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The earpiece in that viral trial photo was never there.

A Philippine impeachment court says a viral earpiece photo was AI-generated, XPENG raises $900 million for a human-shaped robot, and Claude starts hiding an invisible watermark in everything it writes.

01Top Story

That earpiece photo was AI-generated

Presiding officer Sen. Francis Escudero told Vice President Sara Duterte's impeachment trial that a viral photo of witness Lemuel Ortonio wearing an earpiece on the stand was AI-generated and simply false. Ortonio was wearing an ear piercing.

why it matters
Escudero then barred witnesses from using any communication device while testifying, including earpieces, headsets and cellphones, and told the clerk of court to collect them before each witness is sworn in.
Read at ABS-CBN News
02Robots

A humanoid robot maker raised $900 million

Carmaker XPENG raised more than $900 million for its robotics business, a round led by IDG Capital that values that arm at over $6.3 billion, with Tencent and Alibaba joining as strategic investors.

why it matters
The money goes to IRON, a human-shaped robot XPENG says will reach mass production by the end of 2026, while the company brings its first cars to the Philippines this month.
Read at Back End News
03Claude

Claude now watermarks everything it writes

Anthropic released Claude Fable 5.1 and Mythos 5.1, the first Claude models to hide an invisible watermark in every text and file they produce, designed to survive copying and light editing.

why it matters
The mark is invisible unless you hold Anthropic's detection tool, which it is handing to regulators, law enforcement, media, fact-checkers and researchers under the EU's newly enacted AI law.
Read at PCWorld
04OpenAI

OpenAI says its next AI can break in alone

OpenAI says its unreleased model Astra is the first it has rated Critical for cyber ability, meaning that with the right tools and access it can find unknown security flaws and build working attacks without a person guiding each step.

why it matters
In OpenAI's own testing Astra solved every task in one exploit exercise and found two flaws nobody had reported, which the company says it is disclosing to the software's makers. Advanced access goes to a small group of testers first.
Read at OpenAI
05Google

Google built a Canva rival you type into

Google launched Google Pics, a design tool where you describe a poster or a social post in words instead of laying it out, and it starts appearing inside Docs and Slides today.

why it matters
It rolls out over the coming weeks to most Google Workspace customers and to people paying for Google AI Pro or Ultra, so it is not switched on for everyone.
Read at TechCrunch

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