Two days bring two tech crises

And Jensen Huang misled Nvidia’s lawyer, sources say

Stay informed with Reuters. Subscribe for $1/week. Weekend Briefing Weekend Briefing From Reuters Daily Briefing   By Robert MacMillan, Reuters.com Weekend Editor Thanks for joining me on another Saturday full of news. We have the latest on our various technology disasters below, but first: Vladimir Putin, Xi Jinping and Donald Trump might hold their first three-way meeting next week in China. And our reporter Ed Ou visits Mississippi in this week’s On Assignment podcast to get a firsthand look at how the state tilted toward blue. Flight shutdown highlights a network crisis   REUTERS/Elijah Nouvelage Big snarl: A communications failure that froze flight departures across the country is renewing scrutiny of the aging US air-traffic network. It even came on the same day that the Transportation Department asked Congress for billions of dollars for upgrades. Here are some portraits of passenger misery that our photographers shot. Tech support: The Microsoft glitch that sank Outlook, Teams and Copilot forced some businesses and institutions to rely on old technology from telephones to fax machines. It reminds us that a handful of big tech companies furnish most of the software and infrastructure that we use to communicate around the world. Jensen Huang misled Nvidia lawyer on his affair, sources say Documents: The former CEO told company leaders, including general counsel Tim Teter and chief marketing officer Alison Wagonfeld, that his interactions with Alice Huang were routine and reflected standard business practices. Jensen Huang this week hired law firm Paul Weiss, which has made headlines of its own over the past year. Background: Several news organizations have reported that US and other government authorities had suspicions that Alice Huang was spying for China. Here is what we know and what we don’t know about the Megaspeed executive. Trump aims to cut judges’ powers again Challenge: A Justice Department appeal pending before the Supreme Court urges the justices to curtail the longstanding ability of judges to halt the actions of federal agencies that hold the power to carry out Trump’s policy priorities. Speaking of priorities: The On Assignment podcast I flagged above illustrates how important food stamps are to struggling families. The Agriculture Department wants to cut millions of people from the program. Russia tries to freeze Ukraine out one more time Winter: Russia is trying once again to damage Ukraine’s energy infrastructure, seeking to leave millions of people without heat and power during the year’s coldest months. Our reporters visited a power plant to see how personnel repair the damage. Talks: US negotiators said Russia agreed that Europeans can join negotiations to end the Ukraine war, but Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov a day later suggested that this is not yet so. An urgent need, a non-urgent response COP31: Poor nations exposed to climate-related disasters are asking for cash to help them mitigate the risk, but rich nations are offering a limited response. Our reporters at the COP31 climate talks in Turkey say Western governments are putting national security and living costs first. Remittances: A group of small island states wants to create a fund backed by a charge on money their residents receive from abroad to raise $3 billion a year. Before I forget… Kazakhstan’s president said that the arrest of the country’s sovereign wealth-fund chief on corruption charges should increase investor confidence, not erode it. Hungarian authorities recovered nearly $20 million in cash in a bribery probe of former minister Miklós Seszták. Some of the money was buried in forests and hidden in farm buildings and warehouses. A police detective in Kentucky must face a lawsuit for allegedly relying exclusively on AI facial-recognition technology to identify a check-fraud suspect. The wrong man was arrested and imprisoned. Indian telecom officials ordered the takedown of more than 100 websites based on fake court orders. You’re so far away from me: NASA's Voyager 1 probe, launched in 1977, soon will reach the point of being one light-day away from Earth. Alpacas in a retirement home? Sign me up. If I’d known they were going to hand out awards for AI music, I’d have sent a few numbers in.   Sponsors are not involved in the creation of newsletters or other Reuters news content. Advertise in this newsletter or on the Reuters website   Weekend Briefing is sent once a week. Think your friend or colleague should know about us? Forward this newsletter to them. They can also sign up here. Want to stop receiving this email? Unsubscribe here. To manage which newsletters you're signed up for, click here. This email includes limited tracking for Reuters to understand whether you’ve engaged with its contents. For more information on how we process your personal information and your rights, please see our Privacy Statement. Terms & Conditions   © 2026 Thomson Reuters. All rights reserved. 3 Times Square, New York, NY 10036

Microsoft outage causes major disruption

And who will take Jensen Huang's job?

Go beyond the headlines with Reuters on the stories shaping the day. Subscribe for $1/week. Daily Briefing Daily Briefing By Robert MacMillan Thanks for reading today’s edition of the Daily Briefing, assuming you received it at all given the Microsoft outage. Listen to today’s edition of our World News podcast to learn more about it, and read on for Friday’s big headlines. Today's Top News   REUTERS/Romina Amato It’s not just you. Microsoft’s Outlook, Teams and Copilot have been down for an unusually long time. Microsoft said server problems caused the outage and that it was not aware of any malicious activity. White House officials are discussing whether to push out Howard Lutnick after lawmakers criticized the commerce secretary over not doing enough to restrict AI chip shipments to China. Donald Trump pulled his vice president off the Iran beat and onto alleged crime and corruption in Democrat-run cities and states. JD Vance blamed the war for the Republicans’ midterm-election losses. Rescue teams found no more victims of a New York City apartment-building collapse that killed eight people including two children. The city will examine five companies associated with an adjacent Brooklyn construction site and more than 100 other sites connected to those companies. The gunman who killed one person and injured four others in Washington, DC was embroiled in a longstanding dispute with his condo association over mold and moisture in his apartment. Matt Lambert appeared to have deliberately targeted the building manager, who died from his wounds, before killing himself. Nvidia It seemed like Jensen Huang just might survive the revelation of his extramarital affair with a suspected Chinese spy. Less than an hour before markets opened on Thursday and less than a day after the New York Times revealed another affair, this time with a direct report, he was out. Trump and his attorney general said the Justice Department has not determined that Alice Huang was a spy. Meanwhile, Jensen Huang had an intimate relationship with a second employee at Nvidia, sources told us. Who should take over as Nvidia’s next CEO? Donald Trump favors Apple’s chief Tim Cook, but other names are circulating. Then there is Colette Kress, now interim chief executive, who spent years as the only executive willing to check Huang’s risky ambitions. Business & Markets   REUTERS/Carlos Barria Global stocks traded lower while the dollar and US Treasury yields climbed as Jensen Huang’s resignation rippled through the AI economy and the incredibly large amounts of money people have thrown at it. Who’s buying Nvidia stock at a time when its shares are trading at their lowest valuation since 2012? Retail investors, naturally. You read it here first: Amazon is working on a secret plan called World Product Graph, an effort to gather data on virtually every item for sale on earth, whether Amazon stocks it or not. The goal is to keep you on its site forever. Are you solvent? US banks collected the highest quarterly amount of overdraft fees from their customers in four years. Kalshi ended its advisory contract with Donald Trump Jr. after his venture-capital firm increased its stake in arch-rival Polymarket. How ICE melted Kansas   REUTERS/Matt Mills McKnight Federal immigration agents swept into this rural corner of Kansas in late September and detained 104 people, according to the local US Attorney. On Election Day, voters made themselves heard. Kansas elected a Democrat to the US Senate for the first time in nearly a century when Adam Hamilton ousted incumbent Republican Roger Marshall. The three counties most affected by the ICE raids swung toward Hamilton by more than 20 points on average from Donald Trump’s 2024 vote share, results compiled by Reuters and USA Today showed. Read more And Finally... REUTERS/Thaier Al-Sudani Did you know that the first finance minister of the modern Iraqi state was Sassoon Heskel, a Jew born in Baghdad? His portrait and those of many others hang on the walls of Baghdad’s first Jewish museum, offering tributes and a glimpse into a once integral part of life in Iraq that has all but disappeared. "I saw people’s interest in this subject, and I hope it is a seed of goodness that grows in the future, because the Jews were among the founders of this country," said Baghdad resident Nabil Abdul Hameed. "I hope those in charge will ⁠think about bringing the Jews back. The Jews have property, history and heritage. I wish they would come and take part in the revival of the country." Read more   Sponsors are not involved in the creation of newsletters or other Reuters news content. Advertise in this newsletter or on the Reuters website   Reuters Daily Briefing is sent 5 days a week. Think your friend or colleague should know about us? Forward this newsletter to them. They can also sign up here. Want to stop receiving this email? Unsubscribe here. To manage which newsletters you're signed up for, click here. This email includes limited tracking for Reuters to understand whether you’ve engaged with its contents. For more information on how we process your personal information and your rights, please see our Privacy Statement. Terms & Conditions   © 2026 Thomson Reuters. All rights reserved. 3 Times Square, New York, NY 10036