Tech Brew Ride Home - Taking The Threat Seriously

Episode Date: April 10, 2026

The US government is taking the Anthropic warning seriously. Google is showing prediction markets alongside various search results. Europeans ARE beginning to decouple from US tech. Kicking the tires on SpaceX’s actual business. And, of course, the Weekend Longreads Suggestions. Anthropic Model Scare Sparks Urgent Bessent, Powell Warning to Bank CEOs (Bloomberg) Google rolls out Gmail end-to-end encryption on mobile devices (Bleeping Computer) Google News Now Prominently Featuring Polymarket Bets (Futurism) France to ditch Windows for Linux to reduce reliance on US tech (TechCrunch) YouTube Premium is getting pricier (The Verge) OpenAI Backs Bill That Would Limit Liability for AI-Enabled Mass Deaths or Financial Disasters (Wired) SpaceX Posted Nearly $5 Billion Loss Last Year from AI Spending (The Information) Weekend Longreads Suggestion: An Internet of Checkpoints (Longreads) Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

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with a custom color Xbox wireless controller. Learn more at Windows.com slash student offer. While supplies last, ends June 30th, turns at AKA.m.m.S. slash college PC. Welcome to the Tech Brew Ride Home for Friday, April 10th, 2026. I'm Brian McCullough today. The U.S. government is taking the Anthropic Warning seriously. Google is showing prediction markets alongside various search results. Europeans are beginning to decouple from U.S. Tech, kicking the tires on SpaceX's actual business. And of course, the week on Long Read Suggestions. Here's what you miss today in the

world of tech. There has been some chatter this week that, you know, what if that whole Anthropic is afraid to release a model because it might break all the software thing was really nothing more than a marketing stunt. Well, if it is a marketing stunt, these folks are taking it seriously, quoting Bloomberg. Treasury Secretary Scott Besant and Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell summoned Wall Street leaders to an urgent meeting on concerns that the latest artificial intelligence model from Anthropic PBC would usher in an era of greater cyber risk. Bessent and Powell assembled the group at Treasury's headquarters in Washington on Tuesday to make sure banks are aware of possible future risks raised by Anthropics' mythos and potential similar models,

and are taking precautions to defend their systems, according to people familiar with the matter who asked not to be identified, citing the private discussions. Many of the executives were in town already for a meeting of the Financial Services Forum, an advocacy group made up of the biggest lenders. A representative for the Treasury didn't immediately respond to a request for comment. A spokesperson for the Fed declined to comment as well. The previously unreported meeting arranged on short notice is another sign that regulators consider the possibility of a new breed of cyber attacks as one of the biggest risks facing the financial industry. All the banks summoned to the meeting are classified as systemically important by top regulators,

meaning their stability is a priority for the global financial system. Chief Executive Officers summoned to the meeting with the Fed and Treasury include city groups, Jane Fraser, Morgan Stanley's Ted Pick, Bank of Americas, Brian Moynihan, Wells Fargo's, Charlie Scharf, and Goldman Sachs, David Solomon, the people said. J.P. Morgan's Jamie Diamond was unable to attend, the people said. Spokespeople for the banks declined to comment, a representative for Anthropic had no immediate comment as well. In recent years, regulators have required banks to hold some capital tied to the potential for cyber attacks, as well as other so-called operational risks, such as Los

suits and rogue employees. Banks have sometimes chafed at those requirements, given that operational risk is more difficult to measure than the market and credit risks that also factor into bank's capital levels, end quote. Google is rolling out end-to-end encryption for Gmail on Android and iOS devices for enterprise users, letting them read and compose emails without additional tools, quoting bleeping computer. Starting this week, encrypted messages will be delivered as regular emails to Gmail recipients' inboxes if they use the Gmail app. Recipients who don't have the Gmail mobile app and use other email services can read them in a web browser regardless of the device and service they're using. For the first time, users can compose and read these

E2E messages natively within the Gmail app on Android and iOS. No need to download extra apps or use mail portals. Users with a Gmail E2E license can send an encrypted message to any recipient regardless of what email address the recipient has. Google announced on Thursday. This launch combines the highest level of privacy and data encryption with a user-friendly experience for all users, enabling simple encrypted email for all customers from small businesses to enterprises and public sectors.

This feature is now available for all client-side encryption users with Enterprise Plus licenses and the Assured Controls or Assured Controls Plus add-on after admins enabled the Android and iOS clients in the CSE admin interface. via the admin console. To send an end-to-end encrypted message, Gmail users have to turn on the additional encryption option by clicking the lock icon when writing the message. In October, Google also announced that Gmail enterprise users can now send end-to-end encrypted emails to recipients on any email service or platform. Gmail's end-to-end encryption feature is powered by the

client-side encryption CSE technical control, which allows Google workspace organizations to use encryption keys they control and are stored outside of Google servers to protect sensitive documents and emails. This way, the messages and attachments are encrypted on the client before being sent to Google servers, which helps meet regulatory requirements such as data sovereignty, HIPAA, and export controls by ensuring that Google and third parties can't read any of the data, end quote. Google News is now showing polymarket bets alongside news articles in the 4U section of that app In tests, polymarket bets also appeared on the Google News homepage, quoting Futurism. But links from the prediction market can pop up all over Google News, including in searches.

In further tests, looking up will ships transit the strait, the Strait, referring to the Strait of Hormuz, returned numerous credible sources like the Financial Times, the Guardian, and Reuters. Just below them, however, was a polymarket bet on the number of ships that would be allowed to pass through the critical oil passageway. This doesn't appear to be an accident. When searching Polymarket in its search bar, Google News now allows users to choose it as a source, directing them to a page that aggregates other Polymarket hits. And it's not the only non-news site that's selectable as a source. Looking up Reddit and X offers that option too. But searching for Kalshi, another prediction market and Polymarkets' main competitor, doesn't give the option to use it as a source. It's unclear when Polymarket bets began crowding Google News, but it appears to be a recent development. A handful of complaints on social media go back to around the same date in late March. Polymarket bets will also appear in the news section of a Google search, and at least one post reporting this goes back to January. Google did not respond to questions of comment by press time.

In November, the search giant announced a deal with Polymarket and Kalshi to feed their prediction data into its finance platform. It's unclear if Polymarkets' inclusion in Google News had anything to do with that partnership. Regardless, it's easy to see why Polymarket. Pollymarket would be catnip to Google's algorithms, since it generates huge numbers of pages for bets that are constantly updated in small ways, making them seem on surface level, at least like valuable news stories. The reality, though, is that Pollymarket has been criticized for dealing in the language of journalism while peddling wildly irresponsible falsehoods, end quote. Something I warned about last year

is apparently coming to pass, and this isn't the first story like this I've seen. France says it plans to move government computers running Windows to Linux to further reduce its reliance on U.S. technology without providing a timeline in terms of how and when it will do so. Quoting TechCrunch, in a statement, French minister David Amiel said that the effort was to regain control of our digital destiny by relying less on U.S. tech companies. Amiel said that the French government can no longer accept that it doesn't have control over its data and digital infrastructure. The French government did not provide a specific timeline for the switchover or which distributions it was considering. The switchover

will begin with computers at the French government's digital agency, Dinam. When reached by TechCrunch, a spokesperson for Microsoft did not comment on the news. This is the latest effort by France to reduce its dependence on U.S. tech giants and use technology and cloud services originated within its borders known as digital sovereignty, following growing instability and unpredictability on the part of the Trump administration. Lawmakers and government leaders across Europe are growing more aware of the looming threat facing them at home and their over-reliance on U.S. technology. In January, the European Parliament voted to adopt a report directing the European Commission to identify areas where the EU can reduce its reliance on foreign providers.

France's decision to ditch windows comes months after the government announced it would stop using Microsoft Teams for video conferencing in favor of French-made Vizio, a tool based on the open-source and to end-en-encrypted video meeting tool Jitzy. The French government said it also plans to migrate its health data platform to a new trusted platform by the end of the year, end quote. YouTube has raised YouTube premiums prices in the U.S. YouTube Lite is a dollar more at $8.99 a month. Individual is now $2 more at $15.99 per month, and the family version is $4 more at $26.99 per month. Quoting the verge. The new prices are live now. for new signups and 9 to 5 Google reports that existing subscribers are being notified about the

price hike via the following email. To continue delivering great service and features, we're increasing your price to $1599 a month. We don't make these decisions lightly, but this update will allow us to continue to improve premium and support the creators and artists you watch on YouTube. You will see the change reflected on your June 7th, 2026 billing date. The increase follows price hikes for both Netflix and Amazon Prime video last month. YouTube Premium last raised its U.S. prices in 2023, though many international users saw price increases in late 2024, end quote. Ambition comes in all shapes and sizes. At First Citizens Bank, we roll with your goals because we're built for what you're building. Fit for your ambition for Citizens Bank.

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Visit redbull.com slash bright summer ahead to learn more. See you this summer. Open AI is backing an Illinois bill shielding AI labs from liability even for critical harms. harms like more than 100 deaths or more than $100 billion in damage if they published safety reports, quoting Wired. The effort seems to mark a shift in OpenAI's legislative strategy. Until now, OpenAI has largely played defense opposing bills that would have made AI labs liable for their technologies harms. Several AI policy experts tell Wired that SB 3444, which could set a new standard for the industry is a more extreme measure than Bill's Open AI has supported in the past. The bill

would shield frontier AI developers from liability for critical harms caused by their frontier models as long as they did not intentionally or recklessly cause such an incident and have published safety, security, and transparency reports on their website. It defines a frontier model as any AI model trained using more than $100 million in computational costs, which likely could apply to America's largest AI labs like OpenAI, Google, XAI, and and meta. We support approaches like this because they focus on what matters most, reducing the risk of serious harm from the most advanced AI systems while still allowing this technology to get into the hands of the people and businesses small and big of Illinois, said OpenAI spokesperson Jamie

Redis in an emailed statement. They also help avoid a patchwork of state-by-state rules and move toward clearer, more constitutional standards, they said. Under its definition of critical harms, the bill lists a few common areas of concern for the AI industry, such as a bad actor using AI to create a chemical, biological, radiological, or nuclear weapon. If an AI model engages in conduct on its own that, if committed by a human, would constitute a criminal offense and leads to those extreme outcomes, that would also be a critical harm. If an AI model were to commit any of these actions under SB 3444, the AI lab behind the model, would not be held liable so long as it wasn't intentional and they published their reports. Federal and state legislatures in the U.S.

have yet to pass any laws specifically determining whether AI model developers like OpenAI could be liable for these types of harm caused by their technology. But as AI labs continue to release more powerful AI models that raise novel safety and cybersecurity challenges, such as Anthropics Claude Mythos, these questions feel increasingly prescient, end quote. As SpaceX preps for its IPO, we're going to get our first look under the hood, as it were, quoting the information. SpaceX lost just under $5 billion last year while generating more than $18.5 billion in revenue. Two people familiar with the figure said. SpaceX has closely guarded its financials as it prepares for what will likely be the largest

initial public offering of all time. The lost figure shows that investors who participate in the IPO will essentially be financing Elon Musk's unproven AI ambitions in order to get a piece of a high-performing commercial space and telecom firm. SpaceX spent heavily on chips and data centers to power XAI with capital expenditures for the division nearing $13 billion. That was 50% more capital spending than the rocket and satellite divisions combined. SpaceX's core businesses of selling rocket launch services to governments and companies, as well as selling its own Starlink satellite internet services, together generated nearly $8 billion in earnings before taxes, interest, depreciation, amortization, and stock-based compensation in 2025. The two space-related

divisions are intertwined, though, with most SpaceX launches of its Falcon 9 launches, carrying Starlink satellites rather than other companies' payloads. Overall, including its AI division, the company generated just over $6.5 billion in adjusted EBITDAB. SpaceX's depreciation of chips, rockets, and satellites was among its largest expenses, is topping 6.6 billion. Other large costs were stock-based compensation and interest expenses, which each neared $2 billion. For SpaceX Bulls, the company's allure is its dominance in the commercial space market where it sends by far the most payloads into space-lapping competitors. That could further its ability to catch up in the AI race in the coming years if it can bring down the cost

of launching solar power data centers into orbit, as Elon Musk has said he wants to do. SpaceX is hosting investor meetings this month and sending invitations to a two-day IPO sales pitch in Southern Texas and Tennessee, where it launches its new rocket and is building data centers as well, respectively, end quote. In the long reads this week, the mystery of a famous YouTube video, the video in question featured a pixelated forest scene from the 1995 game Donkey Kong Country 2 set to David Wise's ambient synth track, Stickerbush Symphony. The visuals were simple, green brambles, blue skies, scrolling clouds. But the real magic was in the comments section underneath. Thousands of

strangers started posting unguarded, deeply personal reflections about their lives. Many used the word checkpoint, borrowing from the video game parlance of a checkpoint, which is where you pause, or maybe after you beat a big boss. People wrote about career struggles, lost, love, housing dreams that felt out of reach and the general difficulty of keeping going, generally. The comment section had become an accidental confessional of sorts. The video was uploaded on April 26, 2012, by an anonymous user called Taya 777. It was their first upload ever. Taya never shared personal details, just periodically posted similar videos of retro game music and pixel art, a handful in 2012, over a dozen in 2013, a few more through 2014.

One final upload in September 2017, and then nothing. The channel sat quietly with a small subscriber base, but basically, you know, a dead and empty corner of the internet. Then in 2019, YouTube's recommendation algorithms did something unexpected. It began surfacing this obscure nearly decade-old video with a title written entirely in Japanese to thousands of new viewers whose browsing histories had nothing to do with retro gaming. people flooded the comments, many describing the experience of stumbling upon the video in almost spiritual terms, feeling the algorithm had guided them there for a reason. The writer of the piece I'm quoting from recalls spending an unknowable stretch of time scrolling through the stranger's stories and says the experience has stayed with them ever since, leaving them wondering where all those people ended up. Well, read on to find out a bit more about that,

and also about the story behind the person behind the video. This is from Longreeds itself. No weekend content for you this weekend, but if you want to check out part three of the Rad History series on the end of the Cold War, please do so. We're getting to the Berlin Wall falling. A listener who was born in East Germany got in touch and said, my take on the events was ringing true to them,

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