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Newly released Federal Trade Commission data show that consumers reported losing more than $10 billion to fraud in 2023, marking the first time that fraud losses have reached that benchmark. This marks a 14% increase over reported losses in 2022.

From: As Nationwide Fraud Losses Top $10 Billion in 2023, FTC Steps Up Efforts to Protect the Public | Federal Trade Commission.

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Another first is the method scammers reportedly used to reach consumers most commonly in 2023: email. Email displaced text messages, which held the top spot in 2022 after decades of phone calls being the most common. Phone calls are the second most commonly reported contact method for fraud in 2023, followed by text messages.

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Invesco is preparing to roll out generative artificial intelligence technology to cut rising compliance costs, but would not employ it to pick stocks anytime soon, says its chief executive.

From: Invesco wants to use generative AI to cut costs but not yet pick stocks.

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Several executives, product managers and salespeople at the major cloud providers, such as Microsoft, Amazon Web Services and Google, also privately said most of their customers are being cautious or “deliberate” about increasing spending on new AI services, given the high price of running the software, its shortcomings in terms of accuracy and the difficulty of determining how much value they’ll get out of it.

From: Amazon, Google Quietly Tamp Down Generative AI Expectations — The Information.

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Four months after Altman announced the GPT Store, however, some developers who offer chatbots through it say they have been disappointed by the lack of customers for their products. They say they’ve gotten little support from OpenAI in terms of analytics about their users. OpenAI also limits access to the store to paying customers of ChatGPT and hasn’t allowed the developers to charge money for their apps yet.

From: OpenAI’s Chatbot App Store Is Off to a Slow Start — The Information.

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TECHNOLOGY
Jan 5, 2024
Analyst shares views on AI stocks amid downgrades
Ben Cousins, BNN Bloomberg
Now Showing 7:06
‘Growth-at-all-costs’ no longer – it’s now profits and generative…
Up Next 8:14
AI is going to make a productivity revolution says Peapack privat…
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Artificial intelligence is only going to accelerate in 2024: Wate…
6:26
Microsoft is in charge of its AI destiny as OpenAI former CEO joi…
As investors downgrade some top artificial intelligence firms, an analyst covering the sector says he believes people are realizing revenue from the technology may not come as quickly as previously thought.
In the past week, analysts downgraded expectations for AI firms MongoDB and Palantir, citing overhyped AI prospects.
Rishi Jaluria, managing director of software equity research RBC Capital Markets, said he believes analysts are realizing that many AI firms might not generate substantial revenue until 2025.

From: Analyst shares views on AI stocks amid downgrades – BNN Bloomberg.

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The YouTubers’ faked letter of engagement for the whistleblower included a clause stating that the palace had a right to amputate one of his limbs should he fail his probation period.

Carlson’s people did not spot the preposterous faked document and Manners was sent to a London studio with a hotline to Carlson for the interview.

From: Tucker Carlson Duped By Kate Middleton Whistleblower YouTube Prank.

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Michael J. Totten

Artificial intelligence is like nothing that humans have ever created.

From: Something Like Fire | City Journal.

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Respected futurist Andrew Curry delivers a very intereting perspective on the paradigm shift. He says that the more he looks at AI, the more it looks like the kind of technology adaptation you get at the end of one of Carlota Perez’ technology waves, not the beginning, signalling the long run problems left behind by a mature technology. Effectively in the fourth quarter of the wave, markets become saturated, and returns start to fall, and companies that led the way during the period of rapid market development during the third quarter of the surge start looking and behaving like “conventional mature businesses” (a process that some commentators of more robust opinion have labelled “enshitiffication”.

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Several executives, product managers and salespeople at the major cloud providers, such as Microsoft, Amazon Web Services and Google, also privately said most of their customers are being cautious or “deliberate” about increasing spending on new AI services, given the high price of running the software, its shortcomings in terms of accuracy and the difficulty of determining how much value they’ll get out of it.

From: Amazon, Google Quietly Tamp Down Generative AI Expectations — The Information.

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In February, Mastercard pulled Still’s reporting, with an attorney stating in a letter that the data CipherTrace had relied on was itself “unverifiable and unauditable,”

From: Mastercard-owned CipherTrace tells clients it is shutting down key products.

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Banks must currently process payments by the end of the following business day in most cases even if they suspect wrongdoing, which limits their chances of halting transactions involving fraudsters.

The government’s draft legislation, which ministers intend to pass into law by October 7, will allow banks and payment groups to delay processing transactions by a further 72 hours if they have reasonable grounds to suspect fraud or dishonesty.

From: UK banks to be given more time to investigate fraudulent payments.

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all of the pilots and trials that have been done to date are largely worthless because we don’t really know what we want the digital currency to do.

From: MPE 2024: What will be the impact of a digital euro?.

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