Critic Disputes Microsoft's Quantum Computing Claim

There is a new critique in the scientific journal Nature, who is raising fresh questions about Microsoft's claimed quantum computing breakthrough last year. This has now underpinned the company's announcement this month that it will have a working quantum system by 2029.

Quantum computers ‌could solve scientific and cybersecurity problems beyond the reach of conventional machines. They have become a priority for U.S. President Donald Trump's administration, which ‌invested US$ 2 billion in the field and this week set goals for a scientific quantum system by 2028.

Like Big Tech rivals IBM, Alphabet's Google and others, Microsoft is developing its own quantum computer. But while rivals are engineering machines based on better-understood quantum technologies, Microsoft has spent nearly two decades trying to break new scientific ground on a technology it says could help it leapfrog competitors.

In a formal reply to the critique and an interview with Reuters, Microsoft said it stands behind its research and that its quantum program is making practical progress despite any concerns.

Microsoft's scientific effort has drawn skepticism. Two previous Microsoft-backed papers were retracted from Nature, while editors flagged alerts about possible research problems in two others, one ‌in Nature and another in Science.

Microsoft said the previously ⁠retracted papers in Nature were done outside its labs and it did not review the data in them before publication.

The peer-reviewed critique published in Nature on Wednesday by Henry Legg, a lecturer in quantum physics at the University of St. Andrews in Scotland, ⁠raises concerns about a fifth paper, published in February 2025, and an associated press announcement. The paper, which is not being retracted, is central to all of Microsoft's subsequent quantum efforts.

Microsoft said publicly last year it had found the Majorana, a long-theorized subatomic particle central to its approach. However, it has not published that discovery in a peer-reviewed journal, such as Nature. The February 2025 Nature paper made a narrower claim: that Microsoft had developed software to identify a minute gap in an otherwise highly conductive ‌wire.

The gap matters because qubits, the basic units of quantum computers, are powerful but fragile, often losing their state within fractions of a second. Microsoft says that finding a stable gap in a conductive wire is part of a process that could create longer-lasting, more useful qubits.

Legg, however, found Microsoft's software "yielded inconsistent and misreported outcomes." He also said a broader dataset Microsoft released but did not include in the paper showed random noise, with no clear evidence of the gap Microsoft claimed to find.

In an interview, Legg compared the effort to finding an image of Jesus in toast by looking through an entire bakery's worth of loaves.

"If you're looking into something ‌which is essentially just random physics, eventually you will find the Jesus in your toast," Legg said.

In its reply in Nature, Microsoft defended its claims and said the software was a "practical tuning tool" to find good places on its chips to place qubits.

Chetan Nayak, who oversees Microsoft's quantum hardware efforts, told Reuters in an interview that the code works well enough that Microsoft regularly ‌uses it to set up chips now carrying out quantum computing operations.

"It's almost like arguing, is flight possible or not? And then you're standing next to an airplane," Nayak said. "Well, why don't you hop in and take a ride?"

Sergey Frolov, a University of Pittsburgh physicist who has also criticized Microsoft's work, said Microsoft lacks the longstanding evidence supporting the approaches taken by rivals such as IBM and Quantinuum that do not rely on the existence of the ‌Majorana.

"Neither Microsoft nor anyone else has laid a foundation where it is clear that these (Majorana-based) advances are plausible, through a series of reliable experiments," Frolov said. "On the contrary, we have a series of papers that keep being challenged at the very basic level, by different people."

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Meta Joining The Prediction App Market

There's a potential competitor in the prediction market space and its Meta, the parent company of Facebook and Instagram.

Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg has a development team working on an experimental standalone app, internally called "Arena," through which users would be able to weigh in on the outcomes of sporting events, political contests and other questions, The New York Times reports.

Unlike Kalshi and Polymarket, however, the Meta platform would not involve cash wagers, at least initially. Instead, Arena would employ a points system reminiscent of a video game, according to the article, which cited two unnamed Meta employees.

Meta would leverage its social media platforms to nudge people to its prediction market.

CNBC said news of Zuckerberg's initiative may have caused declines in the market values of DraftKings and the parent of FanDuel, Flutter Entertainment, last 23 June. The sports betting platforms are seen as potentially vulnerable to prediction markets.

Prediction markets — on which people buy or sell contracts based on the predicted outcome of an event — have surged in popularity and generate billions of dollars in transactions. They are increasingly scrutinized, too.

Accusations of insider trading, including politicians betting on their own races, have surfaced.

Kalshi reported former New York Congressman George Santos to federal prosecutors after he said he'd be going to President Donald Trump's State of the Union address in February before betting against his own attendance.

In April, the U.S. Department of Justice said a special operations officer used classified knowledge to net US$ 400,000 on a prediction market that speculated on the future of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro. Maduro was captured by U.S. forces on 3 January.

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Malware Hides Behind Steam Workshop

One of the best arguments for buying games through Steam is the Steam Workshop. This community hub lets users seamlessly download and install mods for their favorite games. No searching for the right files and the folders they go in; Steam Workshop does all the hard work.

However, since all the content is user-created, sometimes malicious coders upload virus-laden items, and victims are often none the wiser.

Earlier this week, Kaspersky blew the whistle on a new virus that hijacks Steam user accounts. This news came several months after the FBI warned about seven Steam games hiding malware.

According to Kaspersky, hackers are exploiting the sharing features of Steam Workshop's Wallpaper Engine. Unlike your average computer wallpaper, the Wallpaper Engine specializes in animated wallpapers (think the animated backgrounds you can get on your Xbox Series X/S and PlayStation 5), so there's more space for hackers to hide malicious code.

Kaspersky's analysis indicates that while only "dozens" of these malware-laden wallpapers exist, they are extremely popular — each has been downloaded thousands or tens of thousands of times. While anyone who installs the wallpapers will get infected, currently the people who built them are mostly targeting Chinese players.

How so? The art styles and titles are "tailored specifically to them." 89 percent of all victims hail from China, followed by Russia at 5.5 percent.

As previously stated, the virus is designed to attract people with certain sensibilities. The wallpapers lure victims in with images of women that can be best described as waifu material. And then when downloaded, the virus springs into action.

According to Kaspersky's analysis, once the wallpaper is launched, it installs a backdoor and an executable file that acts as a "game" while also digging for Steam account credentials. Once the executable has what it needs, it sends the data to a server that the hacker owns. From there, they have full control over your account; they can change your password, steal your credit card information, and upload more infested wallpapers under your name. Oh, and they can also hide all of your files behind ransomware and install crypto miner software if they want.

Kaspersky claims the malware is spread in two ways. The first is the most straightforward: Hackers draw from an archive of wallpapers compromised with malicious EXE files, DLLs, and scripts.

However, Kaspersky says some versions of the malware spread by turning victims into unwitting gofers. Basically, the target is tricked into accessing a protected archive containing the malware by entering its password. Although, sometimes the hacker installs a script that does it for them — not all of us are technologically literate enough to shoot ourselves in the foot.

Obviously, the best way to avoid this malware is to stay clear of Steam Workshop's Wallpaper Engine for the time being. If you really need a special wallpaper, use obscure Windows apps such as WinDynamicDesktop or download Van Gogh-inspired wallpapers for your Mac. However, let's assume that you downloaded these wallpapers before reading this article. You're not doomed just yet.

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Jerry Seinfeld Funny Take Down Of Anti-Israel Protester

Comedian Jerry Seinfeld was able to shut down an anti-Israel influencer by telling him Palestine "doesn't exist" after he was rushed while leaving the Garden last 10 June following the Knicks' Game 4 win.

The legendary comedian, 72, was walking among the throngs of people after the game when he was ambushed by a struggling streamer armed with a mic and camera.

"What up, Seinfeld? What up? Can we get a 'Free Palestine'?" said the streamer, FinesseFave, sticking a mic in the face of the Jewish actor and writer.

The famously quick-on-his-feet standup responded with a laugh before shutting down the incendiary question in three words.

"It doesn't exist," he said, before walking away.

FinesseFave later shared the video with his 180,000 TikTok followers, along with the caption, "Clown hasn't been relevant in decades anyway."

@finessefave Clown hasn’t been relevant in decades anyway #finessefave #nyc ♬ original sound - finessefave

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Lesbian Couple "Triggered" Over Comedian's Crowd Work

A lesbian couple went to see a comedian perform in Boston. Then they were made fun of by the comedian multiple times during crowd work. They got too sensitive and can't handle it.

TikToker Desii (@xoxo.desii) posted a section of a Boston comedian's set where he singled her and her girlfriend out. Desii said that she laughed because she was uncomfortable and that she almost cried during the set because of comments the comedian made.

So, this begs the question, why did she stay? She should not attend a comedy show because they make fun of everyone, regardless of yout feelings.

Desii, who has a girlfriend, tagged the post #wlw. WLW stands for "women loving women." It's a broad term that refers to women who are attracted to other women. It can also describe non-binary or female-aligned people who are attracted to women.

Desii started recording a portion of a comedian's set at some point after he realized that she was a lesbian. The comedian referred to her by race and started making jokes about her.

"Oh, it's like 90 degrees up here, and she's Mexican and a lez," the comedian said. "My whole time up here I've just been picturing her just getting ...  Anyway. It's on. Anyone else, fellas?"

Viewers on the post summed up what the comedian may have been implying. One viewer said, "He's saying he's been imagining her and her gf having [expletive]."

The comedian continued and told his audience he wasn't joking about the sexual innuendo. "I mean, I'm not kidding at all. Nothing I've said here is a joke tonight. I want you to know that," the comedian said in the clip. "This has been all real. I'm kidding. I don't know what's real anymore. I really don't."

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