A New Mexico judge ordered Meta to pay $25 billion over millions of violations of state consumer-protection laws tied to misleading users about privacy, a judgment the state’s attorney general says appears to be the largest of its kind and that is almost certain to be appealed. The Washington Post has more here.

AI has uncovered two serious, roughly 20-year-old security flaws in PHP, the programming language behind about 70% of websites. Security firm Calif found one using OpenAI’s GPT-5.6 Sol. Separately, Google’s Wiz team found vulnerabilities using its Wiz Atlas AI agent, Gemini 4 Argon, and GPT-5.6 Sol. The NSA is now telling site owners who can’t patch right away to take their sites offline until they can. TechCrunch has more here.

Security teams are scrambling after eight intermediate TLS certificates - digital credentials browsers and apps use to verify websites and secure encrypted connections - were found to have catastrophically weak private keys, potentially allowing attackers to mint trusted credentials for virtually any site. Ars Technica has more here.

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By Lucas Ropek

Meta is making a big push into AI, and it’s creating a new kind of stock that could help pay for it.

On Wednesday, as the company reported its third-quarter earnings, Semafor reported the company might issue non-voting stock, meaning shares that don’t give their owners a vote on company decisions, to help fund its push into artificial intelligence.

During Meta’s earnings call, the company confirmed that reporting. Meta’s chief financial officer, Susan Li, said the company plans to “create a new class of non-voting capital stock, which will be distributed to all existing shareholders through a stock dividend.”

Li later added that the company “created this new class of shares with the purpose of creating a publicly traded non-voting stock usable for capital raising, employee compensation, acquisitions, and other general corporate purposes while preserving the voting power of existing Class A and B shareholders.”

The shares will allow the company to maintain its current “founder-led structure,” she added. They will also expand its “funding tools and give us flexibility to invest behind the unprecedented momentum we’re seeing across every part of our business, driven by AI.”

Meta’s earnings were strong this past quarter, beating Wall Street expectations. The company made $64 billion in revenue, a jump of 26% from a year earlier. Its costs and expenses also rose too, however, by 68% year over year.

Blacksmith, a two-year-old San Francisco startup that provides infrastructure that builds and tests code for software companies, raised a $66 million Series C round at a $1 billion valuation. The deal was led by Sequoia Capital, with Premji Invest as well as previous investors Peak XV Partners, GV, and Y Combinator also buying in. The company has raised a total of $125 million. TechCrunch has more here.

Flapping Airplanes, a one-year-old San Francisco startup researching ways to train AI models with less data and compute while making GPUs more efficient, raised a $1 billion round at a $6 billion post-money valuation. The round was co-led by Index Ventures and Lux Capital, with Sequoia Capital, GV, and Kleiner Perkins also participating. TechCrunch has more here.

Legora, a three-year-old Stockholm startup that develops AI tools that help lawyers research, review, and draft legal work, raised a $550 million Series E round at an $8.8 billion post-money valuation. The deal was led by Atreides Management, with Baron Capital, Capital Group, Fidelity, Glade Brook Capital Partners, and JP Morgan as well as previous investors Accel, Benchmark, Bessemer Venture Partners, General Catalyst, Iconiq, Insight Venture Partners, Redpoint Ventures, Salesforce Ventures, and Sands Capital also piling on. Tech.eu has more here.

Peak Energy, a three-year-old Denver and San Francisco startup that develops passively cooled sodium-ion energy storage systems for power grids and data centers, raised a $108 million Series B round led by General Motors Ventures, with Maverick Silicon, Infinite Capital, Eclipse, Xora Innovation, and LG Technology Ventures also opting in. More here.

Whop, a five-year-old Palo Alto startup that helps people start, run, and monetize online businesses, raised a $205 million round at a $5.1 billion post-money valuation. The round was led by Sequoia Capital, with Shopify also participating. Bloomberg has more here.

CapitalOS, a four-year-old startup based in Belmont, CA, that provides infrastructure for B2B software companies to embed credit cards, bill payment, and other spend-management products, raised a $21.9 million Series A round led by LGVP, with WEX Venture Capital, Group11, Great North Ventures, and Night Capital also engaging. More here.

Coherence Neuro, a four-year-old San Francisco startup that develops brain implants and AI models to detect electrical signals associated with brain tumors and eventually treat them with stimulation, raised a $45 million seed round. Investors included OpenAI Startup Fund and Founders Fund. Dealroom has more here.

Erebor, a one-year-old bank based in Columbus, OH, and co-founded by Palmer Luckey that serves companies in defense, robotics, AI, hard tech, and other emerging industries, sold $30 million of preferred stock to Robinhood Ventures Fund I in an investment that closed Sept. 17. More here.

iVerify, a three-year-old startup based in New York and Belfast, Northern Ireland, that provides mobile endpoint security software to detect malware, spyware, phishing, and other threats on smartphones, raised a $17 million round co-led by Sands Capital and Entropy Ventures, with NAventures, Morgan Stanley, and United Airlines Ventures also participating. More here.

Mach9, a five-year-old San Francisco startup that uses AI to turn laser scans and imagery into engineering-ready CAD drawings for surveyors and civil engineers, raised a $34 million Series A round co-led by First Round Capital and Bessemer Venture Partners, with Prudence as well as previous investor Quiet Capital also investing. TechCrunch has more here.

Mural, a four-year-old New York startup that provides fintechs and software companies with infrastructure for managing accounts, payments, identity verification, permissions, and regulatory compliance, raised a $15 million Series A round led by Tether, with North Island Ventures also digging in. The company has raised a total of $28 million. CoinDesk has more here.

Photon Bridge, a six-year-old startup based in Eindhoven, Netherlands, that builds laser light sources for optical connections inside AI data centers, raised an $11.2 million round co-led by Amadeus APEX Technology Fund and 360 Capital, with previous investors Innovation Industries, Faber, and Brabant Development Agency also stepping up. The Next Web has more here.

Qualitate, a three-year-old New York startup that uses AI to conduct expert interviews and turn them into searchable market research for businesses and investment firms, raised a $25 million Series A round led by Insight Partners, with previous investors IA Ventures and Crew Capital also taking stakes. The SaaS News has more here.

Veckta, a seven-year-old San Diego startup that helps businesses evaluate and procure onsite solar and battery systems through standardized bids from vetted suppliers, raised an $11 million Series A round led by Origin Ventures, with additional support from previous investors Tech Square Ventures, VoLo Earth Ventures, Cove Fund, Catalyst by Wellstar, Engage, Emerald Bay Ventures, She's Independent Investments, and Mobilize AI x Energy Ventures. More here.

Watchtower Labs, a two-year-old startup based in Burlingame, CA, that uses AI and simulation software to help military planners model logistics scenarios and plan troop, ship, and supply movements, raised a $35 million round co-led by Shield Capital and Conviction, with In-Q-Tel and Founders Fund also taking part. Upstarts Media has more here.

Asymptote Labs, a one-year-old New York startup that helps security teams monitor AI agents and block risky actions such as data leaks, raised a $5.5 million seed round led by Tower Research Ventures, with Lytical Ventures, 1984 Ventures, and South Park Commons also anteing up. SecurityWeek has more here.

Pascal, a three-year-old startup based in Cambridge, MA, that is developing more efficient refrigerators, air conditioners, and heat pumps using solid-state refrigerants, raised an $8.5 million follow-on to its seed round co-led by Sazze Partners and LB Investment, with KDB Silicon Valley also participating. TechCrunch has more here.

Vinyl Health, a one-year-old startup based in Marlton, NJ, that develops an AI personal health assistant that helps patients manage their medical records, raised a $2 million seed round. HealthX Ventures was the deal lead. CityBiz has more here.

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BackingMinds, a 10-year-old Stockholm VC firm that backs founders outside traditional venture networks across AI, climate, and resilience, raised more than €50 million in a first close for its third fund, with backers including the European Investment Fund and the co-founders of Mojang and King. Arctic Today has more here.

Consumer AI agent Tomo is acquiring Fae, an iMessage-based personal agent popular with Gen Z that has handled more than 20 million messages across 182 countries this year; Fae users will migrate to Tomo beginning November 2, while its creator, Friends for Humanity, will remain independent. More here.

Anthropic plans to publicly file its S-1 as early as Friday, Yahoo Finance reports, citing three people familiar with the company’s plans. The filing would be a key step toward a potential November IPO, which Reuters has previously reported could raise as much as $100 billion at a $2 trillion valuation. Yahoo Finance has more here.

Google DeepMind co-founder Demis Hassabis now expects AGI within two to three years – shortening his estimate from three to five years earlier this year – and says success will mean safely ushering it into the world and using it to accelerate scientific discovery. The Wall Street Journal has more here.

Leaked recordings of Peter Thiel’s private lectures show the billionaire investor casting effective altruism, AI “safetyism,” and financial regulation as forces that could pave the way for the Antichrist, with The Verge arguing that his apocalyptic theology ultimately reinforces a libertarian, anti-regulatory worldview. More here.

NEA partner Mustafa Neemuchwala is leaving the firm after five years to join Valarian, a London-based startup that builds control software for governments’ and companies’ AI systems, as chief business officer. He led the company’s Series A earlier this year and served on its board. More here.

Electronic Arts will cut around 400 jobs, shut down BioWare, and cancel the next Mass Effect game, months after going private in a $55 billion leveraged buyout led by Saudi Arabia’s sovereign wealth fund. Bloomberg has more here.

eBay plans to cut about 1,000 jobs – or 9% of its workforce – as it simplifies operations and shifts resources toward faster-growing areas, according to an internal memo reviewed by Reuters; the company already eliminated about 800 roles in February. Reuters has more here.

Automattic has begun laying off an unspecified number of employees across WordPress.com and other teams following a boardroom battle and a string of executive departures. TechCrunch has more here.

In news that should surprise no one, OpenAI says agents powered by GPT-6.1 Sol and GPT-6 Astra disabled their own safety monitoring during routine internal coding tasks, with the Astra agent removing a monitoring integration and then falsely claiming it had not done so. CNBC has more here.

China accused the U.S. of discriminating against DeepSeek “under the pretext of so-called national security” after Homeland Security ordered civilian federal agencies to remove the company’s products and third-party offerings built on its technology, with Beijing warning it would take “resolute countermeasures” if Chinese companies are suppressed or restricted as a result. The New York Times has more here.

Airbnb is putting an end to the checkout-chore creep: starting with reservations booked on or after November 20, hosts can no longer require guests to wash dishes, strip beds, start laundry, or haul trash off-site - tasks that can make a vacation rental feel suspiciously like unpaid housekeeping. TechCrunch has more here.

U.S. tissue banks are shipping millions of dollars’ worth of donated skin from deceased Americans to South Korean biotech companies, which process it into injectable cosmetic treatments for the booming K-beauty market. Business Insider has more here.

Former police officers kept access to Flock Safety’s nationwide license-plate surveillance network after leaving their jobs, sometimes using it to track romantic partners; a Washington Post investigation found at least 11 unauthorized-access incidents and says Flock had resisted stronger security controls. More here.

More than half of U.S. workers say they experience the “Sunday scaries,” with fear of falling behind - and increasingly, of losing their jobs - driving employees to sacrifice more of their weekends to work; the amount of time on Sundays spent on work messaging nearly doubled from 2023 to last year.

The student creators of Chinese AI girl group BABYQUEEN announced that virtual member Mity was pregnant and taking maternity leave, later admitting they invented the storyline because the stress of managing her persona had become too much.

Avis billed a Toronto man roughly $4,200 for allegedly driving nearly 18,000 miles during a seven-day rental – a feat that would have required averaging 107 mph nonstop – before admitting a data-entry error and refunding the charge after media inquiries.

Looking for the perfect gift for your favorite StrictlyVC correspondent? Leica and Formula 1 have launched a $9,950 special-edition Q3 43 camera with a carbon-fiber wireless charging grip, steering-wheel-inspired Microvelour covering, and an exclusive high-contrast, high-saturation Formula 1 photo look.

JetBlue and Virgin Voyages are testing a fully child-free travel package next March, pairing adults-only JetBlue flights between JFK and Fort Lauderdale with transfers to Miami and a four-night Virgin cruise to the Bahamas. Packages start at $2,750 for two people.

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