RISKS-LIST: Risks-Forum Digest Monday 1 August 2022 Volume 33 : Issue 35

ACM FORUM ON RISKS TO THE PUBLIC IN COMPUTERS AND RELATED SYSTEMS (comp.risks) Peter G. Neumann, founder and still moderator

***** See last item for further information, disclaimers, caveats, etc. ***** This issue is archived at <http://www.risks.org> as
<http://catless.ncl.ac.uk/Risks/33.35>
The current issue can also be found at
<http://www.csl.sri.com/users/risko/risks.txt>

Contents:
Coding Error Caused Outage That Left Millions Without Service
(Alexandra Posadzki)
Push for innovation in artificial intelligence can create dangerous products
(Channel News Asia)
Drone Contraband Deliveries Are Rampant at US Prisons (WiReD)
Politicians want to crack down on payment systems like Zelle. Here's why.
(The Boston Globe)
Starlink Satellites Get Upgrades To Prevent Interference With Astronomy
(PCMag)
"I Was Wrong" (NYTimes)
China's Expanding Surveillance State (NYTimes)
Voice Jammer Stops Anyone from Recording Your Speech (Matthew Sparkes)
Tim Hortons Offers a Free Coffee and Pastry for Spying on People for Over a
Year (Vice)
Cyberattack Illuminates Shaky State of Student Privacy (Natasha Singer) Hospital IT melts in heatwave, leaving doctors without patient records
(The Register)
Google, Oracle cloud servers wilt in UK heatwave, take down websites
(The Register)
How to Prevent Another European Transport Meltdown (WiReD)
Chess-playing robot grabs child opponent's finger and breaks it (TechSpot) BMW's Heated as a Service Model Has Drivers Seeking Hacks (WiReD)
Online pricing algorithms are gaming the system, and could mean you pay more
(npr.org)
Lawsuit: Chicago police misused ShotSpotter in murder case (AP)
Undersea Internet Cables Can Detect Earthquakes -- and May Soon Warn of
Tsunamis (The New Yorker)
Average Data Breach Costs Hit a Record $4.4 Million, Report Says (CNET) Messaging app JusTalk is spilling millions of unencrypted messages
(TechCrunch)
Researchers Discover Nearly 3,200 Mobile Apps Leaking Twitter API Keys
(Cloudsek)
The Default Tech Settings You Should Turn Off Right Away (NYTimes)
Uber avoids federal prosecution over data breach that exposed data of 57
million users (Engadget)
Martin Shkreli Is Back With a Web3 Drug Discovery Platform (WiReD)
It's Not Just Loot Boxes: Predatory Monetization Is Everywhere (WiReD)
The Surprising Fight Over Google's Downtown West Development (WiReD)
The price of solar modules has declined by 99.6% since 1976 (WholeMarsBlog)
How online misinformation threatens Fortune 500 companies (Fortune)
"Dr. Birx ADMITS She 'Knew' COVID-19 Vaccines 'Were Not Going to Protect
Against Infection' (VaxxedFox)
13 propositions on an Internet for a burning world (APNIC Blog)
Chip shortages hit hard at Yamaha's musical instrument business
(The Register)
Jeopardy! player causes `at-home-disturbance' (Sundry sources abridged)
Inside Ukraine's Thriving Tech Sector (The New York Times)
Students and staff are entirely prohibited from using Google Search --
Data privacy concerns trigger restrictions on Google Chrome in Dutch
schools (Android Police)
Tech giants, including Meta, Google, and Amazon, want to put an end to
leap-seconds (ZDNet)
BMW's 3,854-Variable Problem Solved in Six Minutes with Quantum Computing
(Francisco Pires)
Re: UK proposes new rule for AI (Dick Mills)
Re: MIT scientists think they've discovered how to fully reverse climate
change (goldy)
ACM Launches New Journal on Responsible Computing (Lauren Weinstein)
On-demand education program of medical safety (MSPO)
Abridged info on RISKS (comp.risks)

----------------------------------------------------------------------

Date: Wed, 27 Jul 2022 11:34:02 -0400 (EDT)
From: ACM TechNews <technews-editor@acm.org>
Subject: Coding Error Caused Outage That Left Millions Without Service
(Alexandra Posadzki)

[This is an update to the Interac item in RISKS-33.32 on the outage. PGN]

Alexandra Posadzki, *The Globe and Mail* (Canada), 25 Jul 2022)

Millions of Canadians lost their cellphone, Internet, or home phone service
for at least a day due to a coding error on 8 Jul 2022, when Rogers Communications was upgrading its wireless/broadband infrastructure. The telecommunications company has one core network that supports all its
services, and company documents indicated a piece of code deleted a routing filter during the sixth phase of the seven-phase infrastructure upgrade. The deletion caused all possible channels to the Internet to pass through the routers, resulting in several devices exceeding their memory and processing capacities, inducing a network shutdown. Rogers uses equipment from
different manufacturers in its network, and its router suppliers have
different traffic management and overload safeguards, which the documents identified as the source of the outage.

https://orange.hosting.lsoft.com/trk/click?ref=znwrbbrs9_6-2ef56x234f88x070683&

[Single point of failure? PGN]

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 24 Jul 2022 04:17:33 +0000
From: Richard Marlon Stein <rmstein@protonmail.com>
Subject: Push for innovation in artificial intelligence can create dangerous
products (Channel News Asia)

https://www.channelnewsasia.com/commentary/ai-legal-liability-boeing-tesla-uber-car-crash-2828911

"There is a perverse incentive for firms to design AI that is artificially innocent. A better approach would involve more extensive harm reduction,
says a professor of management."

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 31 Jul 2022 01:48:51 -0400
From: Gabe Goldberg <gabe@gabegold.com>
Subject: Drone Contraband Deliveries Are Rampant at US Prisons (WiReD)

Law enforcement officers face an air assault as drugs, weapons, and
phones are flown in to prisoners.

https://www.wired.com/story/drone-contraband-deliveries-prisons-united-states

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 31 Jul 2022 13:01:27 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
Subject: Politicians want to crack down on payment systems like Zelle.
Here's why. (The Boston Globe)

https://www.bostonglobe.com/2022/07/25/business/politicians-want-crack-down-payment-systems-like-zelle-heres-why/

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 30 Jul 2022 18:50:44 -0700
From: geoff goodfellow <geoff@iconia.com>
Subject: Starlink Satellites Get Upgrades To Prevent Interference With
Astronomy (PCMag)

*The improvements promise to stop Starlink satellites from reflecting too
much sunlight as they travel over the night sky.*

SpaceX is working on several upgrades to the company=E2=80=99s Starlink <https://www.pcmag.com/how-to/what-is-starlink-spacex-satellite-internet-service-explained> satellites in an effort to prevent them from bothering
astronomers.

The upgrades try to address how Starlink satellites can reflect sunlight as they orbit the Earth. This same light can accidentally photo-bomb <https://www.pcmag.com/news/starlink-satellites-are-photo-bombing-astronomy-images> astronomical observations, which has sparked concerns within the
scientific community.

In response, SpaceX has been working with astronomers to develop ways to
reduce the amount of sunlight Starlink satellites will reflect over the
night sky. On Thursday, the company published a document (Opens in a new window) that outlines the upgrades, which involve altering some design
elements to the Starlink satellites. <https://api.starlink.com/public-files/BrightnessMitigationBestPracticesSatelliteOperators.pdf> [...]

https://www.pcmag.com/news/starlink-satellites-get-upgrades-to-prevent-interference-with-astronomy

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 24 Jul 2022 20:46:42 PDT
From: Peter G Neumann <neumann@csl.sri.com>
Subject: "I Was Wrong" (NYTimes)

This is a remarkable piece of honest journalism, with eight NYT opinion columnists revisiting their earlier incorrect predictions.

*The New York Times* Sunday Opinions, 24 July 2022

Thomas L. Friedman highlighted one of our recurring themes in RISKS,
in his piece entitled "I was wrong about Chinese censorship":

``Trust is a byproduct of truth, and truth is a product of a free
and independent press -- not everywhere and always, but more
often than not.''

In RISKS, we try to let the truth tell the story, with some help from
readers to get it closer to truth. Thanks again. However, as we have said before, ground truth is getting more difficult to ascertain. PGN

------------------------------

Date: Wed, 27 Jul 2022 21:18:53 PDT
From: "Peter G. Neumann" <neumann@csl.sri.com>
Subject: China's Expanding Surveillance State (NYTimes)

Muyi Xiao, Paul Mozur, Isabelle Qian and Alexander Cardin
*The New York Times* National Edition 27 Jul 2022 centerfold pp. A10-A11,

China's ambition to collect a staggering amount of personal data from
everyday citizens is more expansive than previously known. ...
Phone-tracking devices are everywhere. The police are creating some of the largest DNA databases in the world. And the authorities are building upon facial recognition technology to collect voice prints from the general
public.

Here are the bold-faced section heads in the full two-page article:

* The Chinese police analyze human behaviors to ensure facial recognition
cameras capture as much activity as possible.

* The authorities are using phone trackers to link people's digital lives to
their physical movements.

* DNA, iris scan samples, and voice prints are being collected
indiscriminately from people with no connection to crime.

* The government wants to connect all of these data points to build
comprehensive profiles for citizens -- which would be accessible
throughout the government.

[Total Information Awareness? PGN]

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 1 Aug 2022 12:02:12 -0400 (EDT)
From: ACM TechNews <technews-editor@acm.org>
Subject: Voice Jammer Stops Anyone from Recording Your Speech
(Matthew Sparkes)

Matthew Sparkes, *New Scientist*, 29 Jul 2022,
via ACM TechNews, 1 Aug 2022

Michigan State University's Qiben Yan and colleagues have developed an artificial-intelligence voice jammer that can prevent anyone from recording
the speech of a single target person. The Neural Enhanced Cancellation (NEC) tool exploits a bug contained within most microphones by introducing sounds
at set distances above and below the microphone's recording frequencies. NEC taps this flaw to play inverse speech in the ultrasonic range outside of
human hearing, the frequencies needed to clandestinely block an audible
voice. The tool effectively blocked voices when tested on a range of Apple, Xiaomi, and Samsung smartphones from up to 3.6 meters (nearly 12 feet) away.

https://orange.hosting.lsoft.com/trk/click?ref=znwrbbrs9_6-2ef9fx235020x070817&

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 29 Jul 2022 20:56:31 -0400
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
Subject: Tim Hortons Offers a Free Coffee and Pastry for Spying on People
for Over a Year (Vice)

Tim Hortons Offers a Free Coffee and Pastry for Spying on People for Over a Year

The wholesome Canadian chain caused a scandal when its privacy violation was revealed, and now it's proposing a free coffee and a baked good as restitution.

https://www.vice.com/en/article/wxnnn4/tim-hortons-offers-a-free-coffee-and-pastry-for-spying-on-people-for-over-a-year

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 1 Aug 2022 12:02:12 -0400 (EDT)
From: ACM TechNews <technews-editor@acm.org>
Subject: Cyberattack Illuminates Shaky State of Student Privacy
(Natasha Singer)


Natasha Singer, *The New York Times*, 31 Jul 2022,
via ACM TechNews, 1 Aug 2022

A cyberattack on student-tracking software provider Illuminate Education highlights the inadequacies of student privacy safeguards. The breach
worries cybersecurity and privacy experts because it involved sensitive personal details about students or student data dating back over 10
years. Technology companies and education reformers have pressured schools
to adopt software that can catalog and categorize student behavior to help educators identify and assist at-risk students. With hacks on school
software vendors increasing, the exposure of such information could have long-term ramifications. Said New Mexico attorney general Hector Balderas,
"My concern is there will be bad actors who will exploit a public school setting, especially when they think that the technology protocols are not
very robust. And I don't know why Congress isn't terrified yet."

https://orange.hosting.lsoft.com/trk/click?ref=znwrbbrs9_6-2ef9fx23501ex070817&

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 24 Jul 2022 21:50:38 -0600
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
Subject: Hospital IT melts in heatwave, leaving doctors without patient
records (The Register)

https://www.theregister.com/2022/07/22/hospital_it_meltdown/

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 24 Jul 2022 21:51:02 -0600
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
Subject: Google, Oracle cloud servers wilt in UK heatwave, take down websites
(The Register)

https://www.theregister.com/2022/07/19/google_oracle_cloud/

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 31 Jul 2022 23:04:49 -0400
From: Gabe Goldberg <gabe@gabegold.com>
Subject: How to Prevent Another European Transport Meltdown (WiReD)

This summer's heat wave knocked roads, railways, and runways out of action.
But existing solutions could help shore up critical infrastructure.

https://www.wired.com/story/europe-transport-heat-wave-solutions

This just discusses transportation -- there's also power lines, oil/gas pipelines, water/sewage infrastructure.

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 24 Jul 2022 19:35:22 +0200
From: Peter Houppermans <peter@houppermans.net>
Subject: Chess-playing robot grabs child opponent's finger and breaks it
(TechSpot)

https://www.techspot.com/news/95405-watch-chess-playing-robot-grabs-child-opponent-finger.html

According to Sergey Smagin, vice-president of the Russian Chess Federation,
the boy responded before the robot had completed its move. [..]

Smagin seemed to put most of the blame on the victim. "There are certain
safety rules and the child, apparently, violated them. When he made his
move, he did not realize he first had to wait, This is an extremely rare
case, the first I can recall.''

1. As a parent, I find the assumption that a nine-year-old will perfectly
follow ANY sort of rule profoundly optimistic :).

2. It's an industrial robot, and they tend to have pressure sensitive grips (exactly because full force could crush whatever they grab). Unless the
chess pieces were made of uranium, gold or other overly dense material (the brain matter of the operators involved?), there should have been a low grip force set, low enough for a child to wiggle out of.

3. In most civilised countries, human + proximity to powerful mechanics
tends to mandate a nearby emergency stop. Oops.

I get the impression that the rule breaking child exposed at a minimum a
lack of critical thinking of the parties involved.

[Even if corporations are people (Citizens United) and AI machines are
people, industrial-strength robots should not be allowed to play chess.
PGN]

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 24 Jul 2022 23:56:34 -0400
From: Gabe Goldberg <gabe@gabegold.com>
Subject: BMW's Heated as a Service Model Has Drivers Seeking Hacks (WiReD)

Connected car companies now charge owners to use physical hardware they
already bought -- but some owners are pushing back.

Extra features have been built into the software of cars for a number of
years, from more sophisticated cruise control with speed management and lane-keep assist, to fancy light shows on startup. They are switched on for top-of-the-range models and left dormant for others, with some offered as "dealer fit" options, sold in the showroom to a customer collecting their
new car.

https://www.wired.com/story/bmw-heated-seats-as-a-service-model-has-drivers-seeking-hacks

[I recall in the 1960s that AT&T offered a more expensive data service
which was enabled by clipping a single wire. PGN]

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 25 Jul 2022 09:43:09 +0000
From: Richard Marlon Stein <rmstein@protonmail.com>
Subject: Online pricing algorithms are gaming the system, and could mean you
pay more (npr.org)

https://www.npr.org/2022/07/25/1113004433/online-shopping-deals-algorithm-pricing-regulation

"Theoretically, these algorithms could be good for competition. For example,
if one business sets a price, the algorithm could automatically undercut it, resulting in a lower price for the consumer.

"But it doesn't quite work that way, MacKay said. In a paper he co-authored
in the National Bureau of Economic Research, he studied the way algorithms compete. He found that when multiple businesses used pricing algorithms,
both knew that decreasing their price would cause their rival to decrease
their price, which could set off a never-ending chain of price decreases."

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 25 Jul 2022 08:30:13 -0600
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
Subject: Lawsuit: Chicago police misused ShotSpotter in murder case (AP)

https://apnews.com/article/gun-violence-technology-crime-chicago-lawsuits-3e6145f63c96593866cf89ac01ce7498

------------------------------

Date: Tue, 26 Jul 2022 18:12:17 -0400
From: Jan Wolitzky <jan.wolitzky@gmail.com>
Subject: Undersea Internet Cables Can Detect Earthquakes -- and May Soon
Warn of Tsunamis (The New Yorker)

More like a benefit than a risk...

A trick of the light is helping scientists turn optical fibres into
potential disaster detectors.

https://www.newyorker.com/science/elements/undersea-internet-cables-can-detect-earthquakes-and-may-soon-warn-of-tsunamis

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 29 Jul 2022 15:45:54 -0600
From: Jim Reisert AD1C <jjreisert@alum.mit.edu>
Subject: Average Data Breach Costs Hit a Record $4.4 Million, Report Says
(CNET)

Bree Fowler, CNET, 27 July 2022

The average cost of a data breach rose to an all-time high of $4.M marked
a 2.6% increase from a year ago and a 13% jump since 2020.

More than half of the organizations surveyed acknowledged they had passed
on those costs to their customers in the form of higher prices for their
products and services, IBM said.

The annual report is based on an analysis of data breaches experienced by
550 organizations around the world between March 2021 and March 2022. The
research, which was sponsored and analyzed by IBM, was conducted by the
Ponemon Institute.

The cost estimates are based on both immediate and longer-term expenses.
While some costs like the payment of ransoms and those related to
investigating and containing the breach tend to be accounted for right
away, others such as regulatory fines and lost sales can show up years
later. On average, those polled said they accrued just under half of the
costs related to a given breach more than a year after it occurred.

https://www.cnet.com/tech/services-and-software/average-data-breach-costs-hit-a-record-4-4-million-report-says/

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 23 Jul 2022 20:16:43 -0600
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
Subject: Messaging app JusTalk is spilling millions of unencrypted messages
(TechCrunch)

https://techcrunch.com/2022/07/22/justalk-unencrypted/

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 1 Aug 2022 16:29:58 -0700
From: geoff goodfellow <geoff@iconia.com>
Subject: Researchers Discover Nearly 3,200 Mobile Apps Leaking Twitter
API Keys (Cloudsek)

Researchers have uncovered a list of 3,207 apps, some of which can be
utilized to gain unauthorized access to Twitter accounts. The takeover is
made possible, thanks to a leak of legitimate Consumer Key and Consumer
Secret information, respectively, Singapore-based cybersecurity firm
CloudSEK said in a report exclusively shared with The Hacker News.

<https://cloudsek.com/whitepapers_reports/how-leaked-twitter-api-keys-can-be-used-to-build-a-bot-army/>

------------------------------

From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
Date: Thu, 28 Jul 2022 10:27:04 -0400
Subject: The Default Tech Settings You Should Turn Off Right Away (NYTimes)

These controls, which are buried inside products from Apple, Google, Meta
and others, make us share more data than we need to.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/27/technology/personaltech/default-settings-turn-off.html

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 23 Jul 2022 20:15:04 -0600
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
Subject: Uber avoids federal prosecution over data breach that exposed
data of 57 million users (Engadget)

https://www.engadget.com/uber-avoids-prosecution-2016-data-breach-205134044.html

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 29 Jul 2022 00:16:44 -0400
From: Gabe Goldberg <gabe@gabegold.com>
Subject: Martin Shkreli Is Back With a Web3 Drug Discovery Platform (WiReD)

Martin Shkreli -- the notorious ex-pharmaceutical executive fresh from
prison after his 2017 fraud conviction -- announced his latest,
eyebrow-raising venture this week: the creation of a blockchain-based Web3
drug discovery platform that traffics in his own cryptocurrency, MSI, aka Martin Shkreli Inu.

https://www.wired.com/story/martin-shkreli-druglike-crypto-web3-drug-discovery-platform/

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 29 Jul 2022 00:24:44 -0400
From: Gabe Goldberg <gabe@gabegold.com>
Subject: It's Not Just Loot Boxes: Predatory Monetization Is Everywhere
(WiReD)

The UK recently declined to regulate prize draws as a form of gambling, but does it matter? The industry has moved on to more problematic ways to make money.

Whenever a term from the world of video games enters broader society, it’s a safe bet that it's not for a good reason. Loot boxes -- like Hot Coffee or Gamergate -- don;t buck this trend. For at least the past five years, driven
by a mix of grassroots Reddit organizing and parental horror stories -- "my teen spent £6,000 on FIFA cards"—-- these randomized prize draws have attracted the world's ire; in several countries, they're now illegal. Last week, after a 22-month consultation, the UK government decided that loot
boxes will not be regulated under betting laws. Despite finding a link
between these systems and problem gambling, the government has left
regulation up to the industry.

https://www.wired.com/story/loot-boxes-predatory-monetization-games

The risk? Not understanding new risks...

------------------------------

Date: Fri, 29 Jul 2022 00:34:37 -0400
From: Gabe Goldberg <gabe@gabegold.com>
Subject: The Surprising Fight Over Google's Downtown West Development (WiReD)

To secure the land for its multibillion-dollar Downtown West development,
the company has had to track down dozens of distant relatives of
19th-century landowners.

https://www.wired.com/story/google-downtown-west-san-jose-lawsuits-land-descendants/

The risk? Not using blockchain in the 1800s to track real estate!

------------------------------

Date: Sat, 23 Jul 2022 18:18:05 -0700
From: geoff goodfellow <geoff@iconia.com>
Subject: The price of solar modules has declined by 99.6% since 1976

https://twitter.com/WholeMarsBlog/status/1550958392209915905

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 1 Aug 2022 15:00:05 -0400
From: Gabe Goldberg <gabe@gabegold.com>
Subject: How online misinformation threatens Fortune 500 companies (Fortune)

It didn't take long for the conspiracy theorists to weave a fresh tragedy
into their twisted narrative. Just hours after a disturbed 18-year-old armed with an AR-15 assault rifle and racist hate walked into a grocery store in Buffalo and murdered 10 innocent people, on Sunday, May 15, the mass
shooting was already being reimagined as part of a plot involving some of
the world's largest companies.

https://fortune.com/2022/06/02/online-trolls-using-dangerous-lies-to-take-down-executives-and-companies/

[UnFORTUNEate. PGN]

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 1 Aug 2022 11:00:48 -0700
From: the keyboard of geoff goodfellow <geoff@iconia.com>
Subject: "Dr. Birx ADMITS She 'Knew' COVID-19 Vaccines 'Were
Not Going to Protect Against Infection'

Since then, "breakthrough cases" have become common, with triple-vaccinated Americans regularly catching SARS-CoV-2 and staying sick for much longer
than the unvaccinated... https://twitter.com/VaxxedFox/status/1550930366566961152

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 25 Jul 2022 11:02:47 +0900
From: David Farber <farber@keio.jp>
Subject: 13 propositions on an Internet for a burning world (APNIC Blog)

https://blog.apnic.net/2022/07/15/13-propositions-on-an-internet-for-a-burning-world-9-11/

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 24 Jul 2022 21:49:59 -0600
From: Monty Solomon <monty@roscom.com>
Subject: Chip shortages hit hard at Yamaha's musical instrument business
(The Register)

Tried silicon substitutes but that effort fell flat. Literally and tonally https://www.theregister.com/2022/07/22/yamaha_chip_shortage/

------------------------------

Date: Thu, 28 Jul 2022 20:48:25 -0400
From: Jan Wolitzky <jan.wolitzky@gmail.com>
Subject: Jeopardy! player causes `at-home-disturbance'

[This story is super-redundant with oodles of reported complaints.
I have shortened it considerably. PGN]

``Every time Ken Jennings says 'Alexa', my echo is activated,''

... even the tech company had to buzz in on the categorically hilarious
issue, responding to one viewer, ``temporarily mute your Alexa device.''

The player herself - Alexa - then posted, ``Thank you all for the well
wishes tonight! Also, if you're complaining that your Amazon device was set off tonight, I can't do much about that!''

https://www.the-sun.com/entertainment/5872572/jeopardy-ken-jennings-mayim-bialik-alexa-amazon-detail/

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 24 Jul 2022 14:57:50 -0400
From: Gabe Goldberg <gabe@gabegold.com>
Subject: Inside Ukraine's Thriving Tech Sector (The New York Times)

Ukrainian technology companies have earned billions. But with most
executives unable to meet foreign clients, the good times may not last.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/07/22/business/ukraine-tech-companies-putin.html

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 24 Jul 2022 07:54:06 -0700
From: Lauren Weinstein <lauren@vortex.com>
Subject: Students and staff are entirely prohibited from using Google Search
-- Data privacy concerns trigger restrictions on Google Chrome in Dutch
schools (Android Police)

Totally nutso privacy paranoia! -L

https://www.androidpolice.com/dutch-ministry-chromeos-restrictions-in-schools/

------------------------------

Date: Wed, 27 Jul 2022 20:49:25 -0400
From: Gabe Goldberg <gabe@gabegold.com>
Subject: Tech giants, including Meta, Google, and Amazon, want to put an end
to leap-seconds (ZDNet)

For decades, we've used leap seconds to keep our computers in sync with
Earth's rotation time. Now, Meta and many others argue that new leap seconds are more trouble than they're worth.

In her hit song, Cher sang, "If I could turn back time <https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9n3A_-HRFfc>." For her, that would be a
good thing. But in the computing world, Meta, formerly Facebook, believes it would be a very bad thing indeed. In fact, Meta wants to get rid of leap seconds which keep computing time in sync with Earth's rotational time. <https://engineering.fb.com/2022/07/25/production-engineering/its-time-to-leave-the-leap-second-in-the-past/>,

Meta's not the only one that feels that way. The US National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), its French equivalent (the Bureau International de Poids et Mesures or BIPM), Amazon, Google, and Microsoft
all want to put an end to leap seconds.

Why? As Meta explained in a blog post <https://engineering.fb.com/2022/07/25/production-engineering/its-time-to-leave-the-leap-second-in-the-past/>,
"We bump into problems whenever a leap second is introduced. And because
it's such a rare event, it devastates the community every time it
happens. With a growing demand for clock precision across all industries,
the leap second is now causing more damage than good, resulting in
disturbances and outages."

Therefore, Meta concludes, we should simply "stop the future introduction of leap seconds."

https://www.zdnet.com/home-and-office/networking/tech-giants-want-to-put-an-end-to-leap-seconds/

------------------------------

Date: Mon, 1 Aug 2022 12:02:12 -0400 (EDT)
From: ACM TechNews <technews-editor@acm.org>
Subject: BMW's 3,854-Variable Problem Solved in Six Minutes with Quantum
Computing (Francisco Pires)

Francisco Pires, *Tom's Hardware*, 28 Jul 2022,
via ACM TechNews, 1 Aug 2022

Quantum Computing Inc. (QCI) solved a 3,854-variable optimization problem
for German automaker BMW in six minutes, using its Entropy Quantum Computing (EQC) solution to determine the ideal placement of vehicle sensors in BMW's Vehicle Sensor Placement Challenge 2022. EQC factors the changing
environment into its calculations, saving time and expense by not having to control for all variables outside the Quantum Processing Unit. Said QCI's
Bob Liscouski, "We believe that this proves that innovative quantum
computing technologies can solve real business problems today."

https://orange.hosting.lsoft.com/trk/click?ref=znwrbbrs9_6-2ef9fx235028x070817&

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 24 Jul 2022 11:00:45 -0400
From: Dick Mills <dickandlibbymills@gmail.com>
Subject: Re: UK proposes new rule for AI (Law Gazette)

How would they define AI?

If we had a black box that we communicated with, what test would prove that
the content of the bos is or is not an AI?

I prefer a broad definition of AI. I would include James Watt's flyball governor from 1788. It figured out for itself how to manipulate the
throttle, and it displaced human workers who could have done the same thing. That sounds to me like an AI.

Don't forget that trained-neural-networks being almost the only way to implement AI may not be a durable paradigm.

------------------------------

Date: Sun, 24 Jul 2022 20:06:54 -0600
From: goldy <gold2718@gmail.com>
Subject: Re: MIT scientists think they've discovered how to fully reverse
climate change (BGR, RISKS-33.33)

Dan Eakins posted a link with a tantalizing subject and geoff goodfellow followed up with more details. However, neither one mentioned the
significant risks of attempts at solar radiation management (the usual term
for blocking some incoming sunlight).

The first big risk is that less incoming short-wave radiation means less evaporated water which will lead to significant drops in global
precipitation. This could threaten drinking water supplies and crop yields around the world. Some studies suggest that trying to block sunlight only in polar regions would provide cooling without as much loss of precipitation (e.g., https://acp.copernicus.org/articles/14/7769/2014/) but this is
difficult to do and is not attainable from some sort of sun shield sitting
at L1 as suggested in the article.

A second risk is that cooling only with solar radiation management does
nothing to affect the buildup of CO2 in the atmosphere or the oceans. This means continued acidification of the oceans and a large rebound effect any
time the solar radiation management is interrupted or stopped.

[Disclaimer, I do not speak for my employer or the National Science
Foundation. goldy]

[Reminder: I generally toss the disclaimers, because they are implicit
in every issue of RISKS. However, some employers or government
contracts require their presence. PGN]

------------------------------

Date: Wed, 27 Jul 2022 13:48:02 -0700
From: Lauren Weinstein <lauren@vortex.com>
Subject: ACM Launches New Journal on Responsible Computing

https://www.acm.org/media-center/2022/july/jrc-launch

ACM, the Association for Computing Machinery, announced it is now accepting submissions for a new publication, the ACM Journal on Responsible Computing

[continued in next message]

--- SoupGate-Win32 v1.05
* Origin: fsxNet Usenet Gateway (21:1/5)