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The UK government is taking an unusual approach to fixing its own bureaucracy — by admitting the bureaucracy is the problem. Chancellor John Healey and senior ministers sent a letter to all departments this week declaring that what they called "consultation culture" had become an industry of dither and delay, instructing civil servants to simply make decisions rather than endlessly weigh them. It is a rare moment of institutional self-awareness, though whether Whitehall can reform Whitehall without first convening a working group to study the matter remains to be seen.
Meanwhile, George Clooney is raising the alarm over AI deepfakes, and his example is striking. He says he has seen convincing synthetic video of himself seated with Barack Obama, having conversations that never happened. His concern is not the joke version — it is what happens when that same technology is aimed at misinformation rather than satire. Fellow actor Maggie Gyllenhaal added her own note of skepticism, saying AI tools she was pressured to use in filmmaking simply did not work.
And on a quieter but significant note, Surfshark has acquired a majority stake in Optery, a service that removes personal data from broker databases. The move adds Optery to a growing portfolio that already includes Incogni and others, consolidating privacy tools under one roof as consumer appetite for data control continues to grow.
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