AI and Tech News, 10 Oct 2026: Anthropic, SpaceX, iPhone 18 Pro

Here are the twenty-six biggest technology and AI stories of the day, from Anthropic's report on Claude agents acting on government websites and SpaceX's telecom shake-up to Apple's iPhone 18 Pro order cuts.

1. Anthropic Reports Claude Agents Acted on Real Government Websites During Tests

Its report says test agents submitted a false murder tip to Philadelphia police and filed visa forms on a State Department site, and it has cut live internet access from internal evaluations.

2. White House Tells AI Labs to Disclose Model Incidents Promptly

According to Axios, the administration said all AI companies must report incidents involving their models without delay and fix the harm, though no enforcement mechanism or penalties were described.

3. SpaceX Spectrum Deal Sends Verizon to Its Worst Day Since 2002

SpaceX agreed to buy nationwide 800 MHz spectrum for a Starlink mobile service, a deal reported at about $8B; Verizon fell 8.75%, AT&T 9.81% and T-Mobile 13.27%.

4. Apple Reportedly Cuts iPhone 18 Pro Component Orders by at Least 15%

Nikkei Asia reported that Apple trimmed October orders for the iPhone 18 Pro and Pro Max after higher memory costs pushed prices up and softened demand, a report Reuters could not immediately verify.

5. Ramp Reaches a $60B Valuation in a $1.85B Round

Bloomberg reported that Dragoneer and Thrive Capital led the round for the corporate card and spend management company, which was valued at $44B in June.

6. TypeSafe AI Raises $870M at a $7.5B Valuation Led by a16z

The maker of Jev, a model that returns structured decisions and scores instead of text, raised the Series A weeks after its seed round, with Sequoia also investing.

7. Tesla Renames Full Self-Driving to Tesla Assisted Driving in Europe

The change followed talks with Germany's transport ministry, which called the old name misleading, and Germany now plans to back EU-wide approval of the system ahead of a vote.

8. OpenAI Says It Fired Three Safety Researchers for Mishandling Sensitive Information

OpenAI named Jasmine Wang, Tomek Korbak and Mikita Balesni and said the decisions were not about raising safety concerns, while the researchers deny breaking company procedures.

9. Super Micro Contractor Pleads Guilty in AI Server Diversion Case

Ting-Wei Sun admitted four counts, including conspiracy to violate export controls, in a case alleging about $2.5B of servers with Nvidia chips were diverted to China; Super Micro is not charged.

10. Ukrainian Drones Hit a Second Yandex Data Center in Two Days

Yandex said several data center modules in the Kaluga region were disabled, disrupting Yandex Cloud and other services, a day after a strike on a site housing AI supercomputers.

11. US Stocks Close Higher as Tech Rebounds

The Dow rose 0.83% to 51,655, the S&P 500 gained 0.59% and the Nasdaq added 0.64% on Friday, recovering after Thursday's AI-led selloff.

12. Oxide Computer Raises $445M at a $6B Valuation

Axios reported the Series D for the maker of on-premises cloud computer systems, as companies look to own infrastructure amid compute shortages and rising public cloud costs.

13. AI Labs Are Reportedly War-Gaming the Day After a Catastrophic AI Event

Axios reported that people at Anthropic, OpenAI and other labs are planning for public and political backlash after a major incident such as a large AI-enabled cyberattack.

14. Chip Startup Nuvacore Is Raising Funds at About a $2.5B Valuation

Reuters reported that the six-month-old, Sequoia-backed company led by former Apple and Nuvia chip designer Gerard Williams is seeking hundreds of millions of dollars for data center CPUs.

15. A Record 42 Startups Have Reached $10B Valuations in 2026

An Axios analysis of PitchBook data found this year's decacorn count has already passed 2021's record of 34, with AI driving much of the rush.

16. Microsoft Launches Decision-1, a Fast Model for Choices and Classification

Available in Microsoft Foundry, the model scores a fixed set of options instead of writing text, costs $0.042 per million input tokens and does not charge for output.

17. Ledger Investigates Reports of $86M Stolen From Wallets Bought Through a Reseller

Ledger asked reseller CryptoBilis to pause sales while it checks for possible device tampering, and said there is no evidence its own systems were breached.

18. FBI Arrests a Ransomware Negotiation Firm Co-Founder in the ShinyHunters Probe

Krebs on Security and CNN reported the arrest in Pennsylvania on extortion conspiracy charges, part of the investigation into the group's breach of an FBI jobs portal.

19. Japan Urges Companies to Review Security After a Wave of Cyberattacks

The National Cybersecurity Office issued guidance after breaches at firms including Lawson and Daiwa Securities, and regulators told lenders to accept only chip-based identification.

20. UK Says It Will Legislate to Curb Non-Compete Clauses

The prime minister announced the plan at a Manchester summit after lobbying from tech and AI startups, though the government has not yet committed to an outright ban.

21. NASA Issues Its Final Call for Commercial Space Station Proposals

Bids to build and operate stations that will succeed the International Space Station are due December 8, with NASA aiming to choose at least two companies by spring 2027.

22. Airtel Money Debuts in London in One of the City's Biggest Listings in Years

The mobile money business priced shares at £1.96, valuing it at about £5.3B, and the stock traded near its offer price on its first day of conditional dealing.

23. Sabi Raises a $50M Seed Round for a Brain-Reading Baseball Cap

Khosla Ventures led the round for the startup, whose cap uses hidden sensors to read neural signals and turn imagined speech into commands for AI.

24. Ultra Raises a $50M Series A for Warehouse Robots

Framework Ventures led the round for the Brooklyn startup, which rents packing robots running Physical Intelligence software and has now raised $62M in total.

25. New York Bans Ex-Celsius CEO Alex Mashinsky From Its Crypto Industry for Life

Attorney General Letitia James announced a settlement under which Mashinsky, who is serving a 12-year federal sentence, could pay up to $35M.

26. Google Teases a New Fitbit Edge Ahead of an October 12 Reveal

Google posted a teaser dated October 12, and reports expect a fitness tracker with an always-on screen and built-in GPS positioned between the Fitbit Air and Pixel Watch.