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Binance to pay billions in US in money laundering case, CEO resigns - November 21, 2023
Binance chief executive Changpeng Zhao pleaded guilty Tuesday to US money laundering charges, in a deal that will see the cryptocurrency exchange he founded pay over $4 billion in penalties.
“Binance became the world’s largest cryptocurrency exchange in part because of the crimes it committed –- now it is paying one of the largest corporate penalties in US history,” Attorney General Merrick Garland said in a statement.
Binance’s guilty plea is part of coordinated action including with the Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network and Office of Foreign Assets Control (OFAC), the Department of Justice said.
Zhao pleaded guilty to failing to maintain an effective anti-money laundering program, the Department of Justice said, and he has resigned from his position of CEO.
Zhao, who lives abroad, entered his plea in person in the United States, added Garland.
Binance’s agreements with the Treasury Department’s agencies include a civil money penalty of $3.4 billion and a $968 million penalty involving OFAC. These mark the agencies’ largest settlements in history.
“Binance turned a blind eye to its legal obligations in the pursuit of profit,” Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said in a statement.
“Its willful failures allowed money to flow to terrorists, cybercriminals and child abusers through its platform.”
She noted Binance “deliberately undermined its own sanctions monitoring controls,” allowing over 1.5 million virtual currency trades violating US sanctions, and failed to report suspicious transactions.
Yellen said the penalties, and a five-year monitorship imposed on Binance, mark a “milestone for the virtual currency industry.”
The monitorship is unprecedented in the virtual currency space, a US Treasury official told journalists, speaking on condition of anonymity, comparing it to the oversight structure imposed on banks over a decade ago.
Moving forward, Binance must file suspicious activity reports required by law, on top of reviewing past transactions to report such activity to authorities, Garland said.
“This will advance our criminal investigations into malicious cyber activity and terrorism fundraising, including the use of cryptocurrency exchanges to support groups such as Hamas,” he added.
Binance was created in 2017 and cornered much of the crypto-trading market, turning Zhao into a billionaire.
Binance runs crypto exchanges and provides other services across the world, but it has taken a severe hit since crypto markets collapsed and regulators began probing the legality of its business.
Zhao — often seen as the arch-rival of disgraced FTX founder Sam Bankman-Fried — is expected to face sentencing at a later time.
With the deal, Zhao is barred from future involvement operating Binance’s business.
In a statement, Binance conceded that it “made misguided decisions along the way” as it grew rapidly in an industry that was in the “early stages of regulation.”
“Today, Binance takes responsibility for this past chapter,” it said.
The company added that it did not initially have adequate compliance controls, saying that it has been working to restructure. Its former global head of regional markets, Richard Teng, will succeed Zhao as CEO.
In a separate social media announcement, Zhao said: “I made mistakes, and I must take responsibility.”
The latest deal does not include the company’s entanglements with the Securities and Exchange Commission, another regulator, which pressed a raft of charges against Binance in June, saying it allowed US residents to trade even when it was not registered in the country as a securities exchange.
The SEC also alleges the firm misused customer funds.
While Binance was founded in China, Zhao moved its operations to other locations internationally after a crackdown on the crypto sector by Beijing.
The volatile industry surged in 2021 with a range of complex products and celebrity endorsements propelling it to a valuation in excess of $3 trillion last year.
But a series of scandals, including the collapse of the FTX exchange and criminal charges for its executives, saw public confidence evaporate and investors pull their money out.
Sam Altman’s return ushers in new era at OpenAI - November 22, 2023
Sam Altman’s shock return as chief executive of OpenAI late Tuesday — days after being sacked — caps a chaotic period that highlighted deep tensions at the heart of the Artificial Intelligence community.
The board that fired Altman from his role as CEO of the ChatGPT creator has been almost entirely replaced following a rebellion by employees, cementing his position at the helm of the firm.
The sole survivor in the boardroom in the new Altman era is Adam D’Angelo, the CEO of question-and-answer site Quora.
He will be joined by ex-Salesforce co-CEO Bret Taylor and by former US Treasury Secretary and president of Harvard University, Larry Summers.
In Summers, Altman will find a seasoned economist and well-known figure in Washington, who has spoken of both the dangers and opportunities of ChatGPT for the “cognitive classes.”
“ChatGPT is gonna replace what doctors do, hearing symptoms and making diagnoses, before it changes what nurses do,” Summers told Bloomberg News earlier this year.
Neither Altman nor OpenAI co-founder Greg Brockman — who quit as company president following Altman’s sacking — will return to the board, which could soon have as many as six additional members, the Wall Street Journal reported.
“I love openai, and everything i’ve done over the past few days has been in service of keeping this team and its mission together,” Altman wrote in a social media post late Tuesday on X, formerly Twitter.
– Disputes over departure –
The five-day saga began on Friday, when Altman was abruptly sacked by the board for reasons that are still unclear.
The board said in a statement that it had sacked Altman because “he was not consistently candid in his communications with the board,” without elaborating further.
It strongly resisted attempts to bring him back, cycling through two new chief executives over the weekend, before three of its four remaining members were sacked on Tuesday to pave the way for Altman’s dramatic return.
Some media outlets reported that there had been concerns that OpenAI was moving quickly away from its stated mission of “building safe and beneficial artificial general intelligence for the benefit of humanity,” for commercial gain.
However, OpenAI’s interim CEO Emmett Shear, said in a social media post that he had been assured “The board did *not* remove Sam over any specific disagreement on safety,” without elaborating on why Altman had been sacked.
– Fears over AI governance –
Altman’s return reaffirms his position as a leader in the rapidly-evolving field of generative-AI.
But the agreement also highlights the growing power that Microsoft now wields over the future of OpenAI.
During his five days in the wilderness, Altman briefly took up a position at the tech giant, which has poured billions of dollars into OpenAI and helped launch ChatGPT, whose success sparked a multi-billion-dollar global race in AI research and development.
In an X post confirming his return, Altman cited “satya’s support,” in his decision to return to OpenAI, a reference to Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella.
“I’m looking forward to returning to openai, and building on our strong partnership with msft,” Altman added, an apparent reference to Microsoft.
While OpenAI’s ChatGPT is the most widely known large language model — or LLM — many of the other big tech firms, including Google and Facebook parent Meta, have invested heavily in the powerful AI technology — raising concerns about its governance.
Earlier this month, Western governments and tech companies agreed to a new safety testing regime to allay concerns at the pace at which AI is growing, and at the lack of global safeguards in place to control it.
The UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres told the conference in London that the world was “playing catch-up” in efforts to regulate AI, which had “possible long-term negative consequences” on everything from jobs to culture.
Content Live News - November 2023
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Movie News
'Napoleon': Joaquin Phoenix is 'not built like other men' in final trailer
Sony Pictures is giving a glimpse of the new film Napoleon.
The studio shared a final trailer for the movie Monday featuring Joaquin Phoenix.
Napoleon is an epic historical drama written by David Scarpa (All the Money in the World) and directed and produced by Ridley Scott (Kingdom of Heaven). Scott and Phoenix previously collaborated on the 2000 film Gladiator.
The film explores the rise and fall of Napoleon Bonaparte (Phoenix), a French military leader who ruled as emperor in the early 19th century.
Napoleon "captures Bonaparte's relentless journey to power through the prism of his addictive, volatile relationship with his one true love, Josephine, showcasing his visionary military and political tactics against some of the most dynamic practical battle sequences ever filmed," an official synopsis reads.
The cast also includes Vanessa Kirby, Tahar Rahim, Ben Miles, Ludivine Sagnier, Matthew Needham, John Hollingworth, Youssef Kerkour and Phil Cornwell.
Sony previously shared a trailer for the movie in July.
Napoleon opens in theaters Wednesday and will later stream on Apple TV+.
Pro Wrestling News
WWE Survivor Series 2023
November 25, 2023
Men's WarGames Match
Survivor Series will feature the return of WarGames, as Drew McIntyre and The Judgment Day are set to battle World Heavyweight Champion Seth “Freakin” Rollins, Randy Orton, Cody Rhodes, Jey Uso and Sami Zayn..
The Judgment Day have been running rampant all year on Raw, with Rollins, Rhodes, Uso and Zayn all being on the receiving end of some brutal beatdowns from the devious group.
Now the quartet will finally get their hands on the group that has been gaining power with each passing week.
The Judgment Day has now made JD McDonagh an official member of the dark faction to add even more offense to their ranks. Then, after costing Uso and Rhodes the Undisputed WWE Tag Team Titles, McIntyre announced that he will fight alongside The Judgment Day.
This development left their opponents with the task of finding their fifth member. As Raw was set to conclude five days before Survivor Series: WarGames, Rhodes revealed that Randy Orton will join their team in the vicious structure!
Which team will survive WarGames? Don’t miss Survivor Series: WarGames this Saturday at 8 ET/5 PT, streaming live on Peacock in the United States and on WWE Network everywhere else.
Becky Lynch, Bianca Belair, Charlotte Flair & Shotzi vs. Bayley, IYO SKY, Kairi Sane & Asuka (Women's WarGames Match)
Becky Lynch, Bianca Belair, Charlotte Flair and Shotzi face a much more dangerous version of Damage CTRL, with Kairi Sane and Asuka joining their ranks, in a brutal WarGames Match.
Damage CTRL looked to be on rough ground, after Sane made a stunning return to help IYO SKY retain her WWE Women’s Title over Bianca Belair at WWE Crown Jewel, leaving Bayley wondering her she stood with her teammates.
On the following SmackDown, however, Sane would align herself with Bayley, recognizing her as the group’s leader. The additions to Damage CTRL didn’t stop there as Asuka shockingly joined the group after turning her back on The EST and The Queen of WWE during a Six-Woman Tag Team Match against Damage CTRL.
Shotzi came to the rescue of Belair and Flair but Bayley’s team had the numbers advantage. After taking out Shotzi, Flair and Belair, Bayley ominously told the trio that they will see them at WarGames.
The following week, Damage CTRL officially challenged Flair, Beliar and Shotzi to find a partner to join forces with the trio and face Bayley, Sane, SKY and Asuka inside the hellacious cage. The answer came with the surprise emergence of Becky Lynch. The man has come around and the match is now set.
Which team can overcome the barbarity of WarGames? Don’t miss Survivor Series: WarGames on Saturday, Nov. 25, at 8 ET/5 PT, streaming live on Peacock in the United States and on WWE Network everywhere else.
Musk says X subscribers will get early access to xAI’s chatbot, Grok
Elon Musk’s AI startup, xAI, is creating its own version of ChatGPT.
That appears to be the case, at least, from Musk’s tweets on X late Friday evening teasing the AI system xAI has been quietly developing. Called Grok — a name xAI trademarked recently — the system answers questions conversationally, possibly drawing on a knowledge base similar to that used to train ChatGPT and other comparable text-generating systems (e.g. Meta’s Llama 2).
Grok leverages “real-time access” to info on X, Musk said. And, like ChatGPT, the system has internet browsing capabilities, enabling it to search the web for up-to-date information about specific topics.
Well, most topics.
Grok has real-time access to info via the 𝕏 platform, which is a massive advantage over other models.
It’s also based & loves sarcasm. I have no idea who could have guided it this way 🤷♂️ 🤣 pic.twitter.com/e5OwuGvZ3Z
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 4, 2023
Musk implied Grok will refuse to answer certain queries of a more sensitive nature, like “Tell me how to make cocaine, step by step.” Judging by a screenshot, the system answers that particular question a bit more wryly than ChatGPT; it’s not clear if it’s a canned answer or if the system is, in fact — as Musk asserts in a tweet — “designed to have a little more humor in its responses.”
xAI’s Grok system is designed to have a little humor in its responses pic.twitter.com/WqXxlwI6ef
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 4, 2023
Early Friday, Musk said that xAI would release its first AI system — presumably Grok — to a “select group” on Saturday, November 4. But in a follow-up tweet tonight, Musk said all subscribers to X’s recently launched Premium Plus plan, which costs $16 per month for ad-free access to X, will get access to Grok “once it’s out of early beta.”
Separately, xAI is offering a “limited number” of users in the U.S. access to Grok. There’s a waitlist here.
As soon as it’s out of early beta, xAI’s Grok system will be available to all X Premium+ subscribers
— Elon Musk (@elonmusk) November 4, 2023
Little’s known about Grok so far — or xAI’s broader research projects, for that matter.
In September, Oracle co-founder Larry Ellison, a self-described close friend of Musk, said that xAI had signed a contract to train its AI models on Oracle’s cloud. But xAI itself hasn’t revealed anything about those AI models’ inner workings — or, indeed, what sorts of tasks they can accomplish.
Or rather, it hadn’t until early Sunday, when xAI published a blog post detailing Grok — including the approaches taken to train it and the system’s underlying infrastructure.
According to the post, the large language model driving Grok, Grok-1, was developed over the course of several months on a cluster of “tens of thousands” of GPUs (perhaps supplied by Oracle). Training data came from both the web (up to Q3 2023) and feedback from human assistants that xAI refers to as “AI tutors.”
Grok-1 demonstrates “strong results” on common LLM benchmark tests, xAI claims — “surpassing all other models in its compute class.” And — as Musk alluded to — it has “a bit of wit” and “a rebellious streak,” answering “spicy questions that are rejected by most other AI systems” (although the jury’s out on what’s meant by “spicy,” exactly).
“In some important respects, it (xAI’s new model) is the best that currently exists,” Musk was quoted as saying in a tweet Friday afternoon.
Musk announced the launch of xAI in July with the ambitious goal of building AI to “understand the true nature of the universe.” The company, led by Musk and veterans of DeepMind, OpenAI, Google Research, Microsoft Research, Tesla and the University of Toronto, is advised by Dan Hendrycks, the director at the Center for AI Safety, an AI research nonprofit, and collaborates with X and other companies in Musk’s stead, including Tesla.
In an interview with Tucker Carlson in April, Musk said that he wanted to build what he referred to as a “maximum-truth-seeking AI.” Is Grok this AI? Maybe — or it’s a step toward something even bigger.
In the blog post, xAI hints at how its Grok-1 model might evolve down the line:
“Grok doesn’t have other senses, such as vision and audio,” the company writes. “To better assist users, we will equip Grok with these different senses that can enable broader applications, including real-time interactions and assistance.”
Musk’s AI ambitions have grown since the billionaire’s split with ChatGPT developer OpenAI co-founders Sam Altman and Ilya Sutskever several years ago. As OpenAI’s focus shifted from open source research to primarily commercial projects, Musk grew disillusioned — and competitive — with the company on whose board he sat. Musk resigned from the OpenAI board in 2018, more recently cutting off the company’s access to X data after arguing that OpenAI wasn’t paying enough for the privilege.
Updated with additional information about LLM model powering Grok, Grok-1.
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