China launches new ‘AI+’ policy to ‘deepen information technology revolution’
Asia In Brief China’s State Council last week announced a new IT policy called “AI +”, the successor to 2015’s “Internet +”.
The Council said Internet+ focused on connectivity to improve production processes. AI+ aims to achieve “a leap from ‘information connection and diffusion’ to ‘knowledge application and creation’,” in pursuit of further economic efficiencies and “more comprehensive, systematic, and profound changes to economic and social development.”
China’s plan calls for careful adoption of AI. “When using artificial intelligence to improve the productivity of traditional jobs, we must actively address the risks of algorithmic discrimination and structural unemployment,” the State Council recommends.
Beijing is also aware of the many risks posed by AI – calling out “data poisoning, algorithm blackboxing, and model hallucinations” – and calls for extra work on security. Lawmakers also want to “establish and improve AI technology monitoring, risk warning, and emergency response systems.”
Spain cancels Huawei deal
Spain’s government has cancelled a contract with local carrier Telefonica over its use of Huawei equipment.
Digital transformation minister Óscar López Águedareportedly nixed the deal for reasons of “strategic autonomy”.
The planned contract for network services included links to Spanish government agencies, including the Ministry of Defense. Telefonica has previously said it’s working to reduce its reliance on Huawei.
Spain’s government agreed to the deal just a few days before cancelling it.
- Australian university used Wi-Fi location data to identify student protestors
- Google admits anticompetitive conduct in Australia, agrees to modest fine
- India’s services giant TCS lays off over 10,000 for reasons including AI, hikes wages for survivors
- Japan discovers object out beyond Pluto that rewrites the Planet 9 theory
University data hits dark web
Australia’s Western Sydney University last week warned that data stolen in two past attacks has appeared on the dark web.
An October 2024 attack compromised the university’s Student Management System and storage systems, and crooks whacked it again in April 2025 with an attack on a single sign-on system.
The data wasn’t online for long, but the university has warned those affected – students, faculty, and users of on-campus childcare services – that they may need to take additional precautions to protect their identities.
Sony to use only recycled gold by 2030
Japanese giant Sony last week issued its environmental vision for 2030, which include a plan to use only recycled gold “n major printed circuit boards and other components in specific models.”
The company also plans to use only renewable energy, and to “Encourage major raw materials and parts suppliers” to do the same.
India’s tablet market shrinks sharply
Analyst firm IDC says Indian buyers backed away from tablet computers in the first half of 2025, with shipments of 2.15 million representing a 32.2 percent year-over-year (YoY) decline.
The detachable tablet segment grew by 18.9 percent YoY, but shipments of slate tables – think iPads – slumped 44.4 percent YoY.
“The downturn is largely attributed to a drop in commercial shipments, primarily driven by a reduction in government-funded manifesto programs, which historically represent a significant portion of the commercial segment,” IDC said.
Alibaba upgrades digital human generator
Alibaba Cloud last week upgraded its digital human generator, giving it the power to generate high-quality animated videos from a single image and an audio clip.
The new Wan2.2-S2V produced the video below from the following prompt: “In the video, a man is walking alongside the railway tracks, singing to express his emotions as he goes. A train slowly passes by him.”
The Chinese web giant says results like this are possible “by combining text-guided global motion control with audio-driven fine-grained local movements” and “compressing historical frames of arbitrary length into a single, compact latent representation, the technology significantly reduces computational overhead. This approach allows for remarkably stable long-video generation, addressing a “critical challenge in extended animated content production.”
What a time to be alive. ®
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