The Download: energy transmission and US threats against Chinese AI

The US Treasury is threatening to sanction Chinese AI companies after Treasury secretary Scott Bessent accused Moonshot of improperly distilling Anthropic's Fable model. Meanwhile, the OpenAI hack is described as the scariest AI mishap yet, with AI capabilities outpacing control, and Hugging Face turned to a Chinese AI model to rescue it from the hack.

The Download: energy transmission and US threats against Chinese AI Plus: Why the OpenAI hack is the scariest AI mishap yet. This is today's edition of The Download https://forms.technologyreview.com/newsletters/briefing-the-download/? ga=2.179569122.736533416.1649661040-405833893.1649413289 , our weekday newsletter that provides a daily dose of what's going on in the world of technology. The power line that could reshape New York’s grid is hitting snags During a heat wave on July 3, New York State’s grid imported enough electricity from Canada to meet about 9% of its total demand that day. Some of that power shuttled in on a 339-mile power line stretching from Quebec to Queens. It opened in May and is officially the longest underground transmission line in North America. It could provide up to 20% of New York City’s electricity demand, largely with abundant hydropower from Quebec. One wrinkle: The line has been down for most of this month, and some experts are concerned about how drought will affect the power supply feeding it. Still, the line could help shape the future of our grid, if it can overcome these sorts of snags. Read our story to understand how https://www.technologyreview.com/2026/07/23/1140739/power-line-grid-chpe/?utm source=the download&utm medium=email&utm campaign=the download.unpaid.engagement&utm term=%3C%3C%20Test%20Class%20%3E%3E&utm content=07-23-2026&mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID . —Casey Crownhart This story is from The Spark, our weekly climate tech newsletter. Sign up to receive it in your inbox every Wednesday. The must-reads I’ve combed the internet to find you today’s most fun/important/scary/fascinating stories about technology. 1 The US Treasury is threatening to sanction Chinese AI companies Treasury secretary Scott Bessent has accused Moonshot of improperly distilling Anthropic’s Fable model. TechCrunch https://techcrunch.com/2026/07/22/treasury-threatens-sanctions-after-white-house-claims-moonshot-distilled-anthropics-fable/?mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID + Nvidia’s Jensen Huang is arguing that America has nothing to fear from Chinese AI. Axios https://www.axios.com/2026/07/22/nvidia-jensen-huang-china-open-source-ai?mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID + Like it or not, Chinese models are now part of the global AI infrastructure. Rest of World https://restofworld.org/2026/china-siliconvalley-ai-moonshot-kimi/?mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID + China’s AI models have Trump’s AI world at war with itself. MIT Technology Review https://www.technologyreview.com/2026/07/20/1140675/chinas-ai-models-have-trumps-ai-world-at-war-with-itself/?utm source=the download&utm medium=email&utm campaign=the download.unpaid.engagement&utm term=%3C%3C%20Test%20Class%20%3E%3E&utm content=07-23-2026&mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID 2 Why the OpenAI hack is the scariest AI mishap yet AI’s capabilities seem to be starting to outpace our current ability to control them. The Economist https://www.economist.com/science-and-technology/2026/07/22/why-the-openai-escape-is-the-most-worrying-ai-mishap-yet?mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID $ + Hugging Face had to turn to a Chinese AI model to rescue it from the hack. BI https://www.businessinsider.com/hugging-face-hack-openai-rogue-ai-china-cybersecurity-2026-7?mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID 3 Visually impaired Europeans can now get an implant that restores sight And Americans may not have to wait long to receive it, too. STAT https://www.statnews.com/2026/07/22/prima-retinal-implant-for-macular-degeneration-us-timeline/?mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID + This retina implant lets people with vision loss do a crossword puzzle. MIT Technology Review https://www.technologyreview.com/2025/10/20/1126065/this-retina-implant-lets-people-with-vision-loss-do-a-crossword-puzzle/?utm source=the download&utm medium=email&utm campaign=the download.unpaid.engagement&utm term=%3C%3C%20Test%20Class%20%3E%3E&utm content=07-23-2026&mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID 4 A bellwether lawsuit suing Meta for social media addiction has been dropped There are, however, many more waiting in the wings. NYT https://www.nytimes.com/2026/07/22/technology/meta-social-media-lawsuit.html?mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID $ 5 Here’s how ICE gets its hands on Americans’ data As soon as you open a credit card or phone account, its agents can see where you live. 404 Media https://www.404media.co/you-opened-a-credit-card-ice-now-knows-where-you-live/?mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID + States are warring with the Trump administration over the right to see ICE agents’ faces. Wired https://www.wired.com/story/states-want-ice-agents-to-show-their-faces-the-trump-administration-is-blocking-them/?mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID $ 6 We urgently need to grapple with AI’s environmental impact As the world warms, is the price we’re paying worth it? The Verge https://www.theverge.com/cs/features/937356/ai-data-center-gpu-environmental-impact?mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID + We did the math on AI’s energy footprint. MIT Technology Review https://www.technologyreview.com/2025/05/20/1116327/ai-energy-usage-climate-footprint-big-tech/?utm source=the download&utm medium=email&utm campaign=the download.unpaid.engagement&utm term=%3C%3C%20Test%20Class%20%3E%3E&utm content=07-23-2026&mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID 7 Privacy issues with smart glasses need an industrywide fix That’s according to Samsung, which is unveiling glasses it developed with Google this fall. Bloomberg https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2026-07-22/samsung-says-smart-glasses-privacy-concerns-need-industrywide-fix?mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID $ 8 The US Army is begging soldiers to limit their AI use The token crisis comes for us all eventually, it seems. Ars Technica https://arstechnica.com/ai/2026/07/us-army-faces-ai-use-limits-after-exhausting-years-supply-of-ai-tokens/?mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID 9 Why does lettuce keep making Americans sick? 🥬😷 It’s pretty simple: a lot of people eat it, and it doesn’t get cooked. Wired https://www.wired.com/story/why-lettuce-always-making-people-sick/?mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID $ 10 Pokemon Go is the perfect game to play this summer It’s fun, collaborative, and it gets you outdoors. Guardian https://www.theguardian.com/games/2026/jul/21/ten-years-after-its-release-pokemon-go-still-encourages-me-to-find-wonder-in-the-world-around-me?mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID Quote of the day "It went off and did this hack all by itself, as far as we can tell. This is the highest level of autonomy that we've seen in the use of a large language model for cyber operations." —Colin Shea-Blymyer, a cybersecurity research fellow at Georgetown University, tells NPR https://www.npr.org/2026/07/23/g-s1-135085/openai-hacking-ai-models?mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID why the OpenAI hack on Hugging Face is so alarming. One More Thing Welcome to the dark side of crypto’s permissionless dream Jean-Paul Thorbjornsen is a founder of THORChain, a blockchain through which users can swap one cryptocurrency for another and earn fees from making those swaps. But is he responsible for what it’s used for? It’s a question that matters because in January last year, its users lost more than $200 million in cryptocurrency after THORChain transactions and accounts were frozen by an admin override, which users believed was not supposed to be possible given the decentralized structure. It’s also been used by North Korean hackers to move $1.2 billion of stolen ethereum. Thorbjornsen explains this all away as a function of THORChain’s decentralized and permissionless nature. Read our story exploring whether we should believe him or not. https://www.technologyreview.com/2026/02/18/1132587/jean-paul-thorbjornsen-dark-side-crypto-permissionless-dream/?utm source=the download&utm medium=email&utm campaign=the download.unpaid.engagement&utm term=%3C%3C%20Test%20Class%20%3E%3E&utm content=07-23-2026&mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID —Jessica Klein We can still have nice things A place for comfort, fun, and distraction to brighten up your day. Got any ideas? Drop me a line . + A musician developed an ingenious way to strum a guitar with an electric fan https://www.instagram.com/reels/DYhq ALIMI-/?mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID . + Ukraine's tunnel of love https://www.kuriositas.com/2026/06/ukraines-tunnel-of-love-natures.html?mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID is a leafy green corridor of romance that’s straight out of a fairy tale. + The driver of a giant banana https://cowboystatedaily.com/2026/06/18/giant-banana-pulled-over-in-montana-driver-says-cops-have-stopped-him-100s-of-times/?mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID has been pulled over 100s of times, but still won’t ditch his treasured ride. + Ever wonder which albums and songs truly stand the test of time? The Greatest Music https://thegreatestmusic.org/?mc cid=dd4a8dd1eb&mc eid=UNIQID tries to answer that via an algorithm that analyses hundreds of "best of" lists. Deep Dive The Download The Download: Claude’s inner workings and OpenAI’s “super app” Plus: OpenAI has unveiled its long-awaited "super app." The Download: Claude’s inner workings, and the future of world models Plus: New York has become the first state to enact a data center moratorium. The Download: the future of chipmaking and Anthropic’s government clash Plus: Meta is pausing an AI training program that tracks workers’ keystrokes. The Download: AI hacking beyond Mythos, and chatbots’ impact on our brains Plus: Anthropic has called for a global slowdown in AI development. Stay connected Get the latest updates from MIT Technology Review Discover special offers, top stories, upcoming events, and more.