Monday, July 03, 2023

Insider attack? Is Russia falling apart?

https://www.databreaches.net/cyberattack-knocks-out-satellite-communications-for-russian-military/

Cyberattack knocks out satellite communications for Russian military

Joseph Menn reports:

A satellite communications system serving the Russian military was knocked offline by a cyberattack late Wednesday and remained mostly down on Thursday, in an incident reminiscent of an attack on a similar system used by Ukraine at the start of the war between the countries.
Dozor-Teleport, the satellite system’s operator, switched some users to terrestrial networks during the outage, according to JD Work, a cyberspace professor at the National Defense University.

Read more at The Washington Post.

A Wagner-affiliated group claimed responsibility for the attack.





Vague laws make for many lawsuits?

https://www.theregister.com/2023/07/03/china_espionage_law_update_warning/

US authorities warn on China's new counter-espionage law

Almost anything you download from China could be considered spying, but at least one analyst isn't worried

The United States' National Counterintelligence and Security Center (NCSC) has warned that China's updated Counter-Espionage law – which came into effect on July 1 – is dangerously ambiguous and could pose a risk to global business.

The NCSC publishes non-classified bulletins titled "Safeguarding Our Future" on an ad hoc schedule to "provide a brief overview of a specific foreign intelligence threat, as well as impacts of that threat and steps for mitigation."

On June 30 it issued a new one [PDF] titled "US Business Risk: People's Republic of China (PRC) Laws Expand Beijing's Oversight of Foreign and Domestic Companies." The first item discussed is China's recently revised Counter-Espionage Law, on grounds it "Expands the definition of espionage from covering state secrets and intelligence to any documents, data, materials, or items related to national security interests, without defining terms."

That vagueness, the Center argues, means "Any documents, data, materials, or items could be considered relevant to PRC national security due to ambiguities in the law" and adds up to potential "legal risks or uncertainty for foreign companies."





Perspective. Economics as history...

https://www.ben-evans.com/benedictevans/2023/7/2/working-with-ai

AI and the automation of work

ChatGPT and generative AI will change how we work, but how different is this to all the other waves of automation of the last 200 years? What does it mean for employment? Disruption? Coal consumption?

The Lump of Labour fallacy is the misconception that there is a fixed amount of work to be done, and that if some work is taken by a machine then there will be less work for people. But if it becomes cheaper to use a machine to make, say, a pair of shoes, then the shoes are cheaper, more people can buy shoes and they have more money to spend on other things besides, and we discover new things we need or want, and new jobs.

In the 19th century the British navy ran on coal. Britain had a lot of coal (it was the Saudi Arabia of the steam age) but people worried what would happen when the coal ran out. Ah, said the engineers: don’t worry, because the steam engines keep getting more efficient, so we’ll use less coal. No, said Jevons: if we make steam engines more efficient, then they will be cheaper to run, and we will use more of them and use them for new and different things, and so we will use more coal.

We’ve been applying the Jevons Paradox to white collar work for 150 years.





Perspective.

https://www.insideprivacy.com/artificial-intelligence/uk-and-g7-privacy-authorities-warn-of-privacy-risks-raised-by-generative-ai/

UK and G7 Privacy Authorities Warn of Privacy Risks Raised by Generative AI

On 21 June 2023, at the close of a roundtable meeting of the G7 Data Protection and Privacy Authorities, regulators from the United States, France, Germany, Italy, United Kingdom, Canada and Japan published a joint “Statement on Generative AI” (“Statement”) (available here ). In the Statement, regulators identify a range of data protection-related concerns they believe are raised by generative AI tools, including legal authority for processing personal information, and transparency, explainability, and security. The group of regulators also call on companies to “embed privacy in the design conception, operation, and management” of generative AI tools.



No comments: