Weekly Roundup: Friday, 9 June, 2017
Here are some links I thought were worth sharing this week:
DATA SCIENCE
How AI Startups Must Compete with Google: Reply to Fei-Fei Li
"AI startups must focus on solving their customers problems. This requires empathy and domain expertise, it’s not enough to know how to train machine learning models. Each industry vertical, like manufacturing, healthcare or retail, requires a specific approach and skillset." This article goes on to provide a critique of Google's AI ambitions and research approach, well worth a read.
DATA PRIVACY
Wikipedia’s Switch to HTTPS Has Successfully Fought Government Censorship
"HTTPS prevents governments and others from seeing the specific page users are visiting. For example, a government could tell that a user is browsing Wikipedia, but couldn't tell that the user is specifically reading the page about Tiananmen Square."
"Up until 2015, Wikipedia offered its service using both HTTP and HTTPS, which meant that when countries like Pakistan or Iran blocked the certain articles on the HTTP version of Wikipedia, the full version would still be available using HTTPS. But in June 2015, Wikipedia decided to axe HTTP access and only offer access to its site with HTTPS. The thinking was that this would force the hand of restrictive governments when it came to censorship—due to how this protocol works, governments could no longer block individual Wikipedia entries. It was an all or nothing deal."
CYBER SECURITY
When safety and security become one
This post from the Security Group at the University of Cambridge Computer Laboratory.
"Up till now, we’ve known how to make two kinds of fairly secure system. There’s the software in your phone or laptop which is complex and exposed to online attack, so has to be patched regularly as vulnerabilities are discovered. It’s typically abandoned after a few years as patching too many versions of software costs too much. The other kind is the software in safety-critical machinery which has tended to be stable, simple and thoroughly tested, and not exposed to the big bad Internet. As these two worlds collide, there will be some rather large waves."
UK's Trident nuclear submarines 'vulnerable to catastrophic hack'
The article references a report by the British American Security Information Council (BASIC) into vunrabilities on the UKs four nuclear missile-carrying Vanguard class submarines. The Guardian article gives an overview but links to the report for more detail. From the report "The Submarine Command System (SMCS) was first created for the Vanguard-class submarines as their tactical information and torpedo weapon control systems. It has a long and complex pedigree. Its updated versions are based upon a version of Windows XP and known colloquially as ‘Windows for Warships’. These have now been installed on all active Royal Navy submarine classes."
"Defence Minister Adam Ingram later gave assurances to parliament in 2004 that this was a low risk use of Microsoft Windows, on the basis that it was more likely to have long-term product support." this is not an unreasonable answer, Windows XP was released in 2001 and Microsoft ended extended support to 2014. The shortcoming arises where using off the shelf consumer software that has a much shorter lifespan than a piece of military hardware.
COMPUTING
Mossberg: The Disappearing Computer
Veteran technology journalist Walt Mossberg has been writing a technology column since 1991, this is his last column. He charts the journey of computing since 1991 and into the future. "Tech was once always in your way. Soon, it will be almost invisible.". The move towards ambient computing, the transformation of the environment all around us with intelligence and capabilities that don’t seem to be there at all.