Summary: Anthropic warns of recursive self-improvement risks Startup calls for coordinated pause among major AI labs Anthropic valued at $965 billion ahead of IPO     Anthropic is calling on major artificial intelligence labs to consider a coordinated and verifiable pause in development, warning that rapid advances in the technology could soon allow AI systems to improve themselves faster than society can manage the risks.  The Claude creator said AI's ability to complete tasks on its own has been doubling roughly every four months and it was headed for "recursive self-improvement", the point at which the technology can improve without human intervention.  "If systems are capable of fully building their own successors, the ways we secure them, monitor them, and shape their behavior all grow much more important," the startup said in a lengthy blog post on Thursday, adding that a pause would allow society to "deal with its immense implications."  "We are not there yet, and recursive self-improvement is not inevitable. But it could come sooner than most institutions are prepared for," Anthropic co-founder Jack Clark and Anthropic Institute lead Marina Favaro wrote in the post.  Fears that advanced AI systems may get out of human control and cause societal harm have risen as the technology becomes increasingly capable. Anthropic's own Mythos model sent shockwaves through industries including banking and software earlier this year with its ability to find vulnerabilities in existing code.  But regulation has been slow, especially in the U.S. where most leading AI labs are based. A Trump administration executive order earlier this week put the onus on the labs themselves, asking them to voluntarily submit their most capable models for government cybersecurity testing before public release.  AI researchers have also urged a pause before but had little success. Elon Musk, who owns AI lab xAI, was among backers of a 2023 push by the non-profit Future of Life Institute to halt AI development for six months to allow time for safety guardrails.  Anthropic has long positioned itself as a safety-focused AI lab. Earlier this year, it refused to let the U.S. military use its models for domestic surveillance and fully autonomous weapons, prompting backlash from the government which put it on a national security blacklist, set to take effect later in 2026.  Reuters reported on Friday the dispute was showing signs of easing across parts of the U.S. government.  Still, Anthropic has continued to release increasingly powerful models and in February walked back a key safety pledge, saying that it would no longer hold back potentially dangerous AI if rivals were close to matching its capabilities.  It was recently valued at $965 billion in a massive funding round and confidentially filed for a U.S. initial public offering on Monday, putting it ahead of rival OpenAI in both valuation and the race to secure crucial funding.  COORDINATED ACTION  Anthropic's Thursday post cautioned that unilateral or poorly coordinated slowdowns could backfire if less cautious actors continue advancing, potentially reducing overall safety.  It said that a meaningful pause would require agreement among "multiple well-resourced labs" operating at the technological frontier, as well as rules on what conditions would trigger or lift such a pause and who would oversee it.  "A unilateral pause by one lab, by contrast, is achievable immediately, but accomplishes much less: it would change who the front-runner is, but it would not create the wider deliberative process that is currently missing," the startup said.  Its research arm, Anthropic Institute, plans to study systems needed to support a slowdown and in the coming months will convene policymakers, researchers, civil society groups and rival AI firms to discuss managing risks such as recursive self-improvement.  OpenAI, xAI, Alphabet, Meta Platforms and France's Mistral did not immediately respond to requests for comment on whether they would join the call.  Reporting by Aditya Soni in Bengaluru and Juby Babu in Mexico City; Editing by Shreya Biswas and Saumyadeb Chakrabarty

Summary: US Supreme Court rules 8-1 in favor of FCC FCC fined AT&T $57 million and Verizon nearly $47 million Legal dispute over constitutional right to jury trial   The U.S. Supreme Court backed the Federal Communications Commission's system for levying fines, ruling on Thursday against wireless carriers AT&T and Verizon in their challenge to the agency and handing a win to President Donald Trump's administration.  The ruling was 8-1. At issue in the legal dispute was whether the agency's in-house proceedings for imposing the penalties deprived the companies of their right to a jury trial under the U.S. Constitution. Trump's administration defended the FCC's system for assessing financial penalties, known as forfeiture orders.  The FCC fined AT&T $57 million and Verizon nearly $47 million after the agency concluded that the companies had unlawfully sold access to customer location data to third parties without securing the consent of users.  In all, the FCC imposed nearly $200 million in fines on carriers that it said failed to safeguard customer data. It fined T-Mobile $80 million and Sprint, which T-Mobile acquired in 2020, $12 million.  Verizon and AT&T paid the fines they were assessed but also filed legal challenges that eventually led to a split among regional U.S. appellate courts over the lawfulness of the FCC's in-house procedure for imposing the penalties.  In Verizon's case, the New York-based 2nd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the fine. The Constitution permits the FCC to provide an initial penalty assessment as long as an accused party can challenge the government's collection efforts in court, the 2nd Circuit ruled, prompting Verizon's appeal to the Supreme Court.  In AT&T's case, the New Orleans-based 5th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that the FCC's initial assessment of wrongdoing and a fine deprived the company of its constitutional right to a jury trial. That ruling prompted the FCC to appeal to the Supreme Court.  The legal dispute marked the latest case to test whether a federal agency's internal enforcement arrangement violates the constitutional right to a jury trial after the Supreme Court in 2024 curbed the power of in-house proceedings at the Securities and Exchange Commission.  In the government's defense of the FCC's in-house system, Justice Department lawyers had argued that the agency's assessments are not binding. If the government were to bring an enforcement action in court, it would allow the companies to make their case before a jury, the lawyers argued.  The companies, for their part, said that the FCC's system impermissibly uses in-house proceedings for a process that belongs in court, depriving them of their right to a jury trial. The FCC's initial assessments, they added, inflict reputational harm before the accused have had their day in court.  The Supreme Court in 2025 also issued an important ruling involving the FCC, endorsing the way the agency funds its multi-billion-dollar program to expand phone and broadband internet access to low-income and rural Americans and other beneficiaries.  Reporting by John Kruzel; Editing by Will Dunham

Summary: USTR proposes up to 12.5 percent tariffs on 60 economies Tariffs target countries including China, India, and the EU Public comments accepted through July 6 with hearing on July 7     The Trump administration has proposed new tariffs of up to 12.5 percent on imports from 60 economies after determining they had failed to curb trade in goods made with forced labor, an assertion that was rejected by its trading partners.  The proposal from the U.S. Trade Representative's office, issued late on Tuesday, comes from a Section 301 unfair trade practices investigation designed to help rebuild U.S. President Donald Trump's emergency tariffs, struck down by a U.S. Supreme Court decision in February.  Despite laws banning them, the products of forced labor are deeply embedded in supply chains across the world. European lawmakers bristle at the accusation that the region is less effective than the U.S. at curbing the trade in such goods, with one describing the U.S. findings as "utterly absurd". Business leaders said the U.S. move created more confusion for companies.  The USTR proposed 10 percent additional duties on imports from Canada, Ecuador, the European Union, Indonesia, Mexico, Pakistan, Argentina, Bangladesh, Cambodia, El Salvador, Guatemala, Malaysia, Taiwan and Britain. The USTR said all had plans or partial schemes in place.  The trade agency said it would impose additional duties of 12.5 percent on the remaining 45 countries that it investigated. These include China, India, Nigeria, Japan, South Korea, Vietnam, Australia and New Zealand.  "The failure of our most important trading partners to address the importation of goods made with forced labor is unacceptable," U.S. Trade Representative Jamieson Greer said in a statement. "This creates a dynamic where American workers are forced to compete globally on an unlevel playing field."  The USTR said it would accept public comments on the proposed tariffs and other remedies through July 6, with a public hearing scheduled for July 7.  EUROPE SAYS NEW TARIFFS ARE UNJUSTIFIED  The announcement comes ahead of the July 24 expiration of a 10 percent temporary tariff imposed by the Trump administration on February 20, the day the Supreme Court struck down Trump's tariffs under the International Emergency Economic Powers Act.  The European Commission said the tariffs were unjustified and reiterated its commitment to the trade deal sealed with Washington last year.  Bernd Lange, the chair of the European Parliament's trade committee, which voted on Tuesday to accept that trade deal, said the new tariffs were expected, but said the results of the U.S. investigation were still "utterly absurd" given a 2024 EU law to ban imports of forced labor products.  "The impression is increasingly emerging that a tariff measure is sought first, and only then is a suitable legal justification found," he said. However, he added that the key question would be whether the additional tariffs would exceed those agreed between both sides last July.  The U.S.'s largest trading partner, the EU, agreed last July to accept tariffs of 15 percent on a broad range of its exports. In its report, the USTR said the EU anti-forced labor measures only came into force in December 2027 and lacked key elements.  "We know there are ups and downs in what people say," French Finance Minister Roland Lescure told reporters after a cabinet meeting. "But the goal is to ratify the (trade) accord and stick to that."  However it was unclear whether the proposed tariffs — which the U.S. release described as "additional duties" — would come on top of levies agreed in bilateral deals signed with the U.S.  Britain said it was in regular talks with the United States and was taking action to tackle forced labor. It added that the preferential access to U.S. markets that it had negotiated for UK businesses remained in place.  Taiwan said it was "hopeful and confident" that the final results would reflect agreements already reached, securing relatively preferential treatment.  Beijing, facing 12.5 percent tariffs, said that it opposed all forms of unilateral tariffs and that there was no forced labor in China. India, confronted with the same rate, said it was engaged with Washington on the Section 301 proceedings, noting the proposed tariffs were not final.  "There will be deep concerns in the international business community that the US (forced labor law could) become a global template," said Andrew Wilson, deputy secretary general of the International Chamber of Commerce.  "Anyone can make a claim, get a shipment impounded and the company has to prove no forced labor in supply chain."  The USTR moreover said it would exempt from tariffs products including energy, rare earths and some other metals, beef, coffee, certain fruits and vegetables, pharmaceuticals, organic chemicals and aircraft parts.  It also said it was proposing a textile mechanism that would allow for a certain volume of apparel and textile imports to enter the U.S. at a reduced tariff rate, without giving details.  The ICC's Wilson said the list of exemptions over 76 pages suggested sensitivities over the potential cost-of-living hit to food and other goods with known forced labor risks.  "It doesn't make sense if the object of this is to enhance controls on modern slavery," he said.  Reporting by Anusha Shah in Bengaluru, Philip Blenkinsop in Brussels; Elizabeth Pineau in Paris; Josephine Mason in London; Editing by Jacqueline Wong, Thomas Derpinghaus and Hugh Lawson