Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence

The FTC and New York State reported that Google has agreed to pay a record $170 million penalty to settle accusations that YouTube broke the law when it knowingly tracked and sold ads targeted to children.  In agreeing to pay this fine, Google is essentially admitting that YouTube collected user info from kids in violation Continue Reading →

It has been just a week since my essay, Deepfakes 2.0: The Sequel Is Even Scarier. Now, Bloomberg is reporting about Zao, a next-generation deepfake facial replacement tool (a la FaceApp) that is taking China by storm (details below). When you see the results of this “anyone can do it at the tap of a Continue Reading →

Whether it’s because of schadenfreude, morbid curiosity, or simple human nature, the journalistic trope “If it bleeds, it leads” never disappoints. And because anyone who creates content – which is now everyone – is in a never-ending battle for everyone else’s attention, the enduring misalignment of incentives and outcomes raises the question: Whom can you trust? Continue Reading →

For about 200,000 years, we have relied on our eyes and ears to separate truth from lies and fact from fiction. Even if we ignore the rise of fake news, technology is on the verge of making it impossible to know if what we are seeing and hearing is real or fake. Here’s a roundup of what’s new, what’s next, and what you can expect in time for the 2020 election. Continue Reading →

Google Photos can now search for text in your images. That's great if you need help methodically curating your personal collection of early-American street sign photos. But when will Google add the feature to its image search? Of all the things Google does, image search may be the most in need of some "engineering love." Continue Reading →

Amazon says its Rekognition facial recognition software can now identify fear and seven other emotions including, happy, sad, angry, surprised, disgusted, calm and confused. What Amazon is not telling you is that facial recognition when combined with other data will be able, in short order, to take a pretty good guess about lying, cheating, jealousy, and other emotions that you do your best to hide with your "poker face." Lie detectors are so last century. Continue Reading →

At a dinner party the other night, a very accomplished business person told a story about how he and his wife were certain that their devices were listening to their conversations. “I was talking to my wife about a pair of designer shoes that she wanted to purchase, and not 10 minutes later while she was doing some online research for work, she saw an ad for that exact pair of shoes. She hadn’t searched for the shoes; the ad just appeared. Clearly, our computers or our phones are listening.” Some people nodded in agreement, and others began to chime in. Continue Reading →

Apple contractors are listening to snippets of private conversations though Siri. Should you worry? Shelly Palmer speaks with Sukanya Krishnan and Kerry Drew about it on Fox 5 New York's Good Day Wake Up. Original Airdate: July 30, 2019 Continue Reading →

On July 20, 1969, Neil Armstrong took “one small step for man, one giant leap for mankind,” becoming the first human being to walk on the moon. At the time, there were only two entities with the resources to accomplish a mission of this scale: America and its cold war rival, the Soviet Union. Today, there are more than 60 individuals who could write a check for their own space programs and the race is on! Continue Reading →

If Libra and Calibra are successful, Facebook will have control of information (Facebook, WhatsApp, and Instagram), weaponized information (a virtual military), and currency (Libra). I’m pretty sure that makes Facebook the largest government on earth. Continue Reading →