Fidji Simo, OpenAI’s No. 2 executive, will shift from full-time to part-time advisory work after her medical leave proved longer than expected, the WSJ reported July 9, 2026. She joined in May 2025 as CEO of Applications reporting to Sam Altman, disclosed an April relapse of a neuroimmune condition, led Instacart as CEO from 2021, and joined OpenAI’s board in 2024.
Google says that starting July 2026, users can see a “created or edited with AI” label for ads on Google Search, Google Discover, and YouTube via a new section in My Ad Center under “how this ad was made.” Google auto-labels ads made with its generative AI tools, but third-party AI ads require advertisers to apply the label manually.
OpenAI is shutting down ChatGPT Atlas, its autonomous web browser, with a deprecation date set for August 9th, 2026 — less than a year after the product launched. The company confirmed the decision…
Starting July 2026, Google adds a “created or edited with AI” label to ads on Search, Discover, and YouTube, shown in My Ad Center’s “how this ad was made” panel. Google auto-applies it for its own gen-AI tools; others must add it manually.
OpenAI will deprecate ChatGPT Atlas on Aug. 9, 2026—under a year after its Oct. 2025 launch. OpenAI says the browser’s lessons are now powering ChatGPT Work, a new desktop app with an updated in-ChatGPT browser and a cloud browser for Work mode.
OpenAI has received approval from the Trump administration to publicly release GPT-5.6, its latest AI model, and simultaneously unveiled a new AI agent called ChatGPT Work. The rollout began in July…
Microsoft says it will use AI in its security update pipeline starting July 2026 to identify potential issues earlier, boosting the volume of security fixes in each Windows 11 Patch Tuesday release. It’s also updating its Secure Development Lifecycle to cover AI-enabled attack techniques and exploit paths.
Announced in 2026, Meta’s Muse Spark 1.1 improves complex bug detection and fixing and adds multimodal perception for images, videos, and documents. The Meta Model API goes public preview today for US developers, plus $20 free credits per new account.
Block agreed to a $45M settlement with 46 U.S. states over Cash App fraud failures, announced July 2026. States alleged accounts could be created without SSN/DOB, with no cap on per-person openings, and the lack of an official support phone enabled fake help lines; Block must upgrade fraud controls and offer live support.
Ollama raised a $65M Series B led by Theory Ventures on July 9, 2026, taking total funding to $88M, with 8.9M monthly developers and 85% Fortune 500 presence. Launched in 2023, it runs open-weight AI models locally in minutes.
Character.AI announced the launch of c.ai Series in July 2026 — short-form, episodic animated videos designed to be watched and interacted with on mobile devices. The move expands the company’s…
Anthropic announced a new “reflect” feature for its Claude chatbot in July 2026, giving users a dashboard to review and analyze their own AI usage patterns over the past month, three months, six…
