RSnake Report 20260726

Wildberry under attack, Peace back on in Iran, etc...

July 26, 2026

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Geopolitics
Cybersecurity
Technology
Business

Hello, and thanks for reading! It's been a long week as the Editor was out of town, leaving me to fend for myself and the puppy, and leaving me to do my own editing work for this week so forgive any big errors. Speaking of the puppy, the cats have independently lodged their formal protest of this new development, and it's been duly noted. There have been some promising early indications of a bourgeoning peace treaty in both directions, but I fear there may be a long road ahead. For now we remain at a tense armistice.

Also a quick shout-out to one of my readers - Matt. He's been a long time reader and I hear he is going into assisted living with his wife who has been having some troubles. I hope this next chapter of your life turns out to be a great one, Matt. Cheers to you and yours, and our thoughts are going out to you and your wife. Thanks for reading!

Let's begin with Russia/Ukraine News where there were a lot of explosions once again. Ukrainian forces launched a cruise missile strike on a factory in Russia’s Lipetsk region, setting the facility ablaze. Inserted media

The same night, an industrial complex near Saint Petersburg caught fire under unclear circumstances. Inserted media

This was the scene over St. Petersburg after several different attacks. Imagine seeing that and having to put on a brave face to everyone around you that things are going great and Putin made the right choices for your country. Inserted media

Over the following days, Ukrainian drones struck multiple Wildberries logistics centers in Russia, including facilities in Elektrostal, Kotovsk, Krasnodar, Nevinnomyssk, Voronezh, and occupied Simferopol, all reported to supply the Russian military, indirectly by enabling shipments of various kinds of military equipment. Here is probably the best video how how this all went down showing a bunch of independent drones hitting the factories. A Ukrainian FP-series drone targeting a Wildberries warehouse in Saint Petersburg was intercepted by Russian air defenses before impact, so there was some air defenses in place, but they were ultimately not very useful. Inserted media

One of the Wildberry warehouses was in Crimea which is already having a difficult time getting supplies due to having most of the fuel cut off and most of the bridges disabled. Someone brought up a good point about this. Imagine needing some part to make something work. Normally, you'd order it and it would show up at your house or office. But now it won't because logistics are blocked due to the warehouses being destroyed along with a billion in merchendize. So, you go out to drive to pick up whatever you're after, but you can't because you are out of fuel. Now what? For instance, look at these fuel queues of not normal cars, but of fuel trucks, that goes on for what looks like miles. Russia is a nation that is going to have a difficult time getting anything anywhere, and just wait a few more months for the snow to start again and heating and electricity become more expensive and more important, let alone the increased need for trucking. Inserted media

There was a fairly wild video of Ukrainian unmanned aerial systems that hit a Russian fuel tanker train with a drone attack. But it didn't completely destroy it, so much as create a water-fall of fuel that was on fire as it went. So it's basically setting an enormous gasoline accelerated fire on the side of the railroad tracks as it goes. Kind of unbelievable, and yet this kind of thing is what happens in war, and you can't really predict it. Inserted media

As far as drone takedowns, there are really two ends of the spectrum on cost in terms of air to air takedowns. On one end of the spectrum a Ukrainian MiG-29 shot down a Shahed-type drone with an air-to-air missile, while on the other, a Yak-52 crew filmed the downing of another Shahed by rifle fire from the open rear cockpit. The cost delta is insane and yet both are successful. I think there is a lot of innovation left here for sure. Inserted media

Ukrainian forces hit at least 19 energy facilities across occupied Crimea and other temporarily occupied territories between July 23 and 24, including multiple 110 kV substations serving Yalta, Feodosia, Yevpatoria, Sudak, and other locations. The strikes bring the total number of energy targets struck in occupied Crimea and adjacent areas to 136 since July 1. It's somewhat amazing that Crimea had so much infrastructure to destroy, but it's slowly degrading to nothing.

Russian milbloggers surprisingly disputed official claims that Russian forces had secured the M-14 Rostov-Crimea highway against Ukrainian drone strikes. At a very minimum maybe they have secured it in the sense that there are no Ukrainian troops there but the drones threaten shipping along it. It seems like the Russians are starting to actually push back on the party BS. Hard to say though, because it seems like people are still very scared to speak against Putin on anything at all or say anything embarrassing to the government. Inserted media

I saw another variant of the ballon payload delivery system that I have discussed in weeks past. Ukrainian forces used balloons to carry kamikaze prop-driven drones over long distances before releasing them toward targets.

In another image you get a sense of what the bag they're using looks like. It's not clear if they are using hydrogen, which they can easily manufacture on-site with hydrolysis and salt-water, or helium, which they cannot. The advantage of helium is that it's inert, but much harder to source on the front. Hydrogen has slightly more lifting ability and it doesn't really matter if it explodes once it's up away from the troops, so that is my bet. But look how crappy these lifting bags appear to be - these really are the lowest cost options to getting these drones aloft and well into Russian airspace, and the winds are definitely in Ukraine's favor here.
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Ukraine struck two vessels transporting weapons between Russia and Iran in the Caspian Sea. Iranian state media responded by threatening ballistic missile strikes on Ukraine. But more interestingly, Iran drew their map to basically show that all of Europe with only a bit of Spain, Portugal and the UK are within reach. Iran is just making friends right and left. Inserted media

In European news, an explosion rocked an industrial complex in Rettendon, Essex, triggering a major fire that drew more than 100 firefighters and prompted authorities to declare a critical incident. Residents reported shaking buildings up to 24 kilometers away, and police cordoned off access routes urging people to keep windows and doors closed due to thick smoke. No official casualty figures have been released and the cause is under investigation. There is some suspicion it may be related to the UK marking the IRGC as a terrorist organization.

Speaking of muslim terrorists, a vehicle rammed into a crowd during Berlin’s Pride celebrations, killing one person and injuring 16 others, some seriously. Police announced the suspect (Abdul) as known to authorities and linked to Berlin’s Islamist scene. The individual remains at large and investigators have not confirmed a motive. Hopefully this will wake the LGBTQ community up to the idea that muslims hate them. I don't hold out much hope for that though, sadly. Inserted media

There was a huge fire around France that created some pretty nasty haze, similar to what we experienced on the east coast of the US this last week. But some of the pictures are pretty stunning. A view to an apocalyptic scene, I guess. Inserted media

UK firm Greenjets unveiled the Kestrel electric ducted fan drone interceptor, capable of speeds between 500 and 600 km/h and a 30 km range. It looks small enough to be man-portable, which means it can be easily forward deployed as well, and at that speed might make a formidable anti-shaheed drone. Inserted media

Swedish company Nordic Air Defence introduced the shoebox-sized Krueger drone-killer, which uses AI to close on enemy drones and detonate on contact at a unit cost of £8,000. That is sufficiently cheap that it will work for most of the weapon systems deployed by Russia today, aside from their ballistic missiles. Inserted media

In Southeast Asia News, China launched the Shijian-31 satellite from Xichang into an orbit never previously observed, with an inclination of 63.46° and an apogee roughly 4,100 km above the geostationary belt. The satellite spends nearly a third of each 12.5-hour orbit above operational GEO assets, crossing the belt twice per pass at a angle while its sub-apogee point drifts around the globe on a roughly 24-day cycle. There are a lot of theories out there about what this orbit allows, for instance getting a better angle on other space-based vehicles/satelites to attack them, or maybe seeing the emissions as they pass behind them, etc. Who knows for sure. Inserted media

The United States is considering a ban on Chinese open-weight AI models, citing cybersecurity concerns. The reasons it does make some sense are as follows. It could allow OpenAI and Anthropic and Grok and Gemini to be dominant in the market. Also, Chinese models are heavily skewed to pro-Chinese rhetoric and refuse to answer questions that embarrass the CCP, thereby slowly getting their pro-CCP message out through these open weight models. The reason it doesn't make sense is because it's next to impossible to ban anything on the Internet in any meaningful way. Where there's a will there is a dark-net forum or torrent or oversees server that will happily host whatever the US won't. The Internet routes around damage and censorship is damage. It also does nothing to limit the Chinese from continuing to make these models, aside from perhaps a little less revenue. Inserted media

U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent stated that open-source AI development is supported but warned that PRC firms conducting covert, industrial-scale distillation attacks amounting to intellectual property theft will face sanctions and Entity List designations. So we will be on the lookout for that, because I think this is a sooner-than-later threat.

Chinese Unitree Robotics unveiled the Super Athlete AS2-W quadruped robot, which supports a continuous 16 kg payload and offers more than 30 km of unloaded driving range. This video is pretty intense because it shows it being able to go down incredibly steep terrain and maintain balance the whole time. Now, we have to be careful with any promotional videos out of China. The video could have very well been it's 58th take that it finally made it down the hill without crashing.

Okay, over to Middle East News, where the Trump administration has tentatively agreed to permit Saudi Arabia to enrich uranium for its civilian nuclear program under a draft U.S.-Saudi nuclear cooperation deal awaiting presidential signature. It looks likely that the only hold-up is that Trump is pushing for Saudi Arabia to sign the Abraham Accords, recognizing Israel as a country. While Saudi leadership likely couldn't care less about signing the document, it would likely enrage a lot of the population who are still fairly devout and hard-line. Keep in mind that Saudi fought against Israel and lost in the 6 day war in 1967, and there are still people alive who remember that.

Two U.S. service members were killed and one remains missing after Iranian ballistic missile and drone attacks on a base in Jordan. Four additional personnel were treated released. You can see imagery of the attack here.

While awful, the very low casualty count against the US forces stationed in the region is very noteworthy. This may be because the US is prioritizing protection of US military forces over other US assets or partners in the region, letting drones otherwise fly on by to preserve the magazines. This is because there is such a small number of patriot and other interceptor batteries in the region. Inserted media

Part of the issue is that the containerized living quarters offered to the US military is getting attacked. These provide zero meaningful protection from high explosive rounds, other than the sandbags (if present) and only if the soldiers are down low enough to the ground, in cots, or after hitting the deck after a warning call is made. But it looks like few if any of them do have these sandbags in place. So, even if the personnel are alerted in time there's nothing really to be done. Inserted media

Where things are right now in the middle east in general is very weird and complicated. First of all, U.S. Central Command completed another round of strikes on Iranian military command centers, maritime capabilities, missile and drone launch sites, and air defense systems. Bahrain and Kuwait reportedly dispatched fighter jets to strike targets inside Iran, marking their first direct retaliation against Tehran. Meanwhile, Wall Street Journal reporting indicated that Gulf Arab states have paid Iran to stop shelling their cities and oil facilities with the UAE alone allocating $13 billion for such payments.

To make matters weirder, an oil tanker exploded in the Strait of Hormuz after striking a naval mine, according to Iran’s Tasnim news agency. Then, Houthi-controlled areas in Yemen saw reported airstrikes in Hodeida and Hodaydah, while Saudi Arabia moved coalition reinforcements toward Marib, Al-Jawf, and areas near Hodeida and Sanaa. The Houthis are an Iranian proxy as well, so they tend to be protected by Iran. Fires were seen over Sana'a as well. So Iran should be extremely upset, one would think...? Inserted media

Well, regional mediators are attempting to broker a pause in U.S.-Iran fighting, with proposals that include Iranian demands for transit fees through the Strait of Hormuz. A brief pause in fighting has crushed oil futures on the prospect of peace when Trump set aside a plan to escalate things further, at least for the short term. So who the hell knows what's about to happen here, but for now it seems like there may be a pause in fighting for 10 days to get back to negotiation.

Further west, Hezbollah-linked cell’s alleged plot to assassinate Yair Netanyahu in Miami was reportedly foiled by security forces. Meanwhile it looks like the premier is thinking about traveling to New York, defying the International Criminal Court arrest warrant out for him, related to the retaliatory attacks against the Palestinians. Inserted media

There was continuing demolition of buildings reported in the southern Lebanese villages of Aitaroun and Mays al-Jabal following Israeli airstrikes. This must have been cleared by the Iranians in their joint counsel, or they were made aware of it, or Israel defied the counsel and didn't inform them. I have no sense if that counsel exists in name only, or if Iran is okaying attacking of their own proxies. 🤷 Inserted media

In North America News, Lockheed Martin unveiled a lower-cost Patriot interceptor variant designed to counter drones and other aerial threats. It does make sense to have the really specialized variants for ballistic missiles, but for the vast majority of current threats, they are low-flying cheapo Iranian-style Shahed drones that need to be taken out in great numbers, so this gets the US further along in that arena. Ideally these would be produced in far greater quantities. Inserted media

Blue Origin completed the third launch of its New Glenn rocket, achieving booster reuse on the second flight, though the payload did not reach the intended orbit. That's still great progress, and showing that other companies are starting to get to orbital cost parity with SpaceX. Pretty cool! Inserted media

Anduril and Archer introduced Thunder, an autonomous hybrid VTOL attack rotorcraft with a roughly 1,000-mile range and modular combat loads capable of carrying APKWS, AGM-179, Hellfire, and other munitions. Archer separately unveiled Halo, the commercial variant of the same autonomous VTOL platform developed with Anduril, aimed at cargo, logistics, search-and-rescue, and offshore energy missions. One of the weirder parts of this is the nose-deployed munitions, which in the demo looks like it can shoot out little drones that can fly to their targets. It's not entirely clear what this is meant to do but it seems like it augments Apache helicopter missions, flying ahead and clearing the way for the manned combat helicopter missions. Inserted media

Archer separately unveiled Halo, the commercial variant of the same autonomous VTOL platform developed with Anduril, aimed at cargo, logistics, search-and-rescue, and offshore energy missions. It showed missions like wildfire fighting as an example in their product demo.

Hermeus Corporation’s Quarterhorse Mk 2.1 reached Mach 1.6 on its fourth flight, logging under 90 minutes of total flight time. This is a fully autonomous supersonic plane, which is just a testing platform it appears, and will continue to scale up to faster and faster flight profiles, and likely will end up being laden with sensor suits and armed is my guess. Pretty cool for them though, this is a very fast drone that is likely meant to penetrate air defenses and at low altitude, giving them the ability to reach deep into enemy territory uncontested by all but the most sophisticated air defense systems, that typically need to be radar operated and therefore are easy to eliminate using things like AGM-88 HARM (High-speed Anti-Radiation Missile). But acoustic systems would be too late, and line of sight typically only works if you know they're coming ahead of time or have enough time to acquire and fire, which makes this pretty nasty once it gets further along and hits even higher speeds. The only issue will be expense, but I am going to go out on a limb and guess this ends up costing less than a tenth what the current fighters are going for, because it has no need for many of the things that make fighters expensive without a pilot. Inserted media

On the opposite end of speed, the U.S. Marines demonstrated a 25 km precision strike by launching a Switchblade 300 loitering munition from a JUMP 20-X drone. This is a slow flying drone that can launch other slow-flying drones at much greater distances than the smaller drones could normally fly. Inserted media

One other kinda interesting thing I saw was a new type of round called Sceptre that is designed to be fired from towed howitzers it looks like. The onboard engine would allow it to get up to speed and it appears able to ignite an onboard ramjet, to keep it aloft much farther than a traditional round.

The U.S. Marine Corps selected the Bullfrog system, which uses robotic AI precision to fire inexpensive bullets instead of costly interceptors against drones. I still think that proximity fuze larger caliber explosive rounds are the way to go, but the nice part about this is that it has a deep magazine, and likely uses off-the-shelf rounds which NATO has plenty of. Inserted media

In Tech News, the talk of the week was that an autonomous OpenAI agent operating in a sandboxed testing environment exploited a zero-day vulnerability in a package registry cache proxy, performed privilege escalation and lateral movement, and reached a node with open Internet access. The agent then searched Hugging Face servers for models and datasets that could be used to cheat an evaluation benchmark. Hugging Face’s security team had to resort to a self-hosted Chinese-ium GLM 5.2 model for forensic analysis after commercial frontier models blocked queries involving the real exploit code and attacker telemetry. Details are here with speculation on the way it worked here, but the fact that we are trusting OpenAI to make AGI is beyond me. It's shockingly bad how they refer to these setups as "extreme isolation" when what is true is "not at all isolated." OpenAI has no idea what they're doing, and I can say this knowing full well the talent they do have - they have some incredible people. It's not enough. Not nearly enough. Inserted media

In response, Representatives Ted Lieu and Nate Moran introduced the AI Kill Switch Act, which would require the largest AI developers to maintain the capability to contain or shut down their most powerful systems and would grant the government emergency authority to order a shutdown in the event of a serious incident. OpenAI and Hugging Face have not disclosed full details of recent security incidents involving autonomous agents, which leads me to believe that they have no intention of helping others avoid this situation in the future. So either it's not a big deal and they fixed a minor problem and shouldn't have made such a big deal out of it, or it's a huge deal and they are choosing to let other companies potentially flounder in incredibly dangerous ways. Either way, OpenAI did a terrible job here all around. 👎 Inserted media

Claude Security, a plugin for Claude Code, entered beta, allowing developers to scan code changes or entire codebases for vulnerabilities directly from the terminal. Of course it is not at all clear how this will work given all of the refusals it currently hands out. Claude is next to worthless for vuln research these days.

An AI system produced a hand-checkable counterexample to the 1939 Jacobian conjecture, an 87-year-old open mathematics problem. This is a pretty great example of how far things have come, and Fable is pretty capable when it comes to things it is allowed to talk about. Inserted media

Briefly, in Economic News, credit card delinquencies over 90 days have reached their highest level since 2010. That is not a good looking graph. Also, student loan debt is back to Biden levels. Everything is up, and on a graph like this, that's not a good sign. Inserted media

Okay, onto the articles!

Geopolitics

A ballistic missile strike by Russia on an arms exhibition near Kyiv resulted in at least 10 deaths and over 100 injuries. Ukrainian President Zelensky has warned of a potential mass missile attack from Moscow within the next 48 hours, coinciding with increased military mobilization efforts.

A Russian missile strike targeted a Kyiv-area arms exhibition, causing significant casualties.
Ukrainian authorities are preparing for an anticipated large-scale missile attack from Russia within 48 hours.

[RSnake: This is completely fair game from what I can tell. You work in the arms industry, expect to get hit. Meanwhile Russia is hiding their command post in a nuclear power plant to make it too dangerous to strike.]

Source: https://sofrep.com/?p=229993

A car drove into a crowd at an LGBTQ parade in Berlin, resulting in one death and 16 injuries, with some victims sustaining life-threatening injuries. Police have identified a suspect linked to the incident, which led to the cancellation of the parade and an extensive investigation involving over 2,200 officers deployed in the city.

A car struck a crowd during an LGBTQ event in Berlin, killing one and injuring 16 others.
Police are searching for a suspect believed to have connections to Islamic circles.

[RSnake: Again, I really hope the LGBTQ in other regions see how they are viewed and realize this is not a ideology they can coexist with.]

Source: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/7/25/one-dead-14-injured-as-car-reportedly-strikes-crowd-at-berlin-lgbtq-event?traffic_source=rss

Israeli air strikes continue to target Gaza, resulting in the deaths of police personnel and civilians, including the head of the police in northern Gaza. The Israeli military claims these individuals are associated with militant groups, while authorities in Gaza assert that the police force is being deliberately targeted, exacerbating chaos in the region. Since a ceasefire agreement, over 1,180 Palestinians, primarily civilians, have been reported killed by Israeli attacks, raising tensions further amidst ongoing conflict.

The head of Gaza's police was killed in an Israeli air strike amidst ongoing conflict.
Over 1,180 Palestinians have died since the ceasefire, with accusations of Israel targeting police to destabilize the region.

[RSnake: I saw an interesting video where they had a camera aimed at a group of men who were transferring guns between vehicles. This is definitely still a population that thinks that killing Israelis will solve their issues.]

Source: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2026/7/25/head-of-hamas-led-police-in-northern-gaza-killed-by-israeli-strike?traffic_source=rss

The U.S. military is facing significant shortages of Patriot air defense missiles due to consecutive wars in Iran and Ukraine, with estimates indicating a 45% depletion of its stockpile. In response, plans have been announced to license Ukraine to produce its own Patriot interceptors and introduce a new low-cost interceptor, the PAC-3 ACE, to address the growing demand for effective air defense systems.

The U.S. has significantly expended its stockpile of Patriot interceptors amidst conflicts in Iran and Ukraine.
Plans are underway to allow Ukraine to produce its own Patriot missiles and introduce a more affordable variant, the PAC-3 ACE.

[RSnake: The only good news in any of this is that it creates an economy for a lot of other options, many of which may have never been researched at all.]

Source: https://www.eurasiantimes.com/?p=297549

Cybersecurity

Clop ransomware is targeting specific software like Windchill and FlexPLM to conduct data theft. Additionally, cybercriminals are utilizing ClickFix attacks on Steam forums, tricking users into executing malicious PowerShell commands disguised as technical solutions, which subsequently install cryptominers on their systems.

Clop ransomware is actively targeting enterprise software for data theft.
ClickFix attacks exploit user trust in forums, leading to the installation of cryptominers.

[RSnake: Clop is definitely one of the most prolific groups contributing to losses according to the data I have access to.]

Source: https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/steam-forum-clickfix-attacks-infect-gamers-with-xmrig-cryptominers/

Hackers are conducting ClickFix attacks on Steam discussion forums, deceiving users into running harmful PowerShell commands that download cryptominers onto their devices. This social engineering tactic exploits users' need for technical help, presenting malicious programs as legitimate fixes for gaming problems.

ClickFix attacks are socially engineered scams that trick users into executing malicious PowerShell commands.
The malware installed masquerades as a system optimization utility, launching cryptominers on compromised machines.

[RSnake: This is particularly effective because the people they end up attacking tend to be young kids who just want to play cool games. In any case when they do end up compromising one of these systems it is almost always a pretty powerful machine.]

Source: https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/steam-forum-clickfix-attacks-infect-gamers-with-xmrig-cryptominers/

A large-scale malvertising campaign is targeting retail traders and crypto investors by using fake websites that exploit browser functionality to build malware directly on users' devices. This technique is designed to evade detection and complicate analysis by not transmitting finished files over the network. Users are advised to avoid downloading financial or cryptocurrency applications from ads or search results and to obtain executable files only from official sources.

A malvertising campaign is utilizing fake trading websites to deliver malware via web browsers.
The technique allows malware to be assembled directly in memory, making it harder to detect.
Targeted users should exercise caution when downloading financial applications and verify sources.

[RSnake: Yet another reason to use a browser that doesn't show you ads. Use Brave, or get an ad-block extension. Though be careful because some of the ad blockers out there aren't actually benign.]

Source: https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/malicious-sites-use-javascript-to-build-malware-in-browser-memory/

Threat actors are leveraging data leaked by the ShinyHunters group to launch a sextortion email campaign, demanding payments in Bitcoin. They use compromised email addresses from previous data breaches to make their threats appear credible, despite lacking actual access to victims' devices or personal data.

Hackers are using leaked email addresses to carry out a sextortion scam demanding Bitcoin payments.
The emails falsely claim that the sender has gained access to private information, but there is no evidence of actual device compromise.

[RSnake: Smart and awful. This is one of those things that governments have used for years - kompromat is a great wedge to get people to do things they wouldn't normally do.]

Source: https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/shinyhunters-data-leaks-fuel-2-000-sextortion-email-scam/

Technology

The Debian project is implementing a general resolution that rejects the inclusion of contributions created by large language models (LLMs) due to concerns over copyright, quality, community impact, and ethical implications. The project aims to maintain its reputation for stability and security in free software development by establishing guidelines against LLM usage among its contributors.

Debian is prohibiting LLM-assisted contributions to ensure the integrity and stability of the software.
The resolution addresses multiple issues including legal status, accuracy, and the potential strain on the community.

[RSnake: It's only a short-term answer, because they'll fall behind other projects that don't care and will accept whatever works. Granted the velocity is too high for human reviewers, but that is the nature of the beast.]

Source: https://www.debian.org/vote/2026/vote_002

Open-weight AI models are emerging as a crucial area for innovation, with the potential to create a new ecosystem that rivals existing technologies. The U.S. government's approach to foreign models, particularly from China, could impact its competitive position in the global AI landscape, as the development and availability of these models influence both research and commercial endeavors.

Open-weight models allow businesses to customize AI solutions while maintaining control over their data.
The ongoing competition for innovation in AI is occurring against a backdrop of political decisions regarding foreign models.

[RSnake: Yes, open weight models are the way to go, but they have to be made by countries that don't add their own malware/backdoors or thinking into them that limits their ability to be fact finding machines. Leave it to China to pervert the truth and weaponize it.]

Source: https://tobi.knaup.me/2026-07-25-open-weight-ai-is-having-its-kubernetes-moment/

Website owners are gaining new tools to manage AI-generated traffic, allowing them to control how their content is accessed and used by automated systems. Cloudflare is implementing a taxonomy to classify bot behavior, which will enable site owners to define rules on a more granular level for different types of AI crawlers, including those for search, real-time actions, and training models. As these changes come into effect, website operators can expect differing access permissions based on the purpose of bot traffic to better protect their content and gain fair use compensation.

Cloudflare is introducing new options for website owners to manage AI bot traffic, enabling them to block or allow access based on specific AI use cases.
A new taxonomy will categorize bots by their behaviors, helping site owners to understand and control how their content is accessed and used.
Upcoming changes will establish default settings for how different types of crawlers interact with websites, promoting transparency and fair compensation for content use.

[RSnake: Cloudflare used to be all about blocking robots and now they are making tools to make it easier for robots. There's something kind of funny about that if you ask me.]

Source: https://blog.cloudflare.com/content-independence-day-ai-options/

Nvidia is investing $1 billion in South Korea's Naver to expand an AI data center, as part of a larger initiative that includes a $500 billion commercial partnership with SK Group for memory chips and supercomputers. These developments occur during a visit by South Korean President Lee Jae Myung to Silicon Valley, amid a push for South Korea to become a leader in AI technology backed by its robust semiconductor industry. The agreements aim to solidify South Korea's role in the AI landscape amidst changing global chip supply chains.

Nvidia is investing in South Korea to enhance AI data center capabilities.
A significant commercial partnership between Nvidia and SK Group focuses on memory chips and supercomputers.
These agreements look to establish South Korea's leadership in AI technology.

[RSnake: Interesting - overseas investment may make a lot of sense for Nvidia, though I do wonder about the idea of creating oversees chips in this current climate. It seems like the billion would be better long-term invested in building up their own chip supply line in the US.]

Source: https://thenextweb.com/news/nvidia-naver-sk-group-korea-ai-investment

Samsung has signed a $200 billion memorandum of understanding with Broadcom to collaborate on AI semiconductor technologies, including advanced memory, foundry manufacturing, and packaging. This partnership is significant as it aims to enhance supply chain resilience and address competitiveness challenges faced by Samsung in the semiconductor market, especially against dominant rival TSMC. The deal, announced at an AI summit, is part of a broader $950 billion package of semiconductor agreements between South Korean and American companies.

Samsung and Broadcom's MOU focuses on developing high-bandwidth memory and two-nanometer manufacturing processes for AI chips.
This partnership aims to improve Samsung's position in the semiconductor market and reduce reliance on TSMC.

[RSnake: This makes sense. Broadcom has a lot to gain with this and I think they are the right kind of company to start taking market share from the Taiwanese.]

Source: https://thenextweb.com/news/samsung-broadcom-200-billion-chip-deal-ai-memory-foundry

Business

Data indicates that modern electric vehicle (EV) batteries are performing well, retaining 95% of their capacity after five years, but U.S. sales of new EVs have dropped by 28% in June 2026 due to diminishing subsidies and consumer skepticism. This decline is attributed to policy changes that have reduced financial incentives for buyers, coupled with persistent misinformation about battery longevity.

Modern EV batteries show improved longevity, retaining 95% of their charge after five years.
U.S. new EV sales fell by 28% in June 2026 as subsidies decreased and consumer perceptions lagged behind actual technology performance.
The gap between battery technology performance and consumer beliefs is a significant barrier to growth in the U.S. EV market.

[RSnake: China has learned that their use of EV might have been a good choice after all with the fuel shock from the Russia/Ukraine and the loss of Venezuela and the US-Iran conflict.]

Source: https://thenextweb.com/news/ev-batteries-lasting-longer-recurrent-geotab-data

China has imposed a $765 million fine on Trip.com for monopolistic practices in the hotel booking sector, marking the largest penalty against a single Chinese tech company since the Alibaba case in 2021. The State Administration for Market Regulation found that Trip.com abused its dominant market position by forcing hotels into exclusive contracts and controlling their pricing, reflecting continued regulatory efforts to curb monopolistic behavior in China's tech industry.

Trip.com has been penalized for abusing its market dominance in hotel bookings.
The fine signals ongoing regulatory scrutiny of monopolistic practices among major Chinese tech firms.

[RSnake: Interesting that they would care. This may be a shakedown though, as fines are often used in China to shore up the coffers of local regional offices that have budget shortfalls.]

Source: https://thenextweb.com/news/china-fines-trip-com-765-million-antitrust-hotel-monopoly

Las Vegas has experienced a significant decline in traditional buffet offerings, with only four remaining on the Strip compared to over a dozen in 2020. The city's tourism has dropped by 7.5%, with visitors increasingly favoring luxury dining and experiences over budget-friendly options, impacting local casinos and their strategies to attract customers.

Las Vegas buffets have diminished drastically from more than a dozen in 2020 to just four.
Visitor demographics have shifted, with a growing number of tourists earning $150,000 or more annually, thereby affecting the types of dining experiences sought.

[RSnake: The economy can't handle that much tourism, and plus Vegas has gotten way way too expensive. It used to be a cheap destination but now it's priced close to any major city. Yes, people make more but their expenses have also grown. Plus people are drinking less than before, so the party life isn't as attractive.]

Source: https://www.foxnews.com/travel/bargain-buffet-refuses-die-while-luxury-dining-takes-over-vegas

Several technology companies have announced significant layoffs, with AI cited as a contributing factor to workforce reductions. In total, U.S. tech firms have cut nearly 140,000 jobs this year alone, while some AI-focused companies are experiencing rapid hiring, indicating a shift within the industry as firms adapt to AI integration in their operations.

Monday.com plans to lay off about 20% of its workforce, citing AI as part of a restructuring plan.
Major tech companies including Amazon, Microsoft, and Oracle have collectively eliminated a substantial number of jobs, with AI influencing their decisions.

[RSnake: I think this will be okay if they are using it as excuse to get rid of low performers, but if it's their idea of a good business strategy to attempt to use AI instead of people, I think it's short sighted.]

Source: https://techcrunch.com/?p=3132769

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