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The shot craft in PGA Tour 2K25 is exquisite and remains the best feature of the golf sports game from 2K in a series that has excelled in that area. The multi-layered parts of creating a shot, shaping it, thinking about contact and spin, and potentially utilizing specialist shots make the gameplay of 2K25 extremely enjoyable.

Review info

Platform reviewed: PS5
Available on: PS5, Xbox Series X|S, PC
Release date: February 28, 2025

However, the game is not as strong in other areas, and still remains firmly in the shadow of its competition, namely EA Sports PGA Tour. There are some familiar frustrations when it comes to repetitive, underwhelming commentary and strange animation execution. There are also new annoyances like an abundance of obnoxious transition screens, but also oddities in things such as bag building and skill acquisition, while the absence of some major competitions and the most famous courses is still hard to ignore.

Having said that, 2K25 still represents a closing of the gap between it and its main rival a little bit, and the games may be even closer in years to come, especially if 2K25 can continue to build around its awesome shot craft and golf play.

(Image credit: 2K) The shot craft is strong in this one

Shot craft is at the very core of what makes PGA Tour 2K25 fun and kept me devouring hole after hole, and tournament week after tournament week.

The series’ TrueSwing and EvoSwing features are quality and offer a high level of shot planning, execution, and feedback. In short, you can tailor your shots to conditions nicely and factor in strike, spin, and shaping, while EvoSwing’s feedback meter provides you with results in an instant covering contact, rhythm, transition, and swing path.

Throw in the fact that your golfer can smash 300-yard bombs off the tee right from the beginning, and you have the tools necessary to take on all the courses the game has to offer immediately. What helps this are the intuitive controls too: the analog sticks on the controller provide an intuitive way to swing your club, and the three-click method is present once again allowing for users to use one button and timing through visual prompts to nail their shots.

It’s worth mentioning here that although bombing drives for miles straight away is fun, the default difficulty of the game does make it easy to succeed at first: in my second round I shot a 58, 14 under par score. As a result, it’s definitely worth tinkering with the settings to find the right level of challenge; there’s plenty of customization here and it’s worth getting stuck into such as overall swing difficulty, swing bias settings, and even how many times you can use the putt preview line.

(Image credit: 2K) Career steps - and missteps

The career mode in 2K25 offers more than its predecessor and begins with the option to choose from five different archetypes that will govern what kind of player you are. These are pretty broad brush stroke types like ‘magician’ for those good at recovery and ‘big hitters’ for those who crush the ball. There’s a good level of character customization on offer too so you should be able to bring your ideal golfing avatar to life.

The overall means to get into the MyCareer mode is straightforward, and you’ll soon be choosing where to start - in the amateur championships, or diving straight into the PGA Tour for example. Your player is pretty competent from the off and you’ll be competing in no time which is a real plus point of the game and its career mode if you value getting stuck into competitions with real players fast.

Player rivalries make a return but also in message form with other pros dropping you a line offering to create a friendly rivalry. This can add a bit of extra fun to succeeding rounds of golf, and you’ll get a reward for engaging them and winning - often a cosmetic. You’ll also get more social media followers too - though I am still to determine what the benefit of more followers actually is apart from it being a general measure of progression.

PGA Tour 2K25’s personality system is an interesting extra addition and your choices in conversations or interviews allow you to be more confident, bordering arrogant, about your game, or allow you to be a more humble or reserved person. From my time with the game, I haven’t seen any huge tangible benefit to either yet. Feeding into that are the aforementioned rivalries, but also sponsorships, and the game’s interview system.

This - along with the new chats with your agent - is another largely welcome one, but again, something that has its own oddities to raise an eyebrow. In one sense it’s great to see an expansion of the career to include media duties and make choices on how you want your avatar to behave and act in the world. On the other, it is strange to get asked questions about being the best of all time after three tournament wins, and, once again, see the same questions repeat quite often.

Best bit

Nailing a perfectly struck shot is incredibly satisfying in PGA Tour 2K25, and getting every single element of it right is as good as it gets. When you hit your first well-planned and thought-out shot to approach a tricky green by also hitting all of the sweet spots in contact, clubface, tempo, and wing path, the feeling is immensely satisfying.

Sponsorship agreements share this kind of double-edgedness too: it’s welcome to see your player get wooed and approached by big-name brands, but it’s also very jarring to get strange offers such as noted footwear and apparel brand FootJoy offering to provide my clubs. It might not mean much to most casual players, but those who will recognize brands and maybe even want their avatar to use them, are the same ones who will find it offputting.

These additions also give way to one of my particular gripes with PGA Tour 2K25: the sheer number of transition and loading screens. After every single action - be that a round, a chat with your agent, or an interview - you’ll have a transition screen pop up for a few seconds. The frequency is incredibly annoying, and having them pop up so regularly - especially when you’re in the groove of moving swiftly between tournament weeks because you want to play the golf part of the golf game - is incredibly disappointing.

The week of a tournament consists of a practice session and pre-tournament events which help to make each week feel more fulsome. Practice sessions can be used to hone specific skills in the week of the tournament if you wish, and pre-tournament events like practice rounds can familiarize you with some of the tournament's holes before the event. Sponsor events can then boost your progression with those sponsoring your apparel, clubs, and balls too. As a result, every week in the career mode is full of stuff to do which is excellent - especially as much of it is the wonderful shot-to-shot gameplay.

(Image credit: 2K) What's in the bag?

There’s plenty of customization and development to get into in the area of skills and equipment. As you play you’ll acquire experience and skill points which you can use to unlock skills in broad-brush parts of your game such as shots from the tee, recovery play, and more. A lot of these skills are more about increasing forgiveness than anything but the ability to progress that they represent is welcome and satisfying.

Some attributes will be maxed out in line with your archetype which is broadly agreeable, but some skills and shots seem to be totally blocked off by that same choice. This also undermines the role-playing aspect of the game a little. You can bomb 300-yard drives straight away, but a power drive or shot has to be learned - or is unlearnable because I’m not the right archetype. My wedges are as effective as the tour professionals, but my player has to learn a choke down shot (gripping the club a little lower down the shaft). I chose ‘technician’ as my archetype and that meant a power shot or knockdown shot was just flat-out off the table for my player which seems like needless gatekeeping.

In terms of equipment, you can build several bags (like loadouts in shooters, for example) and simply playing with your clubs more and more leads to an increase in proficiency in them. The maximum for each skill is limited by your archetype, which is an interesting way of making you stick to a set of clubs to get more out of them. You can upgrade clubs and balls with bolt-on fittings to upgrade them and their qualities, and also evolve them into clubs of a new level over time too.

The level of flexibility in building your bag is good, though doesn't allow for complete and absolute choice. For example, I couldn’t pick a 58-degree wedge for my bag or even see any driving irons to pick. Spending a practice session on a driving skill can boost all of your clubs which is strange and negates the choice to focus on a single club a little - but I do wish my proficiency with one club making the rest of them better is something that would translate to my real-world game.

My experience with the amount of branded clubs to choose from has been disappointing as the range of club types is pretty small. In 2K23 I could recreate my own golf bag with all the 2022 clubs which allowed me to make my avatar more like myself. I can’t do that in 2K25.

(Image credit: 2K) One stroke forward, two strokes back

Sadly, the largely improved career mode and the moreishness of the gameplay and shot craft is held back by some familiar - and new - frustrations.

The commentary is still odd, repetitive, and underwhelming. I even had one time where the commentators were talking about a replay of a highlight clip over an entire hole that I subsequently played which had the commentary totally out of sync. It’s boring, low-energy, and - the cardinal sin in sports games - often repeats itself to the point of annoyance.

While pre-tournament practice sessions are welcome and the boosts to attributes offer something more, they’re subject to awkwardness; your character will do the same animations like they’ve just won a championship when saving par on a practice round hole, for example. On this note, I find that a golfer’s wrist on the trailing arm looks quite odd at address, as well, almost appearing as if it bulges forward strangely and is overpronounced.

The appearance of microtransactions isn’t too egregious or aggressive but it’s a shame they are deemed necessary in a golf game in which its other elements promote you and your player improving and getting better by simply playing.

For casual golf game fans, PGA Tour 2K25 still scratches many an itch, and the jump-in-and-play aspect is excellent, especially given the satisfaction of crafting great shots. Throw in some fun multiplayer modes like TopGolf, ongoing daily, weekly, and seasonal challenges and quests, and course design modes may well keep committed fans and players may well keep coming back for me with 2K25. For golf game fans like me who grew up with EA’s Tiger Woods series, however, 2K25 is better, but still not quite the right fit for those wanting a full role-playing experience.

As a result, the game still feels firmly in the shadow of its competitor, EA Sports PGA Tour. But, this isn’t a terminal comparison: there is much fun to be had with PGA Tour 2K25, and if you’re after an accessible, pick-up-and-play golf game for the current generation then this is it.

Should you play PGA Tour 2K25? Play it if...

You want the best version of a great pick-up-and-play golf game
The fact that you can take on pretty much any golf course in PGA Tour 2K25 straight after booting is one of PGA Tour 2K25’s most compelling qualities; you can be crafting shots and winning tournaments minutes after starting the game.

You want excellent shot craft
The shot craft in PGA Tour 2K25 is its best and most polished quality. With a more restrained UI this time around, there’s still plenty to get into to prepare the best shot in your armory for each and every situation - and the payoff is oh-so-sweet when it goes well.

You want to tailor and customize your golf experience
While it lacks in some areas, the tinkering you can do in PGA Tour 2K25’s settings to find the right level of challenge is very welcome and will help committed players get more out of the game as the hours pile up.

You want some fun online golf multiplayer modes
Going online and competing against other real-life players in PGA Tour 2K25 is both exceptionally fun and easy to do; you can find some neat games to play against others efficiently.

Don't play it if...

You want to fully role-play as a golfer from hack to pro
You can boot up PGA Tour 2K25 and hit 300+ yard drives from the off, and some skills are totally locked depending on your archetype, so if you’re looking at something where you go on a full journey as a golfer, then you’re better off looking at EA Sports PGA Tour to scratch that itch.

You hate abundant transition and loading screens
The amount of transition screens in between, well, everything in PGA Tour 2K25 is frankly infuriating. Especially when one of the game’s strengths is how enjoyable the core golf play is once you’re in it, this really detracts from the experience.

You want to play all of the best courses and biggest tournaments
Once again PGA Tour 2K25 falls short here compared to its competition and if playing the likes of the Masters and all the other most famous courses are a priority for you then PGA Tour 2K25 won’t offer you that.

You can’t stand bad commentary
While the graphics are improved in PGA Tour 2K25 the commentating is (once again) repetitive, lacking enthusiasm, often badly timed, and seriously underwhelming.

Accessibility

PGA Tour 2K25’s main suite of accessibility features lies in its extensive difficulty options that can be tinkered with. There’s also the ability to choose between holding or toggling buttons for the swing mechanic and a host of display and HUD, camera, and audio options to choose from. Sadly there doesn’t seem to be a setting to change the text size on screen or any colorblind options.

(Image credit: 2K) How I reviewed PGA Tour 2K25

I played PGA Tour 2K25 for nearly 15 hours for this review, taking my created golfer deep into a second PGA tour season having started in the Korn Ferry Championship. While playing through the seasons, I toyed with all the possible ways to play a tournament’s game week and also dipped into several of the online multiplayer modes.

I tried both Performance and and Quality graphics modes - performance was my preference for the smoothness of swings and shots - tinkered with the difficulty settings to tailor my experience, snooped about the shop and store, and interrogated the skill trees and equipment options, while also going out of my way to compare it to EA Sports PGA Tour which I still dip into every now and then.

I reviewed the game on my two PlayStation 5 setups: a PS5 Slim with an Acer X32QFS gaming monitor and Yamaha SR-C20A soundbar; and a PS5 Pro with a Samsung Q6F 55-inch 4K QLED TV and Samsung soundbar. When needing to play with a headset, I played with a SteelSeries Arctis Nova 7 on the PS5 Slim and a SteelSeries Arctis Nova Pro Wireless with my PS5 Pro (there are no special settings for the Pro). I used a regular DualSense Wireless controller on both machines.

First reviewed March 2025

• Google Pixel Feature drop adds people tracking to Find My Device
• You can share your location with friends and family
• It'll appear as a separate tab to your devices

As part of the March Pixel Feature Drop – and Android update – Google Pixel phones (in particular the Google Pixel 9) received a handful of new tools. But one in particular has occupied my thoughts because I’m not sure if I love it or hate: Find My Device’s new people tracking.

Find My Device is Android’s version of Apple’s Find My network. It gathers all of your connected Bluetooth devices and the Android products you’ve signed into and gives you an easy way to quickly locate those gadgets, using directions to their last location or making them play a chime so you can hear where they're lost.

That's all par for the course but the new tool lets you hunt down people, too. Well, it lets friends and family hunt you down specifically via the new People tab (which is currently in beta) if you choose to share your location with them. This works in much the same way as Google Maps, only now you can see people in Find My Device, too.

On the one hand this is super useful. Being able to quickly share my location with people will be great when trying to organize, say, a meetup as I can direct them all to my precise location at the push of a button instead of sending out vague directions. Alternatively, after a night out I can share my location with friends and family so they can see I made it home safely.

Is it safe?

(Image credit: Google)

At the same time, all of these tracking apps (of which Find My Device from Google is but one, there is also Life360, Glympse, and Google Maps to name a few more) make it clear how easy it is for us to be found by our phones, and certainly make me think twice about the threat of digital stalking – especially with news like Apple Find My’s recently discovered exploit.

Thankfully, there are digital protections in place with all of these services, with the main one being that you have to manually send your location to the people you choose. Find My Device will also alert you when tracking is enabled (as do many other services) so you’ll be reminded that your location isn’t private – which means you can either switch it off or keep it active if you still want to share where you are.

And if you’re worried about being tracked by tags you haven’t authorized, Android tech can automatically alert you to the presence of unknown trackers and help you find them – it can even make some compatible trackers play a ring tone to make it even easier to locate them.

Overall, then, the new Find My Device People feature probably falls closer to the useful side of the equation than the creepy one. If you're keen to find out more about the recent feature drop, here are my picks for the seven best tools Google just added to Pixel phone and watches.

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• Cisco warn of new vulnerability in Webex for BroadWorks
• The flaw allowed threat actors to steal sensitive files remotely
• A fix was already deployed, and users should update immediately

Cisco has warned Webex for BroadWorks users of a vulnerability that could allow threat actors to access sensitive data remotely.

Cisco Webex for BroadWorks is a cloud collaboration solution that integrates the video conferencing tool with BroadWorks-based service provider networks, offering messaging, calling, and meeting capabilities for businesses.

In a security advisory published on Cisco’s website, the company said that it uncovered a low-severity vulnerability in the app’s Release 45.2, which allowed malicious actors access to sensitive data if unsecure transport is configured for the SIP communication.

Exploiting the flaw

“This vulnerability is due to the exposure of sensitive information in the SIP headers,” Cisco explained.

It also added that it discovered a related issue that could allow an unauthenticated user to access credentials in plain text, in the client and server logs.

“A malicious actor could exploit this vulnerability and the related issue to access data and credentials and impersonate the user,” Cisco warned.

Since the company already made a configuration change that will fix both the vulnerability and the related issue, users are recommended to restart their Cisco Webex applications to apply the changes. For those who would rather deploy a workaround, Cisco said admins could configure secure transport for SIP communication to encrypt data in transit.

"Cisco also recommends rotating credentials to protect against the possibility that the credentials have been acquired by a malicious actor," the advisory concludes. So far, there has been no evidence that the vulnerability was abused in the wild.

In early February 2025, Cisco released patches for two critical-severity vulnerabilities plaguing its Identity Services Engine (ISE) solution. Both could have been used to run arbitrary commands and steal sensitive information.

Since the fix was already deployed, it advised its customers to restart the application to apply the configuration changes.

Via BleepingComputer

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The Justice Department claims 10 alleged hackers and two Chinese government officials took part in a wave of cyberattacks around the globe that included breaching the US Treasury Department and more.

• YouTube Premium Lite has now fully rolled out in the US
• It lets you watch "most" videos ad-free for $7.99 per month
• YouTube says it'll expand its pilot to more countries "this year"

Here's some good news if you're tired of increasingly lengthy YouTube ad breaks – a new YouTube Premium Lite plan has now fully rolled out in the United States, following some successful pilot tests.

The new plan costs $7.99 per month, compared to $13.99 per month for full YouTube Premium. The key difference between the two is music – while a Premium Lite plans lets you watch "most" videos ad-free, including anything related to "gaming, comedy, cooking or learning", that doesn't apply to music videos.

You also miss out on three other features compared to a full Premium plan. There's no offline or background video playback with the Lite plan, and you don't get full access to YouTube Music. In other words, YouTube Premium Lite is aimed at those who are already signed up to one of the other best music streaming services, but still want (mostly) ad-free YouTube videos.

On Premium Lite, YouTube says that ads "may appear on music content, Shorts, and when you search or browse", so it's not a completely ad-free experience like its pricier Premium alternative. But if you mostly use subscriptions to guide your viewing and don't watch lots of music videos, it could well be worth the price tag.

If that sounds up your street, you may be wondering Premium Lite is rolling out globally. Well, YouTube says that "in the coming weeks" it's going to launch Premium Lite in its other pilot countries, which are Thailand, Germany, and Australia. It added that it'll be bringing the plan in new pilots to "additional countries this year", but hasn't specified exactly when.

How does it compare?

(Image credit: YouTube / Future)

As someone who watches a lot of free YouTube, but who also sadly lives in the UK, this YouTube Lite subscription looks like a no-brainer to me.

I'm a long-time Spotify subscriber, so don't really need YouTube Music and rarely watch music videos on YouTube. I also mainly watch YouTube based on my subscribed channels, and while the ability to download videos and play them in the background on my phone would be nice, that isn't a deal-breaker either.

The main driver for me is that I'm getting close to my limit with YouTube's increasingly lengthy ad breaks, so I would definitely sign up for Premium Lite if it was available in the UK.

It is yet another streaming subscription to add to the list, which is why I'm increasingly using the practice of subscription hopping for the best streaming services. But YouTube is now a significant enough part of my TV watching diet that I could justify the $7.99 a month (or whatever the equivalent is) for the Lite plan.

One thing that isn't yet clear is how easy it is to switch from an existing YouTube Premium plan to the cheaper Premium Lite. Two of my colleagues on TechRadar have checked to see if there's an option to switch, but are so far aren't seeing anything in Subscription Management. I've checked with YouTube on the process and will update this story if we hear back.

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• Integrated AI transcription and translation
• Record, transcribe and summarize meetings
• Viaim RecDot are $236 now (so around £185 or AU$375), usually $249

Fancy an AI feature that's actually useful in your everyday life? Then Viaim's RecDot earbuds could be the very thing. When you're out and about they're a perfectly normal set of hi-res wireless earbuds. But they have extra powers: they can automatically record, transcribe and translate meetings and other sound sources, generating meeting summaries and to-do action lists. You can also use them to record and transcribe phone calls.

You don't necessarily need to wear them to use these features either. You can capture meetings on the buds' memory chip while they're in the case as well as in your ears, as long as you leave the case open and push the red dot on it to start recording (which goes a long way towards explaining the name RecDot), and the pickup range is a promised 7 meters.

The RecDot are one of three pairs of buds unveiled by the company this week. There are two other models: the Nano+, a more compact model, and the Air, which use ear hooks rather than an in-ear design. All three come with the AI features.

(Image credit: Viaim / IFLYTEK) Not just an office experience

The Viaim RecDot are being marketed as a "smarter, more efficient office experience", but if the AI features are as good as claimed then these buds could be useful to a much wider group of people. Think students recording lectures; singers recording vocal harmonies; writers conducting interviews.

I'm currently in the latter category (although I also sing): I use desktop recording software for phone interviews and a small wireless mic system for in-person conversations, feeding the recordings into an AI transcription app that's almost as accurate and considerably faster than me. The prospect of a single device I can use for all of that – and that I can also use to listen to pop music on the way to work – is very compelling.

The Viaim RecDot come with 36 hours of battery, 48dB active noise reduction, an AI meeting assistant and a price tag of $249, currently discounted to $236.55 (so around £185 or AU$375, although availability and official pricing in these regions isn't yet known) for an introductory period. You can find out more at viaim.ai.

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• A leaked image seemingly shows the DJI Osmo 360 alongside the Insta360 X4
• The lens looks bigger than the X4's, suggesting a different sensor size
• Its design has more in common with the GoPro Max, whose successor is delayed

DJI looks set to muscle in on the 360-degree camera space, if a string of rumors and a recently-leaked image are anything to go by.

Tireless DJI-leaker @hakasushi shared said image of the rumored DJI Osmo 360 on X (formerly Twitter), in which it sits alongside the Insta360 X4 – which is the best 360 degree camera currently available – and DJI's Osmo Action 5 Pro action camera (see below).

Based on the image, @hakasushi makes one observation about the rumored Osmo 360 – its lens diameter appears to be wider than the X4's. This likely means that the Osmo 360 has a larger image sensor.

Based on track records, this comes as no surprise. DJI's Osmo Action 5 Pro prioritizes sensor size over resolution, with the aim of better low light image quality than GoPro Hero 13 Black and Insta360 Ace Pro 2 rivals, among other benefits.

Bigger lens = bigger sensor! #dji #osmo360 seems to have bigger lens diameter (inner circle) than #insta360x4 that has 1/2" sensor. I don’t think Osmo360 will have 1-inch, but 1/1.3". pic.twitter.com/d1elOSDuAfMarch 2, 2025

Size matters

Wishful thinking would point to the rumored Osmo 360's sensor being a much larger 1-inch size – the same type found in the DJI Osmo Pocket 3 vlogging camera.

However, we wouldn't be surprised if DJI utilizes the same 1/1.3-inch sensor as the Action 5 Pro in its potential 360-degree camera – that's still bigger than the 1/2-inch type used by the Insta360 X4, even if it's a fair bit smaller than a 1-inch sensor.

The leaked image, if authentic, also confirms that DJI has identified the square-like form factor similar to the GoPro Max as preferable over the stick-like profile of the Insta360 X4 – and that's bad news for GoPro whose Max 2 has been hit by numerous delays and is yet to be released.

Each design is better suited to different users. The square-like design is probably better for extreme sports as it's less likely to get in the way, while the stick-like factor is arguably better for vlogging.

DJI is on a roll, and launching its first 360-degree camera would be a welcome shake up in a space dominated by Insta360 – we expect it to be a different prospect to the X4.

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• Intel unveils Intel Core Ultra Series 2 processors at MWC 2025
• Processors offer significant improvements in performance
• Intel announces Assured Supply Chain for select OEMs

Intel has lifted the veil on its latest commercial offerings - a range of new Core Ultra processors designed for a range of workstations.

Building on the success of the Lunar Lake Core Ultra 200V, Intel is now adding the Core Ultra 200U, 200H, 200HX, and 200S under the Arrow Lake designation.

Revealed at MWC 2025, the 200U will expand the performance of Intel’s thin and light laptop range, while the 200H and 200HX are built for performance notebooks. The 200S will be the beating heart of a range of desktops and workstations. Arrow Lake devices will start shipping in March 2025.

Better productivity and performance

Digging into the stats, the Intel Core Ultra 7 265U offers superior benchmarking across a range of Cinebench, Geekbench, and Procyon over its 165U counterpart. Most notably, the 265U offers an up to 1.30x boost in performance for Procyon Video Editing.

As for the 265H over the 165H, the stats are just as impressive. Offering between a 1.01x and 1.60x boost in performance across the same benchmarks. Simulating the potential increases in performance an upgrade could provide, Intel also benchmarked the 265H against a 4-year-old Intel Core i7-1185G7, and returned a 2.84x improvement in the Cinebench 2024 benchmark, and a 2.42x improvement for the Geekbench 6.3 Multicore test.

(Image credit: Intel)

As for competitor performance, Intel says the Core Ultra 265H edges out past the Snapdragon X Elite-X1E-80-100, and offers a 15% improvement over AMD’s Ryzen AI 7 PRO 360 in Cinebench 2024 Single Core testing.

“2025 is a pivotal year for PC refresh,” said David Feng, vice president of the Client Computing Group and general manager of Client Segments at Intel, “and with Intel Core Ultra (Series 2) processors, we’re delivering the most advanced commercial systems to date.”

(Image credit: Intel) Intel Assured Supply Chain

Intel has also announced that select Intel Core Ultra Series 2 products will benefit from Assured Supply Chain, meaning that certain manufacturers will be able to provide a system-on-chip (SoC) that shows a digitally attestable chain in the silicon manufacturing process, allowing greater control over procurement for governments and sensitive data handlers. This program will be available in the second half of 2025.

“Intel has long been a leader in secure, transparent and reliable semiconductor manufacturing, and the Intel Assured Supply Chain program is another step forward in strengthening trust in the technology that powers our customers’ critical operations,” said Jennifer Larson, general manager, Commercial Client Segments, Client Computing Group, Intel.

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• Samsung has launched a flexible portable monitor complete with a briefcase, one that seems to come straight from a James Bond movie

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Georgetown professor Ella Washington and Harvard professor Frank Dobbin discuss the beneficiaries and misperceptions of DEI, and who will be hurt as it's dismantled across public and private sectors.

• A company's executives received an extortion letter in the mail
• It claims to have come from ransomware operators BianLian
• The senders warned about stealing the company's sensitive files

The security world appears to have come full circle, as spam mail has once again gotten physical with scammers sending their victims snail mail.

Cybersecurity outlet GuidePoint recently came across a couple of these letters sent to members of the target organization’s executive team.

The letters are not your typical extinct spam, either - but claim to have been sent by the BianLian ransomware group.

There is no ransomware

“I regret to inform you that we have gained access to [REDACTED] systems and over the past several weeks have exported thousands of data files, including customer order and contact information, employee information with IDs, SSNs, payroll reports, and other sensitive HR documents, company financial documents, legal documents, investor and shareholder information, invoices, and tax documents,” the letter reads.

“Your network is insecure and we were able to gain access and intercept your network traffic, leverage your personal email address, passwords, online accounts and other information to social engineer our way into [REDACTED] systems via your home network with the help of another employee.”

The researchers said that the attacks are as fake as the letters. There is no evidence of any compromise whatsoever, and the letter’s contents bear no resemblance to the BianLian ransomware operation. Even the wording of the message is inconsistent with ransom notes BianLian was seen sending in the past, they said.

In any case, the scammers were demanding $250,000 to $350,000, to be paid in Bitcoin, within ten days. The letter also included a QR code leading to the Bitcoin address, but it’s freshly generated so it’s impossible to determine if it really belongs to BianLian or not.

The return address for the letters is in Boston, USA, and according to The Register, points to a real address for an office building.

Via The Register

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• Majority say they are now "adequately prepared" to respond to such threats
• Skills shortage is keeping them down

Almost four in five Chief Information Security Officers (CISO) say Artificial Intelligence-powered (AI) threats are having a “significant impact” on their organization, new research has claimed.

The 2025 State of AI Cybersecurity report, released by Darktrace surveyed more than 1,500 cybersecurity professionals across 14 countries, finding 78% saw AI-powered threats as significant, up 5% from in 2024. These are being combined with increasing cybercrime-as-a-service solutions, as well as automation, resulting in more sophistication and diversity in attack techniques in ransomware, phishing, and other methods.

However, businesses are not sitting idly, the report added, as almost two-thirds of the respondents (60%) said they are “adequately prepared” to defend against these threats, up 15% year-on-year.

Unknown attackers

Darktrace added that the results could have been even better, were it not for insufficient AI knowledge and skills, and an acute shortage of personnel and talent.

"The impact of AI on cybersecurity is clear and increasing. There are more employees and enterprise applications using AI that must be protected. Adversaries are using it to make their attacks more targeted, scalable, and successful. All of this is unfolding in a highly volatile geopolitical environment that is creating more uncertainty," said Jill Popelka, CEO, Darktrace.

"There has never been a more urgent need for AI in the SOC to augment teams and pre-empt threats so organizations can build their cyber resilience.”

While almost all (95%) of surveyed professionals see AI as means to improve the speed and efficiency of their cybersecurity platforms, fewer than half (42%) said they fully understand the types of AI in their security stack.

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• Proofpoint observes a sophisticated BEC attack in the UAE
• The attackers used a compromised email account to share polyglot files with their victims
• These files deploy a hidden backdoor against aviation firms

Aviation firms in the United Arab Emirates (UAE) were recently targeted by a highly sophisticated business email compromise (BEC) attack looking to deploy advanced malware.

Cybersecurity researchers Proofpoint recently said they observed customers in the country, “with a distinct interest in aviation and satellite communications organizations, along with critical transportation infrastructure,” being targeted.

The attacks started in late 2024, when a threat actor dubbed UNK_CraftyCamel compromised an Indian electronics company the aviation firms did business with in the past. They used that company’s email account to spread multiple polyglot files, and by using their partner’s email account, the attackers retained a sense of legitimacy, while trying to deploy malware in typical BEC fashion.

Unknown attackers

The infection chain they were looking for starts with polyglot files - these are files that can function as multiple formats simultaneously, allowing them to evade traditional detection mechanisms. While somewhat uncommon, polyglot files were observed in cyberattacks before, Proofpoint says, most notably in the Emmenthaler loader attacks.

Eventually, these files lead to the installation of a custom Go-based backdoor called Sosano, designed to maintain access and execute other malicious commands remotely. The attackers’ effort to conceal the attack didn’t stop with polyglot files, either. The backdoor’s size was bloated through unused Golang libraries, and its execution was delayed, to avoid detection in sandbox environments.

Proofpoint said Sosano connected to a remote server bokhoreshonline[.]com to receive commands and potentially download further payloads.

While the researchers do not directly link UNK_CraftyCamel to known groups, they note similarities with Iran-aligned threat actors TA451 and TA455, both associated with the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps (IRGC).

“Both groups historically focused on targeting aerospace aligned organizations. Furthermore,TA451 and UNK_CraftyCamel both used HTA files in highly targeted campaigns in the UAE; and TA455 and UNK_CraftyCamel share a preference for approaching targets with business-to-business sales offers, followed by targeting engineers within the same companies,” the researchers said. “Despite these similarities, Proofpoint assesses UNK_CraftyCamel to be a separate cluster of intrusion activity.”

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Generative AI might have hit the creative industry like a freight train over the past couple of years, but there’s no doubting the positive effect artificial intelligence has had on photographic technology. It’s changed the way we capture, organize, and edit our photos, but I’m afraid it might be changing our perception of photography for the worse.

First of all, I want to address the elephant in the room. Generative AI does directly threaten photography but the impact won’t be quite as big as you might think. I believe commercial photography and stock photography will be hit hardest, because as generative AI improves, it will provide companies with a cost-effective alternative to expensive location shoots, studio time, or imagery to advertise their latest wears or populate their websites and socials.

But here’s the thing, artificial intelligence can’t generate a real photograph. You need a light-gathering device to expose a photosensitive surface to create a photograph. And the vast majority of photography is about capturing a moment in time. Until AI robots start walking around with cameras, traditional photography will prevail in some sense. How else are you going to document a wedding or newsworthy event?

How is AI affecting photography for the better?

AI noise-reduction tools like Adobe Lightroom's Denoise (pictured) have revolutionized low-light photography (Image credit: Adobe)

AI-powered technology is being used to enhance both cameras and image-editing software. Deep-learning AI can train autofocus systems to recognise specific subjects, so the camera knows the difference between a human’s face, a dog’s face, and a car, for example. Similarly, AI can be used to control variables such as exposure and white balance, depending on the scene being photographed. And the best phones are using computational photography to make intelligent enhancements such as tonal changes, sharpening, and noise reduction, instantly, as the photograph is being taken.

The best photo editor software has embraced artificial intelligence, too. Applications such as Skylum Luminar Neo feature a range of AI-powered tools, providing photographers with the ability to, say, select and replace a drab sky. While Adobe has – somewhat controversially – embraced generative-AI tools powered by its proprietary Adobe Sensei AI. Heck, Adobe Lightroom Classic plug-in, Neurapix, can even learn your own personal editing style and essentially anticipate what edits you’d make to 1,000 images per minute. And that’s before you consider enhanced image organization thanks to facial recognition and automatic geotagging.

But perhaps the biggest effect AI has had on image editing is noise-reduction software (which reduces the lurid grain experienced at high ISOs). This has revolutionized low-light photography, redefining the boundaries of what is and isn’t a usable image when it comes to noise. There is an argument, then, that we have reached – or are about to reach – optimum AI saturation within the photography industry. It’s changed the process of capturing a photo for the better, without encroaching too much on the creative process.

Maybe that’s about to change…

Why do I think AI has changed photography for the worse?

Wedding photographers are already expected to go above and beyond – AI imagery is only going to fuel unrealistic expectations. (Image credit: Getty Images/Mikhail Sotnikov)

The old adage: “the camera never lies” has seemed obsolete for decades. From early image manipulation in the darkroom to hoaxes such as the 1934 ‘Surgeon’s Photograph’ of the Loch Ness Monster to the rise of digital image manipulation, society has long been skeptical of the authenticity of photographs. But during a time where a simple text prompt can generate a convincing image in seconds, we risk becoming more suspicious of photography than ever. And within the midst of a misinformation crisis, that’s not good news.

As AI-generated imagery becomes the norm, I think it will perpetuate unrealistic expectations when it comes to what a photographer can and cannot achieve. This has already proven problematic, thanks to the rise of social media. Wedding photographers are particularly vulnerable, with elite weddings and staged shoots helping to set expectations sky high. Suffice to say, photographs from a $200,000 wedding reception in Santorini aren’t going to look the same as photographs captured at your local golf resort. And AI is only going to send expectations soaring, with photorealistic images that may not even be possible for a photographer to capture.

AI-image generation will also cheapen photography, even further. Photographers are already lambasted for the fees they charge, despite the high cost of professional photography equipment and the hours they spend editing after the fact. There are many reasons why imagery has become less valued in society, but arguably the biggest reason is the prevalence of the smartphone.

Smartphones — jam-packed with computational photography — have allowed anyone to take a half-decent photograph. This has allowed businesses and individuals to question why they’re paying a professional photographer or videographer. You need look no further than social media to see that many brands and outlets opt for ‘lo-fi’ content as opposed to professional-grade content. And while stock library giants have already been accused of negatively impacting stock photographers' livelihoods, AI-generated imagery will surely land the final blow as would-be customers turn to cheaper (or free) AI image generation.

And that leads me to the final reason why I think AI has changed photography for the worse. Hiring a creative isn’t just about delivering the final product, it’s also about gaining access to their unique creative perspective. We’ve all seen AI adverts populating the web that dial the uncanny valley up to 100. As it stands, this imagery cannot hold a candle to what a skillful human can muster. Part of the problem is that AI cannot cultivate a unique style. Think Henri Cartier-Bresson, Annie Leibovitz, and beyond photography, Andy Warhol, and Stanley Kubrick. These are all creatives defined by their unique styles.

The fact is, there’s a difference between a unique artistic vision and somebody just heading online and prompting an AI-generated image. We are going to see photographers and artists alike embrace the powers of AI and create fantastic creative works that we cannot even conceive. But it’s the human element that’s the key. Ultimately, I always come to the same conclusion, when it comes to AI’s relationship with photography or the wider creative industry.

Artificial intelligence must not be seen as an alternative to the human creative, but a tool that bolsters their creativity. The photography industry – so far – has gotten that bit right. I just hope everyone else shares the same sentiment.

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