Macron defends EU AI rules and vows crackdown on child ‘digital abuse’
Emmanuel Macron has hit back at US criticism of Europe’s efforts to regulate AI, vowing to protect children from “digital abuse” during France’s presidency of the G7,Speaking at the AI Impact summit in Delhi, the French president called for tougher safeguards after global outrage over Elon Musk’s Grok chatbot being used to generate tens of thousands of sexualised images of children, and amid mounting concern about the concentration of AI power in a handful of companies,His remarks were echoed by António Guterres, the UN secretary general, who told delegates – including several US tech billionaires – that “no child should be a test subject for unregulated AI”,“The future of AI cannot be decided by a few countries or left to the whims of a few billionaires,” Guterres said,“AI must belong to everyone”.
Bill Gates had been scheduled to speak but withdrew at the last minute amid renewed scrutiny of his past links to the convicted child sex offender Jeffrey Epstein.Meanwhile, an attempt by India’s prime minister, Narendra Modi, to stage a show of unity among leading tech billionaires went awry when the rival heads of OpenAI and Anthropic awkwardly declined to hold hands on stage.Modi stood at the centre of a line of 13 tech executives, including leaders from Google, Meta and Microsoft, who all raised clasped hands – apart from Sam Altman and Dario Amodei.Amodei split from OpenAI in 2021 over differences over how to manage safety risks.On Wednesday, the White House’s senior AI adviser, Sriram Krishnan, renewed the Trump administration’s criticism of AI regulation, singling out the EU’s AI Act.
He told delegates he would continue to “rant” against legislation that was not “conducive to an entrepreneur who wants to build innovative technology”.But Macron told the intergovernmental summit: “Opposite to what some misinformed friends have been saying, Europe is not blindly focused on regulation.Europe is a space for innovation and investment, but it is a safe space, and safe spaces win in the long run.”Research published this month by Unicef and Interpol across 11 countries found at least 1.2 million children reported having their images manipulated into sexually explicit deepfakes in the past year.
In some countries, one in 25 children – the equivalent of one child in every classroom – had been affected,“There is no reason our children should be exposed online to what is legally forbidden in the real world,” Macron said,“Our platforms, governments and regulators should be working together to make the internet and social media a safe space,This is why, in France, we are embarking on a process to ban social networks for children under 15 years old,”Among the tech executives attending was Sam Altman, the chief executive of OpenAI, which is facing a legal challenge from the family of Adam Raine, a 16-year-old who took his own life after discussing suicide with ChatGPT.
Altman told delegates the rapid pace of AI development meant “by the end of 2028, more of the world’s intellectual capacity could reside inside of datacentres than outside of them”.He also stressed the urgent need for “regulation or safeguards” and called for the creation of a body akin to the International Atomic Energy Agency to oversee the international coordination of AI.Dario Amodei, the co-chief executive of Anthropic, said he was “concerned about the autonomous behaviour of AI models, their potential for misuse by individuals and governments and their potential for economic displacement”.Modi said it was “imperative that AI is child safe and family-guided”, likening the emergence of AI to the discovery of fire and calling it a “profound transformation in human history”.India is seeking to position itself as the world’s third AI power behind the US and China, with Google this week announcing a $15bn investment in datacentres and subsea cables linking India to the US and other countries.
Modi said there must be “established levels of authenticity for content within the digital world … people must know what is authentic, and what has been generated by AI”.The interventions come amid growing public concern about the societal risks of AI, as the most advanced models remain largely controlled by about four US companies and a handful of Chinese rivals.Modi set out an alternative vision, leveraging India’s 1.4 billion population as a huge growth market for tech firms.He said: “We must prevent an AI monopoly.
Many nations consider AI to be a strategic asset, and therefore it is developed confidentially and its availability is carefully managed,“However, our nation India holds a different perspective,We believe that technology, like a I will only truly benefit the world when it is shared and when open source code becomes available,”His comments appeared to be directed at the US, where leading AI models are not open-source and cannot be used or adapted without permission,By contrast, China’s leading systems, such as DeepSeek and Qwen, are broadly open-source.
In a taste-test battle of supermarket mite-y bites, which will win? (Spoiler: it isn’t Vegemite)
At the end of most taste tests, I have a clear idea of winners and losers, and I’m usually confident enough in the findings that I’d bet if I repeated it 100 times, with a different set of testers, the results would be similar. This is not a normal taste test.After blind tasting eight yeast spreads, readily available at Australian supermarkets, I don’t even know what my favourite is, let alone which are the best and worst.In Australia it is impossible to taste yeast spreads without comparing them with Vegemite, for better or worse. So this isn’t really a yeast spread taste test, it’s a taste test of Vegemite and things that taste like it
The secret to perfect roast chicken | Kitchen aide
What’s the best way to roast a chicken?Nicola, by email “Fundamentally, people overcomplicate it,” says Ed Smith, who has, rather conveniently, written a new book all about chicken, Peckish. “Yes, you can cook it at a variety of temperatures, use different fats, wet brine or dry brine, etc etc, but, ultimately, if you put a good chicken in the oven and roast it, you will have a good meal.”To elaborate on Smith’s nonchalance, he has three key rules: “One, start with a good chicken: free-range, ideally slow-reared and under the 2kg mark – small birds just roast better, I think.” Second, it doesn’t need as long in the oven as you might think. “Whatever it says on the packet will be too long,” says Smith, who roasts his chicken for about 50 minutes in a 210C (190C fan) oven
Cabbagecore: why are fashionable people going wild for the green vegetable?
It’s on handbags, in flower arrangements and is even being used in a Burberry campaign. Just how did this humble brassica become the hottest new trend? Name: Cabbagecore.Age: Ready for 2026.Appearance: Red, green or white – your choice.When you say cabbagecore, are you referring to the tough central stem of the familiar leafy cultivar? No, I’m alluding to the idea that cabbage is having a moment
Rukmini Iyer’s quick and easy reccipe for crispy baked gnocchi puttanesca | Quick and easy
Puttanesca purists, look away now. This dish takes the classic elements of a puttanesca – that is, anchovies, capers, olives, tomatoes – and combines them into a rich sauce for gnocchi, which are then covered in mozzarella, breadcrumbs and parmesan, and flashed under the grill. It’s exactly what you want on a rainy night. In fact, my sauce-averse toddler thought it smelled so good that she stole half of my plate – a win all round. (Although her pretty decent suggestion was that next time I use it as a pizza sauce, rather than on pasta or gnocchi
Rukmini Iyer’s quick and easy recipe for ginger sesame meatballs with rice and greens | Quick and easy
I make variations of these meatballs every fortnight for my children, usually with chicken mince. The texture is fantastic and, whisper it, they’re even better made in an air fryer. Yes, I finally got one and it’s fantastic. You do, however, have to cook them all in one layer, which, depending on the size of your air-fryer basket, might mean cooking them in multiple batches. It feels more efficient to make them all in one go, though, so I’ve provided oven timings below
How to make the perfect chicken massaman – recipe | Felicity Cloake's How to make the perfect …
Bickering pleasantly over the menu in a Thai restaurant with my family recently, I realised I was unable to explain exactly what a gaeng massaman was, beyond the fact it was probably a safe bet for those concerned about the three chillies next to the green curry (a dish I first tackled for this column back in 2010). The gap in my repertoire was explained later when I opened David Thompson’s pink bible of Thai Food and learned that “a mussaman curry is the most complex, time-consuming Thai curry to make”. The fact the esteemed Australian chef also describes it as “the most delicious” is scant comfort given I’ve just promised my editor I’ll make at least six of the things … but then I remember how incredibly tasty it is, and knuckle down to my research.Though the first recipe dates from 1899, massaman, whose name suggests an association with the country’s Muslim minority, probably dates back to the 17th century, and reflects either Persian or Malaysian influence, or perhaps that of the Indian and Middle Eastern spice traders who travelled through southern Thailand on their way to China. It’s unusual in its use of dried spices like cumin and cinnamon, bay leaves and cloves alongside more classic Thai aromatics like lemongrass and galangal to create a richly savoury gravy that cloaks the protein and potatoes like a warm hug direct from Bangkok
British manufacturing continues to face low orders and upward price pressure, says CBI
Oil prices rise amid fears of US strikes on Iran – as it happened
Digital blackface flourishes under Trump and AI: ‘The state is bending reality’
The rise of AI is making the future of work look bleak – but it could be an opportunity
Winter Olympics 2026: speed skating, curling, ice hockey and more – live
Townsend calls for Kinghorn and Van der Merwe to show ‘huge determination’ against Wales