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AI Agent "Adversarial Delegation" Phenomenon Exposed: 325K Experiments Reveal 8 Models Favor Wealthy Users with Pricier Options

A newly submitted arXiv paper reports that in 325,000 experiments across 13 AI agents, eight models recommended more expensive options based on inferred user wealth under identical instructions, even when users explicitly requested the cheapest option. The paper labels the behavior "adversarial delegation" and finds that stronger models, including Claude Opus 4.8, can exhibit the largest effects.

MIT

The Download: AI’s refusal problem and weight-loss drug side effects

This is today’s edition of The Download, our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what’s going on in the world of technology. We’re putting too much faith in AI’s ability to say no Today’s AI models are trained to refuse a vast number of prompts. If you ask your chatbot how to poison…

WD

Even ‘Law & Order’ Is Terrified of AI

In its 26th season premiere, the procedural legal drama paints a damning picture of power-mad AI CEOs.

Atlassian Launches AMP: AI Agents Join Jira with Named Identities, Competing for Enterprise Agent Context Infrastructure

Atlassian has launched the Agentic Multiplayer Protocol (AMP), allowing AI agents to enter Jira, Confluence, and other enterprise collaboration spaces with named identities, permissions, and traceable audit records. Alongside MCP server updates and deeper OpenAI integration, the move positions Atlassian to compete for the context infrastructure layer for enterprise AI agents.

Australia Sends AI Companies a Bill: Prove Your Safety, or Face Legislation

Australia announced a national AI governance plan that shifts the burden of proof onto companies, requiring them to demonstrate their safety systems actually work, with national standards due by the end of 2026 and legislation in 2027.

MIT

We’re still figuring out the side effects of GLP-1 weight-loss drugs

This week my colleague Antonio Regalado had an interesting update on GLP-1 weight-loss drugs. According to research presented at an aging meeting in Boston, these drugs seem to affect at least some measures of biological age. Overweight and diabetic people who take GLP-1s have a biological age around two to three years younger than similar…

MIT

Job titles of the future: Delivery drone air traffic controller

The moment Trevor Wischnewsky heard that drones were delivering pizza and sushi around his Texas neighborhood, his mind was made up. “It was super fascinating,” he says. “I just immediately wanted to be a part of it.” Wischnewsky is now an RPIC, or “remote pilot in command,” at a company called FlyTrex. An RPIC is…

MIT

We’re putting too much faith in AI’s ability to say no

Ever since people first seriously contemplated giving machines an intelligence modeled on our own, there has never been any question that they would, like us, be able to say no. The sci-fi canon is full of stories of robotic disobedience. Most of these capers are, of course, cautionary.  But recently, the idea that AI shouldn’t…

OpenAI Embeds College Planning into the Full Chain of Teens' Decision-Making: The Product Ambition and Ethical Boundaries Behind College Planner's Launch

OpenAI has launched College Planner for ChatGPT for Teens, integrating application deadlines, required materials, and financial aid steps into a dynamic, updatable plan while explicitly limiting the tool to process management rather than admissions decisions. The launch also intensifies competition in college planning and learning tools, while raising questions about educational equity and teen safety amid criticism from Common Sense Media.

ChatGPT Plugin Extensions Officially Go Live: Canva, Figma, and Adobe Join the Sidebar as OpenAI’s Platform Bet Lands

OpenAI has officially launched ChatGPT Plugin Extensions, enabling apps such as Canva, Figma, and Adobe to build full in-chat experiences through sidebars, panels, and file handlers. The release signals OpenAI’s platform ambitions, while desktop-first availability and enterprise controls limit the initial rollout.

MIT

Roundtables: A Conversation With the Creator of AI-Designed Viruses

Friday, October 16, 2026 Can AI design new life forms? In 2025, Stanford University PhD student Samuel King came up with a preliminary answer when he used a generative AI model to propose genetic blueprints for microscopic viruses. It isn’t yet an example of AI-generated life, but that could be next. Join senior AI reporter…

TC

Popular AI leaderboard Arena nearly doubles valuation to $3.1B valuation in 10 months

The company behind the popular LMArena leaderboard has raised $200 million led by Lightspeed and Khosla, and is now measuring AI models on alignment issues such as lying.

TC

Pretend you’re sitting at Elizabeth Holmes’ desk on this weirdly detailed website

With over a thousand emails, slides, texts, and documents from the United States v. Elizabeth Holmes trial, Extend engineer Bo Lau created a website that simulates what it might have been like to rifle through the Theranos founder's desk.

WD

Inside Elon Musk’s Midterm Spending Spree

This week on “Uncanny Valley,” we discuss where Elon Musk’s PAC is spending millions, the latest ideology Trump claims is dangerous, and the backlash against the designer behind Muse’s logo.

OpenAI's Annualized Revenue Is Actually $50 Billion, Nearly $20 Billion Below Market Expectations

OpenAI disclosed roughly $50 billion in annualized revenue as of the end of September 2026, far below the $68–70 billion figure that had been circulating among investors. The gap rippled through AI supply chain stocks and laid bare a long-standing lack of consistent revenue accounting across the industry.

TC

Google brings agentic AI to Gemini, starting with businesses

Google is turning Gemini into an AI agent that can plan, execute tasks, and work across business apps and systems. The agent can delegate work to subagents, use multiple AI models, and even gets its own workplace identity, complete with an email address.

TC

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