Samuel Axon, Ars Technica:

Apple has released iOS, iPadOS, macOS, watchOS, and tvOS 26.6. Apart from potential security hotfixes, these are likely the last updates before the arrival of iOS 27, macOS 27, and so on.

All of today’s releases include minor bug fixes, and there are numerous security updates: more than 150 for macOS 26.6. Apple also rolled out macOS 14.8.8 and macOS 15.7.8 for older devices, also focused on security fixes.

In terms of new features, you won’t find many in these releases, as they mainly pave the way for the next major OS update, likely to hit sometime in September. Most notably, the release notes for iOS and iPadOS 26.6 say the update “optimizes the Spotlight index to prepare for iOS 27.” This update will kick off some indexing work that will then be leveraged in an ostensibly much more robust Spotlight search feature when iOS 27 launches next month.

I don’t mean to pick nits, but there’s nothing “ostensible” about it. You can use the new Spotlight index via Siri AI in the OS 27 beta releases and it’s really good. The initial background indexing took almost a full week for me on iOS, I suspect because I have so much email archived, but anyone who upgrades to these 26.6 releases now shouldn’t have to wait at all after upgrading to 27.0 in September. Or even if you wait for the 27.1 releases — you won’t need to wait for Siri AI to have your full semantic index at hand.

Nate Anderson, reporting for Ars Technica under the headline “A Missing Underscore Sent Innocent Man to Prison for 18 Months”:

Police were looking for a man using the Kik messaging service under the name “fus__ro_dah” (two underscores after “fus”), but they accidentally requested records for the username “fus_ro_dah” (one underscore after “fus”). This one-character difference led them not to the perpetrator but to a Canadian man named Brandon Klayme. [...]

Despite finding no evidence of the crime on his digital devices, Canadian police arrested Klayme in 2020 on child sex abuse charges. He was convicted after a trial in 2023 and sentenced in 2024 to 18 months in prison. He served the full term.

Even after release, Klayme continued to fight his conviction. In the process of preparing his appeal, the username mistake that led to all these years of disruption was finally discovered. On Thursday, the Nova Scotia Court of Appeal overturned Klayme’s conviction, writing: “Mr. Klayme is factually innocent of the offences. He should never have been charged, let alone convicted.”

Via Paul Kafasis, who asks:

While I understand how the mistake led to this poor guy becoming a suspect, I really can’t fathom how he was convicted. What the hell happened during that trial?

Contra Ars’s headline, it wasn’t the missing underscore that sent Klayme to prison for 18 months.

Update: Guy Chapman observes that this is basically the central plot of Terry Gilliam’s Brazil.

Ashley Belanger, reporting for Ars Technica back in August 2025:

After a public outburst over Grok’s App Store rankings, on Monday, Elon Musk followed through on his threat to sue Apple and OpenAI.

At first, Musk appeared fixated on ChatGPT consistently topping Apple’s “Must Have” app list — which Grok has never made — claiming Apple seemed to preference OpenAI, an Apple partner, over all chatbot rivals. But Musk’s filing shows that the X and xAI owner isn’t just trying to push for more Grok downloads on iPhones — he’s concerned that Apple and OpenAI have teamed up to completely dash his “everything app” dreams, which was the reason he bought Twitter.

For what it’s worth, I just looked at the App Store editorially-curated “Popular iPhone Apps” list, and ChatGPT is in the top spot. Given the lawsuit Apple filed against OpenAI last week, I’d say this is pretty good anecdata that these editorial decisions in the App Store aren’t driven by favoritism. The top 10 downloads list for free iPhone apps currently looks like this (for me here in the U.S. App Store):

1. Paramount+
2. Netflix Game Controller
3. ChatGPT
4. Kalshi: Trade the World Cup
5. Peacock TV: Stream TV & Movies
6. Netshort - Popular Dramas & TV
7. Threads
8. TikTok Pro - Events
9. Freecash - Get Paid Real Money
10. Depop - Buy & Sell Clothes

There are some real winners on that list. But only one AI app: ChatGPT.

Musk alleges that the top downloads list is crooked too. That’s just projection. If Musk ran a popular App Store he’d put his thumb on the scale to make sure his own apps always top the list. That’s what he’s done with his personal account, and accounts aligned with his politics, on Twitter/X. Because that’s what he would do, he thinks that’s what Apple does. I really do think he believes the App Store’s top download lists are fixed, and that Grok is on the wrong side of the fix. Crooks think everyone is crooked. It’s just one of several ways that Musk is not hooked up right.

I suspect, though, that he’s no longer worried that Apple is putting its thumb on the scale to favor OpenAI. Maybe he should never-mind this lawsuit.

Ryan Whitham, writing for Ars Technica back in April:

European regulators are proposing several broad changes to the way AI tools operate on Android phones. Some of this is straightforward, like allowing third-party AI tools to be invoked system-wide via hot words or button presses. This might also include allowing AI tools to view screen context when the user opens them. Context also extends to allowing alternative AI systems to access local data to generate proactive suggestions and summaries. The report actually describes something that sounds like Google’s Magic Cue, which relies on Gemini to offer suggestions based on your activity.

Google has also started experimenting with allowing AI to control certain apps. As we saw when this feature debuted on the Galaxy S26, Gemini is currently pretty bad at using apps on your behalf. The commission wants to explore allowing other AI services to autonomously control installed apps and system features on Android phones. Maybe someone else could do better?

Maybe! But also maybe it’s a bad idea for complex system architecture design to come from non-technical government bureaucrats. One of these maybes strikes me as a lot more likely than the other.

Many of the Gemini AI features in Android, including Magic Cue, rely on running local models, and Google has been slow to allow third parties the system access to make that work effectively. So the EU is also suggesting a mandate that would ensure developers have the necessary hardware access to run local models “with high levels of performance, availability and responsiveness.”

What could go wrong?

Finally, Google may be required under the DMA to create new APIs and offer technical assistance to other AI makers who want to plug into Android. The commission also specifies that these tools must be made available free of charge.

Of course, it’s not free of charge to provide technical assistance to one’s competitors. It’s actually a great expense.

Here’s the European Commission, announcing these “preliminary findings”:

The proposed measures aim to ensure that competing AI services can effectively interact with applications on users’ Android devices and execute tasks accordingly, such as sending an email using the user’s preferred email app, ordering food or sharing a photo with friends. Currently, Google largely reserves these capabilities for use by its own AI offerings on Android phones and tablets. For example, the measures would allow competing AI services to be easily activated by users, using a custom ‘wake word’, a phrase that the user can speak to activate an AI service.

The proposed measures will also enable competing providers of AI services to innovate and offer deeply integrated AI experiences to users on Android phones and tablets, along with Alphabet’s own AI services, such as Gemini. Opening up access to these capabilities will provide Android users across the EU with a wider choice of AI services.

The difference between Google and Apple on this front is that Google just blazed ahead and shipped Gemini integrated into Android in the EU, and is now facing compliance problems after shipping. (Ask forgiveness.) Apple isn’t shipping Siri AI in the EU in iOS 27, knowing that it’s going to be deemed non-compliant. (Ask permission.)

The EC presumes that these measures “will also enable competing providers of AI services to innovate and offer deeply integrated AI experiences to users on Android phones and tablets”. Again: maybe! But really all they can enforce is that “competing providers of AI services” will have the same level of system-level integration that Google’s AI services have. The easiest way for Google to achieve that is by withdrawing Gemini integration in Android from the EU, not by building APIs and privacy protection mechanisms to enable the capabilities for third-party providers that the EC is demanding.

Google is learning the lesson Apple learned the hard way with all the existing features of iOS that were deemed noncompliant with the DMA when it went into effect. The “ship it first and ask forgiveness / hope it’s deemed compliant” strategy is not a good one in the EU.