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Iraq suspends Iranian flights to Baghdad

How scamster used medical bill to raise Rs 1.5 lakh

Visually Impaired Singer Vaikom Vijayalakshmi Wins National Award for Best Playback Singer

Vaikom Vijayalakshmi has been awarded the National Award for Best Female Playback Singer, recognizing her contributions to Indian music. The singer, who lives with visual impairment, has been a vocal advocate for inclusivity throughout her career. Her personal life has also seen significant challenges, including navigating a difficult marriage and ongoing medical treatment. Despite these hardships, she has pursued her passion for music with resilience and determination. Her recognition at the National Awards highlights how personal adversity can coexist with professional achievement.

APOD: 2026 September 23 – A New Lunar Crater: McGetchin

APOD Science APOD APOD: 2026 September 23 – A… Today’s APOD Archive Submissions Index Search Calendar RSS Education About Discuss APOD Astronomy Picture of the Day Discover the cosmos! Each day a different image or photograph of our fascinating universe is featured, along with a brief explanation written by a professional astronomer. AfterBefore A […]

Mininglamp Open-Sources Mano-AFK, an AI Agent That Codes, Tests, and Deploys Autonomously

Mininglamp has released Mano-AFK, an open-source autonomous execution framework under the Apache 2.0 license, designed to take a natural language prompt and carry out the full software build-test-deploy loop without human intervention. The system generates a product requirements document, writes code, deploys it locally, and runs three layers of testing — lint checks, API tests, and browser-based end-to-end tests — automatically looping back to fix errors it encounters. A separate adversarial review agent also inspects the final output for issues such as missing input validation. For browser-based testing, the tool can use either a cloud-based Claude model or a local 4-billion-parameter vision-language model optimized for Apple Silicon, which achieved 58% accuracy across 100 test cases on five web applications. The team noted that while the fix loop resolved around 70% of basic code errors autonomously, the local model struggled with dynamic UIs, animations, and complex multi-step user flows.

Trump bought up to $50,000 in SpaceX shares, sold them within a week

Former US President Donald Trump made notable investment moves in July, including buying and quickly selling a stake worth up to $50,000 in Elon Musk's SpaceX. His trading activity during the month also covered major companies such as Microsoft and Amazon. In total, Trump executed over 1,150 transactions, reflecting a broad and active investment approach. His portfolio moves extended to bond purchases and exchange-traded funds as well.

Winter Rains Trigger Spectacular Wildflower Blooms Across Western Australia

Western Australia has experienced an exceptional season of wildflower blooms this year. Heavy winter rainfall is credited with triggering the vibrant floral display across the region's arid landscapes. Vast stretches of typically dry, ochre-colored terrain have been transformed by dense carpets of colorful wildflowers. NASA highlighted the phenomenon, drawing attention to the striking visual contrast between the blooms and the surrounding desert environment.

Grammarly Reportedly Sends Unsolicited Messages to Users When Admins Try to Cancel

A post on the r/sysadmin subreddit has raised concerns about Grammarly's cancellation practices, warning other system administrators about unexpected user-facing communications. According to the report, when an admin attempts to cancel a Grammarly subscription, the company sends messages directly to end users without the admin's consent. This behavior has been flagged as a potential issue for IT teams managing enterprise accounts, as it bypasses normal administrative controls. The post gained traction on Hacker News, prompting discussion among IT professionals about the implications for organizational data and user communication policies.

Soaring Property Prices Push Taiwanese Buyers Toward Cheaper 'Haunted Homes'

Skyrocketing real estate costs in Taiwan are prompting homebuyers to consider properties with dark histories, commonly known as 'haunted houses,' which are priced significantly lower than the market rate. These homes are typically associated with past deaths or violent incidents, making them less desirable in a culture where superstition remains strong. Many financial institutions are hesitant to offer loans for such properties, citing concerns over difficult resale prospects. Despite these hurdles, some buyers proceed with purchases and often perform traditional spiritual rituals before moving in to appease perceived spirits. The trend highlights how economic pressure is intersecting with deep-rooted cultural beliefs in Taiwan's modern housing market.

World Bank to give $170 mn emergency fund to Nepal

Imran Khan Accuses Pakistani Forces of Intimidation During Night Raid

Imran Khan has levelled serious allegations against Pakistani security forces ahead of a planned major march. His family's account details a night raid in which officers allegedly ordered subordinates to seize individuals and force them into vehicles. The statement cites commands given in Urdu as evidence of conduct described as disrespectful, intimidating, and unprofessional. The allegations have been made public in the lead-up to what is being described as a significant political demonstration.

Delhi Police warns against sharing photos on unknown AI tools amid blackmail risk

Delhi Police has issued a public advisory cautioning residents against uploading personal photographs to unverified AI-based tools. Authorities warn that such images can be misused to create fake profiles or facilitate fraud and blackmail. Users are urged to avoid clicking on suspicious or unverified links that could expose them to scams. Those who fall victim to cyber fraud are encouraged to report incidents through official police channels.

Colombo-Bound Flight Makes Emergency Landing in Chennai After Engine Failure

A flight bound for Colombo made an emergency landing at Chennai Airport following an engine failure. The aircraft was diverted to Chennai as a precautionary safety measure. The incident prompted an emergency response at the airport. Aviation authorities and the airline are expected to investigate the cause of the engine failure.

Data-Only Cyberattacks Pose Greater Risk Than Previously Understood

A publication by USENIX highlights that data-only attacks, which manipulate program data without altering code, are more accessible to attackers than widely assumed. Unlike traditional code-injection exploits, these attacks bypass many modern defenses by targeting runtime data structures. The research suggests that existing security mitigations may offer less protection than developers and organizations currently believe. The findings call attention to a growing gap between assumed and actual security postures in software systems.

FBI Probes Alleged 2TB Data Breach of Its Job Application Website

The FBI is investigating a cyberattack targeting its official job application portal, FBIjobs.gov. Hacker group ShinyHunters has claimed responsibility, alleging they stole over 2 terabytes of sensitive data belonging to FBI employees and applicants. The group says they exploited a vulnerability in Oracle's PeopleSoft system to gain access. Cybersecurity experts have raised concerns about the long-term risks to individuals whose data may be circulating among malicious actors.

Generative vs Agentic AI: How to Choose the Right Tool in 2026

As of September 2026, generative AI remains the preferred choice for content creation tasks such as drafting, summarisation, and code snippets, due to its lower cost and ease of review. Agentic AI, which is built on top of generative models, is better suited for multi-step, goal-directed workflows like bug fixing or data reconciliation, where results can be automatically verified. Despite growing interest, adoption of agentic systems remains limited — only 23% of organisations have scaled one, while 39% are still experimenting. Gartner warns that over 40% of agentic AI projects could be cancelled by end of 2027, citing rising costs, unclear business value, and insufficient risk controls. Experts recommend a default-generative approach, escalating to agentic only for well-defined, verifiable workflows where a machine can reliably grade its own output.

Pickup Crane Runs Over Teen Near College, Driver Flees Scene

A teenage girl named Prerna was fatally struck by a pickup crane while walking to her college. The incident was captured on camera and occurred just 200 metres from the college entrance. The crane driver was allegedly driving recklessly at the time of the accident. After running over the girl, the driver fled the scene without stopping to help. Authorities are investigating the incident based on the available footage.

Breeze TTS 2 Tops Open-Weight TTS Leaderboard but Bars Commercial Use

Breeze TTS 2, developed by BreezeBlue/RESONIA INC., reached the top spot among open-weight text-to-speech models on the Artificial Analysis leaderboard with an Elo score of 1215, surpassing ElevenLabs' Eleven v3 at 1175 as of September 11, 2026. Its hosted price of $34 per million characters is significantly cheaper than ElevenLabs' $100 for the same volume. However, while the model's inference code is licensed under Apache 2.0, the weights themselves are restricted to research and non-commercial use only, with commercial deployment requiring a separate written agreement from BreezeBlue. This makes Breeze TTS 2 a strong choice for researchers, hobbyists, and non-commercial builders with compatible GPU hardware, but unsuitable for businesses shipping paid products without prior licensing negotiations. ElevenLabs remains the recommended option for commercial use cases, given its unambiguous licensing, broader language support, and mature platform infrastructure.

DeepSeek V4.1-Flash Matches Top Closed Models on Coding at a Fraction of the Cost

DeepSeek released V4.1-Flash on 10 September 2026 with MIT-licensed weights, positioning it as a cost-efficient open-source model for coding agents. On the DeepSWE v1.1 benchmark, it scores 74.2, nearly matching Claude Opus 5 (74.0) and GPT-5.6 Sol (73.0), according to DeepSeek's own release figures. Its off-peak cached-input rate of $0.003 per million tokens makes it dramatically cheaper than rivals, with one worked example showing $0.15 versus $25 for Claude Opus 5 on a 100-request agent loop. However, the model significantly trails on hard reasoning tasks, scoring 36.8 on Humanity's Last Exam compared to Claude Opus 5's 56.3, making it less suitable for complex single-answer problems. From 14 September 2026, all V4-Pro API requests are automatically rerouted to V4.1-Flash and billed at the lower Flash rate.