It's crunch time for "chat control", the European Commission's plan to scan private messages and report content suspected of being child sexual abuse. At a European Council meeting on Friday, security officials from across the EU debated the latest proposal, whereby photos and links sent on messaging apps – encrypted or not – would be scanned on-device by an artificial intelligence on the lookout for child sexual abuse material, known to the general public as child pornography.

It's been a week for the history books for Google. The tech giant dodged an order to sell off significant parts of its business in a landmark antitrust ruling in the United States. Then, days later, it was hit with a major fine by the EU for monopolising online advertisements. We take a closer look.
 

Stein-Erik Soelberg killed his mother and himself in Connecticut earlier this month, with the Wall Street Journal reporting that ChatGPT fuelled his irrational fears about her. Meanwhile, a couple in California has filed a lawsuit against OpenAI after the suicide of their son, accusing ChatGPT of helping him do it. In this week's Tech 24, we explore what's behind the increase in tragic stories that's accompanied the boom in people talking to AI chatbots.

The European Commission wants AI companies to stop using pirated data and allow creators to withhold their copyrighted material. This comes amid the rise of a massive global workforce of remote workers from poor countries, who provide bespoke data via third party brokers. We take a closer look in this edition of Tech 24.

Pavel Durov, the enigmatic Russian-born billionaire boss of messaging app Telegram, has his third audience with a French investigating magistrate in the coming days, following his dramatic arrest 10 months ago on wide-ranging charges including complicity in terrorist content, drug trafficking and child sex abuse material.

This week's massive power outage in Spain and Portugal has raised questions over whether Europe's power grid is ready for a surge in demand, given the rapid pace of data centre deployment amid the rise of artificial intelligence. We take a closer look in this edition of Tech 24.

Google is still making lots of money. Its parent company Alphabet reported $90.2 billion in revenue for the first quarter, up 12 percent from the same period last year, making $34.5 billion in profit. Chief Executive Sundar Pichai said Google's AI strategy was to thank. But the elephant in the room at Thursday's earnings call was the possibility that US federal judges might order the company to be broken up. We take a closer look in this edition of Tech 24.

"I'm not worried about Jensen [Huang] at all," said US President Donald Trump, commenting on the Nvidia CEO's visit to Beijing. The trip was the latest twist in a tumultuous week for the US firm, which is the world's third most valuable company and top supplier of AI computer chips. We take a closer look in this week's edition of Tech 24. 

One concern around artificial intelligence is its voracious appetite for energy. Electricity demand for data centres specialised in AI will quadruple in the next five years, according to a new report from the International Energy Agency. But as for claims that AI is accelerating climate change through carbon emissions, the report calls them "overstated".

France says a response from the EU to Trump's new 20 percent tariff will "probably" come at the end of the month. A government spokesperson told French media RTL that services will be targeted, not just goods, including digital products from Big Tech companies like Google and Apple.