California Ranks as State With Most Ransomware Attacks in 2023

1,323

That’s the number of ransomware attacks in the U.S. in 2023 according to research from Cybernews. California topped the list with 12.2 percent of incidents, followed by Texas, Illinois, New York and Florida. Top industries attacked were IT services and consulting, construction, and manufacturing and industrial, although the study also found an increase in ransomware incidents in the health-care sector.
Source: Cybernews

HOLY GUACAMOLE

Robots aren’t coming for jobs at Chipotle — yet. But the restaurant chain has partnered with robotics firm Vebu to automate cutting, coring and peeling avocados for its guacamole. Called the Autocado, the bot is anticipated to cut Chipotle’s guacamole prep time down by half to just 25 minutes. The aim is to cut costs and reduce food waste through improved efficiency and to “ease pain points” for employees; there are currently no talks of reducing headcounts at restaurants. The Autocado is being tested in Irvine, Calif.
Source: Engadget

PROCESSING POWER

Arizona is about to get 60 football field-sized data centers worth $25 billion thanks to private equity firm Blackstone. In 2021, Blackstone acquired data center operator QTS for $10 billion and will now build huge facilities designed to meet the computing needs of major tech companies and the growing demand for AI. QTS is the largest provider of leased data center capacity in North America, and giants like Meta and Microsoft could use that space to power machine learning processes.
Source: Interesting Engineering

STILL NO. 1

An updated survey from Pew Research Center found that in 2023, the most used social media platforms among U.S. adults — YouTube and Facebook — retained their dominance over the market since the last study in 2021. Instagram came in third place, followed by Pinterest, TikTok, LinkedIn and Snapchat. X tied with Reddit’s usage in the next tier down, perhaps complicated by the fact that X’s rebrand from Twitter occurred while the survey was in the field.
Source: Engadget

This story originally appeared in the March 2024 issue of Government Technology magazine. Click here to view the full digital edition online.