Category: Tech

Stock all/Shutterstock

Winter changes how we go about our lives, with shorter days and lower temperatures forcing us to spend more time indoors. This can lead us to recognize inefficiencies in our home, as well as boredom and even cabin fever. When you throw in the gauntlet of holiday festivities that close out one year and ring in the next, you’ve got plenty of good reason to ensure you have all of the right electronics on hand to survive the depths of winter.

Whether you’re hosting for the holidays or simply face stretches of difficult weather throughout the winter, Costco has a variety of electronics that can help you survive the season. The warehouse retailer stocks smart home products designed for winter challenges, including items like smart heaters and devices that can chip in during a power outage. Discounts are frequently available to Costco members, but you don’t have to be one to shop Costco’s online store, making it an accessible option for winter preparation.

We’ve gone through Costco’s inventory and selected some items we feel can be useful to have as the cold weather settles in. Our focus was on emergency preparedness, comfort around the house, and all-around convenience. At the end of this article, you can find more details on how we chose these products. For now, let’s dive into some Costco items that can make winter a little easier to get through.

Backup power

Yana Leonenko/Getty Images

Winter storms and strong winds bring a very real threat of power outages, especially if you live in neighborhoods with above-ground electrical wiring and plenty of large trees. One way to ensure your most important electronics remain up and running through the winter is with a portable power station. Unlike gas-powered generators, a portable power station is quiet and operable indoors. Having access to one will ensure important home electronics like refrigerators and space heaters remain in use during a power outage.

Costco has quite a few portable power stations to choose from. Larger options by top brands like Anker and EcoFlow can provide power for extended periods of time. A mid-level power station like the Anker Solix C1000X is worth considering if you’re looking for something a little more versatile. An option like the Solix C1000X provides enough power around the house, but also has enough portability to keep devices on while RVing or traveling for the holidays.

The downside is that portable power stations can be pretty expensive. The Solix C1000X goes for $750 at Costco, and larger, more powerful options will cost even more. But also among Costco’s inventory is the Jackery Explorer 300 Plus. We think it’s one Costco item that outshines other retailers in price since it’s just $230. It’s meant more for keeping smaller devices like laptops and phones charged up, but that can come in handy during a power outage.

Portable heater

Pixel-Shot/Shutterstock

In the depths of winter, central heating alone may not be enough to keep every nook and cranny of the house warm, which may be especially true if you live in an older home or apartment. A portable heater provides some targeted warmth and allows you to move some additional heat from one room to another. You could utilize a portable heater while working at your desk and easily move it to the bedroom when it’s time for bed.

Costco’s selection of heaters includes a Midea Dual-Flex heater and an Omniheat Digital Ceramic Personal Heater 2-pack. Both stand out as particularly good value and will be able to provide additional heat on particularly cold days. They also serve as emergency heating when paired with a portable power station, should a power outage happen to strike this winter.

Portable electric heaters use a lot of electricity, which can add to your electric bill if you keep one running pretty regularly throughout the winter. You should also be aware of their placement, keeping them away from curtains, blankets, and furniture to avoid accidental fires. Since portable heaters can’t be left unattended, they lack smart home integrations and should only be plugged into smart plugs that can handle their intense electrical current. These models we suggest, however, have a built-in timer and an eco mode that give them smart-like features. But remember, space heaters aren’t meant to be a replacement for your home’s heating system.

Smart lighting

Gorodenkoff/Getty Images

With the sun setting earlier than during the rest of the year, lighting around the house is important in the winter. Smart lighting gives you control of the brightness and ambience of your home, typically through a mobile app that will let you do so right from your recliner. Smart light bulbs can provide you with the ability to change the color temperature throughout the day, so you can set your lamps and other lighting to cooler tones in the morning and warmer tones for quiet, relaxing evenings.

But Costco’s smart lighting section features more than just smart bulbs. You can find items like recessed downlights, ceiling fans with integrated LED smart lights, string lighting, and even outlet covers with built-in lighting. Outdoor lighting is also in the inventory, with a 4-pack of Feit path lights standing out as a way to keep your sidewalks visible, even when it snows. Because many smart lights can change colors, many of these products can also help set a more festive palette for entertaining during the holidays.

Smart lighting can come with some complications, especially if you aren’t particularly tech-literate. You’ll need a stable Wi-Fi connection to control the lights with your smartphone, and setting everything up for the first time can take a little know-how. Additionally, smart light bulbs are more expensive than their traditional LED counterparts, with a 6-pack of 60-watt LEDs going for about $13, and a 4-pack of Feit Electric smart bulbs costing $25.

Smart humidifier

alina_stor/Shutterstock

Winter air is notoriously dry, and running your heating system can add to the aridness in your home. A humidifier adds moisture back into the air, making the environment more comfortable during the coldest months of the year. Smart humidifiers add convenience to the process, letting you monitor and adjust humidity levels from your phone, set operating schedules that align with yours, and receive notifications when the water tank needs to be filled.

Costco has a lot of standard humidifiers available to shop, and they include brands like Dreo and Homedics. On the smart humidifier side of the aisle, the Vornado Energy Smart Evaporative 2G Humidifier is only available through Costco’s online store, and it’s priced at $80. The most premium option available is the Blueair DreamWell Humidifier. It’s priced at $140 and includes a BPA-free, dishwasher-safe tank that makes cleaning the humidifier more convenient.

Cleanliness is something you’ll want to stay on top of if you decide to purchase a humidifier. Refilling the tank from time to time doesn’t take much effort, but you will want to ensure you keep other components clean in order to prevent mold and bacteria from collecting. Smart humidifiers like the Blueair DreamWell, however, are designed for easy maintenance and to accommodate the cleaning process.

Batteries

Kinek00/Shutterstock

With winter pushing us indoors for longer stretches, we’re going to have plenty of time to put our electronics to use. This offers plenty of reason to stock up on batteries, as our streaming remotes, wireless keyboards and mice, and battery-powered holiday gifts are likely to be put through their paces. It’s also good to have a stockpile of batteries in the event of a power outage, as you may need to lean on flashlights and radios for short periods of time.

You can find just about every kind of alkaline battery in Costco’s inventory. For those who want to stock up at the best prices Costco has to offer, Kirkland Signature AA batteries and AAA batteries are available in 48-count packs that cost $16 apiece. Costco also carries Duracell batteries in AA, AAA, C, D, and 9-volt packs.

Alkaline batteries do have some limitations. They can’t recharge once they’ve been drained, and with so many devices now having rechargeable batteries built right in, there aren’t as many opportunities to put a good, old-fashioned set of AAAs to use. But there are still smoke detectors, TV remotes, and plenty of toys that run on replaceable batteries, and it can’t hurt to have some tucked away in a drawer for when such things inevitably run out of power.

How we selected products for winter preparation

Edgar Lee Espe/Shutterstock

Costco has a wide range of products that can help you get through the winter, including ice scrapers and warm winter clothes. Here, however, our focus was on tracking down electronics that can chip in to make your winter more manageable. Keeping owners comfortable and safe at home topped our list of criteria. Our more specific recommendations within each broader category were made based upon brand recognition and reputation, as well as pricing and the product’s availability to non-Costco members.

Source

Among the interesting discussions taking place during this year’s annual UKISUG conference was how much SAP customisation is actually needed, and how to move into the SAP cloud. Like many companies, Radisson Hotel Group has been on a journey to migrate from a legacy SAP system to a more modern platform.

But unlike many organisations, the firm has had to deal with significant geopolitical disruption.

The company was forced to sell its US business during Donald Trump’s first term, when the US administration ordered it to cease operations, and in 2022, Choice Hotels International announced it had completed the acquisition of the franchise business, operations and intellectual property of Radisson Hotels Americas from Radisson Hotel Group for approximately $675m.

The company had previously used the time its hotels were closed during the Covid-19 pandemic to refresh its enterprise IT. “During the pandemic, Radisson had closed all its properties,” said Carlos Violero, head of SAP platforms at Radisson. “But it was investing as much as it could to be ready post-pandemic.”

He said everyone was working remotely to update the company’s legacy SAP system.

Then, there was a major setback with the US presidential mandate, which forced Radisson Hotel Group to offload its US operations. However, unlike the sharing of information through a due diligence process, which is required during normal mergers and acquisitions, the US was not allowed to divulge any information with the Chinese-owned hotel business unless it had been approved by the US National Security Agency (NSA).

“One of the main challenges for us was the separation from the US business,” said Violero, adding that the process involved understanding the US setup to build out the Radisson SAP-based enterprise system. 

But access to the US setup was effectively off-limits. “There was a guy in every single meeting from the NSA, who basically listened to us and told the US IT team what they could and could not tell us,” said Violero. “It was like being in a movie. It was a really exciting moment because you were working with someone in the room who is not allowing you to say anything because you work for a Chinese company, and it’s part of the NSA agreement.”

This meant the Radisson team was unable to access the IT environment to discover how it was built, the way it worked and its configuration. These things would have helped the company be better prepared as it separated its US operations. “There was no documentation and no proper information for the discovery phase of the project,” he said, adding that at the start, the IT team was not allowed to run a discovery process at all. “We had to do some kind of re-engineering, and needed to hire a company to work in the middle between us and the US IT team, who we guided to manage the system for us,” added Violero.

“You were telling other people to do the job and everyone was working remotely,” said Violero – but these constraints meant the teams started building everything from scratch.

The enterprise IT environment Radisson Hotel Group inherited from its US operations was based on SAP Hana Enterprise Cloud, which was based in the US. Due to challenges with support and software licence fees, Violero said the company took the decision to use Amazon Web Services rather than SAP Cloud. It chose IT provider Lemongrass to build this new SAP installation.

However, Violero said the company could not run a standard SAP installation. “In terms of business processes, there is nothing out-of-the-box for the hospitality market in SAP, so we are having to use an add-on product that you basically put on top of the S/4Hana system,” he said.

Although the company was not able to migrate its non-standard installation onto SAP Rise, Violero said Radisson Hotel Group is making an assessment about using SAP Business Warehouse and moving this onto Rise. “It’s completely isolated; it’s master data and, as everyone knows, it’s going to be a key factor for AI,” he said.

Violero said that migrating SAP Business Warehouse to Rise can be achieved without major business disruption, and doing so means that from an SAP perspective, the company then has some aspect of SAP Rise running. This potentially provides a way to take advantage of the AI features SAP is bringing to the platform.

Source

Microgen/Shutterstock

Researchers have successfully resurrected a gene that humanity lost millions of years ago. The results could change how we treat common diseases such as gout and maybe even contribute to slowing down aging. Using the gene editing tool CRISPR-Cas9, a team at Georgia State University introduced a reconstructed version of the ancient enzyme gene uricase into human liver cells. The lab tests were a success that hinted at a future where humanity could live without the crippling joint pain caused by gout. The idea is simple yet bold: re-install a piece of our revolutionary past to fix modern-day health issues.

For now, the research is done in petri dishes, not patients. No one has been treated yet, and no human trials have begun, yet the implications are large. The fact that we can now bring back once lost genes means we have a new weapon to fight modern diseases and improve the quality of life.

The ancient gene resurrected

Gorodenkoff/Shutterstock

Humans, and our closest relatives, the great apes, once carried a functional gene for an enzyme called uricase. This enzyme helped break down uric acid, a normal waste product of our metabolism. Roughly 20 to 29 million years ago, our ancestors lost that gene. We don’t know exactly why, but some scientists speculate the loss may once have offered an advantage. As humans evolved and their diet changed, elevated uric acid might have helped convert fruit sugar into fat. That would be a useful survival mechanism. But what once helped us survive may now contribute to disease.

That’s why bringing this gene back is so exciting. A research team from Georgia State University has just done exactly that. Led by biology professor Eric Gaucher, along with post-doctoral researcher Lais de Lima Balico, the team revived a reconstructed ancient uricase gene using CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing technology. CRISPR is used to treat cancer, but now we’re also seeing this reconstructed gene added into human liver cells in the lab. The liver cells began producing uricase, which broke down the accumulated uric acid. What’s even more interesting is that when these cells were exposed to fructose, they didn’t turn it into fat, as the typical liver cells would.

To go beyond simple cell culture, the research team tested the ancient gene in three-dimensional liver spheroids, miniature lab-grown tissues that behave more like real human organs. The revived uricase enzyme worked there, too. The levels of uric acid dropped, and the buildup of fat was prevented. The resurrected gene might help humans restore their natural metabolic pathway that could protect us from modern diseases linked to high uric acid, especially gout and fatty liver diseases.

Beyond gout and fatty liver

sasirin pamai/Shutterstock

Uric acid does much more than cause gout. High levels of uric acid in the blood, called hyperuricemia, are linked to many modern diseases. It raises the risk of high blood pressure and heart disease. It’s also tied to chronic kidney disease, and is correlated with metabolic syndrome and the buildup of fat in the liver. The fact that lowering uric acid levels has improved outcomes in some trials connected to hypertension and cardiovascular diseases suggests a causal role. That’s what makes this revived ancient CRISPR gene a potentially powerful weapon against many diseases.

The Georgia State University team is now planning to move from the lab to human trials. Next comes the animal testing phase. The team has already started planning the gene delivery to lab mice. They could use systems such as nanoparticles to carry CRISPR components or the gene itself. This is the same technology used in some of the COVID-19 vaccines, and it proved to be efficient. If animal studies are successful, researchers will move to carefully designed human trials.

However, the testing will take time. The researchers need to prove that the gene is stable, doesn’t trigger harmful immune reactions, and works long-term. They also need to come up with a safe delivery method that is controlled and reaches the targeted cells. The road ahead might be long, but it is clear. The benefits could be successful treatment of gout, fatty liver disease, and other conditions tied to high uric acid levels.

Source

Wachiwit/Getty Images

Netflix subscribers who have been using the mobile app on a smartphone or tablet to cast a show onto a TV are in for a surprise. The streaming service has quietly removed casting support for most users. It’s almost impossible to start playing a show or movie from the Netflix app on mobile and beam it to a nearby TV. According to Android Authority, Netflix made the change as early as November 10, with users sharing their experience on Reddit. “Netflix appears to have removed Chromecast support from non-ad-supported plans. This change was done with zero warning,” Redditor techie1980 said. “I’m annoyed, as Chromecast is the main way that I stream content. It gives me all of the control to use my phone as a remote control, and searching for stuff is so much easier. And I’m not sure WHY the change was made. It seems like security is not enhanced here. Even Amazon Prime still supports Chromecast (at least for now).”

A person responded to the thread over the weekend, saying that Netflix customer support gave them the general rule for the change: “if the device has its own remote, you can’t cast”. The company further explained to the customer that Netflix wants to improve the user experience, and that’s why they changed casting support in the mobile app.

How to cast Netflix titles from a phone

DIA TV/Shutterstock

Netflix has a support document that details the change. Titled Can’t find ‘Cast’ button in Netflix app, the web page makes it clear that Netflix “no longer supports casting shows from a mobile device to most TVs and streaming devices.” Subscribers are advised to use the remote that came with their smart TV to play Netflix. However, some Netflix subscribers will still be able to cast Netflix shows from smartphones and tablets. The option is available on older Chromecast devices or TV sets that work with Google Cast, but that’s not the only constraint. Netflix users also have to be subscribed to a more expensive Netflix plan. The ad-supported tier will not let users cast Netflix titles to their TVs.

The document offers support for casting Netflix content from mobile devices (iPhone, iPad, and Android devices) and computers (Windows and Mac). The troubleshooting instructions will help those subscribers who should be able to cast films and TV shows from their mobile devices but are encountering issues. There is one workaround that some Netflix subscribers can employ to continue streaming content via the cast button in the app. They should avoid updating the Netflix mobile app to the most recent version. This method has been tested by The Verge. Netflix may eventually roll out additional updates, forcing users to lose out on Netflix casting support.

Source

Riyadh Air has collaborated with IBM Consulting to deliver what the pair claim is the world’s first airline that is artificial intelligence (AI) native.

Launched in March 2023, the airline Riyadh Air is a digitally led, full-service airline, which aims to connect passengers to more than 100 destinations around the world by 2030. The airline said it wants to reimagine how employees work and engage with travellers in the AI era using generative AI (GenAI) and agentic AI capabilities embedded in workflows.

It has been working with IBM on a multi-year project involving 59 workstreams and more than 60 partners, including Adobe, Apple, FLYR, Microsoft and Oracle. IBM Consulting Advantage has been used to deliver what IBM and Riyadh Air describe as seamless execution of its end-to-end technology strategy.

“We had a clear choice – be the last airline built on legacy technology or be the first built on the platforms that will define the next decade of aviation,” said Adam Boukadida, chief financial officer of Riyadh Air. “With IBM, we’ve stripped out 50 years of legacy in a single stroke. Riyadh Air isn’t just built for today; it’s built for the future and creating a pathway for many airlines to follow in the years to come.”

As it prepares to hire more people, the airline is introducing a personalised digital workplace powered by AI agents, which IBM said enables employees to have a chat-first entry point to HR to simplify workflows and accelerate employee and manager self-service.

There are also AI-powered mobile applications to connect and integrate employee and guest journeys. IBM said it is building an agentic AI-based concierge experience for employees that is proactive and contextually aware, which is able to propose best actions for each persona interacting with guests. According to IBM, this will enable cabin and ground crews to deliver tailored services – for example, prompting staff to offer fast-track services to customers running late.

AI‑enabled voice bots are being used to offer another channel for personalised support based on contextual data, which IBM said can anticipate traveller needs and enhance the overall travel experience.

Sandeep Halli, senior partner at IBM Consulting, said: “We’re currently using large language models from Watsonx.ai that have been fine‑tuned with Riyadh Air’s own knowledge base. We’re also ingesting data from existing systems, including operational and commercial data from the initial test flights, as well as loyalty data from the recent Sfeer programme launch.”

The system is hosted on the Microsoft Azure cloud and uses Watsonx Orchestrate, Watsonx.ai and Watsonx.governance hosted running on Red Hat OpenShift, which Halli said supports digital sovereignty.

In terms of computational power, Halli said: “We’re using Nvidia GPUs [graphics processor units] hosted on Microsoft Azure, including high‑performance options like the A100 and H200. These provide the compute power needed to run advanced models efficiently and at scale. We also use standard CPU [central processor unit]‑based Azure resources for lighter workloads.”

With initial flights underway and its first commercial service expected in early 2026, the three‑year collaboration between Riyadh Air and IBM has reached a pivotal moment.

Mohamad Ali, senior vice-president of IBM Consulting, said: “As a company born in the AI era, Riyadh Air is redefining what’s possible in aviation, and it’s been a privilege for IBM to help make that vision a reality.”

Source

The hyperscalers’ hold on the global, multibillion-pound cloud computing market has come under repeated scrutiny over the past couple of years from governments, regulators and trade bodies.

In broad terms, the purpose of this scrutiny is to ascertain if the market’s biggest hitters, which include Amazon Web Services (AWS) and Microsoft, are behaving in anti-competitive ways to grow and protect their market-leading positions.

Where Microsoft’s activities are concerned, there is one particular behaviour the company participates in that has been singled out for criticism in many of these investigations. That behaviour concerns its widely criticised practice of charging customers more for wanting to run and host its software (namely Windows Server) in competing cloud environments.

It is claimed the tactic can make it cost-prohibitive for enterprise cloud users to run Microsoft’s software anywhere but on the software giant’s own public cloud platform Azure, which could potentially give it an unfair advantage when it comes to building its share of the cloud infrastructure market.

As previously reported by Computer Weekly, the UK communications market regulator Ofcom raised a red flag about the issue in its October 2023 UK cloud market study, which paved the way for a two-year follow-up investigation by the UK Competition and Markets Authority (CMA), which concluded in July 2025.

The CMA’s 637-page investigative report devoted more than 170 pages to discussing Microsoft’s cloud licensing habits in detail, and concluded the company’s practices are “adversely impacting the competitiveness of AWS and Google [specifically] in the supply of cloud services” and “reducing competition in [the] cloud services market”.

The CMA also stated that Microsoft’s licensing practices, “in combination with other features we have identified”, are further limiting the choice and “attractiveness” of alternative products and suppliers.

As a result, the CMA recommended that Microsoft be subject to targeted and bespoke interventions to remedy the impact the company’s behaviour is having on the UK cloud infrastructure services market as a whole.

At the time of writing, it is unclear when exactly in 2026 the CMA’s recommendations are likely to come into effect and what the long-term impact of them will be on Microsoft’s behaviour.

Meanwhile, in November 2025, the European Commission launched a separate probe into Microsoft’s hold on the continent’s cloud market, which is expected to culminate in a final report within 18 months.

In the meantime, work is underway to secure financial recourse for UK businesses in the form of a burgeoning group legal action, which is open to any firm that fears it may have paid more “at any point since December 2018” to use Microsoft’s software in the AWS, Google or Alibaba public clouds.

Overseeing this effort is Italian competition lawyer, Maria Luisa Stasi, with the support of complex disputes resolution firm, Scott+Scott. They claim UK firms affected by Microsoft’s cloud licensing practices could be collectively owed £2bn in compensation.

The first round of court hearings on the issue are due to take place at the UK Competition Appeal Tribunal (CAT) on 11 December 2025.

The hearing’s purpose is to determine if a collective proceedings order (CPO) for the matter should be granted. This is a legal mechanism that allows a collective action involving multiple claimants with similar issues to band together in a single legal action against an entity (in this case, Microsoft) on anti-competition grounds.

If the CAT grants the order, that will certify Stasi’s claim and means her case against Microsoft can proceed to full trial, putting the businesses that have allegedly been left financially disadvantaged by Microsoft’s actions one step closer to being compensated.

The case itself has been more than a year in the making, as news that Stasi had submitted a claim for consideration to CAT first emerged in December 2024, with it being confirmed at the time that this claim would take the form of an “opt-out collective action”.

This approach makes it possible for class actions, such as Stasi’s case, to proceed against a company like Microsoft without needing to get those allegedly affected by its behaviour involved and onside first.

Over the past 12 months, Microsoft has been given the chance to respond to the claim, and – in October 2025 – Stasi issued her first call for businesses that suspect they’ve fallen foul of Microsoft’s alleged licensing practices to get in touch and join her group action.

Ahead of the 11 December CAT court date, Computer Weekly sat down with Stasi to find out what it is about Microsoft’s cloud licensing practices that persuaded her to take on this fight on behalf of the UK business community.

“Microsoft is dominant on some parts of the [IT infrastructure] stack and is using this power to impose things that otherwise will be difficult to accept for business users, and the reality is that they can do that because they limit choice for people,” she says.

“It’s not just about the [fact its services are] overpriced, it’s also about how difficult it is for users to switch and use other providers, and how that limits competition within the market.”

She adds: “[The cloud market] is a sector of the economy that should be very vibrant, innovative and open because we all rely on it, but it’s not. And someone is making a profit out of this situation, so things need to change.”

Stasi makes the point that it would be very difficult for a single business, upset with its treatment by Microsoft, to launch a legal action against the company alone and achieve that change.

“[It’s] my mission. to represent all of [the affected users] and try to get their money back, working on the theory that together, you’re a stronger force”

Maria Luisa Stasi, competition lawyer

“That’s my mission. I want to represent all of [the affected users] and try to get their money back on their behalf, working on the theory that if you unite together, you’re going to be a stronger force to be reckoned with.”

The UK court system is set up well to support this kind of claim, she says, with one of the most advanced systems in Europe for pursuing this kind of group claim. “It’s also exciting to be part of shaping this body of law that, to me, is one of the best guarantees we have for the public interest to be respected.”

Momentum for change

Citing the European Commission’s recently launched investigation into Microsoft, and the previous work done by Ofcom and the CMA to bring to light aspects of the software giant’s anti-competitive behaviours, Stasi says there is a real momentum building to get the software giant to change how it operates. 

However, change will take time, she admits. “We are hoping to see some remedies introduced soon [on the back of the outcome of the CMA’s work], but it’s not a fast process, and even my proposed class action is not going to progress quickly.”

She says: “We went to court a year ago, and we’re hoping to have the certification in a couple of weeks’ time, but that doesn’t mean we’re going to get judgment anytime soon. But if we get certified [after 11 December 2025], we can start working towards the trial, and the game is on.”

Microsoft’s take on Stasi’s case

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Microsoft has not taken the news of Stasi’s legal action particularly well, with a spokesperson for the company sharing a statement with Computer Weekly that accuses Stasi of trying to opportunistically capitalise on Google Cloud’s complaint to the European Commission about Microsoft’s licensing practices.

Incidentally, Google Cloud withdrew its complaint on 28 November 2025, citing the European Commission’s decision to conduct its own investigation into Microsoft’s grip on the continent’s cloud computing market.   

“This is an opportunistic attempt by a law firm and its private funders to piggy-back on baseless complaints Google has made and which we’ve all addressed or rebutted,” the Microsoft spokesperson’s statement reads.

“We enable our cloud competitors to profit by offering our products to their cloud customers, and our competitors set their own prices when they do this.”

Stasi dismisses Microsoft’s take on her legal action and the notion that its existence owes anything to Google’s (now abortive) attempt to address its rival’s cloud licensing strategy.

“I’m grateful to my brilliant legal team and supportive funders, but the driving force for this case is me. What’s more, my voice is not alone. UK regulators found that Microsoft charges higher prices for using its software on rival cloud services,” she says. “The European Commission recently announced a similar probe into Microsoft’s cloud services.”

In response to Computer Weekly’s questions about how Microsoft has engaged with the legal process so far, she says:  “It won’t surprise you that we have a completely different reading of what the impact of its actions are on the class [the businesses involved] and on those sectors of the economy overall.”

She continues: “We’re trying to do everything we can to solve all the different things that can be solved before getting to a potential trial, so that the latter can be straightforward and proceed as fast as is reasonably possible.”

I would be very surprised if nothing changes in the cloud market over the next five years. There are political discussions, policy discussions and enforcement actions coming down the line, so everything seems to be in place for a change to come Maria Luisa Stasi, competition lawyer

The trial will also be an opportunity to address what Stasi describes as an “asymmetry of information” in this case, which would not be possible without getting Microsoft into the courtroom.

“One of the aspects covered by this asymmetry of information is how many clients are actually paying what I consider to be an overcharge [to run Microsoft software in competing clouds],” she says.

“This is something I don’t know precisely, but our experts have been estimating this based on publicly accessible information. The precise number is known to Microsoft, but this type of disclosure won’t happen unless we go to trial.”

She adds: “The piece that I’m arguing is that Microsoft’s [behaviour around licensing has] a real financial impact on many, many businesses and public administrations, which needs addressing.”

With an imminent court date, the CMA’s actions set to take effect in 2026, and the European Commission’s own investigation into Microsoft now underway, Stasi says she is confident that the cloud market will become a much more level playing field in the years to come.

“I would be very, very surprised if, in five years from now, we’re sitting, having this conversation and nothing has changed,” she says.

“This class action might be one of the entry points [for change] and is particularly targeted on claiming back some extra charges, but there is a lot going on [in the cloud market] with the European Commission investigation and the CMA and the work they’re doing to restructure the market, but this is only part of the story.”

She then went on to cite the October 2025 AWS outage in the US, which had far-reaching consequences across the globe, as further evidence that having a market so reliant on just a handful of large tech firms is far from ideal.    

“The outages are a strong reminder of what kind of harms and problems we can face as a democracy and as a citizenry, if we keep on having this environment so concentrated and so controlled in brackets by just a few global players,” she says.

“This makes it extremely difficult to guarantee basic principles such as observability, transparency, accountability and resilience. I would be very surprised if nothing changes in the cloud market over the next five years. There are political discussions, there are policy discussions, and there are enforcement actions coming down the line, so everything seems to be in place for a change to come.”

UK companies interested in joining Stasi’s legal action can find out more about it here: ukcloudclaim.com/register.

Source

Microsoft has addressed a little shy of 60 newly designated common vulnerabilities and exposures (CVEs) in the final Patch Tuesday update of a challenging year for defenders, bringing the total volume of flaws fixed this year to more than 1,100.

Out of this month’s flaws, three are rated as critical in their severity, one is known to be actively exploited in the wild, and two more are known to have public proofs of concept available but are not yet being exploited.

The exploited vulnerability, tracked as CVE-2025-62221, affects Windows Cloud Files Mini Filter Driver. It arises as the result a use after free (UAF) condition in which the program references memory after it has been freed up, leading to unpredictable and sometimes dangerous conditions. In this instance, a threat actor can use it to escalate their privilege levels on the victim system.

“While there is no confirmed public PoC for CVE-2025-62221, past research and PoCs for related Cloud Files mini-filter issues suggest attackers already understand the underlying techniques,” said Mike Walters, co-founder and CEO of patch management specialist Action1.

“The real impact of this vulnerability emerges when attackers chain it with other weaknesses. After gaining low-privileged access through phishing, a browser exploit or an application RCE, they can use CVE-2025-62221 to escalate to SYSTEM and take full control of the host.”

Walters warned that with Cloud Files pretty much ubiquitous, and exploitation confirmed, the risk for defenders was how quickly the flaw will become part of threat actor attack chains. He said that since it only requires low privileges to exploit, users with weak least-privilege practices or heavily shared endpoints may be heading for trouble.

Meanwhile, the two publicly disclosed vulnerabilities this month are both remote code execution (RCE) issues, one affecting PowerShell – CVE-2025-54100 – and the other affecting GitHub Copilot for Jetbrains – CVE-2205-64671.

The PowerShell vulnerability stems from a command injection flaw that exists in how Windows PowerShell process web content, which an unauthenticated attacker could sue to execute arbitrary code as a user who is allowed to run crafted PowerShell commands. Given PowerShell’s significance and role in offensive tooling, exploitation is likely to be straightforward and it likely becomes more dangerous as part of a social engineering attack chain against privileged users.

The GitHub Copilot vulnerability, meanwhile, stands out as one of the more interesting flaws being patched this month, according to Immersive senior director of cyber threat research Kev Breen.

“Copilot is the GenAI coding assistant that is used by Microsoft and GitHub [and] this vulnerability specifically refers to the JetBrains extensions,” explained Breen. “The vulnerability states that it’s possible to gain code execution on affected hosts by tricking the LLM [large language model] into running commands that bypass the guardrails and appending instructions in the user’s ‘auto-approve’ settings.

“This can be achieved through cross-prompt injection, which is where the prompt is modified not by the user but by the LLM agents as they craft their own prompts based on the content of files or data retrieved from a model context protocol [MCP] server that has risen in popularity with agent-based LLMs.”

Breen said that although Microsoft has marked this vulnerability as less likely to be exploited, if adopting a risk-based approach to patching, the developers whom it targets typically have more privileged access to API keys or other secrets. Therefore, he added, anybody running GitHub Copilot for JetBrains should patch promptly.

Finally, this month’s three critical flaws are all RCE vulnerabilities. Two of them, CVE-2025-62554 and CVE-2025-63557, affect Microsoft Office, and the third, CVE-2025-65272 is to be found in Outlook.

Do you want to be a record breaker?

Looking back on the year gone by in his monthly Patch Tuesday roundup, Dustin Childs of Trend Micro’s Zero Day Initiative said Microsoft had patched a total of 1,139 CVEs during the past 12 months, making 2025 the second-largest year ever in terms of volume, just 111 CVEs shy of 2020.

Childs wrote that as Microsoft’s portfolio diversifies and grows in scale, and vulnerabilities originating through artificial intelligence (AI) increase in prevalence, 2026 looks set to be a record-breaking year.

Source

Algi Febri Sugita/Shutterstock

Apple recently introduced iOS 26, the latest software update for its line of iPhones. It offers tons of upgrades to the user experience, including the new Liquid Glass translucent design, more customization options for the Lock Screen, new features for the Phone and Messages apps — like Call Screening and Live Translation, Camera and Photos improvements, and Apple Intelligence enhancements.

It technically works on any iPhone dating back to iPhone 11 series models, as well as iPhone SE models 2nd-generation and later. However, Apple Intelligence is only available for iPhone 15 Pro and newer models. This includes some features you might not even realize leverage AI processing, which, as a result, won’t be available on older phones.

What’s more, before you download iOS 26 to older model devices with less processing power, you should consider potential issues — like slower performance and faster battery drain. This appears to be common when Apple releases new OS models. While software support extends to older phones, you aren’t necessarily getting the full experience of the upgraded operating system.

How iOS 26 might run on older iPhones

Marvin Samuel Tolentino Pineda/Getty Images

It’s tempting to update your older iPhone to iOS 26. It’s always recommended to update your phone to the latest OS available, after all. But there might be some drawbacks when doing so with older phones.

iOS 26 can be taxing on the system for an older iPhone, one less powerful than newer models despite stated compatibility. You could experience slower performance because of the less powerful hardware. If the device has less RAM or a weaker CPU, it’s unlikely to be able to handle processing as quickly as a newer phone might, for example. Overall, the phone could end up being a bit sluggish.

With all the additional features and background processing common to the latest version of iOS, you may also find that your battery drains faster. Batteries degrade over time as it is, so you probably already notice that you’re recharging your old iPhone more than previously. New features and additional processing demands could put more pressure on an already aging battery, potentially leading to overheating.

iOS 26 features you might miss on an older iPhone

Yalcinsonat1/Getty Images

The most notable exclusion when it comes to iOS 26 features you won’t find on compatible older iPhones is anything related to Apple Intelligence, as mentioned earlier. This includes Image Playground, Live Translation, Visual Intelligence functions, and Genmoji improvements, including merge abilities.

Many other AI-related features are absent from installations of iOS 26 on older iPhones. First up: Polls in group Messages and AI features in the Reminders apps, which provide suggested reminders based on things like actions in e-mails or grocery items for a recipe you’ve bookmarked in Safari. You won’t get AI actions in the Shortcuts apps either, missing out on capabilities like summarizing a PDF or producing a daily brief outlining the weather, your appointments, and reminders pertinent to your day’s schedule. Also missing are the lens cleaning warning — which alerts you if the camera lens is smudged — 3D Lock Screen effects, and AI order tracking in the Wallet app, which displays real-time details of any order purchased with Apple Pay.

Basically, you’ll get basic upgrades with iOS 26 on older iPhones. But to enjoy the full experience, you need at least an iPhone 15 Pro.

Source

Jakub Zerdzicki/Getty Images

We may receive a commission on purchases made from links.

3D printing isn’t as simple as choosing a model and hitting the print button. There’s still a learning curve, and all manner of gadgets and gizmos to make your life easier and give your prints a greater chance of becoming what you envisioned; not just a tangle of spaghetti.

I’ve been reviewing 3D printers for the best part of a decade — from the first ever toy machines that printed no more than a few inches cubed (if they managed to print at all), to the almighty Elegoo Orangestorm Giga with a print volume of around 39,000 inches cubed. Rarely a day goes by when one of my machines isn’t pumping out some cosplay props, wargaming terrain, or other such nerdy goodness (you can even 3D print your own laptop parts). I’ve watched the hobby evolve from slinging around glorified hot glue guns, through the awkward phase of Delta printers and polar coordinate systems, and now to the high-speed, precise and reliable CoreXY-based devices — and some things never change.

It’s been a wild ride and I’ve learnt a few things along the way, including what accessories are actually worth investing in. Some are obvious, while some you’ve probably not heard of.

Dry your filaments: Sunlu dryer box

Even if you don’t live in an area of the world that’s constantly above 70% humidity (I do), PLA filament will still absorb moisture from the moment the package is opened. The more moisture it absorbs, the more brittle it becomes, the worse it adheres to the build plate, and the worse your print quality will get as the moisture boils off inside the hot end and interferes with extrusion. Unless you plan to print solidly for a few days and use an entire 1kg roll at once (you could batch print TSA security keys as presents for your entire neighborhood, I guess?), most printers will benefit from a filament dryer to maintain optimal conditions. 

If you’re swapping between a few filaments, a dryer box becomes essential. Leaving them in the bag or a ziploc with a silica gel packet is not enough. The alternative budget solution is sticking a roll in the oven at a very low temperature for a few hours, and that’s not an exact science, nor is it partner-approved. Best case you get nanoparticles of plastic in your Sunday roast; worst case you get the temperature wrong and get a molten plastic pie that you can’t scrape off. Lovely. 

The Sunlu Filament Dryer is what I use, and I’m happy with its performance and features, but they all largely do the same job.

Multicolor upgrade: CMS or AMS units

This one is very much dependant on your printer, but if you’ve got a compatible printer and not yet upgraded to a multicolor AMS/CMS unit, you’re seriously missing out. Just think of all the multicolor flexidragons you could be selling at your local craft market! Even if you don’t plan to do actual multicolored prints, the AMS unit is a great way to store filaments as you swap out colors between prints, keeping them clean and dry within the sealed container. It’s also a lot less hassle to just choose the color you want in your slicer, and let the machine swap them over.

AMS units typically hold four filament rolls in a sealed environment, and keep tabs on the humidity — though you will need to replace the dehumidifier packs occasionally (about once a year in my experience). Sunlu even offers a heater upgrade for your AMS Gen 1, though the next generation units are starting to integrate heaters directly. 

One warning though: multicolor color printing comes with a lot of waste. As the colors change, the machine needs to purge the previous one to avoid color bleed. It does this by printing out a little spiral, then throwing it out of a hole at the back of the printer. You’ll soon be testing out various bin designs. 

Keep the draught out: an enclosure

Sometimes just looking at a 3D printer in a funny way is enough to make your print fail, but ambient temperature fluctuations and draughts are the worst. Being able to keep the temperatures stable is important for flow, and adhesion — especially at the corners. If a part cools unevenly (which can happen even with a heated build plate), it’ll warp, pull up, and potentially slide off.

Putting an enclosure around your printer will keep the heat in, reduce power usage, and increase print quality and reliability — not to mention the safety benefits, if you have children and pets. Here’s one for the ever popular A1 Mini, but as long as you know the size of your printer you should be able to find something suitable. Prices vary from under $20 for a fabric model with a delicate metal wire frame, up to $200 for a more substantial solid Plexiglass system. Of course, at that price, it might be worth simply buying a new printer with an integrated enclosure.

Shiny shiny: holographic build plates

Holographic build plates are a bit like old school records, with thousands of tiny indentations in the surface. But instead of dragging a needle over them to create sound, light is reflected to create a pseudo-3D image. Even more magical is that if you print something on top of a build plate imbued with these specially patterned surfaces, an exact copy of the pattern is transferred to the print. It won’t improve adhesion, and it won’t fix ugly layer lines, but it can certainly add a little bling to the right models. 

Of course, you’ll need to keep in mind it’s only the bottom layer that gets the holographic treatment, so it’s only good for those items that are normally printed upside down with a big, flat surface — like a phone case or badge. You can buy a variety of patterned build plates depending on the effect you want, from rainbow holographic stars to carbon fiber and camouflage.

Glue parts together: Weld-on plastic cement

Sometimes you’ll want to print something larger, complex, or in multiple parts because your build volume is too small. At that point, you’ll need to glue parts together. But gluing plastic can be tricky. PVA or Elmer’s Glue is useless, as it won’t be absorbed. Superglue can work in a pinch, but it’s too brittle to stand up to any rigour. 

Unlike Superglue (or “cyanoacrylate” to give it the technical name) — which produces a layer of chemical bonding — Weld-On plastic cement melts the plastic to physically merge the pieces together, giving a much stronger, and sometimes seamless connection. Be careful not to use too much though or let it drip on the rest of your print; it’ll eat away at the surface and leave indentations, rough edges, or just ruin the surface texture. Be sure to do a test fit first, as well, because once you’ve committed there’s no going back. 

Keep it clean: Isopropyl alcohol

Grease from your fingers is another factor that stops your print adhering to the build plate. Even if you think you have clean hands, it’ll accumulate, and suddenly your prints stop sticking and you can’t work out why. Thankfully, it’s easy to clean off: just a quick wipe with a little 99% isopropyl alcohol every few prints is sufficient to keep your build plate in top condition. A single 32-oz bottle should last you for years; you don’t need to drown the plate with the stuff. 70% “rubbing alcohol” can also work, but only if it’s just isopropyl and water; anything else in the mix could have the opposite effect. 

It’s not exactly a glamorous accessory, but it is an essential. It stinks, and rapidly evaporates — so don’t forget to screw the cap back on when you’re finished. It’s also highly flammable, so keep your vape away from the craft room because we haven’t got to the bit about fire extinguishers, yet.  

Different nozzle sizes

Kirill Gorshkov/Shutterstock

Most printers ship with a 0.4mm nozzle — that’s the width of the molten filament that’s pushed out layer by layer. While you can adjust the layer height in software, the width is determined by your hardware. Luckily, modern printers make it a relatively easy process to swap out the nozzle.

So, why would you want to do this? If you’re printing particularly small models with a lot of fine details, you’ll get cleaner results with a smaller 0.2mm nozzle. Print time will typically double, however. Meanwhile, if you want to print quicker and don’t mind a loss of detail, a larger 0.6mm nozzle will be better. This is especially true if your model has a lot of walls. This Voronoi lamp went from a little under 20 hours to just over 11 hours. If your printer is big enough and happens to be fed by concrete, you can 3D-print a house in 140 hours – imagine the nozzle size on that! 

The other benefit of using a larger nozzle is that you’ll get less clogging when printing with abrasive filaments (like glow-in-dark, wood, or carbon-fiber infused) or flexible filaments (like TPU). While you’re at it, you should also make sure it’s a hardened steel nozzle to lessen the wear and tear of abrasive fibers (printers usually ship with a basic brass nozzle). Sadly, you can’t just swap out the nozzle and start printing in chocolate. 

All the tools: Rustark 3D Printing Kit

Whichever way you look at it, a 42-piece 3D printer toolkit at less than $30 is ridiculously good value. It has everything you’ll need to cut supports and filament, clean the nozzle, scrape your prints off the build plate, debur them, and even some cheap callipers for designing your own models (though I wouldn’t expect great tolerances). There’s a cutting mat, and a bag to store it all in, too. Don’t forget the added fun of playing the “what on earth is this thing even for?” game.  

That said, don’t rush to buy this until your printer has arrived — most come with a little toolkit of the basics, and you can get away without the nice-to-have bits until you’ve got a few prints under your belt. At that point, you’ll probably have a better idea of which tools you need more of and where your arsenal is lacking. 

Safety first: Fire extinguisher

Jj Gouin/Getty Images

While 3D printers are equipped with all manner of safety cut-offs and thermal fuses, they still sling a piece of pointy metal around at upwards of 200 degrees C and run a mini-heater constantly on the build plate. Even if the nozzle temperature has cooled because of an error, the build plate stays hot to ensure the print doesn’t peel away while you fix the other problem. There’s always an unforeseen risk of some glob of plastic getting caught where it shouldn’t, or an electronic part failing, or cables being inadvertently pulled out by moving parts. 

So, having a fire extinguisher around just in case of emergencies is sensible. But what type of fire extinguisher? A regular pressurized water-based extinguisher will ruin the printer for sure, even if the fire otherwise did little damage. Dry powder extinguishers are a little more expensive at around $100, but the chemicals may corrode your electronics. A CO2 extinguisher is best for electrical fires, and won’t damage your printer in the process — but it’s also the most expensive at upwards of $200 each. A cheaper option to consider are fire suppression balls, which sit on top of your printer and shower everything with powder when they detect a flame. Samsung even tried to make a flower vase that could explode into fire suppressing goo. 

Tidy up stringing: Hot air gun

Pixel Enforcer/Shutterstock

Stringing — or whispy strands of extruded filament where the print head moved quickly — is a perpetual problem unless you’re willing to spend hours dialling in the retraction and temperature settings for every new filament you buy.

But there’s a quick and simple “hack” that can deal with stringing: a hot air gun. You don’t need anything fancy, just a quick blast of hot air will shrivel the whispy strings up so they’re either imperceptible, or turn into a tiny ball that you can easily cut off. Just be careful not to leave the hot blast of air dwelling on the print for too long, or you’ll end up deforming it.

In fact, some models are made to be melted with a heat gun after being printed, like this infamous hairy lion whose glorious mane you can melt into place like a L’Oréal commercial.  

Skip this: glue or hairspray for better adhesion

myboys.me/Shutterstock

You might have heard that a glue stick or hairspray is essential to make your print stick to the bed, but it’s not 2010 any more. Modern printers and build plates don’t need glue to print in basic PLA — you’ll just end up with a sticky, unnecessary mess. Material science has come on a long way, and most printers now use an engineered steel textured PEI (polyetherimide) build plate combined with a heated print bed.

That means if you are having problems with adhesion to your build plate, it more than likely points to more fundamental issues with calibration: bed levelling, Z-height, or machine wobble. Make sure you’re printing on as stable a surface as possible, and rerun the height calibration. Hairsprays and glue will just mask the underlying issue (and, ironically, make everything worse). 

In fact, the only time you might need a glue stick on a modern 3D printer is when you’re printing in PETG, and that’s only to reduce the adhesion, not increase it. If you don’t use glue, it can actually stick too well to the bed, ripping up some of the surface in the process.

Methodology

Azmanjaka/Getty Images

This list was created from over a decade of experience, as well as compiled from new user “what else should I buy?!” threads on Reddit. I’ve had my fair share of failed prints, and tried all kinds of techniques to improve print quality or make tricky prints adhere better. I’ve never tried 3D printing shoes though, I’ll admit. Modern 3D printers are getting so close to being plug and play devices that anyone can use, but they’re not quite there yet. Like any hobby, there’s always going to be some essential accessories and maintenance tools, things that can make your life easier, and we’ve tried to share a few with you here.

Source

José Adorno/BGR

Apple is expected to release an all-new iPhone Fold next year. This foldable device has been rumored for a few years, and it’s now finally on its way to becoming a reality. The latest to corroborate Apple moving forward with the iPhone Fold pre-production is The Economic Daily (via IT Home). According to the publication, the iPhone Fold has entered the engineering verification and pre-mass production process.

Not only that, but some assembly factories said that they have already entered the stocking state, so they can ship parts of the iPhone Fold to assembly plants whenever Apple gives a go-ahead. Besides the iPhone Fold, Apple is expected to unveil the next generation of its Pro iPhone models, with the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max expected to launch in September 2026. According to previous rumors, the iPhone Fold is expected to bring a massive change to Apple’s iPhone release schedule, with the company expected to unveil the base iPhone 18, iPhone Air 2, and iPhone 18e in the first half of 2027.

These are the latest iPhone Fold rumors

José Adorno/BGR

Reports claim the iPhone Fold will feature a 5.5-inch cover screen and a 7.8-inch foldable display. Most importantly, Apple is expected to completely remove the crease in the middle of the inner display, making the product stand out from the competition. The iPhone is also expected to feature Apple’s A20 Pro chip, which should use TSMC’s new 2nm manufacturing process. Besides that, all iPhone 18 models are expected to feature 12 GB of RAM, including the iPhone Fold.

In addition to these rumors, Apple might add a massive battery to the iPhone Fold while still maintaining the form factor of two iPhone Airs stacked up. Apple could use silicon-carbon batteries, which could help the company increase the total battery capacity of the iPhone. Finally, there’s also a report saying Apple might use a 24MP under-display camera for the iPhone Fold. However, this seems unlikely since it may compromise the camera quality, as seen on the Samsung Galaxy Z Fold lineup — forcing the brand to revert to a hole-punch setup.

Source