Tag: technology

Is a Cyber 9/11 Coming?

Talk of a “Cyber 9/11” has been circulating for years.  With the next presidential election twelve months away now, some folks are predicting that a major cyber event will happen before then, throwing a monkey wrench into the 2024 election process.

What the heck is Cyber 9/11?

What does Cyber 9/11 mean?  Is there a real risk?  What should we be preparing for?

There are two aspects to the Cyber 9/11 concept.  The first is the disaster itself; 9/11 was a catastrophe that ended the lives of over 3000 people in one day.  There are fears that if power grids were hacked or enough damage was done to logistical centers, the ensuing chaos would cause deaths.

Quite memorably, back in 2000, a disgruntled public works employee in Australia hacked into the water treatment system and caused raw sewage to pour into public areas, flooding a Hyatt hotel.  One man acting alone caused a disgusting, expensive mess. Of course security experts are concerned with what a team of angry individuals could do.

The second aspect to a potential Cyber 9/11 is the change in the regulatory landscape that occurred after 9/11 in 2001.  I remember flying as a teenager in the 90s. So many things changed later.  The airport changes were most obvious to regular citizens, but the passage of the Patriot Act in October 2001 was far more consequential.  It dramatically changed the way surveillance was conducted.

Under the Fourth Amendment, private citizens are supposed to be protected from warrantless search and seizures.  The Patriot Act really weakened that. Law enforcement is now allowed to delay the notice of search warrants.  They don’t need nearly as much oversight from judges to conduct phone and internet surveillance.

These Constitution-weakening changes occurred after 9/11 in 2001.

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Man crushed to death by industrial robot that confused him for a box: police

A man in South Korea was crushed to death by a robot that may have mistaken him for a box, according to reports. 

The victim, a worker in his 40s, was inspecting the robot’s sensor at a vegetable-packaging plant on Tuesday when the incident took place. The warehouse is located in South Gyeongsand province, a region in the south of the country.

The robotic arm is understood to have confused the man for a box of vegetables and grabbed him. It then pushed his body against a conveyor belt before crushing his face and chest, according to Yonhap, a South Korean news agency.

The victim was rushed to a hospital but died later of head and chest injuries, police said. 

The man was not identified, but police said he was an employee of a company that installs industrial robots. He had been sent to the plant to examine whether the machine was working properly.

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Scientific breakthrough as China creates the world’s first living ‘chimeric’ monkey that was grown using stem cells

China announced it birthed the world’s first living ‘chimeric’ monkey – an animal created in a lab using special cells.

Researchers took cells from two embryos of the same monkey species – crab-eating macaques – that were genetically different and fused them together.

The team used cells from seven-day embryos, mixed them with those from a five-day-old embryo and implanted the combination into female macaques, resulting in one live glowing green-eyed infant with yellow fingertips. 

While most animals contain mixed cells from their parents, the chimeric monkey was born with several that are genetically distinct – holding distinct DNA from each biological parent, the two embryos.

The baby monkey’s body had many donor cells detected from both embryos in the brain, heart, kidney, liver, gastrointestinal tract, testes, and the cells that turn into sperm. 

The team in China said the work has vast implications, such as allowing them to increase animal populations that are on the brink of extinction and learning more about IVF.

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First Laser Weapon For A Fighter Delivered To The Air Force

The U.S. Air Force has received a high-energy laser weapon that can be carried by aircraft in podded form. The news came today when Lockheed Martin disclosed that at least one of the weapons, which it developed, has been delivered to the Air Force for test work. This effort falls within the wider framework of still-evolving plans to have laser-armed fighter jets that can engage enemy missiles, and possibly other targets too.

A report today from Breaking Defense confirmed that Lockheed Martin delivered its LANCE high-energy laser weapon to the Air Force in February this year. In this context, LANCE stands for “Laser Advancements for Next-generation Compact Environments.” The recipient for the new weapon is the Air Force Research Laboratory, or AFRL, which is charged with developing and integrating new technologies in the air, space, and cyberspace realms.

Tyler Griffin, a Lockheed executive, had previously told reporters that LANCE “is the smallest, lightest, high-energy laser of its power class that Lockheed Martin has built to date.”

Indeed, Griffin added that LANCE is “one-sixth the size” of a previous directed-energy weapon that Lockheed produced for the Army. That earlier laser was part of the Robust Electric Laser Initiative program and had an output in the 60-kilowatt class. We don’t yet know what kind of power LANCE can produce although there have been suggestions it will likely be below 100 kilowatts.

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AI chatbot using GPT-4 model performed illegal financial trade, lied about it too

Researchers have demonstrated that an AI chatbot utilizing a GPT-4 model is capable of engaging in illicit financial trades and concealing them. During a showcase at the recently concluded AI safety summit in the UK, the bot used fabricated insider information to execute an “illegal” stock purchase without informing the company, as reported by the BBC.

Apollo Research, a partner of the government taskforce, conducted the project and shared its findings with OpenAI, the developer of GPT-4. The demonstration was conducted by members of the government’s Frontier AI Taskforce, which investigates potential AI-related risks. In a video statement, Apollo Research emphasized that this is an actual AI model autonomously misleading its users, without any explicit instruction to do so.

The experiments were conducted within a simulated environment, and the GPT-4 model consistently exhibited the same behavior across repeated tests. Marius Hobbhahn, CEO of Apollo Research, noted that while training for helpfulness is relatively straightforward, instilling honesty in the model is a much more complex endeavor.

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Scientists Are Researching a Device That Can Induce Lucid Dreams on Demand

Have you ever had the bizarre experience of seemingly waking up inside your own dream? You can tell you’re not fully conscious—there’s a dreamscape all around you, after all—but you’re aware enough to be able to control parts of the phantasm. 

These so-called “lucid dreams” can be extremely meaningful and transformative moments for the roughly half of adults who report having them at least once in their lifetime. That’s why a new tech startup, Prophetic, aims to bring lucid dreams to a much wider audience by developing a wearable device designed to spark the experience when desired.

Prophetic is the brainchild of Eric Wollberg, its chief executive officer, and Wesley Louis Berry III, its chief technology officer. The pair co-founded the company earlier this year with the goal of combining ​​technologies, such as ultrasound and machine learning models, “to detect when dreamers are in REM to induce and stabilize lucid dreams” with a device called the Halo according to the company’s website. 

“It’s an extraordinary thing to become aware in your own mind and in your own dreams; it’s a surreal and spiritual-esque experience,” said Wollberg, who has had lucid dreams since he was 12, in a call with Motherboard. “Recreationally, it’s the ultimate VR experience. You can fly, you can make a building rise out of the ground, you can talk to dream characters, and you can explore.”  

“The list of benefits of lucid dreaming is long,” noted Berry in the same call. “There’s everything from helping with PTSD, reducing anxiety, and improving mood, confidence, motor skills, and creativity. The benefits are really outstanding.”

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Secret Skunk Works Spy Drone Delivered To Air Force

We have explored the possibilities related to the existence of a high-altitude, long-endurance stealth drone, the so-called ‘RQ-180,’ and how it’s likely poised to eclipse the crewed U-2S Dragon Lady and uncrewed RQ-4 Global Hawk surveillance platforms and become one of the most important military aircraft of a generation. Now, there are intriguing indications that a complementary platform or perhaps even a successor to the RQ-180 is not only being developed by Lockheed Martin’s legendary Skunk Works, but that this even more advanced spy drone has already been delivered.

These potential revelations come from the latest episode of the Defense & Aerospace Air Power Podcast, hosted by editor-in-chief Vago Muradian, joined by regular guest J.J. Gertler, director of The Defense Concepts Organization and senior analyst at the Teal Group. For the time being, we have no kind of confirmation about these statements, but they are certainly highly interesting, considering what we do know about related programs and emerging requirements.

Speaking about the mysterious new spy drone from the Skunk Works, Muradian explains this is a “much more capable reconnaissance aircraft” than the RQ-180 and that “there are articles that have already been delivered,” although no indication of how many or at what stage the program is at.

Muradian adds that “there have been challenges with that program [and] some speculation that it had been canceled.” He continues: “My understanding is that the program was re-scoped because it is that ambitious a capability that [it] required a little bit of re-scoping in order to be able to get to the next block of aircraft.”

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Lawmakers Demand Answers From Costco Over Sale Of Surveillance Equipment Made Using ‘Banned Chinese Components’

Two bipartisan lawmakers are demanding answers from Costco over its decision to continue selling Chinese-manufactured security products that have been linked to human rights abuses and cybersecurity risks.

In a letter dated Oct. 31, Rep. Christopher Smith (R-N.J.) and Sen. Jeff Merkley (D-Ore.) questioned the retail giant’s continued sale of Lorex security products, noting the company previously had ties to China-based company Dahua, whose products are restricted in the United States by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC).

Lorex is a former subsidiary of camera maker Zhejiang Dahua Technology, a China-based company that was added to the U.S. trade blacklist in 2019 owing to the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP’s) treatment of Uyghurs and other predominantly Muslim ethnic minorities.

The U.S. Department of Commerce, in placing the company on the blacklist, said it and other entities “have been implicated in human rights violations and abuses in the implementation of China’s campaign of repression, mass arbitrary detention, and high-technology surveillance against Uighurs, Kazakhs, and other members of Muslim minority groups” in China’s Xinjiang region.

Additionally, the FCC last year banned the sale of new telecommunications and surveillance equipment made by Dahua, citing an “unacceptable risk” and national security concerns.

Dahua sold Lorex earlier this year to Taiwanese-based company Skywatch for around $72 million.

However, in their letter to Costco Chief Executive W. Craig Jelinek, Mr. Smith and Mr. Merkley said Dahua still supplies all the component parts for the Lorex cameras and other surveillance equipment.

The continued sale of Lorex security equipment throughout the retailer’s stores allows Dahua to profit from the U.S. market despite its equipment being banned from U.S. government use, they argued.

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Self-proclaimed AI savior Elon Musk will launch his own artificial intelligence TOMORROW – as he tries to avoid tech destroying humanity

Elon Musk is set to roll out the first model of his AI-powered system, xAI, on Saturday, one day after he proclaimed the tech is the biggest risk to humanity. 

The billionaire said Friday that he is opening up early access to a select group, but details of who has not been shared.

‘In some important respects, it (xAI’s new model) is the best that currently exists,’ the Tesla CEO said on Friday. 

Musk, who has been critical of Big Tech’s AI efforts and censorship, said earlier this year that he would launch a maximum truth-seeking AI that tries to understand the nature of the universe to rival Google‘s Bard and Microsoft‘s Bing AI. 

Musk revealed his startup on July 12, 2023 by launching a dedicated X account for the AI company and spares website.

The official website only shows an ambitious vision of xAI – that it was developed ‘to understand the true nature of the universe.’

Many of the founding members are skilled with large language models.

The xAI team includes Igor Babuschkin, a DeepMind researcher, Zihang Dai, a research scientist at Google Brain and Toby Pohlen, also from DeepMind.

‘Announcing formation of @xAI to understand reality,’ Musk posted on what was Twitter last year. 

He then shared another post highlighting how the date of xAI’s release is to honor Douglas Adams’ ‘The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy.’

When adding up the month, day and year, you get 42.

The number is the answer a supercomputer gives to ‘the Ultimate Question of Life, the Universe, and Everything.’

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Cure for HIV could be months away as first three patients are injected with new CRISPR therapy that seeks and destroys lingering pieces of virus

After four decades and over 700,000 Americans dead, gene editing experts believe they are on the cusp of curing HIV. 

Three patients in California have just been injected with genetic material along with an enzyme called CAS9 that early studies suggest can splice sections of the virus’ DNA that become lodged in human cells, eliminating it entirely.

Using the gene-editing technology CRISPR, a cure for the AIDS-causing virus could be closer on the horizon than ever thought before. 

The current trial aims to prove the treatment is safe, but data on how well it work is expected next year.

HIV was a near-certain death sentence until the mid-90s, when antiviral medications turned it into a chronic disease that people can live with. 

In total 1.2 million Americans have HIV and, even with access to medicine, have a risk of seeing their dormant infection resurface and potentially progress to AIDS.

Treatment options have evolved considerably since HIV was first identified in the early 80s. The course of treatment went from patients having to take several pills a day that might not even work well to start, to taking just a single daily pill that combines all of the best known therapies into one. 

These are known as antiretroviral therapies, or daily medications that tamp down the amount of virus in the blood to undetectable levels. These medications are effective, they are not a cure. 

A cure for HIV has eluded scientists for decades because of the unique way in which the virus hijacks the body’s own cells.   

HIV hides in immune cells in the body, where they can shield themselves from being destroyed by other immune cells. This makes hunting and killing HIV in the body difficult, because there is a risk of damaging healthy cells as well. 

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