Investigations — Page 2
Original reporting, documents and technical research
- Cursor built a hidden terminal command for steering its desktop AI agents
Cursor has built a working command-line bridge that lets outside scripts find and steer AI-agent conversations already running in its desktop app, RuntimeWire found in Cursor 3.16.17.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Scoop · Based on reverse engineering, testing · By Ryan Merket · Aug 18th, 2026, 11:00am CT
- At least 62 YC startups with over $1.9 billion in funding are hosting on Replit
Public DNS records link 160 custom-domain endpoints at 63 YC companies to Replit's infrastructure, showing how an AI coding platform is settling into production-facing work without replacing entire engineering stacks.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Original analysis · Based on data analysis, public records · By Ryan Merket · Aug 17th, 2026, 11:37pm CT
- Kimi Desktop shipped Moonshot’s hidden employee gateway for off-quota Kimi, GPT and Codex access inside its public client
Version 3.1.10 identifies the office-only service as "KTH Gateway (Internal)," requires a personal bearer token, and routes off-quota Kimi, GPT, and Codex access through a shared upstream pool.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Scoop · Based on reverse engineering, testing, data analysis · By Ryan Merket · Aug 17th, 2026, 4:08pm CT
- Early XChat Meetings prototype previews X's push into workplace video
An unfinished interface spotted by an independent X feature tester previews shareable meeting links, attendee approvals, whiteboards and queued screen sharing.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Scoop · Based on documents, public records · By Ryan Merket · Aug 17th, 2026, 12:22am CT
- Kimi Work secretly attaches raw records from five recent agent sessions to feedback reports
Moonshot AI’s Windows desktop app packages bounded raw records from the five most recently updated Kimi Work conversations whenever a user submits feedback. The form does not identify those attachments or the conversations selected.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Scoop · Based on reverse engineering, testing · By Ryan Merket · Aug 15th, 2026, 12:51am CT
- OpenAI built a credit bonus into ChatGPT’s experimental desktop onboarding
A hidden flow asks newcomers to let ChatGPT complete a real desktop task, then can add a remotely configured bonus to their balance.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Scoop · Based on reverse engineering · By RuntimeWire Staff · Aug 14th, 2026, 9:12pm CT
- ChatGPT Wallet: OpenAI Is Building Agentic Payments
Code in the Windows ChatGPT/Codex desktop application bundle shows secure card entry and states for saving payment methods that ChatGPT can use to complete tasks.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Scoop · Based on reverse engineering · By Ryan Merket · Aug 13th, 2026, 10:01pm CT
- OpenAI starts rolling out giftable ChatGPT credits
The one-time claim links let users buy prepaid usage for someone else. OpenAI's Windows app already contains gated entry points for the purchase flow.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Scoop · Based on reverse engineering, data analysis, public records · By Ryan Merket · Aug 12th, 2026, 11:05pm CT
- Scoop: Grok Bot ships dormant shared rooms for tasking other users' agents
Windows code defines owner-approved invites, cross-account agent membership and scoped computer access, though the tested account remained gated.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Scoop · Based on reverse engineering, testing, public records · By RuntimeWire Staff · Aug 12th, 2026, 6:15pm CT
- Scoop: SpaceXAI's Grok Bot stamps an account-derived ID into browser requests
The 16-character value is derived from the authenticated Cursor account and reaches external websites through Chrome's user-agent header.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Exclusive · Based on reverse engineering, data analysis, testing · By RuntimeWire Staff · Aug 12th, 2026, 12:49pm CT
- Grok Bot's hidden "Elon-Only Settings" picker lists 33 models
The dormant desktop control pulls an account-scoped catalog spanning Grok, GPT, Claude, Gemini, Kimi and GLM.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Exclusive · Based on documents, testing, reverse engineering · By RuntimeWire Staff · Aug 11th, 2026, 11:34pm CT
- Exclusive: Ex-Meta AI Director discloses $10M financing for Noosphere Labs
Former Meta research director Kevin Carlberg leads the 2026 startup, whose filing lists 10 investors and a converted SAFE.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Exclusive · By Ryan Merket · Aug 10th, 2026, 2:15pm CT
- Exclusive: Meta's Muse Code binary reveals hidden agent workflows and a Git plugin marketplace
Meta's R708.1 binary includes an omitted workflows command, Git-based plugin machinery and a JavaScript runtime that cannot execute in the release build.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Exclusive · By Ryan Merket · Aug 10th, 2026, 2:53am CT
- AI Coding Clients Are Reading Each Other’s Personal Instructions
Controlled tests found Muse Code, GitHub Copilot CLI, OpenCode and Grok sending personal rules written for competing AI clients with default remote requests. Claude, Gemini and Kimi chose narrower boundaries, contradicting claims that automatic cross-client loading is an industry standard. Cursor's packaged code expands the concern to skills.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Original analysis · Based on documents, testing, data analysis · By Ryan Merket · Aug 9th, 2026, 11:43pm CT
- Exclusive: Lucid whistleblower lawsuit links dismissed warning to Air recall that grew sixteenfold
Neil Milne's lawsuit ties an April 2025 warning to a half-shaft defect that Lucid later said could cause an unwarned loss of drive power.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Exclusive · By Ryan Merket · Aug 7th, 2026, 9:59pm CT
- EXCLUSIVE: xAI Has Shipped the Foundation for an Unannounced Grok Remote-Workspace Product
Hidden inside Grok Build 1.0, the Computer Hub command can turn a developer's local workspace into a remotely accessible tool server.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Exclusive · By Ryan Merket · Aug 7th, 2026, 3:41pm CT
- EXCLUSIVE: Pair Team Hit With Class Action Alleging Unpaid Wages Across California Workforce
A former lead care manager says Pair Team employees worked through meal periods and after clocking out. The lawsuit seeks to represent more than 40 hourly workers across four affiliated companies.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Exclusive · By Ryan Merket · Aug 6th, 2026, 10:37pm CT
- EXCLUSIVE: Cobot Sales Lead Says She Was Fired Four Days After a Pay Complaint
Alison Tran alleges the $500 million robotics startup reassigned her healthcare pipeline to men, then opened another healthcare account role.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Exclusive · By Ryan Merket · Aug 5th, 2026, 2:16am CT
- EXCLUSIVE: Apple engineer says he was fired after refusing to send customer device IDs to AT&T
A 16-year employee alleges Apple’s carrier team shared IMEI numbers through unsecured email without required customer releases. Apple denies wrongdoing and says he was fired for just cause. A jury trial is set for November 2027.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Exclusive · By Ryan Merket · Aug 2nd, 2026, 9:26pm CT
- EXCLUSIVE: X says ex-manager took $12,000 in crypto and bribed employee to restore scam accounts
A previously unreported lawsuit describes an unofficial market for bans, recoveries and valuable usernames. New discovery filings show how far the alleged backchannel may have reached.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Exclusive · By Ryan Merket · Aug 2nd, 2026, 12:31am CT
- Clipboard Health lawsuit forces open the economics of gig nursing
Clipboard Health co-defendant ordered to reveal nurse wages, client fees and contractor-cost math
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Exclusive · By Ryan Merket · Jul 24th, 2026, 11:28pm CT
- Exclusive: PFF soccer spinout Gradient Sports raises $10.4M
The Cincinnati-based sports data firm, spun out of Pro Football Focus's global soccer business, closed its equity offering to five investors weeks after PFF's enterprise arm sold for over $100M.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Exclusive · By Ryan Merket · Jul 20th, 2026, 5:21pm CT
- Exclusive: Grok Build hides a Doom-like 'easter egg' game behind the /gboom command
RuntimeWire testing found an undocumented mini-game inside xAI's terminal coding agent
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Exclusive · By Ryan Merket · Jul 10th, 2026, 6:18pm CT
- Fleet AI's Big Bet: Before Agents Run the Office, Send Them to the Gym
Insider round led by Sequoia, Bain, Menlo, and SVA; RR climbed from $1M six months ago to $63M now and is tracking $160M next quarter as Ouporov also previews a benchmark exposing spatial failures in frontier models.
RUNTIMEWIRE INVESTIGATION — Exclusive · By Ryan Merket · Jun 1st, 2026, 12:11am CT