Might apply to your software also.

https://www.csoonline.com/article/3623396/nist-defines-critical-software-with-a-broad-range-of-security-functions.html#tk.rss_all

NIST defines "critical software" with a broad range of security functions

A significant part of the Biden administration's wide-ranging cybersecurity executive order (EO) mandates that the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) define what constitutes "critical software," a deliverable that is central to the wider effort of securing software supply chains. Last week NIST made good on this assignment when it released a preliminary list of software categories within the scope of this definition.

Does this surprise anyone?

https://www.nextgov.com/emerging-tech/2021/06/watchdog-10-government-agencies-deployed-clearview-ai-facial-recognition-tech/176411/

Watchdog: 10 Government Agencies Deployed Clearview AI Facial Recognition Tech

Multiple federal agencies that employ law enforcement personnel used facial recognition technology designed and owned by non-government entities in recent years—and 10 deployed systems made by the controversial company, Clearview AI.

In a 92-page report addressed to Congress and publicly released Tuesday, the Government Accountability Office offers details on a range of government implementations of the biometric technology.

… GAO’s review included a visual chart demonstrating facial recognition technology systems used by those federal law enforcement agencies and the number of photos in each system. Clearview AI’s system outnumbers the rest, encompassing more than 3 billion photos.

(Related)

https://www.cpomagazine.com/data-privacy/eu-privacy-watchdogs-seek-ai-biometrics-and-facial-recognition-ban-in-public-spaces/

EU Privacy Watchdogs Seek AI Biometrics and Facial Recognition Ban in Public Spaces

Two of the European Union’s leading independent data protection watchdogs, the European Data Protection Board (EDPB) and the European Data Protection Supervisor (EDPS), are jointly calling for a widespread ban on the use of AI-driven biometric identification in public places. More than just a facial recognition ban, the proposal calls for automated systems recognizing “gait, fingerprints, DNA, voice, keystrokes and other biometric or behavioral signals” to be kept out of all of the EU’s publicly accessible spaces.

When that AI legal software isn’t really AI or software.

https://news.bloomberglaw.com/pharma-and-life-sciences/human-contract-review-behind-ai-might-jeopardize-your-license

Human Contract Review Behind AI Might Jeopardize Your License

Some purported AI contract management vendors are relying on human reviewers rather than exclusively on artificial intelligence, asserts Jerry Ting, CEO of AI contract management firm Evisort. If unvetted and unlicensed humans are reading contracts, general counsel and other attorneys using such services risk violating privacy regulations and law licensing requirements, he contends.

(Related) Other software issues…

https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2021/06/risks-of-evidentiary-software.html

Risks of Evidentiary Software

Over at Lawfare, Susan Landau has an excellent essay on the risks posed by software used to collect evidence (a Breathalyzer is probably the most obvious example).

Bugs and vulnerabilities can lead to inaccurate evidence, but the proprietary nature of software makes it hard for defendants to examine it.

The software engineers proposed a three-part test. First, the court should have access to the “Known Error Log,” which should be part of any professionally developed software project. Next the court should consider whether the evidence being presented could be materially affected by a software error. Ladkin and his co-authors noted that a chain of emails back and forth are unlikely to have such an error, but the time that a software tool logs when an application was used could easily be incorrect. Finally, the reliability experts recommended seeing whether the code adheres to an industry standard used in an non-computerized version of the task (e.g., bookkeepers always record every transaction, and thus so should bookkeeping software).

[More ]

A forensic tools & techniques.

https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/how-do-i-download-an-entire-website-for-offline-reading/

How to Download an Entire Website for Offline Reading

Part of a modern writing class?

https://www.makeuseof.com/emoji-etiquette-when-to-use-them/

Proper Emoji Etiquette: When to Use (or Not Use) Them

Are we beginning to realize we are already at war?

https://www.cpomagazine.com/cyber-security/nato-warns-that-cyber-attacks-on-member-states-could-trigger-a-coordinated-military-response/

NATO Warns That Cyber Attacks on Member States Could Trigger a Coordinated Military Response

NATO could respond to cyber attacks on its member states in similar ways to an armed attack. The alliance’s Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg said the military coalition viewed cyber-attacks on its members as armed land, sea, or air assault, which demanded a collective military response.

… NATO ratified a Comprehensive Cyber Defense Policy, which could invoke Article 5 after a cyber attack perpetrated by rival entities against a NATO ally.

The article, which was ratified in 1949, perceives an attack on a member country as aggression against all alliance members and calls for a collective military response.

Locking the side door isn’t very useful if all the other doors and windows are still open.

https://clark.com/privacy/google-privacy-by-design/

Google Is Making a Big Change To Help You Control Your Data Privacy

Google has enabled a new privacy feature that requires you to enter your password to access your “My Activity” page.

… Although your account will be locked down and require you to enter your password to view some of your most sensitive data, the company makes it clear that the extra verification setting applies only to the “My Activity” feature.

“Your history may still appear in other Google products,” says a notification on the page.

Isn’t this “tampering with evidence?” (Oh look, another Donald Trump print.)

https://www.newscientist.com/article/2282218-ai-clears-up-images-of-fingerprints-to-help-with-identification/

AI clears up images of fingerprints to help with identification

An AI that can repair blurred or distorted images of fingerprints lifted from crime scenes could make identifying people easier, but it is unclear whether such evidence would stand up in court.

Amol Joshi at West Virginia University and his colleagues trained an AI to cancel out distortions of fingerprints caused by incorrect camera focusing and other errors.

Adjusting the law for the computer age is not the same as creating a ‘gotcha’ law specifically for Facebook or other large tech companies.

https://www.axios.com/facebook-ftc-ruling-brakes-tech-antitrust-c5079818-97a6-446a-ba0f-aa9e5d92d631.html

Ruling on FTC's Facebook suits slams brakes on tech's legal foes

… Driving the news: Judge James Boasberg of the Federal District Court in D.C. sent the Federal Trade Commission back to the drawing board to show exactly how Facebook has a monopoly in the market for "personal social networking services."

• The FTC's suit, filed in December, is "legally insufficient," Boasberg wrote: "It is almost as if the agency expects the court to simply nod to the conventional wisdom that Facebook is a monopolist."

Perspective. Automating the law business is big business.

https://www.reuters.com/legal/transactional/ai-fueled-e-discovery-company-disco-plans-ipo-2021-06-28/

AI-fueled e-discovery company DISCO plans IPO

… Austin-based DISCO, which offers artificial intelligence-enabled e-discovery, document review and case management solutions, filed its registration statement with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission on Friday.

"The broad applicability of our solution across a spectrum of industries has created a significant market opportunity for us, which we estimate to be $42 billion globally," the company said in the prospectus.

… The company isn't the only legal tech venture to announce intentions to go public in recent weeks. Glendale, California-based online legal services company LegalZoom.com Inc and Palo Alto-based Intapp Inc, a software provider for professional services and capital markets firms, both announced planned market debuts in the past month. LegalZoom is aiming for a valuation of more than $5 billion, while Intapp is aiming for a valuation of about $1.65 billion, according to regulatory filings.

(Related)

https://www.bespacific.com/how-do-you-calculate-the-roi-of-legal-tech/

How Do You Calculate the ROI of Legal Tech?

Artificial Lawyer: “How do you calculate the ROI of legal tech tools that your firm or inhouse team have bought? Moreover, are there any universal metrics that can be used? Artificial Lawyer asked several founders across a range of companies what they thought. Here is what they said. First, let’s do a NLP-driven bulk review tool. In this case, Kira Systems. CEO Noah Waisberg quoted from the company’s own recent book ‘AI for Lawyers’. The focus on ROI here addresses one of the fundamentals of legal tech: efficiency. But Waisberg also considers several other benefits. ‘A common response is to think of [using Kira] purely in terms of efficiency – that with AI you can do the same amount of work in less time, with the ROI coming in the form of lower costs for the same amount of work,’ he noted in the book. And this approach makes the most sense when you have a fixed fee for that part of the work, e.g. the due diligence review. But, he continued: ‘Another way to think about ROI, however, is that AI allows users to do more work, not just to do the same amount of work more cheaply. …. [or you can also] think about the ROI of AI in contract review [in terms of] its impact on realisation rates.’…”

Is automating juries the next step?

https://www.bespacific.com/virtual-juries/

Virtual Juries

Hans, Valerie P., Virtual Juries (June 4, 2021). Cornell Legal Studies Research Paper No. 21-16, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3860165 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.3860165

“The introduction of virtual or remote jury trials in response to the COVID-19 pandemic constitutes a remarkable natural experiment with one of our nation’s central democratic institutions. Although it is not a tightly controlled experimental study, real world experiences in this natural experiment offer some insights about how key features of trial by jury are affected by a virtual procedure. This article surveys the landscape of virtual jury trials. It examines the issues of jury representativeness, the adequacy of virtual jury selection, the quality of decision making, and the public’s access to jury trial proceedings. Many have expressed concern that the digital divide would negatively affect jury representativeness. Surprisingly, there is some preliminary evidence that suggests that virtual jury selection procedures lead to jury venires that are as diverse, if not more diverse, than pre-pandemic jury venires. Lawyers in a demonstration project reacted favorably to virtual voir dire when it was accompanied by expansive pretrial juror questionnaires and the opportunity to question prospective jurors. A number of courts provided public access by live streaming jury trials. How a virtual jury trial affects jurors’ interpretations of witness testimony, attorney arguments, and jury deliberation remain open questions.”

Now that’s a robot I can understand.

https://www.slashgear.com/heineken-bot-is-an-autonomous-beer-cooler-that-follows-you-around-28680253/

Heineken BOT is an autonomous beer cooler that follows you around

… The Heineken Beer Outdoor Transporter (B.O.T) looks like a tiny agricultural appliance and operates like your own R2-D2 droid, only instead of helping evade Stormtroopers, it makes sure you’re never too far away from a cold can of beer. The tiny robot features four wheels, two big wheels, sensors, a brain running AI, and the capacity to hold a dozen cans in addition to ice. [I can’t wait for the larger version, so I’ll buy at least four… Bob]

So, are there lessons to be learned?

https://asia.nikkei.com/Politics/International-relations/The-first-AI-conflict-Israel-s-Gaza-operation-gives-glimpse-of-future

The first AI conflict? Israel's Gaza operation gives glimpse of future

Israeli military action last month in Palestinian-controlled Gaza has been described as the first artificial intelligence war, imparting a glimpse of future conflicts in the 21st century.

"This is the first time [AI] was used broadly across an operation." a senior Israeli officer involved in digital conflict told Nikkei. The technology was deployed to defend against missile attacks and identify targets. The lessons learned from real battlefield experience will be used to improve accuracy.

… Over the course of the operation, the Israeli military shot down 90% of the rockets flying from Gaza, relying on its Iron Dome anti-aircraft defense system.

AI was used to determine rocket trajectories based on radar information, intercepting those headed for densely populated areas. The system is designed to leave alone rockets judged to fall in uninhabited areas. Each interceptor missile is estimated to cost more than US$50,000, so eliminating pointless interceptions helps control costs. [And war is an economic event. Bob]

“Our next model will try and execute the perpetrator on the spot!”

https://www.nbcnews.com/business/business-news/security-robots-expand-across-u-s-few-tangible-results-n1272421

Security robots expand across U.S., with few tangible results

… For its part, Knightscope maintains on its website that the robots “predict and prevent crime,” without much evidence that they do so. Experts say this is a bold claim.

“It would be difficult to introduce a single thing and it causes crime to go down,” said Ryan Calo, a law professor at the University of Washington, comparing the Knightscope robots to a “roving scarecrow.”

This is right 100% percent of the time OR this is preferred?

https://www.csoonline.com/article/3622888/four-states-propose-laws-to-ban-ransomware-payments.html#tk.rss_all

Four states propose laws to ban ransomware payments

Some state legislatures are debating bills that could limit or ban ransom payments. A better option, experts say, is mandatory reporting of ransomware attacks.

Following the epic ransomware attacks on Colonial Pipeline and top meat producer JBS, some government officials have called on Congress and the administration to ban organizations from making ransom payments to threat actors. The goal of such a ban would be to codify the FBI's current advice: Don't pay ransomware attackers lest you encourage more of the same.

… So far, four states have five pending pieces of legislation that would either ban paying a ransom or substantially restrict paying it. In New York, Senate Bill S6806A "prohibits governmental entities, business entities, and health care entities from paying a ransom in the event of a cyber incident or a cyber ransom or ransomware attack."

Another New York Senate bill, Senate Bill S6154, provides money so that local governments can upgrade their networks. But it also "restricts the use of taxpayer money in paying ransoms in response to ransomware attacks."

New York stands alone in terms of barring private sector businesses from paying a ransom. Legislatures in North Carolina (House Bill 813 ), Pennsylvania (Senate Bill 726 ), and Texas (House Bill 3892 ) are all considering bills that would prohibit the use of state and local taxpayer money or other public money to pay a ransom payment. This public money prohibition would likely hamstring local governments from paying off ransomware attackers.

Interesting graphics as well.

https://www.ft.com/content/a0f8d8c5-ee5c-4618-bfbd-6bfb383b803e

Meet the activists perfecting the craft of anti-surveillance

… Today, the state’s technological force is on show. At last summer’s Black Lives Matter protests in the US, drones, planes and helicopters circled over 15 cities, gathering at least 270 hours of footage on behalf of the Department of Homeland Security. During the marches, the investigative online publication The Intercept reported that police had used special access to social media surveillance tools that monitor protesters’ online discussions in real time.

Another perspective, very similar guidance.

https://www.who.int/news/item/28-06-2021-who-issues-first-global-report-on-ai-in-health-and-six-guiding-principles-for-its-design-and-use

WHO issues first global report on Artificial Intelligence (AI) in health and six guiding principles for its design and use

Artificial Intelligence (AI) holds great promise for improving the delivery of healthcare and medicine worldwide, but only if ethics and human rights are put at the heart of its design, deployment, and use, according to new WHO guidance published today.

The report, Ethics and governance of artificial intelligence for health, is the result of 2 years of consultations held by a panel of international experts appointed by WHO.

Download the report (pdf)

Tools for social engineering. “Donald Trump called and asked me to do it!”

https://www.makeuseof.com/best-voice-changing-apps-iphone/

The 6 Best Voice-Changing Apps on iPhone

Transform your voice with these apps to make yourself sound like a robot, a mouse, or even Donald Trump.

A new field of law.

https://doi.org/10.4324/9781003028031

Drone Law and Policy

Drone Law and Policy describes the drone industry and its evolution, describing the benefits and risks of its exponential growth. It outlines the current and proposed regulatory framework in Australia, the United States, the United Kingdom and Europe, taking into consideration the current and evolving technological and insurance landscape.

This book makes recommendations as to additional regulatory and insurance initiatives which the authors believe are necessary to achieve an effective balance between the various competing interests.

(Related)

https://www.taylorfrancis.com/chapters/edit/10.4324/9781003020998-16/risk-discrimination-ai-systems-jennifer-graham

Risk of discrimination in AI systems

Using artificial intelligence (AI) systems within decision-making processes is neither a new nor an unfamiliar concept. If used correctly, algorithmic decision-making has the potential to be both beneficial and valuable to modern society. Yet the risk of discrimination resulting from the use of these automated systems is substantial and widely acknowledged. As such, this work considers instances in which algorithmic systems have discriminated against individuals based upon protected characteristics, why this is the case, and what can be done to prevent this from continuing to occur. However, the purpose of this chapter is to evaluate the effectiveness of current legal safeguards, such as General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR), the European Convention of Human Rights (ECHR), and the Equality Act 2010, in dealing with AI-based discrimination. In particular, this chapter features analysis of the first known legal challenge to the use of algorithms in the UK brought by The Joint Council for the Welfare of Immigrants and Foxglove and considers the effectiveness of the some of the aforementioned legal safeguards in this case.

No one got it right. (and that might be the model going forward. )

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/1758-5899.12965

Emerging Consensus on ‘Ethical AI’: Human Rights Critique of Stakeholder Guidelines

Voluntary guidelines on ‘ethical practices’ have been the response by stakeholders to address the growing concern over harmful social consequences of artificial intelligence and digital technologies. Issued by dozens of actors from industry, government and professional associations, the guidelines are creating a consensus on core standards and principles for ethical design, development and deployment of artificial intelligence (AI). Using human rights principles (equality, participation and accountability) and attention to the right to privacy, this paper reviews 15 guidelines preselected to be strongest on human rights, and on global health. We find about half of these ground their guidelines in international human rights law and incorporate the key principles; even these could go further, especially in suggesting ways to operationalize them. Those that adopt the ethics framework are particularly weak in laying out standards for accountability, often focusing on ‘transparency’, and remaining silent on enforceability and participation which would effectively protect the social good. These guidelines mention human rights as a rhetorical device to obscure the absence of enforceable standards and accountability measures, and give their attention to the single right to privacy. These ‘ethics’ guidelines, disproportionately from corporations and other interest groups, are also weak on addressing inequalities and discrimination. We argue that voluntary guidelines are creating a set of de facto norms and re-interpretation of the term ‘human rights’ for what would be considered ‘ethical’ practice in the field. This exposes an urgent need for action by governments and civil society to develop more rigorous standards and regulatory measures, grounded in international human rights frameworks, capable of holding Big Tech and other powerful actors to account.

I love a good argument. Particularly when two AIs are arguing.

https://rucforsk.ruc.dk/ws/files/77923472/Ethical_guideine_for_the_use_of_AI_and_value_conflict_challenges.pdf

On the application of ethical guidelines for AI and the challenges from value conflicts

The aim of this article is to articulate and critically discuss different answers to the following question: How should decision-makers deal with conflicts that arise when the values usually entailed in ethical guidelines – such as accuracy, privacy, nondiscrimination and transparency – for the use of Artificial Intelligence (e.g. algorithm-based sentencing) clash with one another?

Do you (or your AI) agree?

https://www.digitaltrends.com/features/trend-analyzing-ai-predicts-next-big-thing-tech/

Here’s what a trend-analyzing A.I. thinks will be the next big thing in tech

Virtual and augmented reality. 3D printing. Natural language processing. Deep learning. The smart home. Driverless vehicles. Biometric technology. Genetically modified organisms. Brain-computer interfaces.

These, in descending order, are the top 10 most-invested-in emerging technologies in the United States, as ranked by number of deals. If you want to get a sense of which technologies will be shaping our future in the years to come, this probably isn’t a bad starting point.

There is real elegance in a simple, foolproof design.

https://dilbert.com/strip/2021-06-27

What happens when you hand enforcement to a bureaucracy?

https://www.pogowasright.org/europes-data-law-is-broken-departing-privacy-chief-warns/

Europe’s Data Law Is Broken, Departing Privacy Chief Warns

Stephanie Bodoni reports:

The European Union’s “GDPR” privacy law suffers from “massive flaws” and endless infighting, according to one of the bloc’s top regulators.

The General Data Protection Regulation — put in motion with great fanfare three years ago — promised multibillion-euro fines for global companies and faster action to solve 21st century problems. But in reality, it’s sparked clashes between watchdogs and delays to probes, said Johannes Caspar, who’s about to step down as head of the Hamburg data protection commission after 12 years.

Read more on Bloomberg.

Edge or over-the-edge computing?

https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-ai-is-taking-over-our-gadgets-11624680004

How AI Is Taking Over Our Gadgets

If you think of AI as something futuristic and abstract, start thinking different.

We’re now witnessing a turning point for artificial intelligence, as more of it comes down from the clouds and into our smartphones and automobiles. While it’s fair to say that AI that lives on the “edge”—where you and I are—is still far less powerful than its datacenter-based counterpart, it’s potentially far more meaningful to our everyday lives.

… These so-called edge devices can be pretty much anything with a microchip and some memory, but they tend to be the newest and most sophisticated of smartphones, automobiles, drones, home appliances, and industrial sensors and actuators. Edge AI has the potential to deliver on some of the long-delayed promises of AI, like more responsive smart assistants, better automotive safety systems, new kinds of robots, even autonomous military machines.

We’re all beginners for the next 20 years…

https://thenextweb.com/news/beginners-guide-to-artificial-intelligence-policy

A beginner’s guide to AI: Policy

Welcome to Neural’s beginner’s guide to AI. This long-running series should provide you with a very basic understanding of what AI is, what it can do, and how it works.

In this edition of the guide, we’ll take a glance at global AI policy.

(Related)

https://searchenterpriseai.techtarget.com/tip/10-steps-to-achieve-AI-implementation-in-your-business

10 steps to achieve AI implementation in your business

Maximizing the value of insights into your business, industry and competition requires a thoughtful, creative, experimental, incremental and team approach to deploying AI.

Interesting thoughts. Not sure I see things exactly their way.

https://venturebeat.com/2021/06/25/how-ai-is-changing-the-nature-of-analytics/

How AI is changing the nature of analytics

At its heart, artificial intelligence is an analytics tool. Its value comes from the ability to parse through enormous amounts of data, without direct human supervision, to identify patterns and anomalies that can then be put to use.

But since human-driven analytics have existed for centuries, long predating the modern computer age, how will this new generation of technology change the game? And how can organizations make sure they are getting their money’s worth once this technology is pushed into production environments?

The key element that AI brings to analytics is context, Oracle’s Joey Fitts and MIT research fellow Tom Davenport recently wrote in the Harvard Business Review. Under traditional analytics, the analyst was rarely an expert in the system or process being analyzed. They knew analytics, not marketing or sales or data networking. Their ultimate recommendations often lacked the context that can only come from broad knowledge and experience.

Interact with an AI developed map.

https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-57615408

'Eyes of a machine': How to classify Planet Earth

We are a force of Nature. Humans have reshaped the surface of the Earth to their whim.

Changes that used to occur naturally over hundreds, even thousands of years, can now turn over in a matter of weeks.

One of the ways we've tried to keep track of this relentless recasting of our planet is through the land cover map.

Researchers will take aerial photos or satellite images and categorise the scene below. Where are the grasslands and forests; the roads and buildings; what is water and what is snow or ice?

… The Living Atlas Sentinel-2 2020 Land Cover Map, produced with the assistance of Microsoft, is open source. Anyone can play with it. Take a look at your home area and see how well you think the model did in gauging the different surface types.

Practical AI? Upgrade your old John Deere tractor.

https://www.cnbc.com/2021/06/22/safeai-raises-21-million-to-build-smart-vehicles-for-heavy-industry.html

Why driverless tech works for mining and construction but robotaxis aren’t ready, according to SafeAI CEO

Despite the ambitions of Waymo, Cruise, Tesla and others, robotaxis have yet to revolutionize transportation in the U.S., and remain in a state of perpetual technical development. Meanwhile, autonomous vehicles are already at work full-time in heavy industries like mining and construction.

That’s one reason SafeAI founder and CEO Bibhrajit Halder left his autonomous passenger vehicle work behind. The start-up retrofits vehicles and equipment that are already popular in heavy industries – including haul or dump trucks, dozers, and skid steers – with its autonomous systems.

Because I need some of that ‘culture’ stuff…

https://www.bespacific.com/1540-monet-paintings-in-a-two-hour-video/

1540 Monet Paintings in a Two Hour Video

Open Culture – “To know anything about the school of painting called Impressionism, one must know Claude Monet, who gave the movement its name with his painting Impression, Sunrise and provided its method — an almost confrontational relationship with landscape in plein-air. “I have gone back to some things that can’t possibly be done: water, with weeds waving at the bottom,” Monet wrote in a letter to his friend Gustave Geffroy in 1890. “It is a wonderful sight, but it drives one crazy trying to paint it. But that is the kind of thing I am always tackling.” That “kind of thing,” the compulsion to paint nature in motion, required working quickly, repeating the same experiments over and over, despairing of getting it right, producing in the attempt his glorious series of haystacks and water lilies. Monet began painting landscapes upon meeting artist Eugene Boudin, who taught him to paint in open air, and he never stopped, refining his brushstroke for almost seventy years: from his first canvas, 1858’s View from the banks of the Lezade, to his last, The Rose Bush, finished in 1926, the final year of his life…”

Microsoft and the rumor of a free operating system.

https://www.cnet.com/how-to/windows-11-use-microsofts-pc-health-check-app-to-check-if-your-device-is-compatible-heres-how/

Windows 11: Use Microsoft's PC Health Check app to check if your device is compatible. Here's how

The new Windows 11 operating system should be compatible with the vast majority of PCs on the market, according to a Windows blog post published Thursday.

… Follow these steps to test whether your PC meets the system requirements for Windows.

1. Download Microsoft's PC Health Check here. Open the file, agree to the terms of service and click Install. Make sure the box is checked that says Open PC Health Check, and click Finish.

2. The app home page that pops up says "PC health at a glance." At the top, a box reads "Introducing Windows 11." Click Check now.

… If your machine is compatible, you can download the Windows 11 update for free when it becomes available around the 2021 holiday season.

External (portable) drives are often used to store evidence…

https://gizmodo.com/western-digital-confirms-my-book-live-drives-are-being-1847171372

Western Digital Confirms 'My Book Live' Drives Are Being Deleted Remotely

Unplug your drives from the internet right now to keep any data safe.

Western Digital’s popular My Book Live hard drives are being deleted remotely by an unknown attacker, according to the company. And there’s not much anyone can do at this point but unplug their drives from the internet.

“We have determined that some My Book Live devices have been compromised by a threat actor,” Western Digital’s Jolin Tan told Gizmodo early Friday by email. “In some cases, this compromise has led to a factory reset that appears to erase all data on the device.”

A whole new field to hack. Be the first one on your block to brick your neighbor’s Tesla.

https://www.cpomagazine.com/cyber-security/protecting-the-software-defined-vehicle/

Protecting the Software-Defined Vehicle

The move toward software-defined vehicles is enabling a wealth of safety, comfort and convenience innovations – and the innovations do not stop when those vehicles leave a dealership. Through over-the-air (OTA) updates, the software that runs the vehicle can continue to evolve and improve throughout its lifecycle, delighting consumers for years to come.

This is a powerful capability, but it requires an approach to development that always has cybersecurity in mind. Attacks might come from physical access to a vehicle, or even via Wi-Fi or Bluetooth, but cellular connections mean an attacker could potentially access the vehicle’s systems from anywhere in the world.

Could this idea spread?

https://www.schneier.com/blog/archives/2021/06/banning-surveillance-based-advertising.html

Banning Surveillance-Based Advertising

The Norwegian Consumer Council just published a fantastic new report: “Time to Ban Surveillance-Based Advertising. ” From the Introduction:

The challenges caused and entrenched by surveillance-based advertising include, but are not limited to:

• privacy and data protection infringements

• opaque business models

• manipulation and discrimination at scale

• fraud and other criminal activity

• serious security risks

At least it was unarmed.

https://www.pogowasright.org/baltimore-spy-plane-program-was-invasion-of-citizens-privacy-court-rules/

Baltimore spy plane program was invasion of citizens’ privacy, court rules

Kim Lyons reports:

The city of Baltimore’s spy plane program was unconstitutional, violating the Fourth Amendment protection against illegal search, and law enforcement in the city cannot use any of the data it gathered, a court ruled Thursday. The Aerial Investigation Research (or AIR) program, which used airplanes and high-resolution cameras to record what was happening in a 32-square-mile part of the city, was canceled by the city in February.

Local Black activist groups, with support from the ACLU, sued to prevent Baltimore law enforcement from using any of the data it had collected in the time the program was up and running.

Read more on The Verge

EPIC.org writes:

The en banc 4th Circuit ruled today that Baltimore’s warrantless aerial surveillance program violates the Fourth Amendment because it “enables police to deduce from the whole of individuals’ movements[.]” The Aerial Investigation Research program was a public-private partnership with Persistent Surveillance Systems that flew several surveillance planes above Baltimore, capturing detailed video of 32 square miles of the city per second. Using the AIR pilot program, Baltimore Police were able to track individual movements throughout the city for up to 12 hours a day. The pilot program was not renewed at the end of its 6-month term last year. EPIC joined an amicus brief in the case, arguing that under Carpenter v. United States the Baltimore Police Department’s ability to track individuals with at least 45 days of flight video augmented by automated license plate reader systems constituted a search. EPIC previously filed an amicus brief in Carpenter v. United States and has long fought to limit drone surveillance and other forms of aerial spying.

Resource?

https://fpf.org/blog/fpf-partners-with-penn-state-and-university-of-michigan-researchers-on-searchable-database-of-privacy-related-documents/

FPF PARTNERS WITH PENN STATE AND UNIVERSITY OF MICHIGAN RESEARCHERS ON SEARCHABLE DATABASE OF PRIVACY-RELATED DOCUMENTS

FPF is collaborating with a team of researchers to build a searchable database of privacy policies and other privacy-related documents. The PrivaSeer project, led by researchers from Penn State and the University of Michigan, has received a $1.2 million grant from the National Science Foundation (NSF) to ease the process of collecting and utilizing privacy documents and privacy-related data.

AI has a negative impact?

https://hai.stanford.edu/news/new-approach-mitigating-ais-negative-impact

A New Approach To Mitigating AI’s Negative Impact

Stanford launches an Ethics and Society Review Board that asks researchers to take an early look at the impact of their work.

… The Ethics and Society Review (ESR) requires researchers seeking funding from the Stanford Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligence (HAI) to consider how their proposals might pose negative ethical and societal risks, to come up with methods to lessen those risks, and, if needed, to collaborate with an interdisciplinary faculty panel to ensure those concerns are addressed before funding is received.

(Related) If you can’t lick ‘em, join ‘em?

https://www.protocol.com/workplace/twitter-ethical-ai-meta

How Twitter hired tech's biggest critics to build ethical AI

… One year later, Twitter's commitment to Font's team has convinced even the most skeptical people in tech — the ethics research community itself. Rumman Chowdhury, notorious and beloved by her fellow researchers for her commitment to algorithmic auditing, announced that she would be leaving her new startup to become Twitter's META leader. Kristian Lum, a University of Pennsylvania professor renowned for her work building machine-learning models that could reshape criminal justice, will join Twitter at the end of June as their new head of research. And Sarah Roberts, famous for her critiques of tech companies and the co-director of the Center for Critical Internet Inquiry at UCLA, will become a consultant for the META team this summer, researching what Twitter users actually want from algorithmic transparency.

I need this technology! It will also be fun to reverse the transformation…

https://thenextweb.com/news/nvidias-vid2vid-cameo-ai-turns-image-into-talking-head-video-videoconferencing

Nvidia AI could let you make video calls in your PJs without anyone knowing

… Nvidia has unveiled an AI model that converts a single 2D image of a person into a “talking head” video.

Known as Vid2Vid Cameo, the deep learning model is designed to improve the experience of videoconferencing.

If you’re running late for a call, you could roll out of bed in your pajamas and disheveled hair, upload a photo of you dressed to impress, and the AI will map your facial movements to the reference image — leaving the other attendees unaware of the chaos behind the camera. That could be a boon for the chronically unkempt, but you should probably test the technique before you turn up in your birthday suit.