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Controversial surveillance startup Flock adds AI to police tech Flock Safety holds a ribbon cutting for their office in Boston's Seaport on July 22. Danielle Parhizkaran/Globe Staff Flock Safety said Thursday it will add artificial intelligence to its surveillance products used by US police departments, an update the company said will help make society safer and that privacy advocates have called 'abominable.' The sometimes controversial $7.5 billion Atlanta-based startup, which opened a second office last month in Boston, is best known for providing customers with automated license plate readers they can use to track vehicles nationwide. The new tool, Flock Intelligence, lets users investigate crimes using natural language to surface relevant records, images, and other data troves. The new, more powerful software offers a few dozen relevant images in a few seconds rather than requiring a manual review of thousands. The software also automatically pulls data, including footage collected in real-time from relevant Flock camera locations the moment a 911 call begins. Infusing AI into the software is designed to automate investigative work, narrowing thousands of leads to dozens 'instantly,' said Flock chief executive officer Garrett Langley. — BLOOMBERG NEWS Get Starting Point A guide through the most important stories of the morning, delivered Monday through Friday. Enter Email Sign Up FINANCE Advertisement Trump opens the door for private equity and crypto as 401(k) retirement plan options Advertisement Millions of Americans saving for retirement through 401(k) accounts could have the option of putting their money in higher-risk private equity and cryptocurrency investments, according to an executive order signed Thursday by President Trump that could give those financial players long-sought access to a pool of funds worth trillions. There is no immediate change in how people invest part of their work earnings. Federal agencies would need to rewrite regulations to allow the expanded choices, and that would take months or more to complete. But once done, employers could offer a broader array of mutual funds and investments to workers, according to the White House. The president's order directs the Labor Department and other agencies to redefine what would be considered a qualified asset under 401(k) retirement rules. — ASSOCIATED PRESS MERGER Paramount and Skydance close their merger, kicking off reign of new entertainment giant Paramount Pictures Studio will be part of the conglomerate. Apu Gomes/Getty Skydance and Paramount officially closed their $8 billion merger on Thursday — kicking off the reign of a new entertainment giant after a contentious, year-long endeavor to get the transaction over the finish line. The new company — which will trade under the 'PSKY' ticker on Wall Street — brings Paramount's legacy Hollywood footprint, major TV networks CBS and MTV, streaming services, and more under the roof of a new power player: billionaire Skydance founder David Ellison. The merger's close came just two weeks after it received regulatory approval from the Trump administration. While now a done deal, the path toward that approval was far from smooth. Months of scrutiny and turmoil surrounded the transaction — particularly amid President Trump's legal battle with '60 Minutes,' the crown jewel of Paramount-owned broadcast network CBS. With the specter of the Trump administration potentially blocking the hard-fought deal with Skydance, Paramount agreed to pay a $16 million settlement to the president in early July. — ASSOCIATED PRESS Advertisement CHIPMAKER Intel's stock tumbles after Trump says its CEO must resign Intel CEO Lip-Bu Tan has been urged to divest investments in Chinese companies. Chiang Ying-ying/Associated Press Shares of Intel slumped Thursday after President Trump said in a social media post that the chipmaker's CEO needs to resign. 'The CEO of Intel is highly CONFLICTED and must resign, immediately,' Trump posted on Truth Social. 'There is no other solution to this problem. Thank you for your attention to this problem!' Trump made the post after Senator Tom Cotton sent a letter to Intel chairman Frank Yeary expressing concern over CEO Lip-Bu Tan's investments and ties to semiconductor firms that are reportedly linked to the Chinese Communist Party and the People's Liberation Army, and asked the board whether Tan had divested his interests in these companies to eliminate any conflicts of interest. Intel did not immediately respond to a request for comment, so it is not immediately clear if Tan, who took over as Intel's CEO in March, has divested his interests in the companies. — ASSOCIATED PRESS MEDIA Closure of Midwest-based newspaper chain leaves dozens of communities without a news source Dozens of communities in the Midwest and West learned Thursday they had lost their newspapers after an Illinois-based publisher announced it would abruptly close because of financial problems. News Media Corp., which owns local newspapers across five states, said it will close 14 operations in Wyoming, seven in Illinois, five in Arizona, four in South Dakota, and one in Nebraska. Touting itself as 'the voice of small town America,' NMC's closure affects longtime newspapers that were often the primary source of news in numerous small towns, worsening the problem of news deserts in rural areas. The closure follows a decades-long pattern of financial challenges for local newspapers — the US has lost over one-third of its print newspapers and two-thirds of its newspaper journalists since 2004 as the news media has struggled to adopt to a changing readership and revenue landscape, according to the Medill Local News Initiative at Northwestern University. — ASSOCIATED PRESS Advertisement HEALTH CARE GLP-1 weight-loss pills are coming. So are doubts about their potency. The Eli Lilly headquarters in Indianapolis. AJ Mast/Photographer: AJ Mast/Bloomberg Next-generation weight-loss pills could hit the market in the coming months, with new data raising a key question: Will patients embrace a more convenient alternative to injecting themselves, even if it means losing less weight? Eli Lilly said Thursday it will seek regulatory approval for its experimental weight-loss pill by the end of the year, announcing results from its latest clinical trial that, while positive, did not appear to be as potent as injectable anti-obesity medications. The pharmaceutical giant said clinical trial participants taking the highest dose of its once-a-day pill lost an average of 12.4 percent of their body weight, compared with a placebo group that lost less than 1 percent, over 72 weeks. That fell short of the weight loss achieved by participants injecting semaglutide, the active ingredient in Ozempic and Wegovy, in an earlier clinical trial. — WASHINGTON POST Trump orders federal regulators to probe alleged bank discrimination against conservatives President Trump has accused JPMorgan and Bank of America of debanking him and his companies in the past, something both banks have denied. HARUKA SAKAGUCHI/NYT President Trump on Thursday signed an executive order mandating a probe into whether banks have discriminated against conservatives and certain industries including gun manufacturers and cryptocurrency companies, invoking the vast powers to go after entities that the Republican president alleges have discriminated against him and his allies. The executive order deals with an issue known as 'debanking,' which is when banks close accounts of individuals or declines to go into business with certain industries. Trump has accused JPMorgan and Bank of America of debanking him and his companies in the past, something both banks have denied. Trump ordered federal bank regulators to make sure banks do not discriminate against individuals or companies for their political or religious beliefs. He also ordered bank regulators to probe when banks may have allegedly discriminated and refer the cases to the Department of Justice. The move could open banks to potential civil or criminal investigations, fines, or punishments. — ASSOCIATED PRESS Advertisement