On today’s episode of You Asked: What’s a good TV that can double as a work monitor and gaming TV? Plus, an increasingly important question: What are some good TVs that don’t spy on you?
TVs that don’t spy on you
TCL QM7KAndre Revilla / Digital Trends
@raffin2040: Do you know any good TV’s to get that don’t spy on you?
Not very specific, but that makes it easy. If you’re looking for one under $1,000, and I’m assuming a 65-inch TV, the TCL QM7K is a good one.
Even better, the Hisense U8QG is on a huge sale right now for less than $1,000. That’s one of the best bangs for your buck available right now.
And then if you’ve got a bigger budget, several OLED TVs from LG, Samsung, and Sony are also great buys. The Samsung S90F is a great all-arounder with excellent color. So is LG’s C5, providing lots of premium features for less than their flagship OLED TVs.
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But again, since you were pretty general, I don’t know if I gave you the answer you were looking for, but I can offer this: If you really want a TV that doesn’t collect any information and throw targeted ads in your face, whatever you get, set it up in a dumb TV mode.
The “Basic TV” option in the setup of a TCL television.Phil Nickinson / Digital Trends
This means you won’t have a lot of the smart functions available and limited internet connectivity, and instead, the TV will essentially be a monitor. Then you can get a streaming stick or box like the Apple TV 4K or Roku or anything that will allow you to use all the familiar apps: YouTube TV, Prime Video, Netflix, etc.
Otherwise, in terms of what you call spying on you, I guess it depends on what data you do or don’t mind sharing. There’s a whole rabbit hole we could, but won’t, go down here.
In my opinion, it’s not so much a specific TV brand that I’d be worried about having my data, but rather the operating system that the TV uses. Google and Amazon are big on collecting user data, but so are the others, because the goal is ultimately to create profiles based on our viewing habits, interests, political leaning, and more that can be sold. Sorry to get so grim, but that’s what it is.
Amazon Alexa Voice Remote PrPhil Nickinson / Digital Trends
Recommended best practices from experts, including the FBI, are to know exactly what your TV has access to, like a microphone or camera, and know how to turn those features off. Use unique passwords for logins. Keep up with security patches and updates. And then know what data each app collects, because again, it’s not just the TV that’s the issue. It’s the software on it.
But even after all of that, there’s still a lack of transparency on what’s still being shared and who has access to it. So the safest thing you can do is disconnect it from the internet.
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And unfortunately, even if you go the streaming box route, you’ll still have to worry about apps there and the data they collect as well.
And in saying all of that, while no one wants their TV spying on them, it’s smart speakers, doorbell cameras, phones, and different apps that we should be most wary of. But again, unless you’ve been extremely careful and consistent with how you share specific data, I dunno, just seems like going out of the way to find a TV that doesn’t spy on you is like putting a band-aid on a bullet wound.
Budget-friendly smaller TVs for work and gaming
TCL QM6KZeke Jones / Digital Trends
@kelrynstrijder: Any recommendations for smaller TVs, say 40″ – 50″ range in the cost conscious realm? (I’m in the unique situation where I’m needing a panel that can work at my desk and gaming after work.)Thank you!
No, thank YOU for sending in a question. Also, I’d imagine that situation is more common than you think. One of the best ways to make the most of your space is to have your work monitor double as your gaming setup.
Anyway, there are some trade-offs with these options, but that’s to be expected for the price.
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The first is the $200, 43-inch Hisense QD6QF. It’s a 4K LCD TV that runs Fire TV as its smart operating system. It does support HDR, including Dolby Vision, so if you’re an Xbox Gamer, that’s a plus. However, without local dimming, I wouldn’t say this TV will be something to write home about for HDR.
But in game mode, there’s a low input lag and support for a 60 hertz refresh rate in 4K or 120 hertz refresh rate in 1440p resolution.
For the same price, there’s also the TCL S551G that sports the same support for Dolby Vision and refresh rates in game mode. But without local dimming, again, don’t expect the best HDR impact.
Still, these are both good options that won’t break the bank and should be solid as long as you’re not demanding the best of the best performance out of your gaming TV.
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For a little bit more, the $300, 50-inch TCL QM5K, a Best Buy exclusive model, does have local dimming for better contrast in HDR.
And stepping a little outside of your parameters, if you had room and budget for the 55-inch TCL QM6K at $450, that would be the best option of the bunch. It’s the only one of the four I’ve mentioned here that supports a 120 hertz refresh rate or faster in 4K, and its HDR performance is super solid.
TCL QM6K vs. LG B5 OLED
TCL QM6KZeke Jones / Digital Trends
@benngu8074: Would you buy this TCL QM6K in 75′ size for $550 or LQ B5 Oled in a 65′ for 450 dollars more? I have a pretty bright room.
We’ve talked about these TVs a lot, so I won’t go all the way into that. But to keep it simple, if you want the best picture quality and don’t need a super bright TV, go for the LG B5. It’s beautiful and hands down has the superior HDR image. You’ll love it for movies and shows and gaming and anything in an HDR format.
LG B5 OLED TVDigital Trends
But if you do need a little more brightness, especially in SDR for basic programming or sports, the QM6K is gonna be a lot brighter.
Honestly though, if I were you, I’d look at the 65-inch QM7K instead of the 75-inch QM6K instead. It offers better black levels for more contrast, which also makes it a better performer in HDR. To me, that would be worth the slightly smaller size.
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Outside of the TVs themselves, if you don’t have a soundbar or speaker setup and have room for one, I’d also say factor that in. If you can save money going with a TCL model instead of an LG OLED and then use that extra cash to elevate the viewing experience with some solid audio gear, it’s worth it.
I’m spoiled, but I can never go back to not having at least a soundbar with some extra punch.
In short:Amazon’s satellite internet service, rebranded from Project Kuiper to Amazon Leo in November 2025, entered enterprise beta on April 8, 2026, with commercial availability targeted for mid-2026 per Andy Jassy’s annual shareholder letter. The service offers three terminal tiers delivering up to 1 Gbps for enterprise users, with Verizon, AT&T, Vodafone, JetBlue, and NASA among the beta partners. Amazon has approximately 210 to 241 satellites in orbit against a Federal Communications Commission requirement of 1,618 by July 30, 2026, has applied for a two-year deadline extension, and has contracted 22 additional launches to close the gap.
From Project Kuiper to Amazon Leo, the rebrand and the beta
Amazon received Federal Communications Commission approval for a 3,236-satellite low-earth-orbit constellation in 2020, then spent five years building the hardware, regulatory infrastructure, and carrier partnerships needed to turn that approval into a commercially viable service. The first production satellites launched in April 2025 aboard an Atlas V rocket operated by United Launch Alliance, and by November 2025 Amazon had enough operational hardware in orbit to retire the Project Kuiper name in favour of Amazon Leo, a rebrand that signals a deliberate shift from development programme to commercial product. A business preview programme opened to select enterprise partners shortly after the rebrand. The full enterprise beta launched on April 8, 2026. The following day,Jassy’s annual letter to shareholdersconfirmed mid-2026 as the commercial launch window, placing Leo alongside Amazon’s $50 billion Trainium chip investment as one of the defining bets in the company’s current capital allocation cycle. Beta customers span Verizon and AT&T in North America, Vodafone and Vodacom across Europe and Africa, JetBlue for in-flight connectivity, NBN Co in Australia, Vrio in Latin America, and NASA, along with enterprise logistics clients Hunt Energy and Crane Worldwide Logistics.
Three terminals, three speed tiers
Amazon has engineered three terminal models to address distinct market segments without forcing a single hardware compromise across all of them. The Leo Nano is the consumer and light-enterprise unit: seven inches square, 2.2 pounds, and rated to 100 Mbps download. The Leo Pro is aimed at small businesses, rural operators, and mobile backhaul deployments: eleven inches square, 5.3 pounds, priced at under $400, and rated to 400 Mbps. The Leo Ultra is the enterprise flagship, a 20-by-30-inch installation weighing 43 pounds and capable of 1 Gbps download with 400 Mbps upload, designed for maritime vessels, commercial aircraft, and large-campus enterprise deployments. Jassy claimed in his shareholder letter that Leo terminals deliver six to eight times better uplink performance and twice the downlink performance compared with the satellite internet alternatives currently available to enterprise customers, a claim that will be scrutinised closely once commercial service begins and independent benchmarks are possible.
The FCC deadline and the launch shortfall
Amazon’s FCC licence for its Generation 1 constellation requires exactly half the planned 3,236 satellites, or 1,618, to be in orbit and operational by July 30, 2026. As of early April 2026, Amazon has between 210 and 241 satellites in orbit, a figure that makes the original deadline effectively unreachable. The company filed a formal request with the FCC in January 2026 for a two-year extension, citing a shortage of available launch vehicles. Alongside the extension filing, Amazon disclosed ten additional Falcon 9 launch contracts with SpaceX and twelve additional New Glenn contracts with Blue Origin.Bezos is betting heavily on orbital infrastructurebeyond Leo itself: Blue Origin separately filed with the FCC for a 51,600-satellite Project Sunrise constellation and a 5,408-satellite TeraWave optical backhaul network, making the New Glenn launch pipeline central to multiple overlapping ambitions simultaneously. The FCC separately approved Amazon’s Generation 2 constellation in February 2026, clearing the path to a potential 7,727-satellite network once the current launch bottleneck is resolved. The contracted vehicle fleet now spans Atlas V and Vulcan Centaur (United Launch Alliance), Falcon 9 (SpaceX), Ariane 6 (Arianespace), and New Glenn (Blue Origin).
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Taking on Starlink, and the Globalstar play
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Starlink is not a vulnerable incumbent. SpaceX’s satellite internet service generated $10.6 billion in revenue in 2025 at a 54 per cent EBITDA margin and serves more than 10 million paying subscribers across more than 100 countries, operating a constellation of 7,600 to 8,000-plus satellites.SpaceX has filed for the largest IPO in history, seeking to raise $75 billion at a valuation of up to $1.75 trillion, potentially as early as June 2026, which would cement Starlink’s position as a capital-markets-validated infrastructure business before Amazon Leo has completed its initial rollout. Amazon’s response involves two distinct moves. The first is distribution: Leo is being sold primarily through carrier partners and enterprise integrators in its launch phase, using Verizon’s, AT&T’s, and Delta’s existing customer relationships rather than competing for consumers directly. Delta has contracted Leo for in-flight Wi-Fi across 500 aircraft starting in 2028, with free access available to SkyMiles members. The second move is spectrum acquisition.Amazon is reportedly in talks to acquire Globalstarfor approximately $9 billion, a deal that would give Leo access to L-band spectrum currently anchoring Globalstar’s existing satellite network and Apple’s emergency satellite connectivity service. Apple holds a 20 per cent stake in Globalstar through a $1.5 billion investment, adding complexity to any acquisition. If the deal closes, Amazon would arrive at commercial launch with not just a new constellation but a second frequency band and an established spectrum position.The year 2025 established satellite internetas a serious enterprise infrastructure market rather than a connectivity experiment, and Amazon Leo’s mid-2026 commercial launch arrives precisely as that market enters its most contested phase.
8849 TANK Pad Ultra1080p projector accurately projects clear images from 0.5 to 4 meters
Night vision camera captures usable images even in near-total darkness conditions
Rugged chassis resists drops, dust, and water for harsh environments
The 8849 TANK Pad Ultra is a rugged Android tablet which combines a 10.95 inch FHD 1200 x 1920 display with a built-in 1080p DLP projector rated at 260 lumens.
The projector can auto-focus and project images from 0.5 to 4 meters, supported by a micro-ranging laser which helps fine-tune the focal distance.
The design is intended for outdoor use, temporary presentations, and fieldwork where a separate projector would be impractical or expensive.
Article continues below
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Night‑Vision camera and rugged features
The 8849 TANK Pad Ultra features a 10.95 inch FHD panel, flanked by stereo speakers using a smart PA configuration and a waterproof receiver for calls.
On the rear, it has the projector lens, night vision camera cluster, and a 2.5 inch-style speaker cutout, while the side and bottom edges host the charging port, PTT keys, and waterproof connector caps.
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The tablet’s IP-rated, reinforced chassis aims to withstand drops, dust, and moisture, while the projector remains enclosed and protected when not in use.
On the imaging side, the TANK Pad Ultra stacks a 50MP rear main camera with an IMX766 sensor and a 64MP AF night vision camera using an OV64B sensor.
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The night vision array adds four infrared LEDs that illuminate scenes in near-total darkness, allowing the camera to capture usable images without a visible light flash.
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The rugged tablet also includes a camping lamp module with red and blue warning lights, magnetic modular accessories, and a 3.5mm headphone jack.
Buttons for power, volume, and two PTT keys are built into the ruggedized frame, which is designed to work with protective handheld leather covers and waterproof interface plugs.
Under the hood, the tablet runs a MediaTek Dimensity 8200 platform with 16GB of LPDDR5 RAM and 512GB of internal storage.
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It supports 5G NR on both FDD and TDD bands, along with LTE Advanced, Wi-Fi 6, and Bluetooth 5.3, enabling fast wireless data and screen mirroring to external displays.
The device includes dual-band GPS, Glonass, Galileo, and Beidou for relatively precise location tracking, as well as NFC for reading and card mode interactions.
A 23,400mAh battery delivers long runtime, replenished over a 66W USB-C fast charging input, with the same port doubling as a reverse charging source for other gadgets.
This device also supports dual nano SIM cards plus a microSD card for additional storage expansion, and it ships with Android 15 out of the box.
The in-development word game “Character Limit” faced testers in the last two months, but as TestFlight got underway, an unexpected game convention opportunity went especially well.
A tale of two tests: TestFlight and a gaming convention.
Back in early February, Character Limit had reached a good stopping point to get some testing done with real players. A lot of the work had been done, so now it was time to get some bug fixing and polishing done, and to get some real feedback. This previously came in the form of visits to meet other game developers in Cardiff for brief sessions. But you can only go so far in terms of feedback from a kind audience. Continue Reading on AppleInsider | Discuss on our Forums
Words have no meaning when Black Friday falls in April and lasts two weeks. Originally coined to denote the pandemonium and chaos when holiday shopping met football games after Thanksgiving, Black Friday has come to blankly mean “discounts whenever.”
And so when The Home Depot says they’ve got a “Spring Black Friday” sale going, what they seem to be trying to say is that springtime might as well be Christmas for the DIY and backyard set. It’s when you buy stuff. Except probably for yourself.
Anyway, most of this sale is not a barn-burner. But Home Depot loves a BOGO tool sale on the Milwaukee tools used and recommended by WIRED tester Scott Gilbertson. And Weber grills are $50 to $100 off, including a couple of WIRED’s favorite grills on earth.
Here are the deals WIRED is tracking on the Home Depot Black Friday Spring Sale, ending April 22. Or just check out the whole Home Depot Black Friday deals below.
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$50 off the Best Gas Grill for Most Families
Weber
Spirit E-210 Gas Grill
For years, we’ve been recommending Weber’s straightforward 200-series Sprit grills as some of the best grills at the intersection of value and performance. The build quality is good, the cook is even, and the heat on the propane burners is easy to adjust. Like all Webers, you can build your grill’s workspace out with accessories and snap-on options until it’s tong heaven. Spirit already starts out pretty affordable, with a 10-year warranty and porcelain-coated cast iron grill grates that make for easy clean-up and clean cooks. An extra $50 off is a nice cherry on top.
But note that while a Spirit is likely all the grill you’ll ever need for a large family, grill cooks who throw a lot of parties might upgrade to the Genesis E-325 ($849) for the larger searing area and higher BTUs, added storage and prep, and the option on a top grill. That’s also on sale in April, for $100 off list price.
BOGO Deals on Milwaukee, Dewalt, and Ryobi Tools
The other thing The Home Depot likes to do is offer BOGOs on tools—in this case packaging a $200 tool with a free $200 power pack. This is, needless to say, a nice deal.
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On the Milwaukee tool ecosystem used by WIRED reviewer and inveterate DIYer Scott Gilbertson—favored for its mix of value, durability and pure power, an assortment of tools come with a free power pack.
But these BOGos can be a bit maddening to sort out on Home Depot’s website. So I’ve done a little legwork for you. Here are the links to the BOGO deals for Milwaukee, Ryobi, and DeWalt. You’re welcome.
Steep Discounts on Ryobi Yard Tools
Longtime WIRED reviewer Parker Hall has long held the belief that Ryobi yard tools are the most most slept-on tool ecosystem for home gardeners and landscapers, from mowers to chain saws to trimmers.
Part of the reason is service: At least in our region (the Pacific Northwest), Ryobi doesn’t make you send in tools to be serviced somewhere else. They instead keep a repairman on retainer, and he comes to you and fixes your mower. This is a wonderful thing. In any case, Hall says that he’s rarely had cause to call on his repairman. He just likes to know he’s there.
A 20-year-old man was arrested by the San Francisco Police Department after allegedly throwing a Molotov cocktail at OpenAI CEO Sam Altman’s house, The New York Times reports.
In a statement shared on X, SFPD wrote that it responded to a request for a fire investigation in the North Beach neighborhood of San Francisco around 7:12 AM ET / 4:12AM PT. “At the scene, officers learned that an unknown male subject threw an incendiary destructive device at a home, causing a fire at an exterior gate.” After the man fled on foot, police found and arrested him around an hour later while responding to a business’ complaint about an “unknown male subject threatening to burn down the building.” That business turned out to be OpenAI’s headquarters and the subject happened to be the same man who threw the Molotov at Altman’s house.
“Early this morning, someone threw a Molotov cocktail at Sam Altman’s home and also made threats at our San Francisco headquarters. Thankfully, no one was hurt,” an OpenAI spokesperson confirmed in a statement to Wired. “We deeply appreciate how quickly SFPD responded and the support from the city in helping keep our employees safe. The individual is in custody, and we’re assisting law enforcement with their investigation.”
As it’s become more commonplace, artificial intelligence has also become more divisive. While more and more people continue to use AI tools, public reaction to the encroachment of the technology, whether in gaming or customer service, is increasingly negative. Altman’s warnings of AI’s impact on employment, and a recent New Yorker investigation digging into his allegedly manipulative leadership style at OpenAI, have also raised questions about the CEO’s prominent role as a steward of the technology.
Microsoft has started stripping Copilot branding out of Notepad in Windows 11, replacing the old Copilot menu with a more generic “writing tools” label. The AI features themselves aren’t going away, but Microsoft seems to be backing off the heavy-handed Copilot branding and extra entry points. Windows Central reports: As promised, Microsoft is now beginning its effort to reduce and remove Copilot branding across Windows 11, with the latest Notepad update for Insiders outright removing the Copilot icon and phrasing. Now, the AI menu is simply called “writing tools,” and maintains the same functionality as before. Additionally, Microsoft has also removed references to AI in the Settings area in Notepad. Now, the ability to turn on or off these AI powered writing tools are now listed under “Advanced features.”
This change is present in the latest preview build of Notepad which is now rolling out to all Windows Insiders. The app version is 11.2512.28.0, and you’ll know you have it if you see the Copilot icon replaced with a pen icon instead. […] For Notepad, it appears Microsoft has opted to replace the Copilot menu with something more generic. It’s still the same functionally, but it’s no longer leaning on the tainted Copilot brand. Of course, you can still easily turn off all AI features in Notepad if you don’t want them. The Verge reports that the “unnecessary Copilot buttons” are also disappearing from the Snipping Tool, Photos, and Widgets.
In short:SiFive, the RISC-V chip IP firm founded by the Berkeley engineers who created the open-source instruction set architecture, raised $400 million in an oversubscribed Series G on April 9, 2026, at a valuation of $3.65 billion. The round was led by Atreides Management and backed by Nvidia, Apollo Global Management, D1 Capital Partners, Point72 Turion, T. Rowe Price Investment Management, Capital Group, Prosperity7 Ventures, and Sutter Hill Ventures. CEO Patrick Little described it as the company’s final private funding round before an initial public offering.
Open source, closed competition
RISC-V (pronounced “risk five”) is an open-source instruction set architecture, the foundational specification governing how a processor interprets and executes instructions, developed at the University of California, Berkeley, from 2010 onwards. Unlike the proprietary architectures maintained by Arm Holdings and Intel, RISC-V is free to implement, extend, and commercialise without per-unit royalties or usage restrictions. SiFive was founded in 2015 by three of the project’s principal architects: Krste Asanović, Andrew Waterman, and Yunsup Lee, working alongside David Patterson, a Turing Award winner and co-author of the standard text on computer architecture. The company’s business model is structurally similar to Arm’s: it designs CPU intellectual property and licences that IP to customers who integrate it into their own silicon, rather than fabricating chips itself. The critical difference is that SiFive’s designs sit on an architecture that no single company controls.
That independence became more commercially valuable in March 2026, when Arm launched its AGI CPU, its first in-house silicon product in its 35-year history, with Meta and OpenAI as debut customers. The move repositioned Arm from a neutral IP licensor into a company with direct hardware ambitions, creating the kind of vertical conflict that has historically pushed technology buyers toward open-standard alternatives, and generating fresh urgency for a competitor that owes no allegiance to any proprietary architecture owner. Intel attempted a different route into the space: in 2021 the chipmaker offered more than $2 billion to acquire SiFive outright, a deal that collapsed over valuation disagreements. Intel has sincejoined Elon Musk’s Terafab as a foundry partnerin April 2026, committing its 18A process node to a $25 billion AI compute facility backed by Tesla, SpaceX, and xAI, a strategic reorientation that leaves the RISC-V IP licensing position without Intel as a would-be acquirer or rival.
The Series G: who invested, and why
The $400 million Series G was led by Atreides Management, a Boston-based investment firm managed by Gavin Baker, who built his reputation running Fidelity’s OTC Portfolio before founding Atreides in 2019. New participants include Nvidia, Apollo Global Management, D1 Capital Partners, Point72 Turion, and T. Rowe Price Investment Management. Existing shareholders Prosperity7 Ventures, Capital Group, and Sutter Hill Ventures also participated. The round closed oversubscribed and lifts SiFive’s total valuation to $3.65 billion, up from the $2.5 billion set at the Series F in March 2022. Nvidia’s presence on the cap table is a technical statement as well as a financial one: in January 2026 SiFive announced it is integrating NVLink Fusion into its high-performance data centre platform, enabling RISC-V-based CPUs to connect directly to Nvidia GPUs via a coherent, high-bandwidth interconnect that reduces latency and improves system utilisation for large-scale AI inference. That compatibility positions SiFive’s CPU IP to work alongsidethe Vera Rubin platform Nvidia announced at GTC 2026, the company’s next-generation GPU architecture targeting agentic AI workloads.
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The broader investment context is one of accelerating hyperscale demand for custom silicon.Amazon committed $50 billion to its Trainium chip programmein its April 2026 shareholder letter, positioning in-house AI silicon as a strategic infrastructure necessity rather than an optional enhancement.The deal between Google, Anthropic, and Broadcom for custom AI computerepresents a parallel approach, using purpose-built ASICs to reduce dependence on commodity processors across hyperscale inference workloads. SiFive’s pitch is that it offers hyperscale customers a third path: RISC-V CPU IP that is fully customisable, architecturally independent, and built on an open standard that no single acquirer can lock down. “Hyperscale customers have made it very clear that it is time to accelerate the availability of open standard alternatives for the data centre,” said CEO Patrick Little. “Their consistent ask is for customisable CPU solutions in IP form, that will enable them to meaningfully differentiate their data centre compute solutions.”
What the capital will build
SiFive has outlined three areas of deployment for the Series G capital. Advanced research and development takes the largest share, focused on expanding the roadmap of high-performance scalar, vector, and matrix RISC-V CPU IP, accelerator cores, and system IP targeting data centre deployments. A second allocation covers software ecosystem development, including existing efforts to port CUDA, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, and Ubuntu to RISC-V, work that is critical to making the architecture practically deployable in production data centres where software compatibility is as important as raw performance. The third allocation supports customer enablement: the direct engineering collaboration that helps hyperscale clients and system vendors integrate SiFive IP into their own silicon programmes. Little framed the company’s open-standard positioning as a structural advantage that compounds over time: “RISC-V was created by our founders to be similar to other open standards, driven and continually improved by collaboration and cross-pollination across a broad community of innovators. This ensures choice and flexibility for customers, and ultimately benefits consumers.” He argued that the market is becoming more receptive to open-standard alternatives precisely as Arm moves further into selling its own branded hardware.
Ten billion cores and the IPO signal
SiFive reported record growth in 2025, with its IP featured in more than 500 semiconductor designs and more than 10 billion RISC-V cores shipped to date across consumer electronics, automotive systems, and data centre processors. The company has framed the data centre segment as a potential $100 billion-plus addressable market, driven by the agentic AI infrastructure buildout that has prompted every major hyperscaler to commit tens of billions of dollars annually to compute expansion. Patrick Little told Reuters that the April 2026 fundraise is the company’s final private round before an IPO, though no exchange or pricing timeline has been confirmed. The signal carries weight: a valuation of $3.65 billion and a roster of investors that includes a major GPU manufacturer, a bulge-bracket alternative asset manager, and two prominent long-only asset managers suggests SiFive is preparing for the kind of institutional scrutiny that accompanies a public filing.As AI chip investment reached record levels in 2025, with capital flowing to custom silicon programmes at every major cloud provider, SiFive’s timing places it squarely at the centre of a market transition it has been building toward for a decade.
We all love encryption. If you use Gmail in an enterprise setting, especially if your work includes sensitive information, you probably love it even more. Certain Gmail app users on iOS and Android phones can now send and receive encrypted emails within the app itself — no add-ons necessary.
Previously, Gmail users could only send emails via end-to-end encryption (E2EE) on their desktops. Google’s announcement said there is “no need to download extra apps or use mail portals.” Customers can simply compose and read encrypted emails on the Gmail app itself on their iOS and Android phones.
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An example of an encrypted email in the Gmail app.
Google
But not all Gmail consumers will be able to use the new feature. It’s only available for Enterprise Plus subscribers with the Assured Controls or Assured Controls Plus add-on. Enterprise Plus is a subscription plan, one of several within Google Workspace. Plus is intended for large businesses and other organizations and offers higher data security and client-side encryption, which the less expensive Enterprise Standard lacks.
Google said the feature is designed to allow users to “engage with your organization’s most sensitive data from anywhere on their mobile devices while ensuring data remains compliant.”
With the new feature, Gmail app users can send encrypted emails to anyone, even if they aren’t using Gmail. If the recipient is using the Gmail app, the encrypted email will appear like any other email in their inbox. If the recipient is not using the Gmail app, they can still read the encrypted email and reply to it on their own browser — with the entire conversation remaining encrypted.
An example of an email from a Gmail app consumer sent to a recipient without the Gmail app.
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Google
For example, say a Gmail app customer sends an encrypted message to someone using an iPhone with the native iPhone email app. That person using the iPhone will still be able to read the encrypted email and then answer back with an encrypted message.
Enterprise Plus customers can use the new feature now, whether they are on either the Rapid Release or Scheduled Release domains. To encrypt an email, click the lock icon and select additional encryption. Then create your message.
Proton is an alternative for businesses and consumers
Proton Workspace, an enterprise solution that launched last month, also has end-to-end email encryption but with the added benefit of being based in Europe (Switzerland), which does have to comply with the US CLOUD Act and, thus, hand over data to the US government.
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For the everyday consumer, Proton Mail has end-to-end email encryption and is available for free or in paid plans, some of which include bundled privacy and security apps, like a VPN and a password manager.
By many estimates, quantum computers will need millions of qubits to realize their potential applications in cybersecurity, drug development, and other industries. The problem is, anyone who has wanted to simultaneously control millions of a certain kind of qubits has run into the problem of trying to control millions of laser beams.
That’s exactly the challenge that was faced by scientists working on the MITRE Quantum Moonshot project, which brought together scientists from MITRE, MIT, the University of Colorado at Boulder, and Sandia National Laboratories. The solution they developed came in the form of an image projection technology that they realized could also be the fix for a host of other challenges in augmented reality, biomedical imaging, and elsewhere. The device is a one-square-millimeter photonic chip capable of projecting the Mona Lisa onto an area smaller than the size of two human egg cells.
“When we started, we certainly never would have anticipated that we would be making a technology that might revolutionize imaging,” says Matt Eichenfield, one of the leaders of the Quantum Moonshot project, a collaborative research effort focused on developing a scalable diamond-based quantum computer, and a professor of quantum engineering at the University of Colorado at Boulder. Each second, their chip is capable of projecting 68.6 million individual spots of light—called scannable pixels to differentiate them from physical pixels. That’s more than fifty times the capability of previous technology, such as micro-electromechanical systems (MEMS) micromirror arrays.
“We have now made a scannable pixel that is at the absolute limit of what diffraction allows,” says Henry Wen, a visiting researcher at MIT and a photonics engineer at QuEra Computing.
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The chip’s distinguishing feature is an array of tiny micro-scale cantilevers, which curve away from the plane of the chip in response to voltage and act as miniature “ski-jumps” for light. Light is channeled along the length of each cantilever via a waveguide, and exits at its tip. The cantilevers contain a thin layer of aluminum nitride, a piezoelectric which expands or contracts under voltage, thus moving the micromachine up and down and enabling the array to scan beams of light over a two-dimensional area.
Despite the magnitude of the team’s achievement, Eichenfield says that the process of engineering the cantilevers was “pretty smooth.” Each cantilever is composed of a stack of several submicrometer layers of material and curls approximately 90 degrees out of the plane at rest. To achieve such a high curvature, the team took advantage of differences in the contraction and expansion of individual layers caused by physical stresses in the material resulting from the fabrication process. The materials are first deposited flat onto the chip. Then, a layer in the chip below the cantilever is removed, allowing the material stresses to take effect, releasing the cantilever from the chip and allowing it to curl out. The top layer of each cantilever also features a series of silicon dioxide bars running perpendicular to the waveguide, which keep the cantilever from curling along its width while also improving its length-wise curvature.
A micro-cantilever wiggles and waggles to project light in the right place.Matt Saha, Y. Henry Wen, et al.
What was more of a challenge than engineering the chip itself was figuring out the details of actually making the chip project images and videos. Working out the process of synchronizing and timing the cantilevers’ motion and light beams to generate the right colors at the right time was a substantial effort, according to Andy Greenspon, a researcher at MITRE who also worked on the project. Now, the team has successfully projected a variety of videos from a single cantilever, including clips from the movie A Charlie Brown Christmas.
Because the chip can project so many more spots in any given time interval than any previous beam scanners, it could also be used to control many more qubits in quantum computers. The Quantum Moonshot program’s mission is to build a quantum computer that can be scaled to millions of qubits. So clearly, it needs a scalable way of controlling each one, explains Wen. Instead of using one laser per qubit, the team realized that not every qubit needed to be controlled at every given moment. The chip’s ability to move light beams over a two-dimensional area, would allow them to control all of the qubits with many fewer lasers.
Another process that Wen thinks the chip could improve is scanning objects for 3D printing. Today, that typically involves using a single laser to scan over the entire surface of an object. The new chip, however, could potentially employ thousands of laser beams. “I think now you can take a process that would have taken hours and maybe bring it down to minutes,” says Wen.
Wen is also excited to explore the potential of different cantilever shapes. By changing the orientations of the bars perpendicular to the waveguide, the team has been able to make the cantilevers curl into helixes. Wen says that such unusual shapes could be useful in making a lab-on-a-chip for cell biology or drug development. “A lot of this stuff is imaging, scanning a laser across something, either to image it or to stimulate some response. And so we could have one of these ski jumps curl not just up, but actually curl back around, and then move around and scan over a sample,” Wen explains. “If you can imagine a structure that will be useful for you, we should try it.”
The attack surface targeted by Iranian-linked hackers in cyberattacks against U.S. critical infrastructure networks includes thousands of Internet-exposed programmable logic controllers (PLCs) manufactured by Rockwell Automation.
According to a joint advisory issued by multiple U.S. federal agencies on Tuesday, Iranian state-backed hacking groups have been targeting Rockwell Automation/Allen-Bradley PLC devices since March 2026, causing operational disruptions and financial losses.
“Iranian-affiliated APT targeting campaigns against U.S. organizations have recently escalated, likely in response to hostilities between Iran, and the United States and Israel,” the authoring agencies warned.
“The FBI identified that this activity resulted in the extraction of the device’s project file and data manipulation on HMI and SCADA displays.”
As cybersecurity firm Censys reported one day later, three-quarters of more than 5,200 such industrial control systems found exposed online globally are from the United States.
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“Censys data identifies 5,219 internet-exposed hosts globally responding to EtherNet/IP (EIP) and self-identifying as Rockwell Automation/Allen-Bradley devices,” Censys said.
“The United States accounts for 74.6% of global exposure (3,891 hosts), with a disproportionate share on cellular carrier ASNs indicative of field-deployed devices on cellular modems.”
To defend against these ongoing attacks, network defenders are advised to secure PLCs using a firewall or disconnect them from the Internet, scan logs for signs of malicious activity, and check for suspicious traffic on OT ports (especially when it originates from overseas hosting providers).
Admins should also enforce multifactor authentication (MFA) for access to OT networks, keep all PLC devices up to date, and disable unused services and authentication methods.
This ongoing campaign follows similar attacks from nearly three years ago, when a threat group affiliated with the Iranian Government’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC) and tracked as CyberAv3ngers targeted vulnerabilities in U.S.-based Unitronics operational technology (OT) systems.
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CyberAv3ngers hackers compromised at least 75 Unitronics PLC devices in multiple waves of cyberattacks between November 2023 and January 2024, with half of those in Water and Wastewater Systems critical infrastructure networks across the United States.
More recently, the Handala hacktivist group (linked to Iran’s Ministry of Intelligence and Security) wiped approximately 80,000 devices from the network of U.S. medical giant Stryker, including employees’ mobile devices and company-managed personal computers.
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