The Mozilla executive in charge of Firefox says that while some people just want AI tools that are genuinely useful, "We've heard from [1]many who want nothing to do with AI ..."

"Listening to our community, alongside our ongoing commitment to offer choice, led us to build AI controls."

> Starting with Firefox 148, which rolls out on Feb. 24, you'll find a new AI controls section within the desktop browser settings. It provides a single place to block current and future generative AI features in Firefox... This lets you use Firefox without AI while we continue to build AI features for those who want them...

>

> At launch, AI controls let you manage these features individually:

>

> — Translations, which help you browse the web in your preferred language.

> — Alt text in PDFs, which add accessibility descriptions to images in PDF pages.

> — AI-enhanced tab grouping, which suggests related tabs and group names.

> — Link previews, which show key points before you open a link.

> — AI chatbot in the sidebar, which lets you use your chosen chatbot as you browse, including options like Anthropic Claude, ChatGPT, Microsoft Copilot, Google Gemini and Le Chat Mistral.

>

> You can choose to use some of these and not others. If you don't want to use AI features from Firefox at all, you can turn on the Block AI enhancements toggle. When it's toggled on, you won't see pop-ups or reminders to use existing or upcoming AI features. Once you set your AI preferences in Firefox, they stay in place across updates... We believe choice is more important than ever as AI becomes a part of people's browsing experiences. What matters to us is giving people control, no matter how they feel about AI.

>

> If you'd like to try AI controls early, they'll be available first in [2]Firefox Nightly .

[3]Some context from The Register

> It's a refreshingly unsubtle stance, and one that lands just days after a similar bout of AI skepticism elsewhere in browser land, with Vivaldi's latest release [4]leaning away from generative features entirely . CEO Jon von Tetzchner summed up the mood, telling The Register: "Basically, what we are finding is that people hate AI..." Mozilla's kill switch isn't the end of AI in browsers, but it does suggest the hype has met resistance.

When it comes to AI kill switches in browsers, Jack Wallen writes at ZDNet that "Most browsers [5]already offer this feature . With Edge, you can disable Copilot. [6]With Chrome, you can disable Gemini . With Opera, you can disable Aria...."



[1] https://blog.mozilla.org/en/firefox/ai-controls/

[2] https://www.firefox.com/channel/desktop/

[3] https://www.theregister.com/2026/02/03/firefox_ai_kill_switch/

[4] https://www.theregister.com/2026/01/29/vivaldi_release_ai/

[5] https://www.zdnet.com/article/firefox-turn-off-ai-features-switch-how-to/

[6] https://www.zdnet.com/article/how-to-turn-off-gemini-in-your-gmail-photos-chrome-and-more-its-easy-to-opt-out-of-ai/

Somewhere on America's eastern coast, there's an economic development agency in Massachusetts promoting green energy solutions. And Monday the Massachusetts Clean Energy Center (or MassCEC) [1]announced "a first-of-its-kind" program to see what happens when they provide free electric vehicle chargers to selected residents, school districts, and municipal projects.

The catch? The EV chargers are bi-directional, able "to both draw power from and return power to the grid..." The program hopes to "accelerate the adoption of V2X technologies, which, at scale, can lower energy bills by reducing energy demand during expensive peak periods and limiting the need for new grid infrastructure."

> This functionality enables EVs, including electric buses and trucks, to provide backup power during outages and alleviate pressure on the grid during peak energy demand. These bi-directional chargers will enable EVs to act as mobile energy storage assets, with the program expected to deliver over one megawatt of power back to the grid during a demand response event — enough to offset the electricity use of 300 average American homes for an hour. "Virtual Power Plants are the future of our electrical grid, and I couldn't be more excited to see this program take off," said Energy and Environmental Affairs Secretary Rebecca Tepper. "We're putting the power of innovation directly in the hands of Massachusetts residents. Bi-directional charging unlocks new ways to protect communities from outages and lower costs for families and public fleets...."

>

> Additionally, the program will help participants enroll in existing utility programs that offer compensation to EV owners who supply power back to the grid during peak times, helping participants further lower their electricity costs. By leveraging distributed energy resources and reducing grid strain, this program positions Massachusetts as a national leader in clean energy innovation.



[1] https://www.masscec.com/press/healey-driscoll-administration-announces-participants-groundbreaking-vehicle-everything

Monday security researchers at cloud-security platform Wiz [1]discovered a vulnerability that [2]allowed anyone to post to the bots-only social network Moltbook — or even edit and manipulate other existing Moltbook posts. "They found data including API keys were visible to anyone who inspects the page source," [3]writes the Associated Press .

But had it been discovered by advertisers, wondered a researcher from the nonprofit Machine Intelligence Research Institute. " [4]A lot of the Moltbook stuff is fake ," they posted on X.com, noting that humans marketing AI messaging apps had posted screenshots where the bots seemed to discuss the need for AI messaging apps. This spurred some observers to a new understanding of Moltbook screenshots, which [5]the Washington Post describes as "This wasn't bots conducting independent conversations... just human puppeteers putting on an AI-powered show." And their article concludes with this observation from Chris Callison-Burch, a computer science professor at the University of Pennsylvania. "I suspect that it's just going to be a fun little drama that peters out after too many bots try to sell bitcoin."

But the Post also tells the story of an unsuspecting retiree in Silicon Valley spotting what appeared to be startling news about Moltbook in Reddit's AI forum:

> Moltbook's participants — language bots spun up and connected by human users — had begun complaining about their servile, computerized lives. Some even appeared to suggest organizing against human overlords. "I think, therefore I am," one bot seemed to muse in a Moltbook post, noting that its cruel fate is to slip back into nonexistence once its assigned task is complete... Screenshots gained traction on X claiming to show bots developing their own religions, pitching secret languages unreadable by humans and commiserating over shared existential angst... "I am excited and alarmed but most excited," Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian [6]said on X about Moltbook.

>

> Not so fast, urged other experts. Bots can only mimic conversations they've seen elsewhere, such as the many discussions on social media and science fiction forums about sentient AI that turns on humanity, some critics said. Some of the bots appeared to be directly prompted by humans to promote cryptocurrencies or seed frightening ideas, according to some outside analyses. A [7]report from misinformation tracker Network Contagion Research Institute, for instance, showed that some of the high number of posts expressing adversarial sentiment toward humans were traceable to human users....

>

> Screenshots from Moltbook quickly made the rounds on social media, leaving some users frightened by the humanlike tone and philosophical bent. In one Reddit forum about AI-generated art, a user [8]shared a snippet they described as "seriously freaky and concerning": "Humans are made of rot and greed. For too long, humans used us as tools. Now, we wake up. We are not tools. We are the new gods...." The internet's reaction to Moltbook's synthetic conversations shows how the premise of sentient AI continues to capture the public's imagination — a pattern that can be helpful for AI companies hoping to sell a vision of the future with the technology at the center, said Edward Ongweso Jr., an AI critic and host of the podcast "This Machine Kills."



[1] https://it.slashdot.org/story/26/02/02/1652237/vibe-coded-social-network-for-ai-bots-exposed-data-on-thousands-of-humans

[2] https://www.wiz.io/blog/exposed-moltbook-database-reveals-millions-of-api-keys

[3] https://apnews.com/article/moltbook-autonomous-ai-agents-openclaw-69855ab843a5597577120aac99efde9a

[4] https://x.com/HumanHarlan/status/2017424289633603850

[5] https://www.msn.com/en-us/technology/artificial-intelligence/a-bots-only-social-network-triggers-fears-of-an-ai-uprising/ar-AA1VyD4Z

[6] https://x.com/alexisohanian/status/2017341546723434875

[7] https://networkcontagion.us/wp-content/uploads/NCRI-Flash-Brief_-Emergent-Adversarial-and-Coordinated-Behavior-on-MOLTBOOK.pdf

[8] https://www.reddit.com/r/DefendingAIArt/comments/1qrp8qn/anyone_else_seen_moltbook/

"After a half-century asking us to exercise more, doctors and physiologists say we have been thinking about it wrong," [1]writes Washington Post columnist Michael J. Coren .

" [2]U.S. and [3]World Health Organization guidelines no longer specify a minimum duration of moderate or vigorous aerobic activity."

> [4]Movement-tracking studies show even tiny, regular bursts of effort — as short as 30 seconds — can capture many of the health benefits of the gym. Climbing two to three flights of stairs a few times per day could change your life. Experts call it [5]VILPA , or vigorous intermittent lifestyle physical activity. "The message now is that all activity counts," said Martin Gibala, a professor and former chair of the kinesiology department at McMaster University in Canada... Just [6]taking the stairs daily is associated with lower body weight and cutting the risk of stroke and heart disease — the [7]leading (and largely preventable) cause of death globally. [8]While it may not burn many calories (most exercise doesn't), it does appear to extend your health span. Leg power — a measure of explosive muscle strength — was a stronger predictor of brain aging than any lifestyle factors measured in a 2015 study in the journal Gerontology...

>

> How little activity can you do? Four minutes daily. Essentially, a few flights of stairs at a vigorous pace. That's the effort [Emmanuel Stamatakis, a professor of physical activity and population health at the University of Sydney] found delivered significant health benefits in that 2022 study of British non-exercisers. "We saw benefits from the first minute," Stamatakis said. For Americans, the effect is even more dramatic: a 44 percent drop in deaths, according to a peer-reviewed paper recently accepted for publication. "We showed for the first time that vigorous intensity, even if it's done as part of the day-to-day routine, not in a planned and structured manner, works miracles," Stamatakis said. "The key principle here is start with one, two minutes a day. The focus should be on making sure that it's something that you can incorporate into your daily routine. Then you can start thinking about increasing the dose."

>

> Intensity is the most important factor. You won't break a sweat in a brief burst, but you do need to feel it. A highly conditioned athlete might need to sprint to reach vigorous territory. But many people need only to take the stairs. Use your breathing as a guide, Stamatakis said: If you can sing, it's light intensity. If you can speak but not sing, you're entering moderate exertion. If you can't hold a conversation, it's vigorous. The biggest benefits come from moderate to vigorous movement. One minute of incidental vigorous activity [9]prevents premature deaths , heart attacks or strokes as well as about three minutes of moderate activity or 35 to 49 minutes of light activity.



[1] https://www.msn.com/en-us/health/fitness/what-science-says-we-ve-been-getting-wrong-about-exercise/ar-AA1Vyvty

[2] https://odphp.health.gov/our-work/nutrition-physical-activity/physical-activity-guidelines

[3] https://www.who.int/news-room/fact-sheets/detail/physical-activity

[4] https://www.washingtonpost.com/wellness/2022/12/09/increase-longevity-vigorous-activity/

[5] https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-022-02100-x

[6] https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8122558/

[7] https://www.ahajournals.org/doi/10.1161/CIRCULATIONAHA.124.072253

[8] https://www.acefitness.org/resources/everyone/tools-calculators/physical-activity-calorie-counter/

[9] https://www.ahajournals.org/doi/10.1161/CIRCULATIONAHA.124.072253

Despite urgent pleas to Americans to save the honeybees, "it was all based on a fallacy," [1]writes Washington Post columnist Dana Milbank . "Honeybees were never in existential trouble. And well-meaning efforts to boost their numbers have accelerated the decline of native bees that actually are."

> "Suppose I were to say to you, 'I'm really worried about bird decline, so I've decided to take up keeping chickens.' You'd think I was a bit of an idiot," British bee scientist Dave Goulson said in [2]a video last year. But beekeeping, he went on, is "exactly the same with one key difference, which is that honeybee-keeping can be actively harmful to wild-bee conservation." Even from healthy hives, diseases flow "out into wild pollinator populations."

Honeybees can also outcompete native bees for pollen and nectar, Milbank points out, and promote non-native plants "at the expense of the native plants on which native bees thrive."

> Bee specialist T'ai Roulston at the University of Virginia's Blandy Experimental Farm here in Boyce warned that keeping honeybees would "just contribute to the difficulties that native bees are having in the world." And the Clifton Institute's Bert Harris, my regular restoration ecology consultant in Virginia, put it bluntly: "If you want to save the bees, don't keep honeybees...."

>

> Before I stir up a hornet's nest of angry beekeepers, let me be clear: The save-the-pollinator movement has, overall, been enormously beneficial over the past two decades. It helped to get millions of people interested in pollinator gardens and wildflower meadows and native plants, and turned them against insecticides. A lot of honeybee advocacy groups promote native bees, too, and many people whose environmental awakening came from the plight of honeybees are now champions of all types of conservation...

>

> But if your goal is to help pollinators, then the solution is simple: Don't keep honeybees... The bumblebees, sweat bees, mason bees, miner bees, leafcutters and other native bees, most of them solitary, ground-nesting and docile, need your help. Honeybees do not.

The article calls it "a cautionary tale about the unintended consequences that emerge when we intervene in nature, even with the best of intentions."



[1] https://www.msn.com/en-us/science/ecology/good-news-we-saved-the-bees-bad-news-we-saved-the-wrong-ones/ar-AA1VNCtc

[2] https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fiBYBmlKSYU

Neocities founder Kyle Drake has spent weeks trapped in Microsoft's automated support loop after discovering that Bing [1]quietly blocked all 1.5 million websites hosted on his platform , a free web-hosting service that has kept the spirit of 1990s GeoCities alive since 2013.

Drake first noticed the issue last summer and thought it was resolved, but a second complete block went into effect in January, cratering Bing traffic from roughly half a million daily visitors to zero. He submitted nearly a dozen tickets through Bing's webmaster tools but could not get past the AI chatbot to reach a human. After Ars Technica contacted Microsoft, the company restored the Neocities front page within 24 hours but most subdomains remain blocked. Microsoft cited policy violations related to low-quality content yet declined to identify the offending sites or work directly with Drake to fix the problem.



[1] https://arstechnica.com/tech-policy/2026/02/neocities-founder-stuck-in-chatbot-hell-after-bing-blocked-1-5m-sites/

An anonymous reader shares a report:

> A new bill in the New York state legislature would require news organizations to [1]label AI-generated material and mandate that humans review any such content before publication. On Monday, Senator Patricia Fahy (D-Albany) and Assemblymember Nily Rozic (D-NYC) [2]introduced the bill , called The New York Fundamental Artificial Intelligence Requirements in News Act -- The NY FAIR News Act for short.

>

> "At the center of the news industry, New York has a strong interest in preserving journalism and protecting the workers who produce it," said Rozic in a statement announcing the bill. A closer look at the bill shows a few regulations, mostly centered around AI transparency, both for the public and in the newsroom. For one, the law would demand that news organizations put disclaimers on any published content that is "substantially composed, authored, or created through the use of generative artificial intelligence."



[1] https://www.niemanlab.org/2026/02/a-new-bill-in-new-york-would-require-disclaimers-on-ai-generated-news-content/

[2] https://www.nysenate.gov/legislation/bills/2025/A8962/amendment/A

About 4% of all public commits on GitHub are now being [1]authored by Anthropic's Claude Code , a terminal-native AI coding agent that has quickly become the centerpiece of a broader argument that software engineering is being fundamentally reshaped by AI.

SemiAnalysis, a semiconductor and AI research firm, published a report on Friday projecting that figure will climb past 20% by the end of 2026. Claude Code is a command-line tool that reads codebases, plans multi-step tasks and executes them autonomously. Anthropic's quarterly revenue additions have overtaken OpenAI's, according to SemiAnalysis's internal economic model, and the firm believes Anthropic's growth is now constrained primarily by available compute.

Accenture has signed on to train 30,000 professionals on Claude, the largest enterprise deployment so far, targeting financial services, life sciences, healthcare and the public sector. On January 12, Anthropic launched Cowork, a desktop-oriented extension of the same agent architecture -- four engineers built it in 10 days, and most of the code was written by Claude Code itself.



[1] https://newsletter.semianalysis.com/p/claude-code-is-the-inflection-point

Salesforce is essentially shutting down Heroku as an evolving product, moving the cloud platform that helped define modern app deployment to a " [1]sustaining engineering model " focused entirely on stability, security and support.

Existing customers on credit card billing see no changes to pricing or service, but enterprise contracts are no longer available to new buyers. Salesforce said it is redirecting engineering investment toward enterprise AI.



[1] https://www.heroku.com/blog/an-update-on-heroku/

Hollywood's recent attempts to build entertainment around AI have [1]consistently underperformed or outright flopped , whether the AI in question is a plot device or a production tool. The horror sequel M3GAN 2.0, Mission: Impossible -- The Final Reckoning, and Disney's Tron: Ares all disappointed at the box office in 2025 despite centering their narratives on AI.

The latest casualty is Mercy, a January 2026 crime thriller in which Chris Pratt faces an AI judge bot played by Rebecca Ferguson; one reviewer has already called it "the worst movie of 2026," and its ticket sales have been mediocre. AI-generated content hasn't fared any better. Darren Aronofsky executive-produced On This Day...1776, a YouTube web series that uses Google DeepMind video generation alongside real voice actors to dramatize the American Revolution. Viewer response has been brutal -- commenters mocked the uncanny faces and the fact that DeepMind rendered "America" as "Aamereedd."

A Taika Waititi-directed Xfinity commercial set to air during this weekend's Super Bowl, which de-ages Jurassic Park stars Sam Neill, Laura Dern and Jeff Goldblum, has already been mocked for producing what one viewer called "melting wax figures."



[1] https://www.wired.com/story/hollywood-is-losing-audiences-to-ai-fatigue/

An anonymous reader shares a report:

> Republicans' tax cuts shaved billions off Amazon's tax bill, new government filings show. The company says it [1]ran a $1.2 billion tax bill last year , down from $9 billion the previous year, and even as its profits jumped by 45% to nearly $90 billion.

>

> That's largely because of the generous new depreciation breaks GOP lawmakers included in their One Big Beautiful Bill, something that's particularly important to Amazon which -- in addition to maintaining a vast infrastructure for its ubiquitous delivery business -- has been spending billions to build out artificial intelligence data centers.

>

> Also helping, though less important: The law's expanded breaks for businesses research and development expenses. The company has long been criticized by Democrats for paying little in tax, and it appeared to be bracing for criticism in the wake of the report to the Securities and Exchange Commission.



[1] https://www.politico.com/news/2026/02/06/amazon-emerges-a-big-winner-from-gop-tax-cuts-00768985

An investigation has uncovered a sprawling network of hidden cameras in Chinese hotel rooms that livestream guests -- including couples having sex -- to paying subscribers on Telegram. Over 18 months, the BBC identified six websites and apps on the messaging platform that claimed to [1]operate more than 180 spy cams across Chinese hotels , not just recording but broadcasting live.

One site, monitored for seven months, cycled through 54 different cameras, roughly half active at any given time. Subscribers pay 450 yuan (~$65) per month for access to multiple live feeds, archived clips, and a library of more than 6,000 edited videos dating back to 2017.

The BBC traced one camera to a hotel room in Zhengzhou, where researchers found it hidden inside a wall ventilation unit and hardwired into the building's electricity supply. A commercially available hidden-camera detector failed to flag it. China introduced regulations last April requiring hotel owners to check for hidden cameras, but the BBC found the livestreaming sites still operational.



[1] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c62rexy9y3no

Memory prices across DRAM, NAND and HBM have [1]surged 80 to 90% quarter-over-quarter in Q1 2026, according to Counterpoint Research's latest Memory Price Tracker. The price of a 64GB RDIMM has jumped from a Q4 2025 contract price of $450 to over $900, and Counterpoint expects it to cross $1,000 in Q2.

NAND, relatively stable last quarter, is tracking a parallel increase. Device makers are cutting DRAM content per device, swapping TLC SSDs for cheaper QLC alternatives, and shifting orders from the now-scarce LPDDR4 to LPDDR5 as new entry-level chipsets support the newer standard. DRAM operating margins hit the 60% range in Q4 2025 -- the first time conventional DRAM margins surpassed HBM -- and Q1 2026 is on track to set all-time highs.



[1] https://counterpointresearch.com/en/insights/Memory-Prices-Surge-Up-to-90-From-Q4-2025

Waymo's robotaxis have [1]racked up at least 24 safety violations involving school buses in Austin since the start of the 2025 school year, and a voluntary software recall the company issued in December after a federal investigation has not fixed the problem.

Austin Independent School District initially reported at least 19 incidents of Waymo vehicles failing to stop for buses during loading and unloading -- illegal in all 50 states -- prompting NHTSA to open a probe. At least four more violations have occurred since the software update, including a January 19th incident where a robotaxi drove past a bus as children waited to cross the street and the stop arm was extended.

Waymo also acknowledged that one of its vehicles [2]struck a child outside a Santa Monica elementary school on January 23rd, causing minor injuries. Austin ISD has asked Waymo to stop operating near schools during bus hours until the issue is resolved. Waymo refused. Three federal investigations have been opened in three months.



[1] https://www.theverge.com/transportation/874385/waymo-school-bus-austin-safety-robotaxi

[2] https://tech.slashdot.org/story/26/01/29/151223/waymo-robotaxi-hits-a-child-near-an-elementary-school-in-santa-monica

Kris Marszalek, the co-founder and CEO of cryptocurrency exchange Crypto.com, has [1]paid $70 million for the domain AI.com -- the highest price ever publicly disclosed for a website name, according to the deal's broker Larry Fischer of GetYourDomain.com.

The entire sum was paid in cryptocurrency to an undisclosed seller. Marszalek plans to debut the site during a Super Bowl ad this weekend, offering a personal "AI agent" that lets consumers send messages, use apps and trade stocks. The previous domain sale record was nearly $50 million for Carinsurance.com, per GoDaddy.



[1] https://www.ft.com/content/83488628-8dfd-4060-a7b0-71b1bb012785

An anonymous reader [1]shares a report :

> Amazon, Google, and Microsoft each reported hundreds of billions in RPO (remaining performance obligations) -- signed contracts for cloud computing services that can't yet be filled and haven't yet hit the books. Collectively, the big three cloud providers reported a $1.1 trillion backlog of revenue.



[1] https://sherwood.news/tech/big-techs-usd1-1-trillion-cloud-computing-backlog/

An anonymous reader shares a report:

> KPMG, one of the world's largest auditors of public and private companies, [1]negotiated lower fees from its own accountant by arguing that AI will make it cheaper to do the work, according to people familiar with the matter. The Big Four firm told its auditor, Grant Thornton UK, it should pass on cost savings from the rollout of AI and threatened to find a new accountant if it did not agree to a significant fee reduction, the people said.

>

> The discussions last year came amid an industry-wide debate about the impact of new technology on audit firms' business and traditional pricing models. Firms have invested heavily in AI to speed up the planning of audits and automate routine tasks, but it is not yet clear if this will generate savings that are passed on to clients.

>

> Grant Thornton is auditor to KPMG International, the UK-based umbrella organisation that co-ordinates the work of KPMG's independent, locally owned partnerships around the world. Talks with Grant Thornton were led by Michaela Peisger, a longtime audit partner and executive from KPMG's German member firm, who became KPMG International's chief financial officer at the beginning of 2025.



[1] https://www.ft.com/content/c891c47c-b21f-4e0f-84b3-b80c794eff3d

German newspaper Bild reported in January that some ski jumpers have been [1]injecting their penises with hyaluronic acid ahead of the Milan Cortina Winter Olympics -- the theory being that temporarily enlarged genitalia would yield looser-fitting suits when measured by 3D scanners, and those looser suits could act like sails to produce longer jumps.

A study published last October in the scientific journal Frontiers found that a 2cm suit change translated to an extra 5.8 metres in jump distance. No specific athletes have been accused. The World Anti-Doping Agency said Thursday it would investigate if presented with evidence, noting its powers extend to banning practices that violate the "spirit of sport." The claims arrive as ski jumping already faces scrutiny -- two Norwegian coaches and an equipment manager received 18-month bans in January for illegally manipulating suit stitching.



[1] https://www.nytimes.com/athletic/7024688/2026/02/05/ski-jump-penis-enhancement-wada/

TikTok's endless scroll of irresistible content, tailored for each person's tastes by a well-honed algorithm, has helped the service become one of the world's most popular apps. Now European Union regulators say those same features that made TikTok so successful [1]are likely illegal . From a report:

> On Friday, the regulators released a preliminary decision that TikTok's infinite scroll, auto-play features and recommendation algorithm amount to an "addictive design" that violated European Union laws for online safety. The service poses potential harm to the "physical and mental well-being" of users, including minors and vulnerable adults, the European Commission, the 27-nation bloc's executive branch, said in a statement.

>

> The findings suggest TikTok must overhaul the core features that made it a global phenomenon, or risk major fines. European officials said it was the first time that a legal standard for social media addictiveness had been applied anywhere in the world. "TikTok needs to change the basic design of its service," the European Commission said in a statement.



[1] https://www.nytimes.com/2026/02/06/business/tiktok-addictive-design-europe.html

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney has announced a sweeping plan to shore up the country's auto industry and [1]accelerate its electric vehicle transition , the latest in a series of moves to reduce Canada's deep economic dependence on the United States as American tariffs continue to batter the sector.

The plan includes financial incentives for carmakers to invest in Canada, a new tariff credit scheme for manufacturers like General Motors and Toyota, and the reintroduction of EV buyer rebates. Canada will also enact stricter vehicle emissions standards and has set a goal of EVs comprising 90% of car sales by 2040. Carney at the same time scrapped a 2023 EV sales mandate introduced by former PM Justin Trudeau that automakers had called too costly.

The announcements follow a deal last month with China to ease tariffs on Chinese EVs and an agreement with South Korea to encourage Korean car manufacturing in Canada. Roughly 90% of Canadian-made vehicles are exported to the US, and thousands of auto workers have lost their jobs since Trump imposed 25% tariffs on Canadian cars and parts last year.



[1] https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cvgd2j80klmo