Articles by John P. Mello Jr.

Malware affecting industrial control systems (ICS) has the potential to disrupt key industries underpinning modern society, warned a report released Wednesday by the cybersecurity research website Comparitech Internet-exposed ICS devices are a primary target for threat actors, particularly those running legacy protocols such as Modbus, according to...

With more than 1,000 school shootings killing or wounding 800 victims in the last three years in the United States, parents, teachers, educators, law enforcement agencies, and legislators are desperately seeking ways to avert active shooter situations. One of the latest solutions is the use of drones Mithril Defense, a company in Austin, Texas, has...

Marketing leaders expect SEO and AI search to grow side by side, at least in the short term, according to new research from mobile analytics and marketing tech firm Branch Branch's AI Search and Discovery Enterprise Benchmark Report, based on a survey of 300 enterprise, marketing, growth, and digital leaders across six industries, concluded that le...

Embedding artificial intelligence (AI) in customer service operations is becoming commonplace, but the technology doesn't seem to be lightening the workloads of customer service reps New research by Typewise, based on a survey of 207 frontline agents in the U.S., U.K., and Germany, found that nearly three out of four (72%) of them said AI improved ...

Microsoft has announced initial steps to improve the quality of Windows 11 in the coming year In a blog post, Microsoft Windows + Devices EVP Pavan Davuluri outlined several changes, including:...

Malicious traffic on the internet has increased 245% since the attacks on Iran by Israel and the United States began on February 28, according to one of the world's largest content delivery network providers Akamai Technologies reported that, during the period, automated reconnaissance traffic increased by 65%, credential-harvesting attempts jumped...

Nearly eight out of 10 global IT decision-makers say artificial intelligence now poses a significant security threat, according to a new cyberwarfare report released Tuesday Cyber conflict is entering a new phase as AI becomes deeply embedded across economies, organizations, and everyday digital life, the fourth annual Armis State of Cyberwarfare R...

AI-powered subscription apps generate 41% more revenue per user than non-AI apps but are less “sticky,” according to subscription platform RevenueCat Its State of Subscription Apps report found AI apps convert free-trial users to paid subscriptions at 8.5%, compared with 5.6% for non-AI apps, based on performance data from apps using its platfo...

New research from Microsoft warns organizations that threat actors have begun integrating artificial intelligence (AI) into their workflows to accelerate tradecraft, bypass safeguards, and conduct malicious activity Just as the cyber underworld adopted business practices from legitimate businesses -- corporate-style organizational structures, as-a-...

Forget VR headsets. AI glasses are the hot commodity in wearable tech these days According to market research firm Omdia, global shipments of AI glasses, like Meta's Oakley and Ray-Ban models, increased 322% year-over-year in 2025, reaching 8.7 million units....

Solar-powered automaker Aptera Motors announced Tuesday that it rolled its first vehicle off its validation assembly line, marking a major operational milestone "The completion of the first vehicle off our low-volume assembly line is a significant achievement for the entire company," Aptera Co-CEO Steve Fambro said in a statement. "These first vehi...

Google has announced a new program to make HTTPS certificates secure against quantum computers The program, called PLANTS — PKI, Logs, And Tree Signatures — aims to address performance and bandwidth challenges introduced by the increased size of quantum-resistant cryptography in TLS connections requiring Certificate Transparency (CT)....

The mean number of open-source vulnerabilities per codebase doubled in the past year, according to the annual Black Duck Open Source Software and Risk Analysis (OSSRA) report released Wednesday The report, which has been annually analyzing the state of open-source software for a decade, found an average of 581 vulnerabilities per open-source applic...

Data centers are emerging as a new environmental flashpoint for the tech industry. Public concern is growing over their hunger for power and thirst for water. What's the tech industry's reaction to the problem? Put the data centers in space Space is a great place for data centers because it solves one of the biggest problems with locating data cent...

At the beginning of the hype cycle for any technology, companies' claims can get exaggerated. Artificial intelligence is no exception to that rule. Hence, the arrival of "AI washing." Like greenwashing, where companies try to make themselves appear more environmentally concerned than they actually are, or sportswashing, where countries hope pouring...

Rising expectations for rapid responses are draining the life from asynchronous customer support, according to a new study by a global customer support platform for e-commerce brands and online retailers The rapid rise in discovery commerce is creating a profitable opportunity for retailers, but also a dilemma: retailers are selling items faster th...

A developer of hydrogen production technology announced Tuesday that it has completed two pilot wells in Quebec, a move that could advance large-scale hydrogen production from subsurface rock formations The Quebec pilot is the first field deployment of Vema Hydrogen's Engineered Mineral Hydrogen (EMH) technology and, according to the company, a sig...

Rapid enterprise adoption of artificial intelligence is outpacing organizations' ability to secure their operations, according to a new infrastructure security report indicating that AI-driven attacks are already moving faster than traditional defenses can respond In its ThreatLabz 2026 AI Security Report, Zscaler warns that enterprises are unprepa...

The traditional divide between identity and data security is closing rapidly, and that's bad news for security teams, according to a report released Tuesday by a provider of identity and data security solutions "[T]he next phase of cybersecurity disruption will come from adversaries scaling identity attacks to compromise data security as agentic AI...

eBay announced in a recent email to users that starting Feb. 20, it will prohibit third-party chatbots and AI agents from autonomously placing orders on its platform The change aligns with updates to eBay’s user agreement, which restricts automated tools from making purchases on the platform....