Tuesday, September 29, 2020

Sounds serious. Has anyone died yet?

https://www.bleepingcomputer.com/news/security/uhs-hospitals-hit-by-reported-country-wide-ryuk-ransomware-attack/?&web_view=true

UHS hospitals hit by reported country-wide Ryuk ransomware attack

… According to reports coming from UHS' employees, UHS hospitals in the US including those from California, Florida, Texas, Arizona, and Washington D.C. are left without access to computer and phone systems.

At the moment the affected hospitals are redirecting ambulances and relocating patients in need of surgery to other nearby hospitals.

"When the attack happened multiple antivirus programs were disabled by the attack and hard drives just lit up with activity," one of the reports reads.

"After 1min or so of this the computers logged out and shutdown. When you try to power back on the computers they automatically just shutdown.



(Related) Is this as bad an idea as I think it is?

https://www.zdnet.com/article/ransomware-is-the-biggest-problem-on-the-web-this-big-change-could-be-the-answer/?&web_view=true

Ransomware is your biggest problem on the web. This huge change could be the answer

Making it illegal for companies to pay up when hit with ransomware could finally halt the 'scourge of the internet'.





Practice?

https://www.nbcnewyork.com/news/local/nationwide-reports-of-911-system-outages-cause-not-immediately-clear/2640684/

Nationwide Reports of Brief 911 System Outages, Cause Not Immediately Clear

Law enforcement agencies across the country reported brief outages of their 911 systems Monday night, and it was not immediately clear if there was a connection with a major Microsoft system outage.

Law enforcement agencies around the country, from Nevada to Pennsylvania and Arizona to Minnesota, tweeted that their 911 systems were down beginning sometime after 7 p.m. ET. Multiple reports indicated outages throughout Delaware and Ohio as well.





Good that someone is thinking this through.

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0167404820303096?dgcid=author

A framework for effective corporate communication after cyber security incidents

A major cyber security incident can represent a cyber crisis for an organisation, in particular because of the associated risk of substantial reputational damage. As the likelihood of falling victim to a cyberattack has increased over time, so too has the need to understand exactly what is effective corporate communication after an attack, and how best to engage the concerns of customers, partners and other stakeholders. This research seeks to tackle this problem through a critical, multi-faceted investigation into the efficacy of crisis communication and public relations following a data breach. It does so by drawing on academic literature, obtained through a systematic literature review, and real-world case studies. Qualitative data analysis is used to interpret and structure the results, allowing for the development of a new, comprehensive framework for corporate communication to support companies in their preparation and response to such events. The validity of this framework is demonstrated by its evaluation through interviews with senior industry professionals, as well as a critical assessment against relevant practice and research. The framework is further refined based on these evaluations, and an updated version defined. This research represents the first grounded, comprehensive and evaluated proposal for characterising effective corporate communication after cyber security incidents.





Should the US follow this example?

Egypt Issues New Data Protection Law

Ghada El Ehwany and Kellie Blyth of Baker Mckenzie write:

After several years of debate, the Egyptian government has introduced the Republic’s first standalone data protection law, which aims to regulate and protect citizens’ data online. On 15 July 2020, Resolution No. 151 of 2020 (the Law) (available in Arabic here) was published in the Official Gazette. The provisions under the new Law are modeled on the EU General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and the Law adopts similar concepts and definitions. It is hoped that the new Law will help Egypt attract foreign investment by increasing consumer confidence in electronic data processing and setting clear parameters for companies looking to capitalise on the growth of the digital economy.

The Law will enter into force three months from when it was published in the Official Gazette (namely, on 15 October 2020).

Read more on InsightPlus.





In case we don’t recognize your face?

https://www.vox.com/recode/2020/9/29/21492351/amazon-one-hand-scan-payments-palm-checkout-whole-foods?scrolla=5eb6d68b7fedc32c19ef33b4

Amazon will now let you pay with your palm in its stores

Amazon accounts for nearly 40 percent of e-commerce sales in the US today, and it takes a cut of even more online shopping by selling payments services and other technologies to external shopping sites. Now, the online retail giant is making a play to grab a piece of brick-and-mortar shopping, too — and it wants customers to literally lend a hand to do it.

Amazon on Tuesday is unveiling a new biometric technology called Amazon One that allows shoppers to pay at stores by placing their palm over a scanning device when they walk in the door or when they check out. The first time they register to use this tech, a customer will scan their palm and insert their payment card at a terminal; after that, they can simply pay with their hand.





What conscience would you want it to have? Could we force all AI to behave like Gandhi, or will they (the AIs) choose another model?

https://bdtechtalks.com/2020/09/28/ai-conscience-patricia-churchland/

Will artificial intelligence have a conscience?

This article is part of “the philosophy of artificial intelligence,” a series of posts that explore the ethical, moral, and social implications of AI today and in the future

Can artificial intelligence learn the moral values of human societies? Can an AI system make decisions in situations where it must weigh and balance between damage and benefits to different people or groups of people? Can AI develop a sense of right and wrong? In short, will artificial intelligence have a conscience?

This question might sound irrelevant when considering today’s AI systems, which are only capable of accomplishing very narrow tasks. But as science continues to break new grounds, artificial intelligence is gradually finding its way into broader domains. We’re already seeing AI algorithms applied to areas where the boundaries of good and bad decisions are not clearly defined, such as criminal justice and job application processing.

I went in search of a book (or books) that explained how humans develop conscience and give an idea of whether what we know about the brain provides a roadmap for conscientious AI.

A friend suggested Conscience: The Origins of Moral Intuition by Dr. Patricia Churchland, neuroscientist, philosopher, and professor emerita at the University of California, San Diego.

… “Conscience is an individual’s judgment about what is normally right or wrong, typically, but not always, reflecting some standard of a group to which the individual feels attached,” Churchland writes in her book.



(Related) At least tell us how your AI works…

https://venturebeat.com/2020/09/28/amsterdam-and-helsinki-launch-algorithm-registries-to-bring-transparency-to-public-deployments-of-ai/

Amsterdam and Helsinki launch algorithm registries to bring transparency to public deployments of AI

Amsterdam and Helsinki today launched AI registries to detail how each city government uses algorithms to deliver services, some of the first major cities in the world to do so. An AI Register for each city was introduced in beta today as part of the Next Generation Internet Policy Summit, organized in part by the European Commission and the city of Amsterdam. The Amsterdam registry currently features a handful of algorithms, but it will be extended to include all algorithms following the collection of feedback at the virtual conference to lay out a European vision of the future of the internet, according to a city official.

Each algorithm cited in the registry lists datasets used to train a model, a description of how an algorithm is used, how humans utilize the prediction, and how algorithms were assessed for potential bias or risks. The registry also provides citizens a way to give feedback on algorithms their local government uses and the name, city department, and contact information for the person responsible for the responsible deployment of a particular algorithm. A complete algorithmic registry can empower citizens and give them a way to evaluate, examine, or question governments’ applications of AI.





Listen to Gartner.

https://www.gartner.com/smarterwithgartner/2-megatrends-dominate-the-gartner-hype-cycle-for-artificial-intelligence-2020/

2 Megatrends Dominate the Gartner Hype Cycle for Artificial Intelligence, 2020

… “If AI as a general concept was positioned on this year’s Gartner Hype Cycle, it would be rolling off the Peak of Inflated Expectations. By that we mean that AI is starting to deliver on its potential and its benefits for businesses are becoming a reality,” says Svetlana Sicular, VP Analyst, Gartner.

Five new entrants — small data, generative AI, composite AI, responsible AI and things as customers — make their debut on this year’s AI Hype Cycle, and two megatrends dominate this year’s AI landscape.

Democratization of AI

The democratization of AI means that AI is no longer the exclusive subject matter of experts.

Industrialization of AI platforms

The industrialization of AI platforms enables the reusability, scalability and safety of AI, which accelerates its adoption and growth.





Perspective.

https://techcrunch.com/2020/09/28/a-quarter-of-u-s-adults-now-get-news-from-youtube-pew-research-study-finds/

A quarter of US adults now get news from YouTube, Pew Research study finds

Around a quarter of U.S. adults, or roughly 26%, say they get news by watching YouTube videos, according to a new study from Pew Research Center, which examined the Google-owned video platform’s growing influence over news distribution in the U.S., as well as its consumption. The study, not surprisingly, found that established news organizations no longer have full control over the news Americans watch, as only one-in-five YouTube consumers (23%) said they “often” get their news from channels affiliated with established news organizations. The exact same percentage said they “often” get their news from independent channels instead.





For my researchers. You probably need several…

https://www.bespacific.com/google-scholar-microsoft-academic-scopus-dimensions-web-of-science-and-opencitations-coci/

Google Scholar, Microsoft Academic, Scopus, Dimensions, Web of Science, and OpenCitations’ COCI: a multidisciplinary comparison of coverage via citations

Martín-Martín, A., Thelwall, M., Orduna-Malea, E., & Delgado López-Cózar, E. (in press). Google Scholar, Microsoft Academic, Scopus, Dimensions, Web of Science, and OpenCitations’ COCI: a multidisciplinary comparison of coverage via citations. Scientometrics, https://doi.org/10.1007/s1119 – “New sources of citation data have recently become available, such as Microsoft Academic, Dimensions, and the OpenCitations Index of CrossRef open DOI-to-DOI citations (COCI). Although these have been compared to the Web of Science (WoS), Scopus, or Google Scholar, there is no systematic evidence of their differences across subject categories. In response, this paper investigates 3,073,351 citations found by these six data sources to 2,515 English-language highly-cited documents published in 2006 from 252 subject categories, expanding and updating the largest previous study. Google Scholar found 88% of all citations, many of which were not found by the other sources, and nearly all citations found by the remaining sources (89%-94%). A similar pattern held within most subject categories. Microsoft Academic is the second largest overall (60% of all citations), including 82% of Scopus citations and 86% of Web of Science citations. In most categories, Microsoft Academic found more citations than Scopus and WoS (182 and 223 subject categories, respectively), but had coverage gaps in some areas, such as Physics and some Humanities categories. After Scopus, Dimensions is fourth largest (54% of all citations), including 84% of Scopus citations and 88% of WoS citations. It found more citations than Scopus in 36 categories, more than WoS in 185, and displays some coverage gaps, especially in the Humanities. Following WoS, COCI is the smallest, with 28% of all citations. Google Scholar is still the most comprehensive source. In many subject categories Microsoft Academic and Dimensions are good alternatives to Scopus and WoS in terms of coverage.”





The logic of circles?

https://dilbert.com/strip/2020-09-29



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