WASHINGTON (AP) — Pro-Iran hackers have threatened to release emails supposedly stolen from people connected to President Donald Trump, according to a news report, a move that federal authorities call a “calculated smear campaign.”

The United States has warned of continued Iranian cyberattacks following American strikes on Iran’s nuclear facilities and the threats those could pose to services, economic systems and companies.

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency said late Monday that the threat to expose emails about Trump is “nothing more than digital propaganda” meant to damage Trump and other federal officials.

“A hostile foreign adversary is threatening to illegally exploit purportedly stolen and unverified material in an effort to distract, discredit, and divide,” CISA spokeswoman Marci McCarthy wrote in a social media post, linking to a report from Reuters about the threat. “These criminals will be found, and they will be brought to justice.”

Reuters reported that it contacted the alleged hackers online. They told the news organization that it held a large cache of emails from Trump chief of staff Susie Wiles, other top advisers and porn actor Stormy Daniels, to whom a hush money payment led to Trump’s criminal conviction.

Federal prosecutors charged three Iranians last year on allegations of hacking into Trump’s presidential campaign. Hackers also targeted the campaign of Democrats Joe Biden and Kamala Harris and unsuccessfully tried to leak material supposedly taken from Trump to Democrats and members of the media.

The threat to release more hacked emails was reported the same day that CISA, the FBI and National Security Agency issued a may attack U.S. interests despite a fragile ceasefire between Iran and Israel.

The hackers, authorities warned, could seek to disrupt or disable critical infrastructure systems such as utilities, transportation and economic hubs. They also could target defense contractors or other American companies with ties to Israel, the agencies said.

The bulletin outlined recommendations, including the use of regular software updates and strong password management systems to shore up digital defenses.

Hackers backing Tehran have targeted U.S. banks, defense contractors and energy companies following American strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities — but so far have not caused widespread disruptions.

WASHINGTON (AP) — A proposal to deter states from regulating artificial intelligence for a decade was soundly defeated in the U.S. Senate on Tuesday, thwarting attempts to insert the measure into President Donald Trump’s big bill of tax breaks and spending cuts.

The Senate voted 99-1 to strike the AI provision for the legislation after weeks of criticism from both Republican and Democratic governors and state officials.

Originally proposed as a 10-year ban on states doing anything to regulate AI, lawmakers later tied it to federal funding so that only states that backed off on AI regulations would be able to get subsidies for broadband internet or AI infrastructure.

A last-ditch Republican effort to save the provision would have reduced the time frame to five years and sought to exempt some favored AI laws, such as those protecting children or country music performers from harmful AI tools.

But that effort was abandoned when Sen. Marsha Blackburn, a Tennessee Republican, teamed up with Democratic Sen. Maria Cantwell of Washington on Monday night to introduce an amendment to strike the entire proposal. Voting on the amendment happened after 4 a.m. Wednesday as part of an overnight session as Republican leaders sought to secure support for the tax cut bill while fending off other proposed amendments, mostly from Democrats trying to defeat the package.

Proponents of an AI moratorium had argued that a patchwork of state and local AI laws is hindering progress in the AI industry and the ability of U.S. firms to compete with China.

Some prominent tech leaders welcomed the idea after Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas, who leads the Senate Commerce committee, floated it at a hearing in May.

But state and local lawmakers and AI safety advocates argued that the rule is a gift to an industry that wants to avoid accountability for its products. Led by Arkansas Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders, a majority of GOP governors sent a letter to Congress opposing it.

Also appealing to lawmakers to strike the provision was a group of parents of children who have died as a result of online harms.

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O’Brien reported from Providence, Rhode Island.

WASHINGTON (AP) — On Monday afternoon, the president of the United States was just another person complaining online about his service provider.

Donald Trump wrote in a pair of posts on Truth Social that he was trying to hold a conference call with faith leaders from all over the country but was unable to start the call because of technical difficulties.

“AT&T is totally unable to make their equipment work properly,” the Republican president said in a post. “This is the second time it’s happened. If the Boss of AT&T, whoever that may be, could get involved — It would be good. There are tens of thousands of people on the line!”

Trump then followed up with another post in which he said, “AT&T ought to get its act together.”

Representatives for AT&T responded to a post from the White House press secretary sharing Trump’s complaints.

“We’ve reached out to the White House and are working to quickly understand and assess the situation,” AT&T said.

The issue was resolved and the call started 20 minutes late, according to a White House official who was not authorized to speak publicly and spoke on condition of anonymity.

Trump rarely shies away from posting his gripes on social media, whether the target is foreign leaders, media organizations, elected officials or telecommunication companies.

The call he was delayed from holding was not on his publicly released schedule.

Between 8,000 and 10,000 leaders of Christian, Jewish and Muslim faiths were on the call, the first of a series that the White House expects to regularly hold with religious leaders.

During the call, according to the official, Trump spoke for about 15 minutes and touted provisions in his big tax breaks and spending cuts bill, like the boost to the child tax credit, the Israel-Iran ceasefire and African peace deals he brokered, and the pardons he issued for anti-abortion activists.

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Justice Department announced criminal charges Monday in connection with a scheme by North Korea to fund its weapons program through the salaries of remote information technology workers employed unwittingly by U.S. companies.

The charges are part of what law enforcement officials described as a nationwide operation that also resulted in the seizure of financial accounts, websites and laptops that were used to carry out the fraud.

Two separate cases — one filed in Georgia, the other in Massachusetts — represent the latest Justice Department effort to confront a persistent threat that officials say generates enormous revenue for the North Korean government and in some cases affords workers access to sensitive and proprietary data from the corporations that hire them.

The scheme involves thousands of workers who, armed with stolen or fake identifies of U.S. citizens, are dispatched by the North Korean government to find work as remote IT employees at American companies, including Fortune 500 corporations. Though the companies are duped into believing the workers they had hired were based in the U.S., many are actually stationed in North Korea or in China and the wages they receive are transferred into accounts controlled by co-conspirators affiliated with North Korea, prosecutors say.

“These schemes target and steal from U.S. companies and are designed to evade sanctions and fund the North Korean regime’s illicit programs, including its weapons programs,” Assistant Attorney General John Eisenberg, the head of the Justice Department’s National Security Division, said in a statement.

In one case exposed on Monday in federal court in Massachusetts, the Justice Department said it had arrested one U.S. national and charged more than a half dozen Chinese and Taiwanese citizens for their alleged roles in an elaborate fraud that prosecutors say produced at least $5 million in revenue and affected more than 100 companies.

The defendants are accused of registering financial accounts to receive the proceeds and creating shell companies with fake websites to make it appear that the workers were connected to legitimate businesses. They also benefited from the help of unidentified enablers inside the United States who facilitated the workers’ remote computer access, tricking companies into believing the employees were logging in from U.S. locations.

The Justice Department did not identify the companies that were duped, but said that some of the fraudulent workers were able to gain access to and steal information related to sensitive military technology.

The case filed in Georgia charges four North Korean nationals with using fake identities to gain access to am Atlanta-based blockchain research and development company and stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars in virtual currency.

The Justice Department has filed similar prosecutions in recent years, as well as created an initiative aimed at disrupting the threat.

WASHINGTON (AP) — A ceasefire between Iran and Israel has not ended the threat of cyberattacks from hacking groups supportive of Tehran, the FBI and federal cybersecurity officials warned Monday.

In a , the authorities warned that hacking groups affiliated with or supportive of Tehran may still seek to disrupt or disable critical infrastructure systems in the U.S. such as utilities, transportation and economic hubs. Hackers may also target defense contractors or other American companies with ties to Israel, the agencies said.

“Despite a declared ceasefire and ongoing negotiations towards a permanent solution, Iranian-affiliated cyber actors and hacktivist groups may still conduct malicious cyber activity,” the agencies warned.

The warning of continued cyberthreats after a halt to conventional warfare reflects the often opaque nature of cyber conflict. Hacking groups may have only loose ties to a nation state, and may seek to retaliate as an alternative to traditional military action.

The bulletin outlined recommendations, including the use of regular software updates and strong password management systems to shore up digital defenses.

Hackers backing Tehran have targeted U.S. banks, defense contractors and energy companies following American strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities — but so far have not caused widespread disruptions.

While it lacks the technical abilities of China or Russia, Iran has long used its more limited capabilities to steal secrets, score political points or frighten opponents.

Analysts have tied some of these activities to groups working on behalf of Iran’s military and intelligence agencies. But in other instances, the groups appear to act independently.

CARTERSVILLE, Ga. (AP) — When two South Korean companies announced a multibillion-dollar investment to build solar panel and electric battery factories in northwest Georgia, federal subsidies helped close a deal to diversify the local economy.

The factories promised thousands of new jobs, transforming the manufacturing base in Cartersville, once a cotton mill town before an Anheuser-Busch brewery arrived in the 1990s and a tire plant in 2006.

But now Republicans in Congress want to gut the subsidies for projects across the country in a tax cut bill likely days from final passage. President Donald Trump’s signature legislation could harm Cartersville despite it being in overwhelmingly Republican Bartow County, which backed Trump with 75% of the vote all three times he appeared on the ballot.

Both companies say they’re continuing their buildout plans. But Steve Taylor, a Republican who is Bartow County’s lone elected commissioner, says ending the tax credits would be “a little concerning.”

“Those companies came and it gave us a completely different type of industry and manufacturing for our community,” Taylor said.

By some measures, no state may have more to lose than Georgia from such cuts in Trump’s “ Big Beautiful Bill.” Top Georgia Republicans have been mostly silent, while Georgia’s two Democratic U.S. senators are staunchly opposed.

“A vote for this bill is a vote against Georgia’s economy and a vote that will put so much of what we’ve worked so hard to achieve at risk” U.S. Sen. Jon Ossoff told The Associated Press.

And few towns have more to lose than Cartersville, the Bartow County seat about 35 miles (55 kilometers) northwest of Atlanta. As the county transforms from rural to suburban, leaders foresee an economic boost from the $5 billion battery factory that Hyundai Motor Group and SK On are building, as well as the $2.3 billion solar panel plant belonging to Qcells, a unit of Hanwha Solutions. Both plants pledge to pay workers an average of $53,000 a year.

Clean energy projects are taking off in Georgia

Georgia’s huge inrush of clean energy projects had already begun before 2022, when then-President Joe Biden signed his signature climate law, the Inflation Reduction Act. But if anything, that rush accelerated. The 33 additional projects announced by the end of 2024 were the most nationwide, , an environmental business group. Exact figures differ, but projects in Georgia top $20 billion, pledging more than 25,000 jobs.

Buyers of Qcells solar panels get a 40% federal tax credit, including a 10% bonus for domestic content, which would go away under the bill. Qcells itself would still get production tax credits for panels it started producing last year in Cartersville. The bill would also tax companies that buy panels or components from some foreign countries including China. That could help Qcells, but wouldn’t aid domestic producers as much as the domestic content bonus.

When the 1,900-job plant is complete, it will take refined polysilicon, cast it into ingots and then thinly slice ingots into the wafers that become solar cells. Qcells says controlling its own supply chain will let it work more efficiently. Those additional steps would earn the company additional tax credits.

Scott Moskowitz, vice president of market strategy and industry affairs for Qcells, said the company built its first American factory up the road in Dalton during the first Trump administration in response to Trump’s protectionist trade policy. Moskowitz argues that a quick curtailment of federal subsidies undercuts Trump’s goal of bolstering domestic manufacturing, pushing buyers back to Chinese-controlled producers.

Some local Republicans are expressing alarm, with 16 GOP state legislators imploring Congress in a June 17 letter to preserve tax breaks for solar panels.

“We urge you not to weaken the tax credits, as doing so would only harm the manufacturing renaissance in Georgia while creating opportunities for Chinese companies to take over the solar industry,” wrote the Georgia lawmakers, led by Republican state Rep. Matthew Gambill of Cartersville.

Some argue it’s unfair for Congress to pull the rug out after companies relied on the promise of federal support to invest huge sums.

“I would like to think that from a business perspective that when you have agreements in place that you carry those out to fulfillment,” Cartersville Mayor Matt Santini said.

High-ranking Georgia Republicans have been publicly silent

Clean energy projects have overwhelmingly located in Republican-held congressional districts, with a report by finding GOP districts host 77% of planned spending.

But Republican U.S. Rep. Barry Loudermilk, who lives in Bartow County, praised the cuts when they passed the House in May, saying the bill would “unleash American energy stifled by the Democrats’ Green New scam” and lauding expansion of oil, gas and coal production on federal lands.

Republican Gov. Brian Kemp says he’s staying out of the debate.

“Our position is that Congress needs to be the one to decide the future of the IRA,” said Kemp spokesperson Garrison Douglas.

Kemp loves green energy investments and jobs, and even declared that his goal is to make Georgia the “electric mobility capital of America.” But Kemp and Ossoff clash over who should get credit for Georgia’s green energy boom. Kemp sharply disputes that the Biden-era incentives spurred the flood of investment, saying many industries were already on their way before the Inflation Reduction Act was passed.

Unlike his current silence, Kemp vociferously opposed some domestic content requirements that made it hard for Hyundai to access the same tax credits as unionized U.S.-based automakers.

“Just generally speaking, the Inflation Reduction Act picked winners and losers, and we saw that negatively impact our partners,” Douglas said.

All nine of Georgia’s Republican House members voted to support the bill, including U.S. Rep Buddy Carter, who who is seeking the GOP nomination to oppose Ossoff for Senate in 2026, represents a coastal district that includes a $7.6 billion Hyundai plant in Ellabell that started production last year.

Hyundai wants to make batteries at what would be a 3,500-employee plant near Cartersville so that Hyundai and Kia buyers can fully take advantage of the $7,500 tax credit for electric vehicles. Those credits would end six months after the bill is enacted under the current version.

The company is publicly sidestepping the current legislative fight. But with American demand for electric vehicles slow to take off, Hyundai now says it will also build gas-electric hybrid vehicles in Ellabell, once projected to make only electric vehicles.

“We remain focused on electrification because we believe it represents a significant long-term opportunity,” Hyundai spokesperson Michael Stewart said in a statement. “At the same time, our business is driven by consumer demand, which is why we continue to offer a full range of powertrains.”

Bartow County leaders say it’s in everyone’s interest to keep the projects on solid footing and that jobs should outweigh politics.

“I don’t know that people are lining up along party lines over this topic,” Santini said.

But Ossoff says partisanship is motivating many Georgia Republicans to turn their backs on the state’s economic interests.

“For national Republicans right now, loyalty to Trump is more important than anything else, and this is what Trump says he wants,” Ossoff said.

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (AP) — A tech industry trade group sued Arkansas Friday over two new laws that would place limits on content on social media platforms and would allow parents of children who killed themselves to sue over content on the platforms.

The lawsuit by NetChoice filed in federal court in Fayetteville, Arkansas, comes months after a federal judge struck down a state law requiring parental consent before minors can create new social media accounts. The new laws were signed by Republican Gov. Sarah Huckabee Sanders earlier this year.

“Despite the overwhelming consensus that laws like the Social Media Safety Act are unconstitutional, Arkansas elected to respond to this Court’s decision not by repealing the provisions that it held unconstitutional but by instead doubling down on its overreach,” NetChoice said in its lawsuit.

Arkansas is among several states that have been enacting restrictions on social media, prompted by concerns about the impact on children’s mental health. NetChoice — whose members include TikTok, Facebook parent Meta, and the social platform X — challenged Arkansas’ 2023 age-verification law for social media. A federal judge who initially blocked the law struck it down in March.

Similar laws have been blocked by judges in Florida and Georgia.

A spokesperson for Attorney General Tim Griffin said his office was reviewing the latest complaint and looked forward to defending the law.

One of the new laws being challenged prohibits social media platforms from using a design, algorithm or feature it “knows or should have known through the exercise of reasonable care” would cause a user to kill themself, purchase a controlled substance, develop an eating disorder, develop an addiction to the platform.

The lawsuit said that provision is unconstitutionally vague and doesn’t offer guidance on how to determine which content would violate those restrictions, and the suit notes it would restrict content for both adults and minors. The suit questions whether songs that mention drugs, such as Afroman’s “Because I Got High,” would be prohibited under the new law.

The law being challenged also would allow parents whose children have died by suicide or attempted to take their lives to sue social media companies if they were exposed to content promoting or advancing self-harm and suicide. The companies could face civil penalties of up to $10,000 per violation.

NetChoice is also challenging another law that attempts to expand Arkansas’ blocked restrictions on social media companies. That measure would require social media platforms to ensure minors don’t receive notifications between 10 p.m. and 6 a.m.

The measure also would require social media companies to ensure their platform “does not engage in practices to evoke any addiction or compulsive behavior.” The suit argues that the law doesn’t explain how to comply with that restriction and is so broadly written that it’s unclear what kind of posts or material would violate it.

“What is ‘addictive’ to some minors may not be addictive to others. Does allowing teens to share photos with each other evoke addiction?” the lawsuit said.

Weather experts are warning that hurricane forecasts will be severely hampered by the upcoming cutoff of key data from U.S. Department of Defense satellites, the latest Trump administration move with potential consequences for the quality of forecasting.

The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration the “ingest, processing and distribution” of data collected by three weather satellites that the agency jointly runs with the Defense Department. The data is used by scientists, researchers and forecasters, including at the National Hurricane Center.

It wasn’t immediately clear why the government planned to cut off the Defense Meteorological Satellite Program’s microwave data by Monday. The Defense Department referred questions to the Air Force, which referred them to the Navy, which did not immediately provide comment. NOAA did not immediately respond to a message.

Unlike traditional weather satellites, the microwave data helps peer under a regular image of a hurricane or a tropical cyclone to see what is going on inside the storm, and it is especially helpful at night.

The news is especially noteworthy during the ongoing hurricane season and as lesser storms have become more frequent, deadly and costly as climate change is worsened by the burning of fossil fuels.

Microwave imagery allows researchers and forecasters to see the center of the storm. Experts say that can help in detecting the rapid intensification of storms and in more accurately plotting the likely path of dangerous weather.

“If a hurricane, let’s say, is approaching the Gulf Coast, it’s a day away from making landfall, it’s nighttime,” said Union of Concerned Scientists science fellow Marc Alessi. “We will no longer be able to say, OK, this storm is definitely undergoing rapid intensification, we need to update our forecasts to reflect that.”

Other microwave data will be available but only roughly half as much, hurricane specialist Michael Lowry said . He said that greatly increases the odds that forecasters will miss rapid intensification, underestimate intensity or misplace the storm.

That “will severely impede and degrade hurricane forecasts for this season and beyond, affecting tens of millions of Americans who live along its hurricane-prone shorelines,” he said.

University of Miami hurricane researcher Brian McNoldy called the loss of data “alarmingly bad news” in a post on Bluesky.

“Microwave data are already relatively sparse, so any loss — even gradual as satellites or instruments fail — is a big deal; but to abruptly end three active functioning satellites is insanity.”

NOAA and its National Weather Service office have been the target of several cuts and changes in President Donald Trump’s second term. The Department of Government Efficiency gutted the agency’s workforce, local field offices and funding.

Already, hurricane forecasts were anticipated to be less accurate this year because weather balloons launches have been curtailed because of the lack of staffing.

“What happened this week is another attempt by the Trump administration to sabotage our weather and climate infrastructure,” Alessi said.

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Alexa St. John is an Associated Press climate reporter. Follow her on X: . Reach her at ast.john@ap.org.

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Read more of AP’s climate coverage at http://www.apnews.com/climate-and-environment

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The Associated Press’ climate and environmental coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s for working with philanthropies, a list of supporters and funded coverage areas at .

WASHINGTON (AP) — The Supreme Court on Friday upheld the fee that is added to phone bills to provide billions of dollars a year in subsidized phone and internet services in schools, libraries and rural areas.

The justices, by a 6-3 vote, reversed an appeals court ruling that had struck down as unconstitutional the Universal Service Fund, the charge that has been added to phone bills for nearly 30 years.

At arguments in March, liberal and conservative justices alike expressed concerns about the potentially devastating consequences of eliminating the fund, which has benefited tens of millions of Americans.

The Federal Communications Commission collects the money from telecommunications providers, which pass the cost on to their customers.

A Virginia-based conservative advocacy group, Consumers’ Research, had challenged the practice. The justices had previously denied two appeals from Consumers’ Research after federal appeals courts upheld the program. But the full 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals, among the nation’s most conservative, ruled 9-7 that the method of funding is unconstitutional.

The 5th Circuit held that Congress had given too much authority to the FCC and the agency in turn had ceded too much power to a private entity, or administrator.

The last time the Supreme Court invoked what is known as the nondelegation doctrine to strike down a federal law was in 1935. But several conservative justices have suggested they are open to breathing new life into the legal doctrine.

The conservative-led court also has reined in federal agencies in high-profile rulings in recent years. Last year, the court reversed a 40-year-old case that had been used thousands of times to uphold federal regulations. In 2022, the court ruled Congress has to act with specificity before agencies can address “major questions,” in a ruling that limited the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to combat climate change.

But the phone fee case turned out not to be the right one for finding yet another way to restrict federal regulators.

President Donald Trump’s Republican administration, which has moved aggressively to curtail administrative agencies in other areas, defended the FCC program. The appeal was initially filed by President Joe Biden’s Democratic administration.

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Follow the AP’s coverage of the U.S. Supreme Court at https://apnews.com/hub/us-supreme-court.

ATLANTA (AP) — Georgia has become the latest state where a federal judge has blocked a law requiring age verification for social media accounts.

Like in seven other states where such laws have been blocked, a federal judge ruled Thursday that the Georgia law infringes on free speech rights.

by U.S. District Judge Amy Totenberg means that the Georgia measure, which passed in 2024, won’t take effect next week as scheduled. Instead, Totenberg granted a preliminary injunction blocking the law until there’s a full ruling on the issue.

Georgia’s law would require some social media providers to take “commercially reasonable” steps to verify a user’s age and require children younger than 16 to get parental permission for accounts. It was challenged by NetChoice, a trade group representing online businesses.

“The state seeks to erect barriers to speech that cannot withstand the rigorous scrutiny that the Constitution requires,” Totenberg wrote, finding the law restricts the rights of minors, chills the right to anonymous speech online and restricts the ability of people to receive speech from social media platforms.

Georgia will appeal, a spokesperson for Attorney General Chris Carr said Thursday.

“We will continue to defend commonsense measures that empower parents and protect our children online,” spokesperson Kara Murray said in a statement.

Parents — and even some teens themselves — are growing increasingly concerned about the effects of social media use on young people. Supporters of the laws have said they are needed to help curb the explosive use of social media among young people, and what researchers say is an associated increase in depression and anxiety. Totenberg said concerns about social media harming children are legitimate, but don’t outweigh the constitutional violation.

Totenberg wrote that NetChoice’s members would be irreparably harmed by the law. She rejected arguments from the state that the group shouldn’t get temporary relief because it had delayed filing its lawsuit by a year and because the state would be required to give 90 days’ notice before enforcing the law.

“Free expression doesn’t end where government anxiety begins,” NetChoice Director of Litigation Chris Marchese said in a statement. “Parents— not politicians — should guide their children’s lives online and offline— and no one should have to hand over a government ID to speak in digital spaces.”

It’s the ninth state where NetChoice has blocked a law over children’s use of social media. In Arkansas and Ohio, federal judges have permanently overturned the laws. Besides Georgia, measures are also on hold in California, Florida, Mississippi, Texas and Utah. Louisiana agreed to not enforce its law while litigation proceeds. Only in Tennessee did a federal judge decline to temporarily block a law, finding NetChoice hadn’t proved that people would be irreparably harmed if the law wasn’t blocked before trial.

Georgia had argued the law was meant to protect children in a dangerous place, likening it to banning them from bars serving alcohol instead of restricting their speech.

NEW YORK (AP) — When the Trump family unveiled a new phone before a giant American flag at its headquarters earlier this month, the pitch was simple and succinct, packed with pure patriotism: “Made in the U.S.A.”

The Trumps are apparently having second thoughts.

How about “proudly American”?

Those are the two words that have replaced the “Made in the USA” pitch that just a few days ago appeared on the website where customers can pre-order the so-called T-1 gold-toned phones with an American flag etched on the back. Elsewhere on the site, other vague terms are now being used, describing the $499 phone as boasting an “American-Proud Design” and “brought to life right here in the U.S.A.”

The Federal Trade Commission requires that items labeled “Made in USA” be “all or virtually all” produced in the U.S. and several firms have been sued over misusing the term.

The Trump Organization has not explained the change and has not responded to a request for comment. Neither did an outside public relations firm handling the Trumps’ mobile phone business, including a request to confirm a statement made to another media outlet.

“T1 phones are proudly being made in America,” said Trump Mobile spokesman Chris Walker, according to USA Today. “Speculation to the contrary is simply inaccurate.”

The language change on the website was first reported by the news site The Verge.

An expert on cell phone technology, IDC analyst Francisco Jeronimo, said he’s not surprised the Trump family has dropped the “Made in the USA” label because it’s nearly impossible to build one here given the higher cost and lack of infrastructure to do so.

But, of course, you can claim to do it.

“Whether it is possible or not to build this phone in the US depends on what you consider ‘build,’” Jeronimo said. “If it’s a question of assembling components and targeting small volumes, I suppose it’s somehow possible. You can always get the components from China and assemble them by hand somewhere.”

“You’re going to have phones that are made right here in the United States of America,” said Trump’s son Eric to Fox News recently, adding, “It’s about time we bring products back to our great country.”

The Trump family has flown the American flag before with Trump-branded products of suspicious origin, including its “God Bless the USA” Bibles, which an Associated Press investigation last year showed were printed in China.

The Trump phone is part of a bigger family mobile business plan designed to tap into MAGA enthusiasm for the president. The two sons running the business, Eric and Don Jr., announced earlier this month that they would offer mobile phone plans for $47.45 a month, a reference to their father’s status as the 45th and 47th president. The call center, they said, will be in the U.S., too.

“You’re not calling up call centers in Bangladesh,” Eric Trump said on Fox News. “We’re doing it out of St. Louis, Missouri.”

The new service has been blasted by government ethics experts for a conflict of interest, given that President Donald Trump oversees the Federal Communications Commission that regulates the business and is investigating phone service companies that are now Trump Mobile rivals.

Trump has also threatened to punish cell phone maker Apple, now a direct competitor, threatening to slap 25% tariffs on devices because of its plans to make most of its U.S. iPhones in India.

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PHILADELPHIA (AP) — The U.S. Federal Trade Commission is sending out the latest round of refunds to consumers it says were “tricked” into purchases they didn’t want from Fortnite maker Epic Games — and eligible players who haven’t been compensated yet still have time to apply.

According to an FTC went out in December 2024.

The refunds are part of a $520 million settlement that Epic agreed to pay back in 2022 — to address complaints revolving around children’s privacy and payment methods on its popular Fortnite video game. At the time, the FTC had alleged that the gaming giant used deceptive online design tactics to trick Fortnite players, including children, into making unintended purchases “based on the press of a single button.”

Consumers could be charged while doing something as simple as attempting the wake the game from sleep mode, for example, or by pressing a nearby button when trying to preview an item, the agency said. The FTC also accused Epic of blocking some users who disputed the charges from accessing the content they purchased.

Beyond a $275 million fine related to collecting personal information for players under the age of 13, the settlement included $245 million in customer refunds. Between December’s payments and the refunds sent out this week, about $198 million of that has been sent out — leaving roughly $47 million left to be distributed.

The latest refunds, which come in the form of checks or PayPal payments, are being doled out to consumers who filed a valid claim before Feb. 14 — meaning that any claims filed after that date are still under review, . And eligible consumers who have not been compensated yet still have until July 9 to file a claim, the FTC noted Wednesday.

To file for a claim and learn more about the settlement, users . People who are eligible for these payouts include Fortnite players who were charged in-game currency for items they didn’t want or saw their account locked after complaining to a credit card company about wrongful charges between January 2017 and September 2022 — as well as parents whose kids made charges on their credit cards without their knowledge from January 2018 through November 2018.

The Associated Press reached out to Epic for comment on Thursday. At the time the settlement was announced in December 2022, Epic it accepted the agreement because it wanted “to be at the forefront of consumer protection and provide the best experience for our players.” The Cary, North Carolina-based company added that it was already rolling out changes “to ensure our ecosystem meets the expectations of our players and regulators, which we hope will be a helpful guide for others in our industry.”

CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. (AP) — The first astronauts in more than 40 years from India, Poland and Hungary arrived at the International Space Station on Thursday, ferried there by SpaceX on a private flight.

The crew of four will spend two weeks at the orbiting lab, performing dozens of experiments. They launched Wednesday from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center.

America’s most experienced astronaut, Peggy Whitson, is the commander of the visiting crew. She works for Axiom Space, the Houston company that arranged the chartered flight.

Besides Whitson, the crew includes India’s Shubhanshu Shukla, a pilot in the Indian Air Force; Hungary’s Tibor Kapu, a mechanical engineer; and Poland’s Slawosz Uznanski-Wisniewski, a radiation expert and one of the European Space Agency’s project astronauts on temporary flight duty.

No one has ever visited the International Space Station from those countries before. In fact, the last time anyone rocketed into orbit from those countries was in the late 1970s and 1980s, traveling with the Soviets.

It’s the fourth Axiom-sponsored flight to the space station since 2022. The company is one of several that are developing their own space stations due to launch in the coming years.

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The Associated Press Health and Science Department receives support from the Howard Hughes Medical Institute’s Department of Science Education and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content.

SOUTH HAVEN, Mich. (AP) — A group is ending a 20-year search for a plane that crashed into Lake Michigan in 1950, killing all 58 people on board, after sweeping the vast body of water using sonar technology and even getting support from an acclaimed adventure writer.

When Northwest Orient Flight 2501 crashed, it was the worst aviation disaster in U.S. history.

Valerie van Heest, executive director of the Michigan Shipwreck Association, said she has mixed feelings about ending the search, which began in 2004.

“It’s a hard thing to have to say because part of me feels like we have failed,” van Heest , “but we have done so much to keep memory of this accident and these victims at forefront that I feel like we’ve done better for them than if we’d found the wreckage.”

After covering 700 square miles (1,813 square kilometers) of Lake Michigan, Van Heest said scientists believe the plane broke up into pieces too small to be detected by side-scan sonar and likely “sunk into the muck” on the bottom.

The plane, a propeller-driven DC-4, left LaGuardia Airport in New York at night on June 23, 1950, with two stops planned on the route to Seattle. An intense storm suddenly appeared and the plane went down.

Debris and body parts washed ashore in South Haven, Michigan.

“We know this plane hit the water with great force, and we know there was no way to survive this,” said van Heest, who has about the mystery, “Fatal Crossing.”

Clive Cussler, an author whose adventure fiction has sold in the millions, financially supported a search until 2017. Also known for his own shipwreck hunting and underwater exploits, Cussler died in 2020.

“I hope someday the families of those lost will have closure,” Cussler wrote in 2018.

WASHINGTON (AP) — Hackers backing Tehran have targeted U.S. banks, defense contractors and oil industry companies following American strikes on Iranian nuclear facilities — but so far have not caused widespread disruptions to critical infrastructure or the economy.

But that could change if the ceasefire between Iran and Israel collapses or if independent hacking groups supporting Iran make good on promises to wage their own digital conflict against the U.S., analysts and cyber experts say.

The U.S. strikes could even prompt Iran, Russia, China and North Korea to double down on investments in cyberwarfare, according to Arnie Bellini, a tech entrepreneur and investor.

Bellini noted that hacking operations are much cheaper than bullets, planes or nuclear arms — what defense analysts call kinetic warfare. America may be militarily dominant, he said, but its reliance on digital technology poses a vulnerability.

“We just showed the world: You don’t want to mess with us kinetically,” said Bellini, CEO of Bellini Capital. “But we are wide open digitally. We are like Swiss cheese.”

Hackers have hit banks and defense contractors

Two pro-Palestinian hacking groups claimed they targeted more than a dozen aviation firms, banks and oil companies following the U.S. strikes over the weekend.

The hackers detailed their work in a post on the Telegram messaging service and urged other hackers to follow their lead, according to researchers at the SITE Intelligence Group, which tracks the groups’ activity.

The attacks were denial-of-service attacks, in which a hacker tries to disrupt a website or online network.

“We increase attacks from today,” one of the hacker groups, known as Mysterious Team, posted Monday.

Federal authorities say they are on guard for additional attempts by hackers to penetrate U.S. networks.

The Department of Homeland Security Sunday warning of increased Iranian cyber threats. The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency issued a statement Tuesday urging organizations that operate critical infrastructure like water systems, pipelines or power plants to stay vigilant.

While it lacks the technical abilities of China or Russia, Iran has long been known as a “chaos agent” when it comes to using cyberattacks to steal secrets, score political points or frighten opponents.

Cyberattacks mounted by Iran’s government may end if the ceasefire holds and Tehran looks to avoid another confrontation with the U.S. But hacker groups could still retaliate on Iran’s behalf.

In some cases, these groups have ties to military or intelligence agencies. In other cases, they act entirely independently. More than 60 such groups have been identified by researchers at the security firm Trustwave.

These hackers can inflict significant economic and psychological blows. Following Hamas’ Oct. 7, 2023, attack on Israel, for instance, hackers penetrated an emergency alert app used by some Israelis and directed it to inform users that a nuclear missile was incoming.

“It causes an immediate psychological impact,” said Ziv Mador, vice president of security research at Trustwave’s SpiderLabs, which tracks cyberthreats.

Economic disruption, confusion and fear are all the goals of such operations, said Mador, who is based in Israel. “We saw the same thing in Russia-Ukraine.”

Collecting intelligence is another aim for hackers

While Iran lacks the cyberwarfare capabilities of China or Russia, it has repeatedly tried to use its more modest operations to try to spy on foreign leaders — something national security experts predict Tehran is almost certain to try again as it seeks to suss out President Donald Trump’s next moves.

Last year, federal authorities charged three Iranian operatives with trying to hack Trump’s presidential campaign. It would be wrong to assume Iran has given up those efforts, according to Jake Williams, a former National Security Agency cybersecurity expert who is now vice president of research and development at Hunter Strategy, a Washington-based cybersecurity firm.

“It’s fairly certain that these limited resources are being used for intelligence collection to understand what Israel or the U.S. might be planning next, rather than performing destructive attacks against U.S. commercial organizations,” Williams said.

The Trump administration has cut cybersecurity programs and staff

Calls to bolster America’s digital defense come as the Trump administration has moved to slash some cybersecurity programs as part of its effort to shrink the size of government.

CISA has placed staffers who worked on election security on leave and cut millions of dollars in funding for cybersecurity programs for local and state elections.

The CIA, NSA and other intelligence agencies also have seen reductions in staffing. Trump abruptly fired Gen. Timothy Haugh, who oversaw the NSA and the Pentagon’s Cyber Command.

The Israel-Iran conflict shows the value of investments in cybersecurity and cyber offense, Mador said. He said Israel’s strikes on Iran, which included attacks on nuclear scientists, required sophisticated cyberespionage that allowed Israel to track its targets.

Expanding America’s cyber defenses will require investments in education as well as technical fixes to ensure connected devices or networks aren’t vulnerable, said Bellini, who recently contributed $40 million toward a new cybersecurity center at the University of South Florida.

There is a new arms race when it comes to cyberwar, Bellini said, and it’s a contest America can’t afford to lose.

“It’s Wile E. Coyote vs. the Road Runner,” Bellini said. “It will go back and forth, and it will never end.”

For her 6th grade honors class, math teacher Ana Sepúlveda wanted to make geometry fun. She figured her students “who live and breathe soccer” would be interested to learn how mathematical concepts apply to the sport. She asked ChatGPT for help.

Within seconds, the chatbot delivered a five-page lesson plan, even offering a theme: “Geometry is everywhere in soccer — on the field, in the ball, and even in the design of stadiums!”

It explained the place of shapes and angles on a soccer field. It suggested classroom conversation starters: Why are those shapes important to the game? It proposed a project for students to design their own soccer field or stadium using rulers and protractors.

“Using AI has been a game changer for me,” said Sepúlveda, who teaches at a dual language school in Dallas and has ChatGPT translate everything into Spanish. “It’s helping me with lesson planning, communicating with parents and increasing student engagement.”

Across the country, artificial intelligence tools are changing the teaching profession as educators use them to help write quizzes and worksheets, design lessons, assist with grading and reduce paperwork. By freeing up their time, many say the technology has made them better at their jobs.

A poll released Wednesday by Gallup and the Walton Family Foundation found 6 in 10 U.S. teachers working in K-12 public schools used AI tools for their work over the past school year, with heavier use among high school educators and early-career teachers. It surveyed more than 2,000 teachers nationwide in April.

Respondents who use AI tools weekly estimate they save them about six hours a week, suggesting the technology could help alleviate teacher burnout, said Gallup research consultant Andrea Malek Ash, who authored the report.

States are issuing guidelines for using AI tools in classrooms

As schools navigate concerns over student abuse of the technology, some are also are introducing guidelines and training for educators so teachers are aware of avoiding shortcuts that shortchange students.

About two dozen states have state-level AI guidance for schools, but the extent to which it is applied by schools and teachers is uneven, says Maya Israel, an associate professor of educational technology and computer science education at the University of Florida.

“We want to make sure that AI isn’t replacing the judgment of a teacher,” Israel said.

If teachers are using chatbots for grading they should be aware the tools are good for “low-level” grading like multiple choice tests but less effective when nuance is required. There should be a way for students to alert teachers if the grading is too harsh or inconsistent, and the final grading decision needs to remain with the educator, she said.

About 8 in 10 teachers who use AI tools say it saves them time on work tasks like making worksheets, assessments, quizzes or on administrative work. And about 6 in 10 teachers who use AI tools said they are improving the quality of their work when it comes to modifying student materials, or giving student feedback.

“AI has transformed how I teach. It’s also transformed my weekends and given me a better work-life balance,” said Mary McCarthy, a high school social studies teacher in the Houston area who has used AI tools for help with lesson plans and other tasks.

McCarthy said training she received from her school district on AI tools has helped her model proper use for her students.

“If I’m on the soapbox of, ‘AI is bad and kids are going to get dumb,’ well yeah if we don’t teach them how to use the tool,” said McCarthy. “It feels like my responsibility as the adult in the room to help them figure out how to navigate this future.”

Teachers say the technology is best used sparingly

Views on the role of artificial intelligence in education have shifted dramatically since ChatGPT launched in late 2022. Schools around the country initially banned it, but since then many have sought ways to incorporate it into classrooms. Concerns about student overuse and misuse are still prevalent: About half of teachers worry that student use of AI will decrease teens’ ability to think critically and independently or to have persistence when problem solving, according to the study.

One benefit teachers see in becoming more familiar with artificial intelligence is the ability to spot when students are overusing it.

Clues that assignments are written by AI tools include an absence of grammatical errors and complex phrases in writing, said Colorado high school English teacher Darren Barkett. He said he relies on ChatGPT himself to create lesson plans and grade multiple choice tests and essays.

In suburban Chicago, middle school art teacher Lindsay Johnson said she uses only AI programs vetted by her school and deemed safe to use with minors, for data privacy and other concerns. To ensure students feel confident in their skills, she said she brings the technology in only for later stages of projects.

For her 8th graders’ final assessment, Johnson asked them to make a portrait of an influential person in their lives. After students put final touches on their subject’s face, Johnson introduced generative AI for those who wanted help designing the background. She used an AI tool within Canva, after checking with her district’s IT department that the design software passed its privacy screener.

“As an art teacher my goal is to let them know the different tools that are out there and to teach them how those tools work,” she said. Some students weren’t interested in the help. “Half the class said, ‘I’ve got a vision, and am going to keep going with it.’”

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The Associated Press’ education coverage receives financial support from multiple private foundations. AP is solely responsible for all content. Find AP’s for working with philanthropies, a of supporters and funded coverage areas at AP.org.

In a test case for the artificial intelligence industry, a federal judge has ruled that AI company Anthropic didn’t break the law by training its chatbot Claude on millions of copyrighted books.

But the company is still on the hook and could now go to trial over how it acquired those books by downloading them from online “shadow libraries” of pirated copies.

U.S. District Judge William Alsup of San Francisco said in a ruling filed late Monday that the AI system’s distilling from thousands of written works to be able to produce its own passages of text qualified as “fair use” under U.S. copyright law because it was “quintessentially transformative.”

“Like any reader aspiring to be a writer, Anthropic’s (AI large language models) trained upon works not to race ahead and replicate or supplant them — but to turn a hard corner and create something different,” Alsup wrote.

But while dismissing the key copyright infringement claim made by the group of authors who sued the company last year, Alsup also said Anthropic must still go to trial over its alleged theft of their works.

“Anthropic had no entitlement to use pirated copies for its central library,” Alsup wrote.

A trio of writers — Andrea Bartz, Charles Graeber and Kirk Wallace Johnson — alleged in their lawsuit last summer that Anthropic committed “large-scale theft” by allegedly training its popular chatbot Claude on pirated copies of copyrighted books, and that the company “seeks to profit from strip-mining the human expression and ingenuity behind each one of those works.”

As the case proceeded over the past year in San Francisco’s federal court, documents disclosed in court showed Anthropic’s internal concerns about the legality of their use of online repositories of pirated works. So the company later shifted its approach and attempted to purchase copies of digitized books.

“That Anthropic later bought a copy of a book it earlier stole off the internet will not absolve it of liability for the theft but it may affect the extent of statutory damages,” Alsup wrote.

The ruling could set a precedent for similar lawsuits that have piled up against Anthropic competitor OpenAI, maker of ChatGPT, as well as against Meta Platforms, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram.

Anthropic — founded by ex-OpenAI leaders in 2021 — has marketed itself as the more responsible and safety-focused developer of generative AI models that can compose emails, summarize documents and interact with people in a natural way.

But the lawsuit filed last year alleged that Anthropic’s actions “have made a mockery of its lofty goals” by tapping into repositories of pirated writings to build its AI product.

NEW YORK (AP) — Six months ago, Jennifer Rubin had no idea whether she’d make it in a new media world. She just knew it was time to leave The Washington Post, where she’d been a political columnist for 15 years.

, the democracy-focused website that Rubin founded with partner Norm Eisen in January, now has 10 employees and contributors like humorist Andy Borowitz and White House reporter April Ryan. Its 558,000 subscribers also get recipes and culture dispatches.

In the blink of an eye, Rubin became a independent news entrepreneur. “I think we hit a moment, just after inauguration, when people were looking for something different and it has captured people’s imaginations,” she says. “We’ve been having a ball with it.”

YouTube, Substack, TikTok and others are spearheading a full-scale democratization of media and a generation of new voices and influencers. But don’t forget the traditionalists. Rubin’s experience shows how this world offers a lifeline to many at struggling legacy outlets who wanted — or were forced — to strike out on their own.

Tough business realities, changing consumer tastes

The realities of business and changing consumer tastes are both driving forces.

YouTube claims more than 1 billion monthly podcast views, and a recent list of its top 100 shows featured seven refugees from legacy media and six shows made by current broadcasters. Substack, which launched in 2017 and added live video in January, has more than doubled its number of paid subscribers to participating content creators to 5 million in less than two years.

Almost immediately after he was cut loose by ABC News on June 10 for an anti-Trump tweet, Terry Moran headed for Substack. Two former hosts of NBC’s “Today” show — Katie Couric and Hoda Kotb — announced new media ventures on the same day last month.

“I think you’ve seen, really in the last six months for some reason, this whole space explode with people who are understanding that this is a really important way to convey information,” says Couric, who’s been running her own media company with newsletters, interviews and a podcast since 2017 and recently joined Substack.

Among the most successful to make transitions are Bari Weiss, the former New York Times writer whose celebrates independent thought, the anti-Trump Republicans at and ex-MSNBC host Mehdi Hasan, who champions “adversarial journalism” on .

Television news essentially left for dead after her switch from Fox News to NBC went bust. She launched a podcast in 2020, at first audio only, and SiriusXM picked it up as a daily radio show. She added video for YouTube in 2021, and gets more than 100 million viewers a month for commentary and newsmaker interviews.

This year, Kelly launched her own company, MK Media, with shows hosted by Mark Halperin, Maureen Callahan and Link Lauren.

While they thrive, the prospect of layoffs, audiences that are aging and becoming smaller and constant worry about disappearing revenue sources are a way of life for legacy media. Moving to independent media is still not an easy decision.

Taking a deep breath, and making the leap

“If I’m going to jump off a cliff, is there water or not?” former “Meet the Press” moderator Chuck Todd says. “I didn’t know until . Everybody told me there would be water. But you don’t know for sure until you jump.”

It takes some adjustment — “At first I was like, ‘do you know who I used to be?’” Couric jokes — but some who have made the jump appreciate the nimbleness and flexibility of new formats and say news subjects often respond to the atmosphere with franker, more expansive interviews.

Jim Acosta, who traded a CNN anchor desk for a video podcast he does from his home after deciding not to make a move he considered a demotion, says he’s been surprised at the quality of guests he’s been able to corral — people like Hakeem Jefferies, Pete Buttigieg and Sean Penn.

Many podcasters succeed because they communicate authenticity, former Washington Post editor Marty Baron said in an interview at the George W. Bush Presidential Center. Traditional journalists trade on authority at a time people don’t trust institutions anymore, he said.

Couric has seen it in some of the feedback she gets from subscribers.

“There’s some disenchantment with legacy media,” she says. “There are certainly some people who are frustrated by the capitulation of some networks to the administration, and I think there’s a sense that when you’re involved in mainstream media that you may be holding back or there may be executives who are putting pressure on you.”

Is there an audience — and money — on the other side?

Substack says that more than 50 people are earning more than $1 million annually on its platform. More than 50,000 of its publishers make money, but since the company won’t give a total of how many people produce content for the platform, it’s impossible to get a sense of the odds of success.

Alisyn Camerota isn’t making money yet. The former CNN anchor left the broadcaster after she sensed her time there was running out. Blessed with a financial cushion, she’s relishing the chance to create something new.

She records , “Sanity,” from her basement in Connecticut. A former Fox colleague who lives nearby, Dave Briggs, joins to talk about the news. “It’s harder than you think in terms of having to DIY a lot of this,” Camerota says, “but it’s very freeing.”

Different people on the platform have different price points; some publishers put everything they do behind a pay wall, others only some. Acosta offers content for free, but people need to pay to comment or discuss. Zeteo charges $12 a month or $72 a year, with a $500 “founding member” yearly fee that offers access to Mehdi.

The danger for independent journalists is a market reaching a saturation point. People already stress over how many streaming services they can afford for entertainment. There’s surely a limit to how many journalists they will pay for, too.

“I hope to make a living at this,” Acosta says. “We’ll see how it goes. This is a bit of an experiment. I think it’s a valuable one because the stakes are so high right now.”

A strong point of view is one route to success

To succeed in independent media, people need a strong work work ethic, self-motivation and an ability to pivot quickly to deal with changing markets, says Chris Balfe, founder of . He has created a thriving business ushering conservative media figures into the new world, including Kelly, Bill O’Reilly, Tucker Carlson and Piers Morgan.

Balfe’s clients all have strong opinions. That’s a plus for consumers who want to hear their viewpoints reflected back at them.

“I think you need a point of view and a purpose,” Rubin says. “Once you have that, it helps you to organize your thinking and your selections. You’re not going to be all things to all people.”

That’s one of the things that concerns Acosta and Todd. They’re looser, and they certainly say what they think more than they felt free to do on television; a on June 17, while appearing on Rubin’s podcast, about Trump marrying immigrants was criticized as “distasteful” by the White House. But at heart, they consider themselves reporters and not commentators. Is there enough room for people like them?

Todd has a podcast, a weekly interview show on the new platform Noosphere and is looking to build on an interest in improving the fortunes of local news. He believes that opinion can help someone build an audience quickly but may ultimately limit growth.

As Rubin did, they will find out soon enough.

“As it turned out,” she says, “what was on the other side was much more exciting and successful and absorbing than I could ever have imagined.”

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David Bauder writes about the intersection of media and entertainment for the AP. Follow him at and .

Waymo’s robotaxis will begin carrying passengers through parts of Atlanta on Tuesday in an expansion of a partnership with Uber that began earlier this year in Austin.

Waymo’s driverless march into Atlanta comes just days after Tesla finally launched a limited robotaxi service in Austin, more than five years after CEO Elon Musk brashly promised the electric automaker would quickly overtake Waymo as the leader in autonomous driving technology. Unlike Waymo’s robotaxis, Tesla is initially placing a human in the passenger seat of its rival service to take over the vehicle if something goes wrong.

While Tesla is starting with about a dozen supervised robotaxis, Waymo and Uber have dispatched about 100 completely driverless vehicles in Austin less than four months after their partnership began. The expansion into Atlanta keeps the two companies aligned with a road map they laid out last September.

As has been the case in Austin, Waymo’s robotaxis in Atlanta will be dispatched through Uber’s app. Uber will give customers a choice to request a car operated by a human if they don’t want to take a driverless ride. The robotaxis will initially cover a 65-square-mile (168,00-square-kilometers) area within the Atlanta market before expanding to a larger stretch.

Waymo’s own ride-hailing app is available in Phoenix, Los Angeles and a steadily expanding swath of the San Francisco Bay Area. Factoring in its partnership with Uber, Waymo is currently providing more than 250,000 paid rides per week — making it the early frontrunner in the still-nascent robotaxi market.

But competition looms down the road as Musk continues to insist Tesla’s robotaxi service will be able to grow quickly and Amazon gears up to bring its Zoox driverless cabs to Las Vegas later this year — with plans to expand into San Francisco next year. Zoox is also aiming to bring its robotaxi service to Atlanta, although it hasn’t set a target date for that yet.

Uber once had ambitions to build robotaxis, but reversed course after a bruising legal battle with Waymo, which alleged the ride-hailing company stole its autonomous technology after poaching one of its engineers. After reaching a $245 million settlement with Waymo, Uber eventually sold its self-driving vehicle division following a 2018 crash that killed a pedestrian in Tempe, Arizona.

Uber then pivoted to robotaxi partnerships to remain competitive as driverless cabs reshape the ride-hailing market. “By integrating Waymo’s cutting-edge technology into the Uber platform, we’re continuing to make transportation more convenient, sustainable, and reliable,” said Sarfraz Maredia, who oversees Uber’s efforts in autonomous driving.

With in place around the world, Uber says it is on pace to make about 1.5 million annual driverless trips that either transport passengers or deliver food.

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — A budding partnership between OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and legendary iPhone designer Jony Ive to develop a new artificial intelligence hardware product has hit a legal snag after a federal judge ruled they must temporarily stop marketing the new venture.

OpenAI last month announced it was buying io Products, a product and engineering company co-founded by Ive, in a deal valued at nearly $6.5 billion.

But it quickly faced a trademark complaint from a startup with a similarly sounding name, IYO, which is also developing AI hardware that it had pitched to Altman’s personal investment firm and Ive’s design firm in 2022.

U.S. District Judge Trina Thompson ruled late Friday that IYO has a strong enough trademark infringement case to proceed to a hearing in October. Until then, she ordered Altman, Ive and OpenAI to refrain from “using the IYO mark, and any mark confusingly similar thereto, including the IO mark in connection with the marketing or sale of related products.”

OpenAI responded by scrubbing its website of mentions of the new venture, including a web page of the May 21 announcement.

In its place, the company had a message Monday that said the page “is temporarily down due to a court order” and added: “We don’t agree with the complaint and are reviewing our options.”

IYO CEO Jason Rugolo applauded the ruling Monday in a written statement that said the startup will aggressively protect its brand and tech investments.

“IYO will not roll over and let Sam and Jony trample on our rights, no matter how rich and famous they are,” Rugolo said.

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The Associated Press and OpenAI have a licensing and technology agreement that allows OpenAI access to part of AP’s text archives.