Look there, in the skies over Lithuania! It’s a bird, it’s a plane, it’s… a balloon from Belarus carrying contraband cigarettes? This story is more than just hot air, as hundreds of the deviant dirigibles have wafted across the border in recent weeks, forcing the closure of Lithuania’s main airport and flight cancellations affecting tens of thousands of passengers. Lithuania’s government has imposed a state of emergency, saying the balloons are part of an ongoing campaign from Belarus and Russia of low-level, high-troll “hybrid warfare” against EU and NATO countries. Looks like that planned European “drone wall” can’t go up soon enough. In the meantime, it’s raining loosies in Lithuania!
The White House granted Nvidia permission on Monday to sell its H200 chip – the company’s second-most powerful AI semiconductor – to China, in exchange for the US getting a “cut” of the revenues. The move is in line with President Donald Trump’s suggestion last month that the US should start allowing Beijing to buy them again. Why would the US allow its main tech rival to buy some of its most advanced hardware? To make Beijing dependent on the US, goes the thinking. But there’s just one problem: China doesn’t want the chips, and may not even need them. Beijing is limiting companies’ ability to purchase them. Why? China claims that its domestic industries already have designed chips of similar quality.
Australia today is implementing a first-of-its-kind social media ban for users under 16 years old. The move is meant to mitigate the harmful effects of early social media use on kids’ mental health. Big tech firms are unsurprisingly against the ban, arguing that it’s logistically unfeasible, anti-free speech, and could inspire similar laws globally. Former Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel, a potential 2028 US presidential hopeful,is already saying that Washington should follow Australia’s lead. But for a domino effect of that kind to occur in other countries, Australia will need to prove two things: first, that it can actually keep the kids off these apps, and second, that the ban has had measurably positive effects on adolescents’ mental and academic wellbeing. Do you think kids should be banned from social media? Let us know here.
At the Munich Security Conference, the mood is clear: Europe no longer assumes the United States will lead. In this Quick Take, Ian Bremmer reports from Munich, where this year’s theme, “Under Destruction,” reflects growing anxiety that the US itself is destabilizing the transatlantic alliance it once anchored.
As more small businesses move sales, payments, and customer relationships online, they unlock new opportunities, but they also become easier targets for cyber-criminals and other threat actors.
When Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi called snap elections last month, it was a big gamble. Holding a winter election just four months into her tenure with no real policy record to run on?