Weekly Review 28 August 2026

Some interesting links that I Tweeted about in the last week (I also post these on Mastodon, Threads, Newsmast, and Bluesky):

1. While current AI-based attacks are easy to detect, they are improving and becoming more stealthy: https://www.techtarget.com/cybersecurity/news/366649579/AI-attacks-lack-stealth-nation-state-actors-are-changing-that
2. One in three webpages published since 2022 have AI generated content: https://www.extremetech.com/internet/ai-slop-found-in-over-a-third-of-new-web-pages
3. AI makes code faster to create but slower to verify-so overall gain in efficiency is close to zero: https://www.informationweek.com/software-services/ai-coding-is-creating-a-new-software-bottleneck
4. The oldest book in my library is from around 1902, it makes me sad to think that AI companies would happily destroy it after scanning it: https://www.theregister.com/ai-and-ml/2026/08/21/ai-companies-are-burning-books-advocates-complain-to-ftc/5291299
5. AI is destroying students' ability to learn: https://futurism.com/artificial-intelligence/results-high-school-students-ai
6. AI companies have a real PR problem: https://futurism.com/future-society/ai-industry-fumbled-public-image
7. At this point I suspect we will need legislation, such that AI cannot be allowed to create AI: https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2026/aug/22/ai-disaster-hiroshima-humankind-silicon-valley-technology
8. Listening to an AI reasoning can make people more confidently wrong: https://www.computerworld.com/article/4211682/when-ai-explains-its-decision-humans-may-stop-thinking-independently-2.html
9. The future of AI code generation is agent swarms: https://spectrum.ieee.org/amd-agent-swarms
10. Time for a conversation about what we do if AI really are conscious: https://www.stuff.co.nz/world-news/361021296/ai-might-be-conscious-how-we-respond-may-be-most-important-thing-we-do-species
11. Three different pathways for entering a career in AI: https://www.kdnuggets.com/how-to-build-a-career-in-ai-3-distinct-pathways
12. More instances of AI-generated security breaches: https://www.theregister.com/security/2026/08/19/not-a-theoretical-risk-feds-warn-as-attackers-use-ai-made-code-to-hack-critical-infrastructure-controllers/5289960
13. Five ways AI agents have been used in the real world: https://www.kdnuggets.com/5-real-world-use-cases-for-ai-agents-transforming-industries
14. The developers of speech recognition AI seem to struggle with the concept of accents. Especially in Yorkshire: https://www.theguardian.com/society/2026/aug/20/yorkshire-rotherham-ai-gp-receptionist-cannot-understand-accent
15. Hoping that including humans in the loop will prevent AI from going rogue is a bit of a dream: https://www.techtarget.com/cybersecurity/news/366649417/AI-agent-security-must-move-beyond-human-in-the-loop-experts-say
16. An AI chatbot is not a romantic partner, it's just code: https://www.rnz.co.nz/life/relationships/love-and-sex/is-having-a-romantic-ai-companion-cheating-some-people-think-so
17. AI are getting better at proving theorems, but can still be fooled: https://spectrum.ieee.org/axiom-math-246-theorem-formalization
18. People in the creative industry are teaching AI how to replace them: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2026/aug/22/the-hollywood-creatives-training-ai-to-do-their-jobs
19. Huge volumes of AI slop exist, but people aren't buying it: https://futurism.com/artificial-intelligence/economy-ai-generated-value
20. More about AI being unable to understand the Yorkshire accent, which is leading to people not going to the doctors: https://futurism.com/artificial-intelligence/patients-skipping-doctor-ai-receptionist
21. When using AI to develop software, don't trust, verify: https://www.theregister.com/security/2026/08/20/ai-agent-suggested-installing-a-malware-package-engineer-almost-took-its-advice/5289849