Driverless Cars Should Kill Passengers To Save Lives - But
Then People Won't Buy Them
People want driverless cars to act for the greater good in
traffic collisions – but they don’t want to be in the cars when they do so.
In a series of surveys, researchers asked people whether
autonomous vehicles (AVs) should swerve to avoid hitting a group of
pedestrians, even if that meant killing the occupant of the car. Most people gave the greater good answer, that
saving many lives was better than saving one, but those people don’t want to be
in a car that would make that choice.
… “Although people
tend to agree that everyone would be better off if AVs were utilitarian (in the
sense of minimizing the number of casualties on the road), these same people
have a personal incentive to ride in AVs that will protect them at all costs,”
the researchers said in a
paper for Science
magazine.
Something for my Computer Security students to consider.
U.S. court rules that FBI can hack into a computer without a
warrant
A U.S. court has ruled that the FBI can hack into a
computer without a warrant -- a move that is troubling privacy advocates.
The criminal case involves a child pornography site,
Playpen, that had been accessible through Tor, a browser designed for anonymous
web surfing.
The FBI, however, managed to take over the site in 2014,
and then tracked down and arrested its members by hacking their computers. This allowed law enforcement to secretly
collect their IP addresses.
One of the arrested suspects has argued that the evidence
against him had been unlawfully seized. But
a U.S. court in Virginia has ruled in favor of the FBI, according to court
documents unsealed on Thursday.
… The suspect may
have used Tor to keep his browsing anonymous, but his IP address still isn’t
private information, the judge wrote in his ruling. This is because the IP address is given out to
third parties in order to access the Internet and even the Tor network.
Privacy advocacy group Electronic Frontier Foundation is
opposed to this part of the ruling.
“The implications for the decision, if upheld, are
staggering,” wrote Mark Rumold, an attorney with the group in a blog post. Law enforcement could seize information from a
person’s computer without a warrant, probable cause or any suspicion at all, he
said.
… Morgan, however,
said in his ruling that the rise of hacking has changed expectations about
privacy.
“For example, hacking is much more
prevalent now than it was even nine years ago,” he said. “Now, it seems unreasonable to think that a computer connected to
the Web is immune from invasion.”
As a
result, Tor users “cannot reasonably expect” to be safe from hackers,
he added. The FBI also didn’t violate
the Fourth Amendment of the U.S. Constitution by hacking into the suspect’s
computer. Law enforcement should be able to use cutting-edge technology to stop
crimes done in secrecy, Morgan said.
(Related) Why would
this be different from any other evidence?
Mike Carter reports the latest development in the federal
prosecution of Russian hacker Roman
Seleznev:
A federal judge has refused to
suppress key evidence in the pending trial of accused Russian mega-hacker Roman
Seleznev.
U.S. District Judge Richard Jones
said Seleznev’s accusations that federal agents tampered
with his computer — and the dueling opinions of prosecution and
defense experts about whether that occurred — should be considered by the jury
in Seleznev’s upcoming federal trial.
Sure, because a jury of 12 citizens is perfectly equipped
to consider testimony about evidence of computer tampering by the government.
Read more on Seattle
Times.
(Related) If no computer
is safe, how do you secure government computers?
Detect, Disrupt, Deter: A Whole-of-Government Approach to
National Security Cyber Threats
by Sabrina
I. Pacifici on Jun 23, 2016
Detect, Disrupt, Deter: A Whole-of-Government Approach
to National Security Cyber Threats – by John P. Carlin, Harvard Law
School National Security Journal. Volume 7, Issue 2:
“With increasing network intrusions affecting the U.S.
government and American companies, and unsecured connectivity creating new
vulnerabilities to cyber attacks, the United States is implementing a
whole-of-government, all-tools approach to countering cyber threats. This article discusses
the role played by the Department of Justice within this government-wide
effort, including its progress in attributing cyber activities to their source,
and how attribution can be used to deter, disrupt, and defend against cyber
threats. In doing so, the article demonstrates the need for a continued commitment to and
discussion around effective cyber security tools.”
For my Computer Security students.
KSN Report: Ransomware in 2014-2016 The evolution of the
threat and its future
by Sabrina
I. Pacifici on Jun 23, 2016
Kaspersky Lab, June 22, 2016: “Ransomware is a type of
malware that, upon infecting a device, blocks access to it or to some or all of
the information stored on it. In order
to unlock either the device or the data, the user is required to pay a ransom,
usually in bitcoins or another widely used e-currency. This report covers the evolution of the
threat over the last two years…
Supply and demand. Perhaps
an auction App for tickets?
Hamilton’s $849 Tickets Are Priced Too Low
Hoping to catch the smash Broadway hit Hamilton
in the near future? Good luck: Even as
the anniversary of its opening approaches, there remains a frenzy to buy
tickets. The musical about founding
father Alexander Hamilton recently won 11 Tony awards, including Best Musical,
bolstering its list of accolades — which also include a Grammy Award and
Pulitzer Prize. Its level of acclaim has
even reached the White House, with First Lady Michelle Obama proclaiming Hamilton is
“the best piece of art in any form I have ever seen in my life.” As a result, the producers of Hamilton are
scrambling to find the right pricing strategy to handle demand.
What’s clear is that recent prices — starting at
$549 for premium seats and $139 for regular seats — are significantly
lower than what the public is willing to pay. The result? A paradise for scalpers. The New York Times estimates scalpers earn up
to $60 million annually from reselling Hamilton tickets. Estimates of the average resale price hover
around $1,000 per ticket. Asking prices
for future performances are even higher, routinely in the $3,000–$4,000 range
and close to $10,000 per ticket for the last show before creator Lin-Manuel
Miranda exits the cast next month.
To capitalize on this strong demand, Hamilton’s
producers raised ticket prices for newly scheduled 2017 performances.
Now the top ticket price is $849 (for
200 premium tickets) and the remaining 1,075 regular seats range from $179–$199
… We’ve entered a
new era, one where consumers understand market-based prices. Consumers are surrounded by businesses in
their daily lives — Uber, Disney, sports teams, Amazon — that blatantly flex
prices to be in sync with demand. It’s
telling that in the rock concert industry, where musicians have been loath to
raise prices out of fear of being accused of gouging fans, VIP prices are
becoming the norm.
Perspective.
WhatsApp users are making 100 millions calls every day
WhatsApp users are now making more than 100 million voice
calls every single day – over 1,100 calls per second.
That’s an impressive number, given the feature only
finished rolling out to Android
and iOS
in April of last year. Of course, plenty
of those calls are from individuals who make multiple calls per day, but it
still shows how quickly WhatsApp’s 1
billion users have jumped on the feature.
For comparison, Skype only has about 300
million active users per month, so it’s not a stretch to imagine WhatsApp
has already surpassed the number of daily Skype calls (a figure Skype doesn’t
make public). Not bad, considering
WhatsApp calling is 12 years younger.
A tool for my students?
Maybe when they add some useful channels.
Instagram’s new video channels will help you geek out over
your obsessions
Instagram wants you to watch more video.
The company is adding new topic-based video channels to
the "explore" section of the app. The channels, which will be labeled as
"picked for you," will surface based on topics you may be interested
in.
… The channels are
algorithmically generated and curated by Instagram. The company hasn't elaborated on how it
determines which ones to show to each user, but we're guessing it's based on
the same or similar factors that power the rest of Explore's recommendations, including the accounts you
follow and posts you have liked in the past.
(Related)
Instagram: lost in translation no longer
In keeping with other social media giants, Instagram has
decided to offer automatic translation, which the photo- and video-sharing
service says it will roll out over the coming month.
… With 80 percent
of Instagram users now based outside the United States, the company is keen to
banish any barriers that may hamper people’s ability to communicate.
Perspective. I
wonder if this will change how they campaign?
Or talk to constituents?
Live-streamed videos from House sit-in viewed on Facebook 3M
times
Facebook live-streaming videos from House Democrats'
sit-in on the floor were watched more than 3 million times, CEO Mark Zuckerberg
said.
After official C-SPAN feeds from the House floor were cut
off by House Republicans on Wednesday, Rep. Beto O’Rourke (D-Texas) began
streaming the sit-in over the Facebook Live feature. Rep. Scott Peters
(D-Calif.) was also streaming video from the floor via Periscope, and several
other lawmakers streamed videos on social media.
… C-SPAN, which
repeatedly noted that it had no control over the video stream from the House
floor, began
streaming from some of the lawmakers' social media feeds instead.
There was often an alert on the C-SPAN screen that noted the "House
cameras are not permitted to show sit-in."
It was the first time C-SPAN had used social media to
circumvent the standard House feeds.
"When they turned the cameras off today, we found out there's an app for that,”
Peters said as the sit-in continued late into Wednesday night.
Damn! Missed
another one.
Twilio stock closes at $28.53, jumping more than 90% in first
day of trading
My students (some at least) have the talent, now all I
have to do is convince them to try.
Khan Academy Announces a Talent Search
Do you enjoy making instructional videos for your students
or the general public? Can you break
complex topics into small, digestible chunks for others to understand? If so, you may be interested in entering the Khan Academy
Talent Search contest. The contest
runs now through August 1, 2016. Ten
finalists will be chosen from all of the entries. Each of those finalists will win $300. The overall winner will receive $3000. All finalists will be considered for a
contract to produce content for Khan Academy. Learn more about the Khan Academy
Talent Search here or watch the video below.
Should you need ideas for an instructional video, check
out the suggested
topics list on Khan Academy.
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