{"id":255786,"date":"2025-12-29T09:03:08","date_gmt":"2025-12-29T09:03:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/255786\/"},"modified":"2025-12-29T09:03:08","modified_gmt":"2025-12-29T09:03:08","slug":"china-bans-ai-powered-relatives-to-comfort-the-elderly-the-register","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/255786\/","title":{"rendered":"China bans AI-powered relatives to comfort the elderly \u2022 The Register"},"content":{"rendered":"

Asia In Brief China\u2019s Cyberspace Administration on Saturday posted<\/a> draft rules governing the behaviour of AI companions that prohibit using them to serve as friends for the elderly.<\/p>\n

The draft \u201cInterim Measures for the Administration of Humanized Interactive Services Based on Artificial Intelligence\u201d opens with a suggestion that China needs regulations to ensure the healthy development of AIs that \u201cengage in emotional interaction with humans.\u201d<\/p>\n

As is always the case with China\u2019s tech regulations, the draft calls for providers of companion AIs to ensure they are secure, don\u2019t expose users to fraud, encrypt data, and reflect core socialist values. It also includes a requirement for parental controls, and for protection of data that describes minors.<\/p>\n

One Article in the draft addresses how AI companions interact with the elderly:<\/p>\n

The draft also calls for AI companions to remind users they are not interacting with a human every two hours, and for providers of such systems to provide advance notice of outages.<\/p>\n

Also among the draft requirements are calls for \u201cmental health protection, emotional boundary guidance, and dependency risk warning, and should not use replacing social interaction, controlling users’ psychology, or inducing addiction as design goals.\u201d<\/p>\n

The draft also prohibits using data gathered during interaction with AI companies to train models.<\/p>\n

The Cyberspace Administration wants feedback on the draft by January 25th.<\/p>\n

Australia signs Google Cloud defence deal<\/p>\n

Australia\u2019s Department of Defence has tapped Google for an \u201cenhanced, secure and air-gapped hyperscale cloud capability.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cDefence will have access to advanced global cloud solutions to deliver key sovereign capabilities,\u201d states the department\u2019s announcement<\/a> of the deal. \u201cThe technology will support faster rollout of critical systems, ongoing upgrades and improved cooperation with international partners, while ensuring Australia retains control of critical Defence assets.\u201d<\/p>\n

Australia\u2019s government already has a deal<\/a> with AWS to operate three datacenters dedicated to government workloads, including information rated as the nation\u2019s \u201cmost classified data.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Department said the sensitivities of the Google deal mean it will \u201crefrain from providing further commentary \u2026 with all specific details remaining strictly confidential.\u201d<\/p>\n

JAXA blames rocket crash on engine misfire<\/p>\n

Japan\u2019s Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) has published<\/a> its initial analysis of the failed<\/a> launch of its H3 rocket last week.<\/p>\n

The agency found that when the rocket\u2019s fairing separated, pressure in a fuel tank fell. When the engine that used the fuel tank ignited, it produced around 80 percent of expected pressure.<\/p>\n

The rocket\u2019s second stage and payload therefore could not reach the intended orbit. The report suggests both fell into Earth\u2019s atmosphere and burned up safely.<\/p>\n

Huawei phones now 57 percent Chinese<\/p>\n

57 percent of components present in Huawei smartphones are now made in China, according to a product teardown reported<\/a> by Japanese outlet Nikkei.<\/p>\n

Working with Japanese teardown service Fomalhaut Techno Solutions, Nikkei analyzed the content of 2024\u2019s Mate 70 Pro and this year\u2019s Pura 80 Pro, and found 57 percent of components in both were made in China, and that those parts accounted for 60 percent of the phone\u2019s value.<\/p>\n

Nikkei reports that just 19 percent of components in Huawei\u2019s 2020 models came from China, rising to 32 percent in 2023.<\/p>\n

PNG to prosecute Starlink users<\/p>\n

Papua New Guinea\u2019s (PNG\u2019s) National Information & Communications Technology Authority has warned signatories to a petition calling for Starlink to be licensed for operations in the country that they risk prosecution.<\/p>\n

PNG is a rugged country with poor telecommunications infrastructure \u2013 a fine fit for Starlink\u2019s satellite broadband service. Local netizens have campaigned<\/a> for PNG to license Starlink, suggesting they email NICTA to express support for Starlink.<\/p>\n

On December 16th NICTA demanded<\/a> Starlink suspend services to the country.<\/p>\n

On Christmas Eve, NICTA published<\/a> a list of petitioners and warned \u201cIndividuals who have signed or participated in the petition may be regarded as potential offenders, and NICTA will not hesitate to pursue appropriate regulatory and legal action where non-compliance is established.\u201d<\/p>\n

Starlink has since ended service in PNG.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Asia In Brief China\u2019s Cyberspace Administration on Saturday posted draft rules governing the behaviour of AI companions that…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":255787,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[261],"tags":[291,289,290,18,19,17,82],"class_list":{"0":"post-255786","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-artificial-intelligence","8":"tag-ai","9":"tag-artificial-intelligence","10":"tag-artificialintelligence","11":"tag-eire","12":"tag-ie","13":"tag-ireland","14":"tag-technology"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@ie\/115802053222387424","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255786","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=255786"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/255786\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/255787"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=255786"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=255786"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=255786"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}