanks to Siri’s upgraded capabilities – though we’ll have to wait and see how it actually performs in users’ hands because, well, Apple Intelligence hasn’t exactly convinced me of its premiership so far. 

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Apple’s on-device hook

Now I’m not going to pretend that these are entirely new AI features – they’re not. We’ve seen pretty much all of this on the Android side of things in one form or another (okay, bar the Shortcuts app – I still wish Google had an alternative to that app!), and it’d be easy to say that this is simple Apple playing catch-up to the competition.

But there’s a core difference here: Apple’s laser focus on privacy.

Most Android-based AI tools, especially image-based tools, rely on cloud processing – and that means sending your private data to a cloud-based server somewhere, before the result is sent back to you via the web. Depending on what you’re doing, that could be a privacy nightmare.

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But Apple has always had a particular focus on privacy that stands in direct opposition to how Google does things with Android – and it seems that’ll continue with the new Siri experience. 

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It’s said that Apple is aiming to keep as much processing on-device as possible to limit the amount of data that leaves the user’s device, and, where necessary, it’ll lean on Apple’s Private Cloud Compute systems that even Apple doesn’t have internal access to. 

It’s also said that Apple will limit Siri’s memory, including restrictions on the information it can ‘remember’ and how long it’s kept, with users able to auto-delete chats and requests after set periods. 

And it’s that focus on privacy that’ll really help Apple sell the upgraded Siri experience, even in the face of much more established options from Google, OpenAI, Anthropic and the like. I just hope that it actually works as well as it sounds, because Apple can’t mess this up. Not again. 

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Former tech executive and VC Sriram Krishnan is leaving the Trump administration at the end of June.

“It is hard to express how big a privilege it has been to serve the American people and how grateful I am to have had the opportunity to do so,” Krishnan said in a post on X. “First and foremost, it has been an honor to serve under President [Donald Trump]. Without his leadership, we would not be leading in the AI race.”

Krishnan, who’s been serving as a senior policy advisor on artificial intelligence at the White House, was one of a number of tech industry figures to take roles in the second Trump administration. Krishnan has led product teams at Microsoft, Twitter, Yahoo, Facebook, and Snap, and he was most recently a partner at Andreessen Horowitz, a firm whose founders threw their support behind Trump during the 2024 election. 

In his post, Krishnan highlighted some “key public accomplishments,” starting with the administration’s AI Action Plan, which prioritized data center construction over regulation and safety. Since then, Trump has signed several executive orders around AI, including one that seeks to challenge state-level AI regulations and another focused on oversight that was delayed and narrowed after industry pushback.

Trump has also endorsed the idea that the government could take an equity stake in major AI companies.

Krishnan noted that the person he “worked [most] closely with over the last 18 months” was David Sacks, the investor and podcaster who stepped down as AI and crypto czar earlier this year and became co-chair of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology.

“[Sacks’] continuing advocacy for America winning on AI has been and continues to be crucial,” Krishnan said.

Next, Krishnan said he will be “building institutions” that tackle big challenges for “America and its allies.” According to The Washington Post, he’s planning to start an outside institution that will still give him a role in influencing Trump’s AI policy.

“Whether it is energy, data centers or a clear path for Americans to experience the benefits of AI, there are many tough issues we all need to navigate together,” Krishnan said.

science

DoE wants to keep 13 coal-fired power generators going at the same time as funding nuclear research

The Trump Administration is using Cold War-era rules to authorize up to $500 million in funding to keep 13 coal-fired power plants going and build a coal export terminal in California.

America’s Department of Energy (DoE) says it is securing the funding via the Defense Production Act (DPA), which grants the president authority to use federal financial incentives to stimulate private domestic industry deemed critical to national defense.

At the same time, the DoE announced that one of the advanced nuclear reactor projects it has been sponsoring has achieved criticality ahead of a July 4 deadline set by President Trump.

That DPA funding includes up to $425 million for 12 projects to “expand and reinvigorate” the aging US coal power fleet, plus up to $75 million for the West Gateway Terminal Project in Oakland, California.

This will be an export terminal reached by rail, capable of handling more than 10 million tons annually, which the government hopes to export to nations such as Japan, South Korea, Taiwan, Vietnam, and Malaysia.

The pretext for authorizing funding via the DPA is that the DoE is ensuring the US maintains the industrial capacity and energy resources it needs to strengthen national security.

Those projects chosen are intended to keep domestic coal mining alive and support reliable baseload power generation to boost the resilience of critical energy infrastructure, the DoE said.

The coal industry in America has been declining for decades. It delivered 578 million tons in 2023, less than half the amount produced in 2008 when coal production peaked, according to figures from the US Energy Information Administration.

And according to a report from the Stanford Institute for Economic Policy Research (SIEPR), it was largely due to natural gas becoming cheaper, rather than green energy rules or clean air legislation, while solar and wind have also proved a competitive threat to coal.

But the recent AI-driven datacenter build boom has pushed electricity demand upwards after years of stagnation, prompting coal-fired plants to stay online rather than retire.

A group of environmental nonprofit organizations warned earlier this year that coal plants in America emit pollutants such as sulfur dioxide (SO2) and nitrogen oxides (NOx), both threatening human health, in addition to the greenhouse gases belched out.

The DoE is at least pushing ahead with new nuclear reactor technology. One of its advanced reactor designs, the Mark-0 from Antares Nuclear, has successfully completed what the agency calls a zero-power fueled criticality demonstration at the Idaho National Laboratory.

This is basically a test running a controlled, self-sustaining chain reaction, but with no electricity generation involved, simply to show that the reactor can operate safely.

Perhaps the reason for the announcement is that Energy Secretary Chris Wright promised in an interview with Bloomberg last year that at least one small nuclear reactor project would be online by July 2026.

Sustaining a test chain reaction doesn’t really count as online in our book, but we’ll let that pass.

The DoE said the Mark-0 is the first of multiple advanced reactors anticipated to go critical by July 4, the 250^th anniversary of the US Declaration of Independence.

“It is fitting that on the eve of our nation’s 250th anniversary, we are witnessing a historic moment for American energy,” Secretary Wright commented. “For the first time in more than four decades, a new privately developed non-light-water reactor has reached criticality in the United States.”

The DoE announced the Nuclear Reactor Pilot Program last June, and in August disclosed a list of ten companies it has accepted to take part, including Antares Nuclear.

In other news, the department also trumpeted that Japan is officially joining the Trump Administration’s Genesis Mission, billed as a national effort to use AI to drive scientific discoveries.

Japan’s RIKEN scientific research institute and Fujitsu began working with Argonne National Laboratory (ANL) and Nvidia to build the compute infrastructure for Genesis back in January, but now the DoE says that Japan and the US are both contributing $500 million each to the project.

The move makes Japan the first, and so far only, international partner on Genesis. ®

As a crowd of 60 anti-vaxxers squeezed into the upstairs dining area of Jonathan’s Grille in Nashville on a recent Monday night, a moment of pride washed over Scott Armstrong.

Years ago, he had been let go from his job as a drug and alcohol counselor for refusing to get vaccinated. Now, unvaccinated people from all over the country were piling into the sports bar to meet others like them. There was a woman who flew in from New Jersey and another from Philadelphia. One group drove up from Florida.

They were there to attend a mixer hosted by Unjected, an anti-vaccination dating app that, according to its website, is “built on creating health-conscious relationships.” It was the second stop on Unjected’s four-city “Summer of Love” tour meant for singles who oppose the Covid-19 vaccine.

“We’re still some of the most persecuted people in society right now,” Armstrong, who now owns a video production company and helped organize the event, tells WIRED. “People still express this absolute hatred for us and for our beliefs in natural health. It just continues to encourage us to host these meetups.”

The reorientation around in-person events to cure app fatigue is a major trend among dating apps struggling for signs of new life. According to ticketing platform Eventbrite, IRL dating events have been on the rise since 2025. Tinder, as part of its rebrand this year, announced it was investing in member meet-ups. But singles in the anti-vax community say for them the events are about connecting with people—potentially future partners—who, above all, believe in bodily autonomy.

Other platforms include the app Unjabbed, NoVax.Singles, Unjuiced.Date, and the Reddit-style dating and community site also named Unjabbed.net, whose members are spread across the US and Europe. PureBlood.Dating, which operates like a social club, launched earlier this year with a street marketing campaign, posting flyers around San Francisco to attract members that urged people to sign up for notifications on its website if they wanted to join a “community for unvaccinated singles to connect at real, in-person events.”

“This is really a pro-freedom movement. It’s not just an anti-vaccination movement,” says Shelby Hosana, the 32-year-old founder of Unjected. “Whatever goes in your body and whatever you do with your body is 100 percent your choice.”

Unjected was designed specifically for people against the Covid vaccine but, according to its site, it is against all vaccinations. Members operate on an honor system, though the app does offer a premium tier—“Unjected Verfied”—where they attest to their unvaccinated status by affidavit. In 2021, the same year it launched, Unjected was removed from the Apple App Store for violating Covid misinformation policies. The app was reaccepted into the App Store, in addition to being uploaded onto Google Play, in fall 2024, which Hosana attributes to “the timing in the world.” Donald Trump, who in the past promoted the myth that childhood vaccines were linked to autism, won reelection that November.

Covid and other vaccines have been proven safe through rigorous trials and years of research, and prior to Robert F. Kennedy Jr., a known vaccine skeptic, taking over the US Department of Health and Human Services, the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention reflected those realities. Recommendations, according to the agency, are updated when warranted by new scientific research and are also monitored by the Food and Drug Administration, which collaborates with government and non-government partners to guarantee vaccine safety.

With the Trump administration weakening vaccine policies and more Americans opting out, the US is seeing a rise in the incidence of diseases that were largely stamped out. According to multiple recent reports, fatal illnesses that many vaccines are known to protect against are again on the rise in the US, including measles, whooping cough, tuberculosis, and various bacterial infections.

security

Totally different attack from the break-in last month. Oh so that’s OK then 

Oxford University students seeking work will be dismayed to learn that crooks have breached a second external platform provider for the university in as many months.

The institution’s CareerConnect platform, provided by Group GTI, was the target of the intrusion, which exposed users’ full names and email addresses. Those who don’t use single sign-on (SSO) had their encrypted passwords leaked, too.

CareerConnect forms part of Oxford University’s career services department, supporting students and alumni to find work opportunities. It is available to students, alumni, research staff, and recruiters.

The same underlying technology powering the platform, which GTI markets as TargetConnect, is used by other universities in the UK and overseas, according to its website.

OxfordUni said the May 28 attack was enabled by a “security vulnerability,” which has since been fixed.

GTI has not publicly disclosed the security snafu itself, and did not respond to our requests for more information. The London-based tech company has not confirmed how many individuals were affected by the break-in, nor whether any data was stolen.

It has also not explicitly stated which types of individuals were affected, although Oxford’s announcement listed “alumni, research staff, and employer users” as those who had their passwords forcibly reset following the attack.

“There is no evidence that course information, uploaded files, appointment information, or financial information were involved in this incident,” the announcement went on to say. 

“GTI has stated this breach appeared to be focused on gathering credentials which may lead to phishing attempts.”

The university did not list current students as among those affected, but told student newspaper Cherwell that names and email addresses might be compromised, and said the attack was entirely separate from the one which hit Instructure’s Canvas last month.

Twice bitten

Oxford University was just one of the circa 8,800 educational institutions affected by the mega breach at Canvas, a separate platform that’s also relied upon by schools, colleges, and universities.

Seemingly timed by ShinyHunters to coincide with exam season, students across multiple countries were left without access to learning materials, tests, and grades at a pivotal time of the year.

The scale of the attack was vast, affecting the usernames, email addresses, course names, enrollment information, and messages of up to 275 million students, teachers, and staff.

The severity of the situation, coupled with the inopportune timing, led to Instructure “reaching an agreement” with ShinyHunters to prevent the criminal gang from leaking all the data online.

In cyberese, this implies Instructure paid the criminals an extortion fee in exchange for their word that they would delete the stolen data. 

“We received digital confirmation of data destruction (shred logs),” Instructure said, adding “We have been informed that no Instructure customers will be extorted as a result of this incident, publicly or otherwise.” ®

Watch Bolivia vs Scotland live streams as Steve Clarke’s side look to build on their 4-1 friendly win over Curaçao by overcoming a Bolivian team that failed to qualify for the 2026 World Cup after losing 2-1 to Iraq in an intercontinental playoff.

Scotland delivered the perfect send-off to their fans last week at Hampden as they hit minnows Curaçao for four. There were plenty of positives for Clarke and his coaching team, with Lawrence Shankland scoring twice, 19-year-old Findlay Curtis scoring his first international goal and Tyler Fletcher delivering an accomplished performance on his debut.

President Donald Trump said on Friday that he’s spoken to AI companies about striking deals “where the American people can benefit from the success of AI.”

Trump does not seem to have mentioned specific companies in his comments, but OpenAI is a likely candidate, especially after CNBC reported that the Trump administration has indeed been discussing an equity stake with the AI company.

CNBC said some of that equity could be used to seed a “Public Wealth Fund” recently proposed by OpenAI. As outlined by the company, proceeds from the fund “could be distributed directly to citizens, allowing more people to participate directly in the upside of AI-driven growth, regardless of their starting wealth or access to capital.”

According to Bloomberg, when reporters on Air Force One asked Trump about the idea, he replied that he’s been talking to AI executives about “concepts where pieces could be given to the American public, where the American public essentially becomes a partner with the companies.”

Bloomberg also reports that CEO Sam Altman has been discussing the idea of a government stake in major AI companies since early 2025.

This seems to align with Trump’s broader interest in government ownership of for-profit companies — most notably, with the government taking a 10% stake in struggling chipmaker Intel last year.

The idea has also found some traction on the left, with Senator Bernie Sanders this week proposing a one-time, 50% tax that companies like OpenAI, Anthropic, and xAI (which is part of SpaceX) would pay in the form of stock.

With all of those businesses potentially going public this year, Sanders argued this tax would “give the public a direct role in determining the future of this technology” and “guarantee that the trillions of dollars potentially generated by A.I. are used to improve the lives of all of us.”

David Sacks, an investor who recently stepped down from his role as Trump’s AI and crypto czar, posted that he can see why Sanders’ idea resonates, “including with many on the right,” but warned it would actually “accelerate the corporate-government fusion we’re already sliding toward.”

Elsewhere on social media, former Microsoft employee Dare Obasanjo suggested, “The groundwork is already being laid for a government bailout of OpenAI.”

Chinese electric vehicles face 125% cumulative tariffs, a proposed Senate ban, and fierce opposition from lawmakers and the US auto industry. But there is a growing possibility that Chinese EVs will be sold in the US within the next few years. The routes in are multiplying: through Canada, Mexico, and partnerships with the very automakers that publicly oppose them.

China captured nearly 75% of global EV manufacturing and 40% of global EV trade in 2025, according to the International Energy Agency. Production of 16 million electric cars outstripped domestic demand by 20%, pushing exports to a record 2.5 million. “The only market in the world they have not yet penetrated is the United States,” said Michael Dunne, CEO of Dunne Insights.

The Big Three are in an awkward position. Ford, GM, and Stellantis have retreated from aggressive EV plans while most experts agree electrification is the future. “U.S. companies have stepped back from a lot of their electric vehicle campaigns, because they haven’t been able to develop, in an inexpensive way, a compelling value proposition,” said Stephen Dyer of AlixPartners. “You can’t be competitive if you’re not in the game.”

Yet all three are quietly deepening ties with Chinese automakers. Ford is in talks with Geely to create a European partnership and, according to The Wall Street Journal, “appears to be opening the door to allowing Chinese cars in the U.S. at some point.” GM imports CATL battery cells for its Chevy Bolt. Stellantis owns 21% of Leapmotor and a 51% majority of a joint venture that its CEO said could expand into Mexico and Canada.

Geely is already using Volvo’s plants rather than building new factories, giving it manufacturing bases in both Europe and the US without greenfield investment. The Volvo factory near Charleston, South Carolina, could be adapted for other Geely platforms, including Zeekr, the brand Waymo uses for its robotaxi fleet.

Chinese EVs are already arriving in Canada, where Prime Minister Mark Carney signed a deal in January permitting up to 49,000 Chinese-built EVs annually at a 6.1% tariff rate. In Mexico, Chinese vehicles account for a quarter of total sales. BYD and Geely are among finalists vying to purchase a Nissan-Mercedes plant there. GAC announced plans to begin assembly in Mexico this year.

Trump expressed support in January for letting Chinese companies manufacture in the US, provided they employ American workers. But hurdles remain. A Senate bill to permanently ban Chinese automakers has bipartisan backing. Regulations restrict Chinese-developed software in connected vehicles. And the USMCA trade deal is up for renewal, with the Trump administration pushing for a new US-content requirement in vehicles.

Even the border is becoming porous. Chinese EVs from BYD, Geely, and Xpeng are showing up along the US-Mexico border, purchased at Mexican dealerships for under $20,000 by citizens who commute to US border cities. Registration in the US is nearly impossible, but the demand signal is clear. According to Kelley Blue Book, 38% of Americans would consider buying a Chinese vehicle.

China’s domestic market is also pushing companies outward. EV and hybrid sales in China fell 6.8% year-over-year in April. Overall vehicle sales dropped 21.5%. Overcapacity and intensifying competition mean Chinese automakers must export to survive.

“By 2030, we will see some form of Chinese cars on American roads,” Dunne said. “One way or another, they’ll find their way in.” The question is whether Detroit will be a partner or a bystander when they do.