Interesting that no one has developed a “significantly superior” search tool to steal customers away from Google.

https://www.cnn.com/2024/08/05/business/google-loses-antitrust-lawsuit-doj/index.html

Google loses massive antitrust lawsuit over its search dominance

Google has violated US antitrust law with its search business, a federal judge ruled Monday, handing the tech giant a staggering court defeat with the potential to reshape how millions of Americans get information online and to upend decades of dominance.

“After having carefully considered and weighed the witness testimony and evidence, the court reaches the following conclusion: Google is a monopolist, and it has acted as one to maintain its monopoly,” US District Judge Amit Mehta wrote in Monday’s opinion. “It has violated Section 2 of the Sherman Act.”

(Related)

https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cy9eegg0rdvo

What could Google monopoly ruling mean for you?

… The US government specifically wants "structural relief" - so what could that look like?

The nuclear option would be to demand Google breaks itself into smaller chunks - a move US officials have not ruled out.

… That might cause consternation for Alphabet executives. But as long as Google remained the default search engine on devices, the average consumer would be unlikely to notice the difference. [Leaving Google still ubiquitous? Bob]

… The US said Google was currently paying firms like Apple more than $10bn a year to be pre-installed as the default search engine on their devices or platforms.

The judge agreed.

The contention is, had Google never spent that money, the big firms might have been encouraged to develop their own search experience. [Not their business model… Bob]

… Something that's easier to imagine is some kind of choice screen, where people opening a browser for the first time are asked whether they'd like to use Google or an alternative like Microsoft's Bing. [Oh, let’s pick one we’ve never heard of! Bob]

I am old, therefore I am wise?

https://www.bespacific.com/why-wisdom-work-is-the-new-knowledge-work/

Why “Wisdom Work” Is the New “Knowledge Work”

Harvard Business Review: “Today the workforce is getting older, and the number of younger workers in positions of senior management is growing. These two developments might appear to spell trouble, in that they seem to set the generations against one another, but the author of this article argues that in fact they represent an important opportunity: If companies can figure out how to enable the intergenerational transfer of the wisdom that comes with age and experience, they can strengthen themselves — and the workplace as a whole.

Others might find this useful…

https://www.bespacific.com/aba-task-force-releases-report-on-ais-opportunities-challenges-for-the-legal-profession/

ABA Task Force releases report on AI’s opportunities, challenges for the legal profession

The American Bar Association’s Task Force on Law and Artificial Intelligence released a report today titled “Year I Report on the Impact of AI on the Practice of Law” that details the work of the group over the past year. The AI Task Force, created in August 2023 by ABA President Mary Smith, brought together lawyers and judges from across the ABA to address the impact of artificial intelligence on the legal profession and the practice of law, provide insights on developing and using AI in a trustworthy and responsible manner, and identify ways to address AI risks. The AI Task Force has concentrated its efforts on a broad array of legal issues related to AI that will affect the legal profession including:

• the impact of AI on legal practice

• ethical dilemmas

• the challenges of generative AI

• access to justice

• the integration of AI in the courts

• advancements in legal education

• strategies for risk management and governance

Expert opinion?

https://www.technologyreview.com/2024/08/05/1095447/a-playbook-for-crafting-ai-strategy/

A playbook for crafting AI strategy

… Moving from initial forays into AI use, such as code generation and customer service, to firm-wide integration depends on strategic and organizational transitions in infrastructure, data governance, and supplier ecosystems. As well, organizations must weigh uncertainties about developments in AI performance and how to measure return on investment.

If organizations seek to scale AI across the business in coming years, however, now is the time to act. This report explores the current state of enterprise AI adoption and offers a playbook for crafting an AI strategy, helping business leaders bridge the chasm between ambition and execution.

Download the full report

Oh, the horror…

https://www.ft.com/content/70697929-4b53-440e-b770-2135e31ae318

Legal AI could force a rethink of the billable hour

… For now, most lawyers say they are optimistic about the impact on margins and revenues of adopting technology that can summarise, search, draft and review. Many are hoping for productivity gains that will help them do more — and sell more — billable work.

But there will be losers too. A third of UK law firms polled by PwC think generative AI will have a negative impact on profits and margins. AI might reduce one of the biggest firms’ competitive advantages, namely having large numbers of junior staff who can be deployed on large, complex lawsuits and transactions.

(Related)

https://www.bespacific.com/professors-currently-teaching-ai-law-related-courses/

Professors Currently Teaching AI & Law-Related Courses

Via LawSites – Professors Currently Teaching AI & Law-Related Courses (136) – Only group members can view professor and course details. Table format including Headshot; Name; Title & Organization; AI & the Law-Related Course(s).

Because my AI is better at this than I am.

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4909907

Regulating Hidden AI Authorship

With the rapid emergence of high-quality generative artificial intelligence (AI), some have advocated for mandatory disclosure when the technology is used to generate new text, images, or video. But the precise harms posed by non-transparent uses of generative AI have not been fully explored. While the use of the technology to produce material that masquerades as factual (deepfakes) is clearly deceptive, this Article focuses on a more ambiguous area of harm: the consumer’s interest in knowing whether works of art or entertainment were created using generative AI.

In the markets for creative content—fine art, books, movies, television, music, and the like—producers have several financial reasons to hide the role of generative AI in a work’s creation. Copyright law is partially responsible. The Copyright Office and courts have concluded that only human-authored works are copyrightable, meaning much AI-generated content falls directly into the public domain. Producers thus have an incentive to conceal the role of generative AI in a work’s creation because disclosure could jeopardize their ability to secure copyright protection and monetize the work.

Whether and why this obfuscation harms consumers is a different matter. The law has never required disclosure of the precise ways a work is created; indeed, failing to publicly disclose the use of a ghostwriter or other creative assistance is not actionable. But AI authorship is different. Not only is there growing evidence that consumers have strong ethical and aesthetic preferences for human-created works, but we can understand such failure-to-disclose as damaging to art’s social role. Building on various theories of artistic value, the Article argues that works that masquerade as human-made destabilize art’s ability to encourage self-definition, empathy, and democratic engagement, turning all creative works into exclusively entertainment-focused commodities.

The Article also investigates ways to facilitate disclosure of the use of generative AI in creative works. Industry actors could be motivated to self-regulate, adopting a provenance-tracking or certification scheme. And Federal Trade Commission (FTC) enforcement could provide some additional checks on the misleading use of AI in a work’s creation. Intellectual property law could also help incentivize disclosure. In particular, doctrines designed to prevent the overclaiming of material in the public domain—such as copyright misuse—could be used to raise the financial stakes of failing to disclose the role of AI in a work’s creation.

A tiny weeny misdirection.

https://www.cnbc.com/2024/08/02/elon-musk-pac-voter-data-trump-harris.html

How an Elon Musk PAC is using voter data to help Trump beat Harris in 2024 election

… If a user lives in a state that is not considered competitive in the presidential election, like California or Wyoming for example, they’ll be prompted to enter their email addresses and ZIP code and then directed quickly to a voter registration page for their state, or back to the original sign-up section.

But for users who enter a ZIP code that indicates they live in a battleground state, like Pennsylvania or Georgia, the process is very different.

Rather than be directed to their state’s voter registration page, they instead are directed to a highly detailed personal information form, prompted to enter their address, cellphone number and age.

If they agree to submit all that, the system still does not steer them to a voter registration page. Instead, it shows them a “thank you” page.

So that person who wanted help registering to vote? In the end, they got no help at all registering. But they did hand over priceless personal data to a political operation.

Probably not written by AI.

https://www.publishersweekly.com/pw/by-topic/industry-news/publisher-news/article/95621-u-s-copyright-office-releases-part-one-of-ai-report-calls-for-new-legislation.html

U.S. Copyright Office Releases Part One of AI Report, Calls for New Legislation

The U.S. Copyright Office has released part one of wide-ranging report on the impact of the recent artificial intelligence boom—and “digital replicas,” more commonly known as deepfakes, are the first topic of concern.

From “AI-generated musical performances to robocall impersonations of political candidates to images in pornographic videos,” the report acknowledges that “a new era of sophisticated digital replicas has arrived.” And while the technology has long existed to produce such deepfakes, the report concludes that rapid advancement of generative AI suggests that new federal legislation is needed.

(Related)

https://www.billboard.com/pro/ai-firms-suno-udio-blast-lawsuit-music-labels-threat-to-market-share/

AI Firms Blast Lawsuit From Music Giants: ‘Labels See a Threat to Their Market Share’

AI music firms Suno and Udio are firing back with their first responses to sweeping lawsuits filed by the major record labels, arguing that they were free to use copyrighted songs to train their models and claiming the music industry is abusing intellectual property to crush competition.

In legal filings on Thursday, the two firms admitted to using proprietary materials to create their artificial intelligence, with Suno saying it was “no secret” that the company had ingested “essentially all music files of reasonable quality that are accessible on the open Internet.”

But both companies said that such use was clearly lawful under copyright’s fair use doctrine, which allows for the reuse of existing materials to create new works.

Interesting resource. It would be even better if I had a way to transcribe the documentaries.

https://www.bespacific.com/4000-free-movies-online/

4,000+ Free Movies Online

4,000+ Free Movies Online: Great Classics, Indies, Noir, Westerns, Documentaries & More – Watch 4,000+ movies free online. Includes classics, indies, film noir, documentaries and other films, created by some of our greatest actors, actresses and directors. The collection is divided into the following categories: Comedy & Drama; Film Noir, Horror & Hitchcock: Westerns (many with John Wayne); Martial Arts Movies: Silent Films; Documentaries, and Animation.

Tools & Techniques.

https://www.makeuseof.com/ai-powered-video-transcription-tools/

These 3 AI-Powered Video Transcription Tools Save Me Hours of Watching

… AI video transcription tools turn hours of watching into minutes of quick info-finding. Here are three tools that have significantly reduced my video-watching time and improved my productivity.

Help or handicap? Blocking what might be the best option?

https://www.darkreading.com/vulnerabilities-threats/would-making-ransom-payments-illegal-result-in-fewer-attacks

Would Making Ransom Payments Illegal Result in Fewer Attacks?

Ransomware and other malware attacks are among the top three types of security incidents that organizations experience, according to Netwrix's "2024 Hybrid Security Trends Report." In a bid to curb this menace, for several years now there have been discussions around a radical approach: making ransomware payments illegal. The rationale is straightforward. If paying a ransom is prohibited, organizations won't do it — thus eliminating the incentive for cybercriminals to launch ransomware attacks. Problem solved. Or is it?

(Related)

https://www.cnn.com/2024/07/31/politics/cyberattack-oneblood-blood-donation/

First on CNN: Cyberattack hits blood-donation nonprofit OneBlood

… OneBlood serves hospitals in Alabama, Florida, Georgia, and North and South Carolina, according to its website. In a statement, the nonprofit acknowledged the ransomware attack and said it was working closely with cybersecurity experts as well as law enforcement. The nonprofit is “operating at a significantly reduced capacity.”

“We have implemented manual processes and procedures to remain operational. Manual processes take significantly longer to perform and impacts inventory availability. In an effort to further manage the blood supply we have asked the more than 250 hospitals we serve to activate their critical blood shortage protocols and to remain in that status for the time being,” said Susan Forbes, a spokeswoman for the nonprofit.

Perspective.

https://sloanreview.mit.edu/article/seven-reasons-to-strengthen-your-customer-benefits-focus/

Seven Reasons to Strengthen Your Customer Benefits Focus

Harvard Business School professor Theodore Leavitt emphasized the customer impact of benefits when he famously argued that people don’t want to buy a quarter-inch drill; they want a quarter-inch hole.1 Although his idea is straightforward, many companies still fail to appreciate how embracing a benefits-driven approach can help them unlock new opportunities — for innovation, customer satisfaction, and sustainable growth.

Is this the future of all government documents? If so, I have a few concerns…

https://www.reuters.com/technology/california-dmv-puts-42-million-car-titles-blockchain-fight-fraud-2024-07-30/

California DMV puts 42 million car titles on blockchain to fight fraud

California's Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) has digitized 42 million car titles using blockchain technology in a bid to detect fraud and smoothen the title transfer process, the agency's technology partners exclusively told Reuters on Tuesday.

The project, in collaboration with tech company Oxhead Alpha on Avalanche blockchain, will allow California's more than 39 million residents to claim their vehicle titles through a mobile app, the first such move in the United States.

The value of good security keeps going up!

https://therecord.media/ibm-breach-report-cost-rise-to-5-million

IBM: Cost of a breach reaches nearly $5 million, with healthcare being hit the hardest

Businesses that fall victim to a data breach can expect a financial hit of nearly $5 million on average — a 10% increase compared to last year — according to IBM’s annual report on cybersecurity incidents.

The tech giant worked with the Ponemon Institute to study 604 organizations affected by data breaches between March 2023 and February 2024. The breaches — affecting 17 industries across 16 countries and regions — ranged from 2,100 to 113,000 individuals records leaked. The researchers also interviewed 3,556 security and C-suite business leaders with firsthand knowledge of the data breach incidents at their organizations.

What stood out most to IBM was the jump in the global average cost of a data breach, which reached $4.88 million and was the biggest jump since the pandemic. In 2023 the cost was $4.45 million.

Think this could kick off a ‘largest settlement’ competition?

https://pogowasright.org/attorney-general-ken-paxton-secures-1-4-billion-settlement-with-meta-over-its-unauthorized-capture-of-personal-biomet/

Attorney General Ken Paxton Secures $1.4 Billion Settlement with Meta Over Its Unauthorized Capture of Personal Biometric Data In Largest Settlement Ever Obtained From An Action Brought By A Single State

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton issued the following press release today:

Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton has secured a $1.4 billion settlement with Meta (formerly known as Facebook) to stop the company’s practice of capturing and using the personal biometric data of millions of Texans without the authorization required by law.

This settlement is the largest ever obtained from an action brought by a single State. Further, this is the largest privacy settlement an Attorney General has ever obtained, dwarfing the $390 million settlement a group of 40 states obtained in late 2022 from Google. This is the first lawsuit brought and first settlement obtained under Texas’s “Capture or Use of Biometric Identifier” Act and serves as a warning to any companies engaged in practices that violate Texans’ privacy rights.

Reasonable.

https://www.lawnext.com/2024/07/in-first-ethics-ruling-on-gen-ai-aba-says-lawyers-must-have-reasonable-understanding-of-the-technology-but-need-not-become-experts.html

In First Ethics Ruling on Gen AI, ABA Says Lawyers Must Have Reasonable Understanding of the Technology, But Need Not Become Experts

In its first major pronouncement on the ethics of using generative AI in law practice, the American Bar Association has issued an opinion saying that lawyers need not become experts in the technology, but must have a reasonable understanding of the capabilities and limitations of the specific generative AI technology the lawyer might use.

In Formal Opinion 512, issued yesterday, the ABA’s Standing Committee on Ethics and Professional Responsibility sought to identify some of the ethics issues lawyers face when using generative AI tools and offer guidance for lawyers in navigating this emerging landscape.

Acknowledging that the rapid development of gen AI makes it a fast-moving target, the committee said, “It is anticipated that this Committee and state and local bar association ethics committees will likely offer updated guidance on professional conduct issues relevant to specific GAI tools as they develop.”

The opinion offers no earth-shattering insights.

Will this change be reversed? Probably.

https://techcrunch.com/2024/07/29/us-border-agents-must-get-warrant-before-cell-phone-searches-federal-court-rules/?guccounter=1

US border agents must get warrant before cell phone searches, federal court rules

A federal district court in New York has ruled that U.S. border agents must obtain a warrant before searching the electronic devices of Americans and international travelers crossing the U.S. border.

The ruling on July 24 is the latest court opinion to upend the U.S. government’s long-standing legal argument, which asserts that federal border agents should be allowed to access the devices of travelers at ports of entry, like airports, seaports and land borders, without a court-approved warrant.

What is worse than a deepfake?

https://pogowasright.org/kansas-court-of-appeals-denies-that-ku-medical-center-has-a-duty-of-privacy-to-its-patients/

Kansas Court of Appeals Denies that KU Medical Center has a Duty of Privacy to its Patients

While looking for information on another breach, PogoWasRight stumbled over this blog post by McShane & Brady law firm in Kansas City:

McShane & Brady filed a lawsuit against the University of Kansas Medical Center (KUMC) for a breach of private medical information in which a doctor took a photograph of a patient’s genitals on her personal cell phone and texted the photo to medical students.

The case was filed in the Wyandotte County District Court and assigned to Judge Timothy Dupree. KUMC moved for the case to be dismissed claiming that it did not have a duty to keep patient information confidential. On March 29, 2023, Judge Timothy Dupree dismissed the case finding that the KUMC did not have a duty to keep patient information private. The decision of Judge Dupree was appealed to the Kansas Court of Appeals.

On July 5, 2024, the Kansas Court of Appeal affirmed the District Court’s ruling stating:

“We agree with the district court that Kansas does not recognize a common-law duty for a medical entity to protect the privacy and confidentiality of patients that would give rise to a private cause of action for the alleged breach of that duty.”

“The Court of Appeals thrown medical privacy out the window, “said Maureen Brady.

McShane & Brady is filing a Petition for Review with the Kansas Supreme Court and is seeking justice for all patients who have been victims of the wrongful disclosure of medical information.

Fox4Kc conducted an interview with Maureen Brady to discuss the case. KU Medical Center is expected to comment today. Click here to view the story.

So this is a bit shocking. It’s one thing for HIPAA to have no private cause of action, but for there to be no private cause of action under state law, well, does that leave Kansas residents with any redress if their medical privacy has been violated? What law is left that protects them? From reading the opinion, it sounds like there is none. And although Ms Brady claims the appellate court has “thrown medical privacy out of the window,” it sounds like medical privacy was never in any window in Kansas.

It will be interesting to see what the state supreme court does.

Another reason for AI lawyers?

https://www.bespacific.com/the-race-against-time-to-reinvent-lawyers/

The race against time to reinvent lawyers

Via LLRX – The race against time to reinvent lawyers – Jordan Furlong is a leading analyst of the global legal market and forecaster of its future development. In this insightful article he contends that our legal education and licensing systems produce one kind of lawyer. The legal market of the near future will need another kind. I f we can’t close this gap fast, we’ll have a very serious problem.

Something to consider. Is the software for self driving cars vulnerable to a Crowdstrike type failure?

https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2024/07/providing-security-updates-to-automobile-software.html

Providing Security Updates to Automobile Software

Auto manufacturers are just starting to realize the problems of supporting the software in older models:

Today’s phones are able to receive updates six to eight years after their purchase date. Samsung and Google provide Android OS updates and security updates for seven years. Apple halts servicing products seven years after they stop selling them.

That might not cut it in the auto world, where the average age of cars on US roads is only going up. A recent report found that cars and trucks just reached a new record average age of 12.6 years, up two months from 2023. That means the car software hitting the road today needs to work — and maybe even improve— beyond 2036. The average length of smartphone ownership is just 2.8 years.

I wrote about this in 2018, in Click Here to Kill Everything, talking about patching as a security mechanism:

This won’t work with more durable goods. We might buy a new DVR every 5 or 10 years, and a refrigerator every 25 years. We drive a car we buy today for a decade, sell it to someone else who drives it for another decade, and that person sells it to someone who ships it to a Third World country, where it’s resold yet again and driven for yet another decade or two. Go try to boot up a 1978 Commodore PET computer, or try to run that year’s VisiCalc, and see what happens; we simply don’t know how to maintain 40-year-old [consumer] software.

Consider a car company. It might sell a dozen different types of cars with a dozen different software builds each year. Even assuming that the software gets updated only every two years and the company supports the cars for only two decades, the company needs to maintain the capability to update 20 to 30 different software versions. (For a company like Bosch that supplies automotive parts for many different manufacturers, the number would be more like 200.) The expense and warehouse size for the test vehicles and associated equipment would be enormous. Alternatively, imagine if car companies announced that they would no longer support vehicles older than five, or ten, years. There would be serious environmental consequences.

We really don’t have a good solution here. Agile updates is how we maintain security in a world where new vulnerabilities arise all the time, and we don’t have the economic incentive to secure things properly from the start.

Defining privacy?

https://pogowasright.org/invasion-of-the-data-snatchers-b-c-court-of-appeal-clarifies-possible-scope-of-privacy-claims-against-data-custodians-in-data-breaches/

Invasion of the Data Snatchers: B.C. Court of Appeal Clarifies Possible Scope of Privacy Claims Against Data Custodians in Data Breaches

Lyann Danielak, Joshua Hutchinson, and Robin Reinertson of Blake, Cassels & Graydon LLP write:

On July 4, 2024, the B.C. Court of Appeal issued a duo of class action appeal decisions considering the potential scope of statutory and common law privacy claims against data custodians that fall victim to cyberattacks in data breach cases. In both G.D. v. South Coast British Columbia Transportation Authority (G.D.) and Campbell v. Capital One Financial Corporation (Campbell), the B.C. Court of Appeal affirmed that numerous causes of action may arguably be available even against data custodians innocent of any intentional wrongdoing, including the statutory tort of violation of privacy pursuant to the B.C. Privacy Act. These decisions follow the B.C. Court of Appeal’s decision earlier this year in Situmorang v. Google, LLC, in which the court left open the question of whether the tort of intrusion upon seclusion exists in B.C., in addition to the statutory tort of violation of privacy.

Read more at JDSupra.

Raising obfuscation to an art…

https://pogowasright.org/ninth-circuit-signals-that-a-reasonable-user-cannot-consent-to-data-collection-via-confusing-and-contradictory-privacy-disclosures/

Ninth Circuit Signals That A Reasonable User Cannot Consent to Data Collection Via Confusing and Contradictory Privacy Disclosures

From EPIC.org:

Last week, the Ninth Circuit heard oral arguments in Google v. Calhoun, a case about whether users really consented to Google’s collecting and sharing their data when Google’s own published policies said contradictory things about those practices. EPIC’s amicus brief asserted that Google cannot argue that consumers reasonably consented to its data practices when the company’s privacy policy said it would not engage in those practices, even though Google disclaimed any liability in its contradictory general disclosure terms. During oral argument, the judges signaled agreement with EPIC’s position.

In this case, plaintiffs sued because Google represented to Chrome users that it would not collect browsing history unless the users chose to sync that data to the cloud. But, in fact, Google did collect and transfer information about Chrome user’s browsing habits even if they did not choose to sync their data to the cloud. Google argued in its defense that these users had nevertheless consented to the collection and transfer of their sensitive browsing data based on general disclosures in its user agreement.

The Ninth Circuit judges seemed to agree with plaintiffs and EPIC, explaining that the federal judge had an 8-hour evidentiary hearing to understand the data collection practices and no reasonable user can be held to that standard to consent to them. One judge also said that reading complicated Terms of Service online is like reading hieroglyphics.

Read more at EPIC.

Tools & Techniques. (Also creates more ‘bad data’ for the AI to rely on...)

https://www.bespacific.com/a-new-tool-for-copyright-holders-can-show-if-their-work-is-in-ai-training-data/

A new tool for copyright holders can show if their work is in AI training data

MIT Technology Review [unpaywalled ]: “Since the beginning of the generative AI boom, content creators have argued that their work has been scraped into AI models without their consent. But until now, it has been difficult to know whether specific text has actually been used in a training data set. Now they have a new way to prove it: “copyright traps” developed by a team at Imperial College London, pieces of hidden text that allow writers and publishers to subtly mark their work in order to later detect whether it has been used in AI models or not. The idea is similar to traps that have been used by copyright holders throughout history—strategies like including fake locations on a map or fake words in a dictionary. These AI copyright traps tap into one of the biggest fights in AI. A number of publishers and writers are in the middle of litigation against tech companies, claiming their intellectual property has been scraped into AI training data sets without their permission. The New York Times’ ongoing case against OpenAI is probably the most high-profile of these. The code to generate and detect traps is currently available on GitHub, but the team also intends to build a tool that allows people to generate and insert copyright traps themselves.”

Tools & Techniques. (Get ready for those election ads…)

https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2024/07/new-research-in-detecting-ai-generated-videos.html

New Research in Detecting AI-Generated Videos

The latest in what will be a continuing arms race between creating and detecting videos:

The new tool the research project is unleashing on deepfakes, called “MISLnet”, evolved from years of data derived from detecting fake images and video with tools that spot changes made to digital video or images. These may include the addition or movement of pixels between frames, manipulation of the speed of the clip, or the removal of frames.

Such tools work because a digital camera’s algorithmic processing creates relationships between pixel color values. Those relationships between values are very different in user-generated or images edited with apps like Photoshop.

But because AI-generated videos aren’t produced by a camera capturing a real scene or image, they don’t contain those telltale disparities between pixel values.

The Drexel team’s tools, including MISLnet, learn using a method called a constrained neural network, which can differentiate between normal and unusual values at the sub-pixel level of images or video clips, rather than searching for the common indicators of image manipulation like those mentioned above.

Research paper.

(Related)

https://www.bespacific.com/fake-images-are-getting-harder-to-spot-heres-a-field-guide/

Fake images are getting harder to spot. Here’s a field guide.

Washington Post [unpaywalled ]: “Photographs have a profound power to shape our understanding of the world. And it’s never been more important to be able to discern which ones are genuine and which are doctored to push an agenda, especially in the wake of dramatic or contentious moments. But advances in technology mean that spotting manipulated or even totally AI-generated imagery is only getting trickier. Take for example a photo of Catherine, Princess of Wales, issued by Kensington Palace in March. News organizations retracted it after experts noted some obvious manipulations. And some questioned whether images captured during the assassination attempt on former president Donald Trump were genuine. Here are a few things experts suggest the next time you come across an image that leaves you wondering…”

Perspective.

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4872389

Technology and Totalitarianism: Artificial Intelligence a Tool for the Dictator?!

In an era where technology is advancing at an amazing speed, artificial intelligence (AI) has been positioned as one of the most important driving forces in these developments. This article provides an in-depth analysis of the effects of AI on political and social structures, with a particular focus on its role in fostering totalitarianism. We examine how authoritarian regimes can use AI as a tool to exercise control and surveillance, and what measures should be taken to prevent this technology from becoming a tool of repression. Also, the paper examines the ways in which democracies can use AI to enhance public participation and transparency. This research was inspired by the article "Is artificial intelligence in favor of autocracy or not?" It is written and seeks to provide a comprehensive and balanced perspective of this topic.

Perspective.

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/15027570.2024.2378584

Does History Matter?

This issue of our journal – while asking crucial questions about today’s world and our future challenges – contains thoughtful pieces attending to history. It has been compiled while the war in Ukraine continues fiercely and frighteningly, and while violent unrest in Sudan, the Middle East, and several other theaters keeps shocking us.

In this rapidly changing and violent world, does history matter? Can we learn from long-dead figures – most of them, as we are frequently and correctly reminded, white men?

James Turner Johnson has been among the leading scholars to insist not only that we can learn from history, thinkers, and tradition, but that we must. Crucial terminology and theoretical categories as well as deep-seated moral convictions, after all, come from somewhere, and by taking seriously how they have emerged we can more clearly grasp their meaning and importance, in the past and today. Edward Erwin’s useful book review of a recent volume of Johnson’s landmark essays brings this into focus. Not least, it reminds us of the coherence of just-war and military-ethics categories over the centuries and across traditions, even as disagreements have been aired and moral views and contexts have changed. Also in this issue, Mihaly Boda helps us untangle differences and nuances within the history of medieval military ethics, adding insights into why human beings more than 1000 years ago as well as in the present have held some actions to be right and others to be deeply wrong.

As we do our best to insist on basic rules of decency and dignity during armed conflict, and as we ask big questions about the morality of nuclear deterrence or the ethical use of artificial intelligence, we should indeed look back to lessons from past thinkers and traditions. We do this not to copy them, nor to accept their teachings uncritically, but in order to develop our serious conversations about military ethics still further.

Adding insult to injury. We always check with primary sources, like the vendor’s website, rather than random emails.

https://www.makeuseof.com/dont-open-any-crowdstrike-repair-emails-theyre-all-fakes/

Don't Open Any CrowdStrike Repair Emails; They're All Fakes

Whenever something big happens in the technology world, scammers are not far behind. The 2024 CrowdStrike outage is no different, and while the issues have been mostly sorted out, scammers are hot on its heels, peddling their latest tricks.

Whenever management says “Oh shinny! Something we could do!” someone needs to add ‘But we probably shouldn’t.”

https://www.ft.com/content/1e8f5778-a592-42fd-80f6-c5daa8851a21

Musk’s X faces questions from watchdog over AI data grab

Social media company’s move to automatically allow user data to train chatbot could breach European privacy rules

Europe’s data protection watchdog is “seeking clarity” on a decision by Elon Musk’s X to allow users’ data to automatically be fed into his artificial intelligence start-up xAI, placing fresh regulatory scrutiny on the social media platform.

X users discovered on Friday that they had been ‘opted-in’ to having their posts to the site, as well as their interactions with its Grok chatbot, be used for “training and fine-tuning” xAI’s systems.

The move was made without first obtaining users’ explicit consent for data sharing. The setting can only be changed on the desktop version of X, so users are currently unable to opt out via its mobile apps.

Do we have your attention yet?

https://www.reuters.com/technology/meta-be-hit-with-first-eu-antitrust-fine-linking-marketplace-facebook-sources-2024-07-25/

Exclusive: Meta to be hit with first EU antitrust fine for linking Marketplace and Facebook, sources say

Meta Platforms, opens new tab is set to be hit in a few weeks with its first EU antitrust fine for tying classified advertisements service Marketplace with its Facebook social network, people with direct knowledge of the matter said.

… Meta could face a fine of as much as $13.4 billion – or 10% of its 2023 global revenue - although EU sanctions are usually much lower than that cap.

Perspective.

https://www.bespacific.com/about-the-insurrection-act/

About the Insurrection Act

Brennan Center – Via Reddit – “I’m Joseph Nunn, counsel in the Liberty and National Security Program at the Brennan Center for Justice. Ask me anything about reforming the Insurrection Act, an outdated law that gives the president near limitless power to use the U.S. military as a domestic police force. The Insurrection Act is the most dangerous law in the United States. It gives the president nearly limitless discretion to use the U.S. military as a domestic police force, and it contains no meaningful safeguards against abuse. Congress, which has not updated the law in 150 years, urgently needs to clarify and limit when the president may invoke the Insurrection Act, restrict what the military can do once deployed under this powerful authority, and create mechanisms that will allow Congress and the courts to intervene to stop abuse. Join Elizabeth Goitein, Hawa Allan, Jack L. Goldsmith, and Joseph Nunn on. Took place on July 25. Read the Q&A

Perspective.

https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2024/07/the-crowdstrike-outage-and-market-driven-brittleness.html

The CrowdStrike Outage and Market-Driven Brittleness

… The brittleness of modern society isn’t confined to tech. We can see it in many parts of our infrastructure, from food to electricity, from finance to transportation. This is often a result of globalization and consolidation, but not always. In information technology, brittleness also results from the fact that hundreds of companies, none of which you’ve heard of, each perform a small but essential role in keeping the internet running. CrowdStrike is one of those companies.

This brittleness is a result of market incentives. In enterprise computing—as opposed to personal computing—a company that provides computing infrastructure to enterprise networks is incentivized to be as integral as possible, to have as deep access into their customers’ networks as possible, and to run as leanly as possible.

Redundancies are unprofitable. Being slow and careful is unprofitable. Being less embedded in and less essential and having less access to the customers’ networks and machines is unprofitable—at least in the short term, by which these companies are measured. This is true for companies like CrowdStrike. It’s also true for CrowdStrike’s customers, who also didn’t have resilience, redundancy, or backup systems in place for failures such as this because they are also an expense that affects short-term profitability.