Tag: technology

Facebook apologizes after its AI software labels Black men ‘primates’ in a video featured on the platform

Facebook on Friday issued an apology after its AI software labeled Black men “primates” in a video featured on the social media network.

The New York Times first reported the story. A Facebook spokesperson told the publication that it was a “clearly unacceptable error,” and said the recommendation software involved had been disabled. 

“We disabled the entire topic recommendation feature as soon as we realised this was happening so we could investigate the cause and prevent this from happening again,” the spokesperson said.

In a statement to the publication, Facebook said: “We apologize to anyone who may have seen these offensive recommendations.”

The offensive terminology related to a video, dated June 27, 2020, which was posted by The Daily Mail. The clip was titled “white man calls cops on black men at marina,” and featured Black men in disputes with white police officers and civilians. 

Facebook users who watched the video received an automated prompt asking if they would like to “keep seeing videos about Primates,” according to The New York Times. 

Keep reading

Maybe You Missed It, but the Internet ‘Died’ Five Years Ago

If you search the phrase i hate texting on Twitter and scroll down, you will start to notice a pattern. An account with the handle @pixyIuvr and a glowing heart as a profile picture tweets, “i hate texting i just want to hold ur hand,” receiving 16,000 likes. An account with the handle @f41rygf and a pink orb as a profile picture tweets, “i hate texting just come live with me,” receiving nearly 33,000 likes. An account with the handle @itspureluv and a pink orb as a profile picture tweets, “i hate texting i just wanna kiss u,” receiving more than 48,000 likes.

There are slight changes to the verb choice and girlish username and color scheme, but the idea is the same each time: I’m a person with a crush in the age of smartphones, and isn’t that relatable? Yes, it sure is! But some people on Twitter have wondered whether these are really, truly, just people with crushes in the age of smartphones saying something relatable. They’ve pointed at them as possible evidence validating a wild idea called “dead-internet theory.”

Let me explain. Dead-internet theory suggests that the internet has been almost entirely taken over by artificial intelligence. Like lots of other online conspiracy theories, the audience for this one is growing because of discussion led by a mix of true believers, sarcastic trolls, and idly curious lovers of chitchat. One might, for example, point to @_capr1corn, a Twitter account with what looks like a blue orb with a pink spot in the middle as a profile picture. In the spring, the account tweeted “i hate texting come over and cuddle me,” and then “i hate texting i just wanna hug you,” and then “i hate texting just come live with me,” and then “i hate texting i just wanna kiss u,” which got 1,300 likes but didn’t perform as well as it did for @itspureluv. But unlike lots of other online conspiracy theories, this one has a morsel of truth to it. Person or bot: Does it really matter?

Keep reading

US Navy is developing sonic weapon that blasts the target’s own voice back at them leaving them disoriented and unable to communicate

The US Navy is working on a non-lethal weapon that would render a person unable to communicate.

The handheld Acoustic Hailing And Disruption (AHAD) system records a subject’s voice with a long-range microphone then amplifies it and plays it back on two distinct tracks, one nearly simultaneous with the original and another on a slight delay, perhaps a few hundred milliseconds.

Using a parametric speaker, it directs the sound back at the person speaking, with the resulting echo theoretically disorienting the person and impeding their attempts to continue talking.

‘Due to the delayed auditory feedback effect, the target speaker’s concentration will be disrupted, making it difficult for them to continue speaking,’ according to the weapon’s patent application, approved in early August.

The chatter would be inaudible to anyone else, New Scientist reports, ‘so, as far as any bystanders can tell, the target will seem to have trouble speaking for no obvious reason.’

Keep reading

Army Wants to Install Facial Recognition, Video Analytics at Child Development Centers

The Army wants to use facial recognition and advanced machine learning algorithms to monitor kids at base Children Development Centers and plans to launch a pilot program at Fort Jackson in the near future.

Army contracting officers posted a solicitation to SAM.gov for a vendor capable of developing a facial recognition and video analytics system and integrating that with the Fort Jackson CDC’s closed-circuit television system.

If successful, the system will be used for “monitoring the health and well-being of children in the CDC,” according to the performance work statement.

“The use of close-circuit television video-recording is common in CDCs for security purposes, however these feeds are not continually monitored during all hours of operation in live time,” the solicitation notes. “Instead, CDC staff log scheduled hours by watching the live video feeds periodically throughout the day for the mandated metrics.”

The center is hoping adding video analytics to the CCTV system will allow for continuous monitoring of students, “used as an addition to the human CCTV monitoring,” and capable of automatically alerting staff to situations as they arise.

Keep reading

Human-animal hybrids: Senate approves billions of dollars for their chilling creation

After a long debate, The Senate approved with 68–32 votes a budget of $250 billion to continue with the controversial creation of hybrid beings by mixing human and animal genetic material.

The bill called the “Endless Frontier Act,” was introduced by Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer, D-New York, according to Life Site on June 14. 

Sen. James Lankford (R-Okla.) referred to the ethical incompatibility and the need to establish clear definitions on the matter in an attitude of submission to international competition.  

“We shouldn’t need to clarify in law that creating animal-human hybrids or ‘chimeras’ is ethically unthinkable, but sadly the need for that very clear distinction has arrived,” said Lankford, who, along with Sens. Mike Braun R-Ind.), and Steve Daines (R-Mont.) sought to criminalize the creation of such creatures.

He added: “There’s a real difference in taking human cells and injecting them into a mouse for cancer research and for other research. That’s been done, and it’s been done for a very long time, and we’ve had time to be able to process that, but trying to be able to create life is a very different threshold for me.”

Senator Daines noted, “In trying to compete with China, we shouldn’t become like them, It’s critical that we draw a bright line against unethical forms of research that fail to recognize the distinct value of humans over animals.”

Keep reading

GMO tomato as edible COVID vaccine? Mexican scientists work to make it a reality

While large companies and public sector consortiums in the United States, Canada, China and Europe are running at full speed to develop a vaccine grown in genetically modified (GM) tobacco plants, a research group at a Mexican university is working toward the same objective, but with a different and innovative strategy. They are using bioinformatics and computational genetic engineering to identify candidate antigens for a vaccine that can be expressed in tomato plants. Eating the fruit from these plants would then confer immunity against COVID-19.

At the time I write these lines, there are already more than 3.6 million people reportedly infected by the COVID19 pandemic and some 252,000 deaths globally. In the US, which has the world’s highest rate of infection, COVID-19 deaths have surpassed deaths from cancer, coronary heart disease and even influenza/pneumonia in just the few  months since the novel coronavirus arrived.

This critical situation has led the entire world to embark on a real race to develop a vaccine that immunizes the population against this new strain of coronavirus, which apparently emerged in the autumn of 2019 in China. So far, more than 100 vaccines are being investigated for COVID-19 by universities, public research centers and especially private companies. Some are already under clinical trial.

The approaches used for their production don’t differ much from the ones classically used in vaccines, where the antigens — a compound of the pathogen used to generate immunity in the patient — can be the inactivated virus, as well as the genetic material or a virus protein, which is grown on a large scale in chicken eggs, mammalian/insect cell tissue or genetically modified microorganisms.

Keep reading

Scientists obtain magnetic nanopowder for 6G technology

Material scientists have developed a fast method for producing epsilon iron oxide and demonstrated its promise for next-generation communications devices. Its outstanding magnetic properties make it one of the most coveted materials, such as for the upcoming 6G generation of communication devices and for durable magnetic recording. The work was published in the Journal of Materials Chemistry C, a journal of the Royal Society of Chemistry.

Iron oxide (III) is one of the most widespread oxides on Earth. It is mostly found as the mineral hematite (or alpha iron oxide, α-Fe2O3). Another stable and common modification is maghemite (or gamma modification, γ-Fe2O3). The former is widely used in industry as a red pigment, and the latter as a magnetic recording medium. The two modifications differ not only in crystalline structure ( alpha-iron oxide has hexagonal syngony and gamma-iron oxide has cubic syngony) but also in magnetic properties.

In addition to these forms of iron oxide (III), there are more exotic modifications such as epsilon-, beta-, zeta-, and even glassy. The most attractive phase is epsilon iron oxide, ε-Fe2O3. This modification has an extremely high coercive force (the ability of the material to resist an external magnetic field). The strength reaches 20 kOe at room temperature, which is comparable to the parameters of magnets based on expensive rare-earth elements. Furthermore, the material absorbs electromagnetic radiation in the sub-terahertz frequency range (100-300 GHz) through the effect of natural ferromagnetic resonance.The frequency of such resonance is one of the criteria for the use of materials in wireless communications devices—the 4G standard uses megahertz and 5G uses tens of gigahertz. There are plans to use the sub-terahertz range as a working range in the sixth generation (6G) wireless technology, which is being prepared for active introduction in our lives from the early 2030s.

The resulting material is suitable for the production of converting units or absorber circuits at these frequencies. For example, by using composite ε-Fe2O3 nanopowders it will be possible to make paints that absorb electromagnetic waves and thus shield rooms from extraneous signals, and protect signals from interception from the outside. The ε-Fe2O3 itself can also be used in 6G reception devices.

Keep reading

US cops served over 20,000 ‘invasive’ geofence warrants targeting users by location data in last 3 years, Google report shows

Google has revealed that over a quarter of all data request warrants it gets from US authorities involve identifying people by location history. These orders, which pinpoint devices near a crime scene, have been called “invasive.”

The so-called ‘geofence warrants’ allow law enforcement agencies to specify area and timeframe and have the tech giant gather information, including names and other details, about persons of interest in that window – from location information recorded by apps and services like Google Maps.

As part of its latest transparency report, the tech giant on Thursday revealed that it received more than 20,000 geofence warrants in the US between 2018 and 2020. It was the first time Google disclosed the volume of these controversial requests, having resisted demands to do so in the past.

Noting that these warrants are only “one subcategory” of the search warrant requests the company gets, Google noted it had “seen a rise” in the number of warrants ordering it to identify users by location info since 2018. That year, it received 982 geofence warrants, and the figure spiked to 11,554 in 2020.

As well, the vast majority of such warrants – to the tune of nearly 96% – are obtained by local and state law enforcement bodies, while federal agencies account for the remainder. Authorities in California made the most information requests between the years specified in the report.

Keep reading

The Internet of Bodies Will Change Everything, for Better or Worse

Ross Compton was there when a fire ravaged his $400,000 home in Middletown, Ohio, in September 2016. Fortunately, Compton told investigators, he was able to stuff a few bags with several possessions—including the charger for an external heart pump he needed to survive—before shattering a window with his cane and escaping.

But as the smoke cleared, police began to suspect that Compton’s story was a fabrication.

His statements were inconsistent. The rubble smelled of gasoline. And it seemed implausible that someone fleeing a burning house—especially someone with a medical condition like Compton’s—could execute such a complex escape plan.

Eventually, investigators were able to indict Compton on felony charges of aggravated arson and insurance fraud. Their star witness? His pacemaker.

Police obtained a warrant to retrieve data on Compton’s heart activity before, during, and after the fire. After reviewing this information, a cardiologist concluded that it was “highly improbable” Compton would’ve been able to escape the flames so quickly, while lugging so many belongings.

Compton pleaded not guilty. His attorney argued that the pacemaker data should be thrown out; including it would violate doctor-patient privilege and Compton’s constitutional right to privacy, the lawyer said.

The case was strange, arguably sad, and fraught with difficult questions. Regardless of whether Compton really torched his house, should a life-saving device inside someone’s body be part of a case that might put them behind bars?

We may not know the answer for some time. Compton passed away in July at the age of 62, leaving his case—and whatever precedent it might have set—unresolved.

This may seem like a one-of-a-kind chain of events, an aberration. But as industries usher in a new era of devices that track personal information by leveraging the internet and the human body in equal measure, it won’t be the last.

Keep reading