Archive for the 'Technology' Category
Targeting Political Ads to Individuals
August 26th, 2014Via: Engadget: Like it or not, another US election is almost upon us — and this time around, the incessant political advertising may cut a little too close to home. Both Democrats and Republicans are using a new TV ad targeting system from DirecTV and Dish that takes advantage of voter records to put personalized […]
The Surveillance Engine: How the NSA Built Its Own Secret Google
August 26th, 2014Via: First Look: The National Security Agency is secretly providing data to nearly two dozen U.S. government agencies with a “Google-like” search engine built to share more than 850 billion records about phone calls, emails, cellphone locations, and internet chats, according to classified documents obtained by The Intercept. The documents provide the first definitive evidence […]
‘Robo Brain’ Will Teach Robots Everything from the Internet
August 25th, 2014This is the exact scenario from two recent cyber apocalypse stories; Robopocalypse by Daniel H. Wilson and Transcendence. The goo escapes the cage in the lab and devours everything. Vis: Physorg: Robo Brain – a large-scale computational system that learns from publicly available Internet resources – is currently downloading and processing about 1 billion images, […]
“Want a Happy Worker? Let Robots Take Control”
August 24th, 2014Alternate Headline: Getting the Most Out of Your Remaining Human Meatsack Workers Until It Makes Economic Sense to Eliminate Them. Via: MIT Technology Review: If you’ve seen a sci-fi flick with autonomous robots in the last 40 years, you may be wary of giving robots any semblance of control. But new research coming out of […]
Yes, Mildred, Your Cell Phone Is Used to Track Your Position on the Ground
August 24th, 2014Keep in mind, what they’re talking about here is just the mobile network information. Most phones have GPS radios built in now, so I’d assume that the position data is accurate to within a couple of meters when the observers are the Five Eyes states. What I don’t know is how often they activate the […]
Bots on Patrol: Mobile Security Robot to be Mass Produced
August 22nd, 2014Via: Factor: In a move that will rock the job security of night watchmen everywhere, the world’s first commercially available security robot is set for mass production in the US. Designed by Denver-based Gamma 2 Robotics, the robot will now be manufactured entirely in the States, with a process that can be scaled up to […]
Despite FAA Setbacks, Amazon Prime Air Makes Notable Engineering, NASA And Aerospace Hires
August 21st, 2014Via: TechCrunch: Something big is going on with Amazon Prime Air, the e-commerce giant’s research project focused on delivering packages in 30 minutes or less using unmanned drones. … Prime Air is shaping up to be more than a marketing stunt, it seems. The company recently scored a few notable hires for this project, including […]
Amazon Expands Its Cloud Services to U.S. Military
August 21st, 2014Via: DefenseOne: Amazon Web Services has become the first commercial cloud provider authorized to handle the Defense Department’s most sensitive unclassified data. Today’s announcement that AWS has achieved a provisional authority to operate under DOD’s cloud security model at impact levels 3-5 is a major win for the company, as it allows DOD customers to […]
Russia Forces Its Popular Bloggers to Register — Or Else
August 20th, 2014Via: Bloomberg: Russian President Vladimir Putin is taking names. Potentially thousands. The former KGB colonel, concerned with how social media can be used to undermine his authority, this month expanded his regulation of media to the blogosphere, requiring those with at least 3,000 daily readers to register their real names and contact information. So far, […]
Navy Conducts First Series of Drone and Manned Fighter Jet Operations
August 19th, 2014Via: Los Angeles Times: The U.S. Navy said its jet-powered, bat-winged X-47B drone has conducted carrier deck operations and performed maneuvers alongside an F/A-18 fighter jet, marking the first time manned and unmanned aircraft have operated together on the same carrier. Navy officials hailed the test flights of the experimental drone, which were completed Sunday […]
