Short answers, pulled from the story.
USB was developed by a consortium of seven companies: Compaq, DEC, IBM, Intel, Microsoft, NEC, and Nortel, beginning in 1995. Ajay Bhatt and his team at Intel led the technical work, and the first integrated circuits supporting USB were produced by Intel in 1995. USB 1.0 was officially released in January 1996.
USB Power Delivery Revision 3.1, finalized in 2021, supports up to 240 watts at 48 volts. Earlier USB versions delivered far less: USB 1.0 and 1.1 provided a maximum of 2.5 watts for high-power devices, while USB 3.0 raised that to 4.5 watts.
USB4 Version 2.0, announced on the 1st of September 2022, supports up to 80 Gbit/s in symmetric mode and an asymmetric mode of 120/40 Gbit/s. It achieves this using PAM3 signaling over USB-C cables.
USB replaced serial ports, parallel ports, game ports, and proprietary connectors because it is self-configuring, hot-swappable, and can supply power to peripheral devices over the same cable. The standard requires compliance testing before the USB logo can be used, giving users confidence that certified devices will work without manual configuration.
A BadUSB attack uses a device that appears to be a flash drive but instead simulates a keyboard when plugged in, typing malicious commands automatically. On Windows systems, such a device can open PowerShell and download malware scripts without any user action beyond inserting the device.
USB-C (officially USB Type-C) is a reversible connector that can be inserted either way, replacing all previous Type-A and Type-B connectors. It is the only connector required for USB4, supports Alternate Mode to carry DisplayPort, HDMI, and Thunderbolt signals, and enables up to 240 watts of power delivery through a single cable.