Dangote Sh1.45trn Lamu refinery, OpenAI Astra pause, GM EV recall

Meta has released Muse Glimmer, a 30-billion-parameter open-weights agentic model under Apache 2.0, small enough to run on a Mac or PC with a single consumer GPU. Distilled from the larger, closed Muse Spark, it targets always-on local agent workflows: function calling, local coding and LLM-as-a-judge evaluation, all without network access. Meta also promised to open the weights of Muse Spark 1.2 in the coming weeks, and Zuckerberg published a long essay arguing for open-weight AI as the US strategy. For developers, Glimmer is a credible local-agent option on consumer hardware, and the licence removes both the cloud dependency and the per-token cost of running agents through frontier APIs.

YouTube is doubling the entry bar for its Partner Program. From February 2027, new creators will need 1,000 subscribers plus either 8,000 qualified watch hours in the past year or 20 million qualified Shorts views in 90 days, up from 4,000 hours and 10 million views. Existing partners, around three million channels, are unaffected. The company is also expanding Premium Lite to every market where Premium is sold, with 60 per cent of Lite subscription revenue going to creators, and it is raising the Shorts revenue pool threshold to 10 million views per 90 days. The net effect: harder to start earning on the platform, but a larger pool of subscription money for established creators.

Microsoft says Storm-1175, a financially motivated threat actor it links to China, is deploying a new ransomware family called StormEncryptor. Written in C++, the malware appends .encrypted to files and drops a ransom note named !!!README_FIRST!!!.txt in every scanned directory. Microsoft believes initial access likely came through CVE-2026-18577, a patch bypass for an authentication bypass in N-able N-central that CISA has flagged as actively exploited. Storm-1175 previously used Medusa ransomware after breaking in via flaws in Mirth Connect, ScreenConnect and TeamCity. MSPs still running unpatched N-central servers are the obvious target: the same hole that hit the platform last week is now tied to a fresh ransomware payload.

Anthropic will embed invisible watermarks in text generated by future Claude models and attach C2PA-signed provenance metadata to generated files, starting with models launched in the EU under the bloc's AI Act transparency rules. The company says marking will apply wherever Claude is offered, worldwide, and it is working on retrofitting already-released models during the EU transition period. The move follows Anthropic signing the EU's Code of Practice on AI-generated content. Enterprises that deploy Claude will need to decide whether provenance marking is a compliance win or a problem for products where invisible watermarks are unwanted, and the added friction could push some users toward open-weight models that carry no such obligations.

General Motors is recalling select 2026 Chevrolet Silverado EV and GMC Sierra EV pickups because an unsecured battery module component could increase the risk of a battery fire. GM will replace the battery packs free of charge, with owner notification letters expected from September 14, 2026. The recall hits GM's biggest electric trucks, vehicles that cost well over $70,000 in most trims, and owners should expect the fix to take time given battery-pack replacement logistics. For EV buyers it is another reminder that battery-pack build quality, not just range and charging speed, is the ownership risk that matters, and that recalled packs are expensive and slow to replace.