🔒 Check your website's PHP version this week
A WordPress update will not fix last week's critical PHP flaw. Here is the two-minute check.
Four-minute read. In today’s issue: the two-minute check for the PHP flaw under most WordPress sites, ChatGPT rewriting your ads from 31 October, Notion’s meeting-notes widget for your phone, Shopify’s guaranteed shipping rates, and a rooster who left his mark.
SECURITY
Check your website’s PHP version: a WordPress update will not fix this flaw
What changed. WordPress said in its notice on the critical PHP security release on 21 October that PHP, the software behind WordPress and most websites, fixed two critical flaws that let a stranger take over the server behind a site without logging in. No WordPress update is planned: the fix is a newer PHP.
What it means for you. AI helped researchers find these flaws, and attack attempts began before the fix was public, then ran into the millions within hours. Governments and councils pulled sites offline as a precaution. Waiting for a routine update is no longer safe.
The first step. Open Tools, Site Health, Info, Server in WordPress to find your PHP version. Versions 8.2.35, 8.3.36, 8.4.27, 8.5.12 and newer are fixed. For anything older, email your host today and ask when they will move you.
The limitation. Hosts that manage PHP for you may already have patched, but we have not checked yours. A site on its own server or VPS is not covered by a host’s patch: whoever set it up has to update PHP.
WordPress on the critical PHP security release (wordpress.org)
ADVERTISING
ChatGPT will start rewriting your ads on 31 October unless you opt out
OpenAI says creative enhancements switch on automatically for new and existing ChatGPT ad campaigns from 31 October. OpenAI may rewrite your headlines and descriptions to fit the conversation, translate them, resize images and send people to a different page on your site.
Versions of your ad that nobody at your business has seen can run under your name. OpenAI says you do not review or approve each one, and there is no preview of every variation.
Open Ads Manager before 31 October, select Manage settings, and decide whether to opt out for the whole account or one campaign. Then check your landing pages show today’s prices, because the rewrites draw on them.
OpenAI on creative enhancements for ChatGPT ads (help.openai.com)
Just shipped
Shopify’s Managed Markets can now set Standard and Express shipping rates for each country you sell to, and prepaid FedEx or DHL Express labels bought through it are protected from later carrier charges, Shopify said on 24 October. It needs duty-inclusive pricing: preview prices and payouts under Markets first. (changelog.shopify.com)
The rest of the day
🎙️ Notion added an AI Meeting Notes widget for iPhone and Android home screens, so a meeting is two taps from being transcribed, Notion said on 23 October. Add it before your next client call and compare its notes with your own. (x.com)
🖼️ Shopify’s Sidekick can now make images with transparent backgrounds, Shopify said on 23 October. Open Sidekick and ask for a transparent background in your prompt. (changelog.shopify.com)
🎬 Higgsfield now generates Seedance 2.5 video at native 4K, four times the pixels of 1080p, instead of upscaling a smaller clip, Higgsfield said on 24 October. Make one product clip at 4K before you book a reshoot. (x.com)
🌐 The ChatGPT desktop app’s built-in browser can now use “site tools” a website offers, so ChatGPT can search or edit the page directly. An arrow in the address bar shows which tools only read and which make changes. (help.openai.com)
🛠️ Built with AI
Ethan Mollick had Opus 5.5 rebuild the website for his book, and says the model mostly did it alone, where his first version needed a lot of work. Give Claude your own homepage with a note on how it should feel, and compare its version with yours. (x.com)
🧰 The Open Source Toolshed
What it is. Krita AI Diffusion adds image generation, inpainting and outpainting to Krita, the free painting app, so you can widen a background or replace part of a picture.
Who it’s for. Whoever makes product shots, banners or social graphics and wants to fix or widen an image without a paid tool.
How hard it is. Install Krita, then add the plugin from a zip file inside the app; expect some setup the first time.
GPL-3.0 licence. (github.com)
📈 The AI Odometer
Source: Social Capital, “Nearly 70% of websites sit on an AI-exposed flaw”, 25 October 2026, Chamath Palihapitiya, chart from W3Techs data of 22 October.
The slow part is older sites: by W3Techs data, about 48% of PHP sites run version 8.1 or older, which PHP no longer updates, so they depend on patches from their hosting vendors or a move to a newer version of PHP.
What it means for you. PHP 8.1 and older no longer get fixes from PHP itself. A site still on one needs a move to a newer version, so put the date in writing with your host this week.
Too early
OpenAI is testing a link between Google Analytics 4 and its Ads Manager, to compare ad results with GA4. It is a beta reached through an account manager, with no date for wider access. (help.openai.com)
🐓 One for the road
A rooster struts across a freshly smoothed strip of wet concrete while the man who laid it watches, leaving a neat trail of footprints.
Next scene: the same man, his dog Oreo, and a roast chicken on the table. The whole clip is AI-made, and the AI clearly had a view on how the story should end. (x.com)
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