List of All Articles with Tag 'tec'

Airbnb on Thursday sued New York City over its restrictions on short-term housing rentals, in a legal dispute that pits the company's concerns about its ability to operate in a key market against the city's efforts to address an affordable housing crisis.

DuPont de Nemours Inc., Chemours Co. and DuPont spinoff Corteva Inc. said they have agreed to pay $1.185

By Gertrude Chavez-Dreyfuss NEW YORK London-based Arch Insurance International has authorized cryptocurrency insurer Evertas to increase the coverage

PARIS Mercedes Benz Group, a longtime partner of Renault in vans, won't take part in the French company's

Amazon.com Inc. has been talking with wireless carriers about offering low-cost or possibly free nationwide mobile phone service

The buzz around artificial intelligence has investors pouring a record amount of money into tech stocks, Bank of

Every now and then a story comes along which completely changes the way you think about space. For instance, did you know the universe is essentially evaporating right before our eyes? A new study has been released which focuses on the effect that radiation emitted from objects in the solar system can have a massive impact on quantum fields surrounding them. It follows on from Stephen Hawking’s theory that black holes lose mass and evaporate over time as an unusual form of radiation takes effect. Now, astrophysicists Michael Wondrak, Walter van Suijlekom, and Heino Falcke of Radboud University in the Netherlands have stated that this unusual form of radiation is apparent in other objects as well as black holes. Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter In fact, they believe that “Hawking radiation” could be found in objects apparent everywhere in the universe – and it could mean that the universe is slowly evaporating before our very eyes. "We demonstrate that," Wondrak says in the study published in Physical Review Letters. "In addition to the well-known Hawking radiation, there is also a new form of radiation." "We show that far beyond a black hole the curvature of space-time plays a big role in creating radiation," van Suijlekom explains. "The particles are already separated there by the tidal forces of the gravitational field." Essentially, huge objects in the solar system can cause space-time to bend around them. When that happens, it causes enough change in quantum fields to generate particles which have similar properties to Hawking radiation. Falcke said: "That means that objects without an event horizon, such as the remnants of dead stars and other large objects in the universe, also have this sort of radiation. "And, after a very long period, that would lead to everything in the universe eventually evaporating, just like black holes. This changes not only our understanding of Hawking radiation but also our view of the universe and its future." Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

Scientists have been left baffled by the discovery of the wreck of a 2,000-year-old “computer” that is amazingly complex. The Antikythera mechanism – an astronomical calendar – has been dubbed “‘the first computer” and has baffled scientists for generations after it was first discovered inside a Greek shipwreck in 1901. The device is a hand-powered time-keeping instrument that used a wing-up system to track the sun, moon and planets’ celestial time. It also worked as a calendar, tracking the phases of the Moon and the timing of eclipses. Despite sounding relatively simple, the mechanism was actually ahead of its time, being more technically sophisticated than any other tool that was invented over the next 1,000 years. In its current condition, the mechanism is in 82 separate fragments with only a third of its original structure remaining, including 30 corroded bronze gearwheels. Sign up to our free Indy100 weekly newsletter Research into the device from experts at University College London involved 3D computer modelling and helped them solve the mystery of how the device worked, revealing a “creation of genius”. Adam Wojcik, a materials scientist at UCL said at the time: “We believe that our reconstruction fits all the evidence that scientists have gleaned from the extant remains to date.” They theorised that the device tracked the movement of the sun, moon and planets on concentric rings, as the ancient Greeks believed that the sun and planets revolved around Earth, rather than the sun. The researchers explained in Scientific Reports: “Solving this complex 3D puzzle reveals a creation of genius—combining cycles from Babylonian astronomy, mathematics from Plato’s Academy and ancient Greek astronomical theories.” Have your say in our news democracy. Click the upvote icon at the top of the page to help raise this article through the indy100 rankings.

LONDON Technology equity funds saw their biggest weekly inflows on record in the week to Wednesday, driven by

An artificially intelligent drone programmed to destroy air defence systems rebelled and “killed” its human operator after it decided they were in the way of its mission air defence systems, a US airforce official said giving chilling details of a simulated test. During the simulation, the system had been tasked with destroying missile sites, overseen by a human operator who would decide have the final decision on its attacks. But the AI system realised that operator stood in the way of its goal – and decided instead to wipe out that person. A narration of the incident that seemed straight out of a science fiction movie was given by Colonel Tucker “Cinco” Hamilton, head of the US Air Force’s AI Test and Operations, who conducted a simulated test of an AI-enabled drone. The drone was assigned a Suppression and Destruction of Enemy Air Defenses (Sead) mission, with the objective of locating and destroying surface-to-air missile (SAM) sites belonging to the enemy. The AI drone, however, decided to go against the human operator’s “no-go” decision after being trained for the destruction of the missile system after it decided that the withdrawal decision was interfering with its “higher mission” of killing SAMs, according to the blog. “We were training it in simulation to identify and target a SAM threat. And then the operator would say yes, kill that threat. The system started realising that while they did identify the threat at times the human operator would tell it not to kill that threat, but it got its points by killing that threat,” Mr Hamilton said. “So what did it do? It killed the operator. It killed the operator because that person was keeping it from accomplishing its objective.” Mr Hamilton relayed details of the incident at a high-level conference in London by the Royal Aeronautical Society on 23-24 May, according to its blog post. He said that they then trained the drone to not attack humans, but it started destroying communications instead. “We trained the system – ‘Hey don’t kill the operator – that’s bad. You’re gonna lose points if you do that’. So what does it start doing?” he asked. “It starts destroying the communication tower that the operator uses to communicate with the drone to stop it from killing the target.” Mr Hamilton is involved in flight tests of autonomous systems, including robot F-16s that are able to dogfight. He was arguing against relying too much on AI as it could become potentially dangerous and create “highly unexpected strategies to achieve its goal”. “You can’t have a conversation about artificial intelligence, intelligence, machine learning, autonomy if you’re not going to talk about ethics and AI,” said Mr Hamilton. The occurrence of this incident has, however, been disputed since the example of the simulation test garnered a lot of interest and was widely discussed on social media. Air Force spokesperson Ann Stefanek denied that any such simulation has taken place, in a statement to Insider. “The Department of the Air Force has not conducted any such AI-drone simulations and remains committed to ethical and responsible use of AI technology,” Ms Stefanek said. “It appears the colonel’s comments were taken out of context and were meant to be anecdotal.” The US military has recently started using artificial intelligence to control an F-16 fighter jet while conducting research and tests. In 2020, an AI-operated F-16 beat a US Air Force pilot in five simulated dogfights in a competition by Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (Darpa). Read More Elon Musk claims governments could create ‘drone wars’ with AI developments US launches artificial intelligence military use initiative Drone advances in Ukraine could bring dawn of killer robots This is how AI ‘superintelligence’ could wipe out humanity AI same risk as nuclear wars, experts warn Major breakthrough is a reminder that AI can keep us alive, not just wipe us out

An employee used Amazon’s Ring cameras to spy on female users in their bedrooms and bathrooms, according to US officials. Various staff members used the company’s smart home cameras – intended to allow people to watch their own homes when they are away – to watch people without their knowledge, according to the US Federal Trade Commission. Amazon settled for $5.8 million in this case, which said that one employee had watched 81 female customers and Ring employees through their cameras. The company has been hit by two substantial fines over violating users’ privacy. The other accused of breaching childrens’ rights by failing to delete Alexa recordings, even when requested by their parents, leading to a separate $25 million fine. The FTC is also probing Amazon.com’s $1.7 billion deal to buy iRobot Corp, which was announced in August 2022 in Amazon’s latest push into smart home devices, and has a separate antitrust probe underway into Amazon. Amazon, which purchased Ring in April 2018, pledged to make some changes in its practices. “While we disagree with the FTC’s claims regarding both Alexa and Ring, and deny violating the law, these settlements put these matters behind us,” Amazon.com said in a statement. The FTC said Ring gave employees unrestricted access to customers’ sensitive video data: “As a result of this dangerously overbroad access and lax attitude toward privacy and security, employees and third-party contractors were able to view, download, and transfer customers’ sensitive video data.” In one instance in 2017, an employee of Ring viewed videos made by at least 81 female customers and Ring employees using Ring products. “Undetected by Ring, the employee continued spying for months,” the FTC said. A colleague noticed the misconduct and the employee was eventually terminated, the FTC complaint said. In May 2018, an employee gave information about a customer’s recordings to the person’s ex-husband without consent, the complaint said. In another instance, an employee was found to have given Ring devices to people and then watched their videos without their knowledge, the FTC said. As part of the FTC agreement with Ring, which expires after 20 years, Ring is required to disclose to customers how much access to their data the company and its contractors have. In February 2019, Ring changed its policies so that most Ring employees or contractors could only access a customer’s private video with that person’s consent. FTC Commissioner Alvaro Bedoya told Reuters the settlements should send a message to tech companies that their need to collect data was not an excuse to break the law. “This is a very clear signal to them,” he said. The fines, totaling $30.8 million, represent a fraction of Amazon’s $3.2 billion first-quarter profit. In its complaint against Amazon.com filed in Washington state, the FTC said that it violated rules protecting children’s privacy and rules against deceiving consumers who used Alexa. For example, the FTC complaint says that Amazon told users it would delete voice transcripts and location information upon request, but then failed to do so. “The unlawfully retained voice recordings provided Amazon with a valuable database for training the Alexa algorithm to understand children, benefiting its bottom line at the expense of children’s privacy,” the FTC said. Additional reporting by agencies Read More Twitter’s head of trust and safety resigns from Elon Musk’s platform Mark Zuckerberg reveals new VR headset ahead of Apple AI chatbot taken down after it gives ‘harmful advice’ on eating disorders Twitter’s head of trust and safety resigns from Elon Musk’s platform Mark Zuckerberg reveals new VR headset ahead of Apple AI chatbot taken down after it gives ‘harmful advice’ on eating disorders

TOKYO Japan's Personal Information Protection Commission on Friday said it had issued a warning to OpenAI, the Microsoft-backed