Security was a hot topic this week with news that Amazon is working with law-enforcement throughout the US on facial recognition software. The ACLU is pleading with Amazon to stop developing this technology (which is high unlikely).
Another big story is GDPR and the fact that more than 60% of companies will not be ready or compliant with regulations which happen to start TODAY.
Intel continues to have security issues with their chips. A new variation of Spectre was recently discovered. Fixes for this new flaw will also likely impact cpu performance.
Acquisitions
- Microsoft acquires conversational AI startup Semantic Machines to help bots sound more lifelike
According to Crunchbase, Semantic Machines was founded in 2014 and raised about $20.9 million in funding from investors, including General Catalyst and Bain Capital Ventures.
In a 2016 profile, co-founder and chief scientist Dan Klein told TechCrunch that “today’s dialog technology is mostly orthogonal. You want a conversational system to be contextual so when you interpret a sentence things don’t stand in isolation.” By focusing on memory, Semantic Machines claims its AI can produce conversations that not only answer or predict questions more accurately, but also flow naturally, something that Siri, Google Assistant, Alexa, Microsoft’s own Cortana and other virtual assistants still struggle to accomplish.
Artificial Intelligence
- IBM gets green light for AI-managed traffic lights
“Responsive to determining the change in the state of the traffic signal for the first intersection should occur, the computer calculates a change to a traffic signal timing based on the determined change in the state of the traffic signal. The computer initiates an adaptation to the traffic signal timing based on the determined change to the traffic signal timing.”
If it works, and there’s a ton of people currently stuck in traffic right now wondering what’s happened to their lives and if they will ever see there loved ones again that are really hoping it does, then it could go some way in easing congestion.
https://www.techradar.com/news/ibm-gets-green-light-for-ai-managed-traffic-lights
- Bank of America debuts its AI-powered assistant, Erica
“Erica’s knowledge of banking and financial services increases with every client interaction,” Aditya Bhasin, head of consumer and wealth management technology at Bank of America, said in a statement. “In time, Erica will have the insights to not only help pay a friend or list your transactions at a specific merchant, but also help you make better financial decisions by analyzing your habits and providing guidance.”
https://www.zdnet.com/article/bank-of-america-debuts-its-ai-powered-assistant-erica/
I don’t want this – and even if I did, I have a sense of dread that they will get things so wrong.
Cloud
- Microsoft wins nine-figure cloud contract with the US intel community
The agreement expands an existing contract among Microsoft, Dell Technologies Inc. and the Office of the Director of National Intelligence to include more products. Chief among these offerings is Azure Government. It’s a version of the company’s cloud platform that is specifically geared toward the public sector and runs in dedicated data centers not used by any commercial customers.
On top of providing separate infrastructure, Azure Government has also been cleared by several of the cybersecurity assessment programs that the government uses to evaluate technology products. Other Microsoft products such as Office 365 boast similar public-sector credentials.
- Amazon Just Confirmed My Biggest Fear About Cloud Applications
But scary, too. Because what happens when your other cloud solution providers do the same? Let’s say you’ve spent hundreds of hours, and thousands of dollars, migrating your accounting, inventory, order entry, human resources, design, customer relationship management, project manager and whatever other system you have to that awesome online application. All of a sudden, just a short period later when your employees are all happily dependent on their servers in their cars and from their homes on their iPads and laptops, the vendor, like Amazon, decides to just up your price 20 percent?
You’re stuck, my friend.
Security
- Amazon Rekognition was always destined to be a privacy nightmare
Thanks to its ability to simultaneously recognize up to 100 people in a crowd at a time and compare them against extensive databases in real time, it’s already proving popular with some law enforcement agencies, including the city of Orlando, Florida, and the Washington County Sheriff’s Office in Oregon, according to the ACLU. Washington County built a database of at least 300,000 mugshot photos to be used with Rekognition while also building a mobile app so law enforcement agents can scan for a match against this database. In Orlando, according to documents obtained by the ACLU, Rekognition facial surveillance is already operating across the city, allowing Amazon to scan and track “people of interest” from the footage of “cameras all over the city.” Law enforcement agencies in California and Arizona have also contacted Washington County, inquiring about Rekognition in addition to what the ACLU terms multiple “fusion centers,” which “collect information about people for dissemination across agencies at the local and federal level.”
https://www.dailydot.com/debug/amazon-rekognition-surveillance-history/
- Google to Hold Talks With Publishers Over Their GDPR Concerns
Google has told publishers using its advertising-technology tools they will need to obtain user consent on its behalf to gather personal information on European users to target ads at them. Elsewhere, the company hasn’t yet signed up to an industry-wide framework many publishers will be using to ask for user permission on behalf of their various ad-tech partners—further complicating an already confusing situation.
And some publishers are concerned that Google’s optional alternative to that service, a free consent management platform called Funding Choices, requires that they limit the number of ad-tech vendors they work with.
- Only 36% of firms will be fully compliant with GDPR by its deadline
At the time of this writing, the deadline for compliance with the EU’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is only nine days away—May 25, 2018. Despite the fast-approaching deadline, only 36% of company leaders believe they’ll be fully compliant by that time, according to a recent IBM report.
This doesn’t mean that these organizations aren’t embracing GDPR—they’re just not able to do it quickly enough. And some are looking to the coming regulation as a catalyst for cleaning house: 60% said they’re using it as a jumping off point for improving privacy, security, and data management, or as a means for creating a new business model.
https://www.techrepublic.com/article/only-36-of-firms-will-be-fully-compliant-with-gdpr-by-its-deadline/
No one’s ready for GDPRTo be fair, GDPR as a whole is a bit complicated. Alison Cool, a professor of anthropology and information science at the University of Colorado, Boulder, writes in The New York Times that the law is “staggeringly complex” and practically incomprehensible to the people who are trying to comply with it. Scientists and data managers she spoke to “doubted that absolute compliance was even possible.”
It’s not a pleasant position to be in, because GDPR can allow regulators to fine companies up to 4 percent of their global revenue for violations of GDPR. To put that in perspective, a 4 percent fine on Amazon would be $7 billion. (Interestingly, since a company like Amazon reports huge revenues and relatively small profits, a 4 percent fine could cost them over two years of profit.)
https://www.theverge.com/2018/5/22/17378688/gdpr-general-data-protection-regulation-eu
- Google Removes ‘Don’t Be Evil’ Clause From Its Code of Conduct
Despite this significant change, Google’s code of conduct says it has not been updated since April 5, 2018.
The updated version of Google’s code of conduct still retains one reference to the company’s unofficial motto—the final line of the document is still: “And remember… don’t be evil, and if you see something that you think isn’t right – speak up!”
https://gizmodo.com/google-removes-nearly-all-mentions-of-dont-be-evil-from-1826153393
Software/SaaS
- Oracle wins payday in Micros Systems lawsuit saga
The litigation conduct prompted a subsequent sanction motion by Oracle, which four of the firms involved have agreed to settle rather than defend.
Oracle said in a statement published on 23 May that four of the plaintiffs’ law firms agreed to pay Oracle Corporation US$270,000 to avoid the vendor’s motion for sanctions over their alleged misconduct in a lawsuit related to Oracle’s acquisition of Micros Systems.
“This substantial monetary settlement reflects the strength of our sanctions motion for what Oracle believes was clearly a “strike” suit brought against Oracle,” Oracle general counsel Dorian Daley said.
https://www.arnnet.com.au/article/641532/oracle-wins-payday-micros-systems-lawsuit-saga/
Datacenter/Hardware
- New Intel Chip Flaws Found—And They Likely Won’t Be the Last
Security researchers say this latest bug, a twist of the Spectre flaw called Variant 4, is complex, making it less of a threat since it is more difficult for hackers to exploit than the Meltdown bug. But it won’t be the last such discovery, they say.
“There are going to be lots more vulnerabilities found over the next five years; no question about it,” Mr. Kocher said.
Research into hardware attacks has heated up in recent years and was given a further boost from the publicity generated by Spectre and Meltdown.
Other
- Trump reportedly pushed USPS to double Amazon’s shipping rates
But Trump’s criticism of Amazon clearly has a personal element. Here’s a nice compendium of the many times he’s gone after the company and its owner Jeff Bezos on Twitter — at least through late-March. The criticism really started to hit its stride around 2015. Bezos, of course, also own The Washington Post, a paper Trump has regularly called out for reporting “fake news.”
Further clouding all of this is the fact that the USPS hasn’t released the specifics of its pricing deals with Amazon, for fear of given competing delivery services “an unfair advantage.” It has, however, insisted that it’s made money on its deals with Amazon, in spite of the fact that the service reported a $2.7 billion loss in 2017.
https://techcrunch.com/2018/05/18/trump-reportedly-pushed-usps-to-double-amazons-shipping-rates/
- IBM denies it is looking for a new CEO to replace Rometty
IBM spokesman Ed Barbini told the news site: “IBM is not looking for a new CEO, and any information to the contrary is absolutely and unequivocally false.”
However, Business Insider reported that Rometty is “bucking a long-standing tradition at IBM by not retiring at age 60, and her reign has been controversial.”
The news comes as news site ProPublic reports that IBM is being investigated by the federal government for alleged age discrimination related to layoffs.
The publication also reported that “we’ve heard several top executive recruiting firms have been approaching people about throwing their names in the hat, including at least two outsiders and one IBM insider, according to someone knowledgeable of the situation.”
- Macron Vowed to Make France a ‘Start-Up Nation.’ Is It Getting There?
As President Trump pursues an increasingly protectionist agenda for the United States, and Britain veers away from the European Union, Mr. Macron has promoted a policy of open borders and being business-friendly in a country that has long had a reputation for being anything but. Multinationals are venturing to create more jobs in France as Mr. Macron overhauls French labor laws, despite protests by French workers.
Symbolic statements, like the opening last year of Station F, a mammoth incubator project in Paris representing France’s start-up ambitions, have also generated buzz. And the government is luring research activity with tax credits worth up to €5 billion a year and other inducements. This month, Mr. Macron announced France would invest €1.5 billion into artificial intelligence research through 2022.
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/05/23/business/emmanuel-macron-france-technology.html
IBM adding 1,800 jobs in France and new tech training“President Macron is making a big bet, and a smart one, that AI is going to transform every job, every profession and every industry,” said Rometty. “At IBM, we share this belief and see evidence of it every day with Watson driving exponential impact here in France and around the world. That is why we are bringing 1,800 new jobs to France to meet growing demand for AI from our clients.”
IBM plans to hire business consultants, IT architects, developers and technical experts, including both new graduates and experienced professionals. The 1,800 new jobs include 400 AI-related roles IBM announced in March at the French AI for Humanity summit.
Photo by Cristian Escobar on Unsplash