Networks

• Your Computer Is On Fire, but it will take much more than this book to put it out

  Detailed diagnosis of tech industry delusion falls short of prescribing a cure
  Lindsay Clark Fri 6 Aug 2021 // 12:32 UTC

  Book review Seasoned industry watchers will welcome Your Computer Is on Fire as a thorough and unflinching debunking of Big Tech's outlandish self-mythologising. They might even hope that governments, business, and the media organisations who buy into the barrage of propaganda start to ask a few important questions. But there are limits to this niche text that is at times prone to academic navel-gazing.

  In the 1990s, despite the outward differences between the industry big guns, the background hum was the same. The internet offered opportunity for all, ecommerce could lead to frictionless economics, software made people more productive, and companies more competitive. Such delusions survived the dotcom crash and financial crisis then re-emerged in the early days of social media as the Arab Spring became a use case for the positive impact of Twitter and Facebook. Together with that movement's difficult development, the nefarious exploitation of social media user data that contributed to the election of US presidential regime with ever-so-slightly insurrectionist tendencies should have given pause for thought.

  It's a wonder, then, that tech industry propaganda has barely shifted. Instead, it's a case of different tech, same tune. Last month, Google CEO Sundar Pichai told the BBC that AI would be the "most profound technology" that humanity will ever develop. Similarly, UK Cabinet Office minister Julia Lopez adopted industry language when she said that "now, more than ever, digital must be front and centre of government's priorities to meet user needs."

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• Flushing roulette: Southern Water installing digital sewer monitors to prevent blockages

  Plan to deal with fatbergs NOT related to that £90m fine for dumping effluent into sea on England's south coast
  Paul Kunert Fri 6 Aug 2021 // 11:34 UTC 2

  Where's there's muck there's brass, and there won't be many places more mucky than a sewer system as bidders for a network digitalisation contract in southern England are about to rediscover.

  According to a tender published this week, Southern Water is wading through the market to sniff out a supplier to "significantly and rapidly improve the visibility of the gravity wastewater network."

  "We plan to achieve this by installing 10,000's (up to 30,000 across Kent, East and West Sussex, Hampshire and the Isle of Wight) of sewer monitors and developing in parallel the associated analytics to make appropriate and effective use of the additional information to prevent sewer blockages developing into a pollution or flooding incident," the document states.

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• Hey, AI software developers, you are taking Unicode into account, right ... right?

  Here's how to switch around account numbers, slip past moderation, and mix up names in production-level models
  Katyanna Quach Fri 6 Aug 2021 // 10:31 UTC 4

  Analysis Computer scientists have detailed ways in which AI language systems – including some in production – can be hoodwinked into making bad decisions by text containing unseen Unicode characters.

  Account numbers can be switched around, recipients of transactions changed, and comment moderation bypassed by special hidden characters, we're told. And it is claimed software built by Microsoft, Google, IBM, and Facebook can be potentially fooled by carefully crafted Unicode.

  The issue is that ambiguity or discrepancies can be introduced if the machine-learning software ignores certain invisible Unicode characters. What's seen on screen or printed out, for instance, won't match up with what the neural network saw and made a decision on. It may be possible abuse this lack of Unicode awareness for nefarious purposes.

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• Q: Post-lockdown, where would I like to go? A: As far away from my own head as possible

  About 238,855 miles would do the trick
  Alistair Dabbs Fri 6 Aug 2021 // 09:27 UTC 15

  Something for the Weekend, Sir? More good news for Team GB's Tokyo Games medal winners: you're going to the Moon.

  This is true because I read it. It was in a press release sent to me this week. "Olympic Medalists Get Free Ticket to the Moon," it says. That is going to be one expensive flight, with more than 50 medals awarded to Brits so far, and the Paralympics yet to begin.

  Unless… yep, here it comes in the first sentence. "LifeShip Inc. today announced they will be sending Olympic and Paralympic gold, silver, and bronze medalists' DNA to the Moon for free."

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• Breaking Bad or just a bad breakpoint? That feeling when your predecessor is BASIC

  Here I am to save the day!
  Richard Speed Fri 6 Aug 2021 // 08:30 UTC 26

  On Call That Friday feeling is upon us again after a week of dealing with IT issues and dodging the gimlet gaze of the boss. Hopefully yours didn't involve some impromptu debugging in production. Welcome to On Call.

  Today are pleased to salute the return of Who, Me? contributor Susan, who previously regaled us with a tale from two decades ago.

  Susan's latest anecdote takes place in the months before Christmas 2001 when she found herself suddenly bereft of work. She had been enjoying the lucrative life of a Visual Basic 6 and SQL Server contractor before her employer of four years abruptly went bust, putting her dreams of a lavish festive holiday in the Scottish Highlands at risk.

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• AI to be bigger than IaaS and PaaS combined by 2025

  $500bn a year to be spent on electro-brain and supporting tech vs $400bn on cloud infrastructure
  Simon Sharwood, APAC Editor Fri 6 Aug 2021 // 07:28 UTC 3

  Analyst firm IDC has predicted that by the year 2025 more money will be spent on artificial intelligence software and services than on infrastructure-as-a-service and platforms-as-a-service.

  The firm on Wednesday published details of its Worldwide Semi-annual Artificial Intelligence Tracker, which predicted global spending of $341.8 billion this year – representing 15.2 per cent year-over-year growth.

  Growth will accelerate to 18.8 per cent in 2022, leading IDC to predict the market is on track to pass $500 billion annual spend by 2024.

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• South Korea to test grenade-launching drones

  Back on terra firma, ransomware rampage sees elevated security threat levels and giveaways to SMBs
  Laura Dobberstein Fri 6 Aug 2021 // 06:30 UTC 19

  South Korea has this week announced two new weapons: grenade-launching drones for its military, and anti-ransomware software for businesses.

  The nation's Defense Acquisition Program Administration (DAPA) has revealed that in 2022 South Korea will test grenade-launching drones that can be remotely controlled over a range of two kilometres, carrying gunpowder-filled 40mm shells. The operator uses optical and thermal imaging cameras and a laser range finder to shoot up to six consecutive shots, with two seconds between firing. A two-axis gimbal and a recoil absorber stabilize the equipment after firing.

  A second drone – a small modular affair – weighs less than two kilograms and is intended for monitoring and reconnaissance. Operators can attach specialized kit – like optical and thermal imaging cameras, speakers, searchlight and laser rangefinders – depending on the purpose of the mission.

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• Microsoft wonders if disabling just-in-time compilation of JavaScript improves browser security

  Edge is getting a 'Super Duper Security Mode' to test the idea. Yes, that is the actual name
  Simon Sharwood, APAC Editor Fri 6 Aug 2021 // 05:30 UTC 13

  Microsoft is conducting an experiment it hopes will improve browser security – by making its Edge offering worse at running JavaScript

  As explained in a post by Johnathan Norman, the vulnerability research lead for Microsoft Edge, JavaScript is the juiciest target when trying to crack a browser – because engines like Google's V8 and the just-in-time compilation (JIT) techniques they employ use "a remarkably complex process that very few people understand" and have "a small margin for error" in the way they handles code.

  We live with that because the likes of V8 mean JavaScript zips along very nicely when used with JIT, making all sorts of in-browser fun possible.

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• America enlists Big Tech to help it develop and execute cyber security plans

  Players in ‘Joint Cyber Defense Collaborative’ include Microsoft, AWS, and Google
  Simon Sharwood, APAC Editor Fri 6 Aug 2021 // 03:15 UTC 5

  The United States' Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) has announced the "standup" of a body called the "Joint Cyber Defense Collaborative" (JCDC) that it hopes will spark ideas for new and improved national responses against electronic threats.

  The aim of the effort is to get the private sector working alongside government agencies, so they can develop and implement better cyber security plans than are currently in operation. It's also hoped the group will help "to unify defensive actions should an incident occur".

  The organisation has therefore been given four jobs – namely:

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• US proposes tracking digital cash and taxing it to pay for, you know, roads and stuff

  Uncle Sam wants digital asset brokers to log customer info but didn't clarify who counts as a broker or not
  Katyanna Quach Fri 6 Aug 2021 // 00:50 UTC 7

  US senators revised a section of the bipartisan infrastructure bill on Thursday to ensure cryptocurrency miners, hardware vendors, and software developers are exempt from collecting user data required to report taxes.

  Congress is stepping up its efforts to prevent crypto investors evade their taxes whenever they buy or sell Bitcoin and the like. The new legislation focuses on “brokers,” requiring everyone involved in handling digital financial transactions to record the payer and payee’s names, addresses, and other forms of data logged in the 1099 tax forms for the Internal Revenue Service.

  But the definition of who is a broker or not was too broad, according to experts. Now, the bill has been altered to make it clear that cryptocurrency miners, blockchain engineers, or vendors selling hardware to run hashing algorithms to mint digital coins are exempt from the new rules. They will not have to collect personal data of everyone using their services or chips.

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• US 'dropped the ball' on security by going it alone claims Huawei US CSO

  Where there's a will, there's Huawei
  Thomas Claburn in San Francisco Fri 6 Aug 2021 // 00:13 UTC 12

  Andy Purdy, CSO for Huawei USA, believes the US needs to be more active in the development of global security standards rather than being aloof.

  "The US has fundamentally dropped the ball when it comes to participation in global security standards," Purdy told The Register. "We need really strong standards and the US should be a major player."

  Instead of working with China and other technologically sophisticated nations, the US under the Trump administration took a confrontational stance. Huawei, a China-based global telecom conglomerate, suffered during this period and the mistrust laid bare during those years lingers.

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