Voters in American towns and counties turned down data center development almost everywhere they were asked on November 3. According to Ballotpedia, 41 local ballot measures in 10 states dealt with the large computer buildings that run artificial intelligence services, through bans, temporary pauses, rezoning requests and nonbinding advisory questions. With most results counted on Wednesday, CNBC and Scientific American reported that voters sided against data centers in every case but one. In Wells, Maine, more than 80 percent approved a 180-day pause on data center construction that also applies to projects already proposed. The single exception was Harwood, North Dakota, where voters rejected, by about three to one, a proposal requiring extra review of industrial projects, data centers included. A $3 billion data center is already being built near the town.

The local votes came alongside races in which the buildings were a campaign issue. In a CNBC voter poll, 56 percent of voters said data centers were a crucial or major factor in their decision. Ohio’s incoming governor, Amy Acton, supports a conditional moratorium that would require new data centers to pay all of their utility costs and to be built with union labor, a position that could slow a large computing site planned by OpenAI, Nvidia and SoftBank in southern Ohio. The tallies are still unofficial. In towns that approved bans or pauses, developers will have to wait out the moratoriums or persuade voters to change the rules.

Britain’s health secretary, Yvette Cooper, told MPs on November 4 that artificial intelligence could mean the National Health Service in England needs fewer staff in some areas. Giving evidence to the House of Commons health committee, she said the technology “will lead to us wanting to increase certain areas but also to potentially reduce certain areas as well.” She named no jobs and announced no cuts. She also confirmed that the 10-year workforce plan, which will set how many doctors, nurses and other staff the health service trains and hires, has been delayed again and will now arrive in the new year, with no date. Cooper said predicting staff needs is much harder than it was two or three years ago.

The direction she described moves people away from hospitals. She told the committee she wants more emphasis on family doctors and community mental health care, and less on the hospital workforce over time. Practice nurse leaders complained that nurses were left out, and the Royal College of Nursing had already asked in June for the plan to be paused, arguing that it counted on AI savings without enough evidence. A separate independent review of NHS productivity and AI, led by Mark Bailie, a non-executive director of NHS England, is due in early 2027. Cooper suggested giving universities and training colleges clearer signals about where staff are needed, but for now they must plan student places without the official numbers.

Seven in every 100 adults surveyed in Australia, the United Kingdom and the United States say someone has used AI to make or spread sexual images of them without their consent. The survey of over 7,200 people, led by Nicola Henry of RMIT University in Australia and published in the International Journal of Human–Computer Interaction, counted three kinds of abuse since age 18. These were having a nude or sexual image of oneself created or altered with AI tools, having such an image shared, and being threatened with its release. Men reported it at over twice the rate of women, 10.2% against 3.8%, and rates were also higher among people under 35, people from racial and ethnic minorities and people with disabilities.

Women reported more fear for their safety and more damage to their mental and physical health. Almost 87% of all victims described at least one harm to their health, relationships, work or finances. Henry warned that the real number may be higher, because some people never find out that a fake image of them exists. The research was funded by Google, and a Google researcher, Rebecca Umbach, co-wrote it. Henry points to Australia’s proposed digital duty of care, which would require online services to prevent foreseeable harm instead of reacting after it happens. She also asks for better education, accessible support for victims and for technology companies to build safeguards into AI image tools from the start.