Greetings all, and happy Wednesday! And Happy October (…)
Apologies if some of you didn’t receive last week’s newsletter. I did write one, and i hit send, but there were issues with the mailer. Hopefully they are now resolved. You may never know!
To kick things off this week there are a few stories on the (seemingly inexorable) move towards a pervasive surveillance world. The first is a Financial Times piece on Israel’s surveillance of Hezbollah, which is not heavy on the details, but does indicate the development of pattern of life analysis, and the ability to flag any anomalies (including in satellite imagery, or video feeds). The second is a 404 Media piece on Meta’s new Smart Glasses, and how some people almost immediately put facial recognition technology on them. The data collection and surveillance possibilities linked to that type of technology is just huge, and hugely troubling.
There is a bit of climate content, which is about time really, given the horrendous environmental impact of AI and the data economy. WIRED has a piece on how AI might be more sustainable… under water. No joke. MIT Tech Review has some info on 15 Climate Tech Companies to watch. You can peruse below.
The Tech Review also has a really interesting piece on how a small open source AI model is performing equally as well as the big players. Which is intriguing. The Guardian has an equally intriguing podcast titled ‘There is no God in the machine: the pitfalls of AI worship.’ Which i will have to listen to.
That’s it for me this week. Even though i dont teach at the moment, this first week of teaching just seems so busy. There are people on campus! Lots of people! (which is, in fairness, lovely).
I’m heading out to meet some friends for BBQ now. So, it seems only appropriate that I leave you with ‘BBQ & Pimms’ by Souleance. How very English.
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The Register, Kamala Harris campaign motorcade halted by confused robotaxis (im not sure what this says about the fight against our AI overlords)
The Register, AI agent promotes itself to sysadmin, trashes boot sequence
Financial Times, How Israeli spies penetrated Hizbollah
Financial Times, It’s time for limited, mandatory testing for AI (well, its a start)
Financial Times, SAP chief warns EU against over-regulating artificial intelligence (oh)
New York Times, Meta Unveils New Virtual Reality Headset and Other Products (what could go wrong)
404 Media, Someone Put Facial Recognition Tech onto Meta’s Smart Glasses to Instantly Dox Strangers (oh)
Smithsonian, Robots Are Coming to the Kitchen. What Does This Mean for Everyday Life?
ASPI. AUKUS needs seamless data sharing. Here’s how to get it
DefenseOne, Special operators hope AI can reduce civilian deaths in combat
DefenseOne, Can AI predict if a Marine will quit? Corps wants to know
Privacy International, When Spiders Share Webs: The creeping expansion of INTERPOL’s interoperable policing and biometrics entrench externalised EU borders in West Africa
AlgorithmWatch, Why we need to audit algorithms and AI from end to end
New York Times, California Governor Vetoes Sweeping A.I. Legislation – The New York Times
The Register, Remote ID verification tech is often biased, bungling, and no good on its own
The Conversation, Wondering what AI actually is? Here are the 7 things it can do for you
The Register, NASA, IBM just open sourced an AI climate model so you can fine-tune your own
The Guardian, Monitoring UK bank accounts for benefits fraud would be ‘huge blow to privacy’
WIRED, Is AI More Sustainable if You Generate it Underwater?
MIT Technology Review, The Download: 15 Climate Tech Companies to Watch
Financial Times, US climate change targets threatened by tech energy surge from AI
The Guardian, South Sudan medics trial AI app to identify snakes and improve bite treatment
The Guardian, World’s first AI art museum to explore ‘creative potential of machines’ in LA
The Register, US Army drafts AI to combat recruitment shortfall
The Register, If your AI does the crime, you’ll do the time, warns DoJ (which seems entirely sensible)
The Guardian, Corporate America has failed to embrace DEI. An AI chatbot could be part of the solution (if you had to italicise one word, which would it be?)
The Guardian, Archaeologists use AI to discover 303 unknown geolyphs near Nazca Lines
WIRED, China’s Plan to Make AI Watermarks Happen
Washington Post, How neo-Nazis are using AI to translate Hitler for a new generation
The Guardian, Social workers in England begin using AI system to assist their work
European Commission, Industry, academia and civil society contribute to the work on Code of practice for general-purpose artificial intelligence
European Commission, Meet the Chairs leading the development of the first General-Purpose AI Code of Practice
Towards DataScience, A Basic Introduction to Quantum GANs
MIT TEchnology Review, A tiny new open-source AI model performs as well as powerful big ones
Access Now, Surveilling Europe’s edges: when research legitimises border violence
Blogs
Just Security, The Next Step for USAID’s New Digital Policy: Account for Conflict Risks and Include Peacebuilding
Just Security, AI at UNGA79: Recapping Key Themes
Just Security, Rethinking Responsible Use of Military AI: From Principles to Practice
Podcast:
The Washington Post, Top experts on the impact of AI on the workforce, education and the economy (well, some top experts)
The Guardian, No god in the machine: the pitfalls of AI worship
Video:The Washington Post, Manyika: ‘AI is not just generative AI’ (very short)