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Submission + - Are Flying Drones a Peeping Tom's Dream Tool? (ibtimes.co.uk)

Submitted by concertina226
concertina226 writes: Fears are growing that helicopter drones could be used to sexually harass women and take secret photographs of them.

This week, Andrea Mears, 23, was charged with assault and breach of the peace for attacking a drone hobbyist who was flying a quadracoptor over a Connecticut beach, according to NBC Connecticut. Meanwhile in Seattle, a resident wrote to the Capitol Hill Seattle community blog to report that a drone had flown into her back garden and hovered next to the third-floor window of her home.

The woman said that when her husband challenged the drone operator, who was standing on the street outside their home, he claimed to be conducting "research", and insisted that it was legal for him to fly his drone over their property.

While drone enthusiasts are up in arms and Haughwout might well be completely innocent, the fact remains that these small remote-controlled aircraft are able to fly almost silently in the air, and most of the time, we have no idea what they are being used for.

Submission + - Why the Turing Test is Not an Adequate Way to Calculate Artificial Intelligence (ibtimes.co.uk)

Submitted by concertina226
concertina226 writes: You may have heard that a supercomputer succeeded in passing the infamous Turing Test over the weekend at a Royal Society competition, but scientists say this is not really a milestone for artificial intelligence at all.

One of the founding fathers of modern computing, in 1950, wartime code breaker Alan Turing published a paper considering the question "Can machines think?" In the paper, Turing mentioned the word "test", and stated that he believed that by the year 2000, computers might be able to be programmed to imitate humans so well that they would be able to fool an "average interrogator" for five minutes.

"He [made] predictions about the size, memory and speed of computers that are surprisingly accurate, and he thought that by the year 2000, 30% [of people] would be unable to tell which was which," Aaron Sloman, a professor of artificial intelligence and cognitive science at University of Birmingham tells IBTimes UK.

"Now, he didn't say that this would prove that machines are intelligent. He said that many people have published arguments about [the fact that machines can't think], and he decided to knock down each one.

"He only set up the test to provide a framework for refuting those arguments. He called it the "imitation game" and lots of people started referring to it as a test, but if you read the paper, it's clear that he doesn't think that this can be sensibly provided."

Submission + - Forget Software Vulnerabilities, Hardware Security Must Improve Soon (ibtimes.co.uk)

Submitted by concertina226
concertina226 writes: While it may not be a big deal if a cybercriminal hacks your smart fridge to send spam, the potential risks associated with maliciously taking control of a pace maker or a car, are obvious to all.

To combat this problem, computer scientists from the University of California have devised a new way to detect security problems, by testing hardware and how it integrates with software. Using Gate-level Information Flow Tracking, a team of scientists from UC San Diego and UC Santa Barbara have invented a tool that can tag critical parts of a hardware's security system and then monitor how each part affects the system.

Currently, the security industry's focus on analysing software for potential security vulnerabilities is based on the assumption that the chip the software runs on is completely secure — when that is not always the case.

Hardware is made up of many interconnected blocks which share resources and perform complex interactions. At times, the way the hardware is designed can enable encrypted memory to be leaked, so it's crucial to look at how software and hardware interact.

Submission + - Take Your Phone Out of Your Pocket: Radiation Could Lower Your Sperm Count (ibtimes.co.uk)

Submitted by concertina226
concertina226 writes: A new study by the University of Exeter strongly suggests that keeping a smartphone in a trouser pocket can have a detrimental effect on male fertility.

Mobile phones emit electromagnetic radiation (EMR), a low-level radio frequency of between 800 to 2200 MHz which can be absorbed by the human body. While this level of radiation is considered safe for humans, several studies have found that the electromagnetic fields emitted from mobile phones can result in more headaches and affect resting blood pressure.

Led by Dr Fiona Mathews from the Biosciences department, a team of researchers analysed 1,492 samples from 10 studies, which featured participants from fertility clinics and research centres.

Submission + - What is Pepper and Why Do I Need a Personal Robot? (ibtimes.co.uk)

Submitted by concertina226
concertina226 writes: Japanese telecoms and technology company SoftBank has announced that it will start selling personal robots next year, making it the first major player in the world to move into this space.

The year 2014 has seen robotics and artificial intelligence coming to the forefront more than ever before. Last month, President Obama made international news when he played football with Honda's humanoid robot Asimo during a state visit to Japan, while a poll of 2,000 people in the UK found that Britons are most afraid of being replaced by artificial intelligence in the work place — but some would be willing to have sex with them.

Pepper is an autonomous, sophisticated humanoid robot made by Aldebaran Robotics, working together with Chinese manufacturer Foxconn and SoftBank since 2012.

Weighing 28kg, Pepper stands 1.2m tall and has two arms. It rolls around on a wheeled base and contains a lithium-ion battery that lasts 12 hours, as well as a 10.1-in tablet mounted on its chest and multiple audio, visual and tactile sensors.

Submission + - Lego to Launch First Female Scientist Minifigures to Meet Overwhelming Demand (ibtimes.co.uk)

Submitted by concertina226
concertina226 writes: Lego has confirmed that it will release a set of Minifigures featuring female scientists following overwhelming support from fans online.

The "Research Institute" set has been designed by real-life geochemist Dr Ellen Kooijman, a Lego fan from Stockholm, and will feature a female astronomer, a female palaeontologist and a female chemist when it is released later this summer.

Kooijman wrote on her blog that she had been building Lego for 10 years and had submitted her entry to the CUUSOO Lego Ideas platform, where fans can give suggestions to the Danish toy maker on sets they'd like to see.

Lego launched the CUUSOO crowdsourcing platform (now Lego Ideas) in Japan in 2008, and it was so successful that it was launched worldwide in 2011. The toymaker has credited crowdsourcing ideas with helping it stave off bankruptcy.

Submission + - 3D Bioprinting Regenerates Vincent van Gogh's Severed Ear from Relative's DNA (ibtimes.co.uk)

Submitted by concertina226
concertina226 writes: Artist Diemut Strebe has teamed up with scientists to create a living replica of post-impressionist painter Vincent van Gogh's severed ear using 3D printing and DNA from his great-great grandson.

Lieuwe van Gogh is the great-great-grandson of Vincent's brother Theo, and he shares a Y chromosome and 1/16 of the same genes with the famous painter.

Strebe and the scientists used Lieuwe's DNA samples, together with a sophisticated 3D bioprinter and computer software, to bioprint skin cells in a shape exactly resembling van Gogh's ear. The ear was then grown in the Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston.

Submission + - Game of Thrones: The Science Behind Skull-Crushing (ibtimes.co.uk)

Submitted by concertina226
concertina226 writes: Scientists, engineers and physicians are chiming in to debunk a controversial and very graphic scene in the latest Game of Thrones episode that aired two days ago. The big question is, can a man really manage to crush a human skull with just his hands?

To refresh you on physics, the calculation for force reads as:

force (newton, N) = mass (kilogram, kg) x acceleration (metre per second squared, m/s2)

According to research by Nasa into body strength and how the body's push forces are affected by zero gravity, an average adult male is capable of exerting about 90kg (200lb) or 1,000 Newtons of force in a static push, in standard gravity.

Submission + - Bugatti Launches Smart Toaster that Cooks Steak Using Semiconductors (ibtimes.co.uk)

Submitted by concertina226
concertina226 writes: If you're collecting smart appliances of the future and would like a new gadget to add to your smart fridge, vacuum cleaner and TV, then you might be interested in a smart toaster from Italy that can even cook meat.

Italian appliance maker Bugatti (no relation to the prestige French car manufacturer) has announced the Bugatti Noun, a new smart toaster featuring transparent glass ceramic slots and layers of semi-conductors, instead of the traditional metal slots and grills.

Bugatti took two years to perfect its patented FIR (Far Infrared technology), which enables bread, meat, seafood or vegetables to be cooked within the slots, as long as the items of food can fit into a heat-resistant bag.

Clemente Bugatti, managing director of Bugatti, told IBTimes UK that he was first inspired to build the toaster travelling on an airplane flight, when the pilot kindly showed him around the cockpit and explained to him how ceramic glass worked.

Submission + - Did Google Remove Vivint From Search Results For Being a Nest Competitor? (ibtimes.co.uk)

Submitted by concertina226
concertina226 writes: Been missing your dose of Silicon Valley gossip? Here's the latest drama – Vivint vs Google.

Yesterday, Utah-based home automation company Vivint, which is a competitor of Nest's smart thermostats, accused Google of deliberately removing it from search results for four months without telling it why.

Vivint's founder and CEO Todd Pedersen and VP of Innovation Jeremy Warren told Pando Daily that 16 days after Google acquired Nest, Vivint stopped appearing in Google search results completely.

It wasn't bumped down the results either – according to search specialists Foxtail Marketing, out of 3,300 possible search terms that would have shown Vivint in Google's search results, the company was only listed for three, meaning that it had all but disappeared from the web.

But while Google officially said not much to us, Google's head of webspam Matt Cutts popped up on YCominator's Hacker News social bookmarking website with a retort.

Submission + - Lyme Disease Bacteria Has Existed For 15 Million Years, Says Scientist (ibtimes.co.uk)

Submitted by concertina226
concertina226 writes: The scientist behind the idea for Jurassic Park has found proof that Lyme disease actually predates the entire human race.

Dr George Poinar Jr, a professor emeritus in the Department of Integrative Biology of the Oregon State University (OSU) College of Science, studied a 15-20 million-year-old piece of amber from the Dominican Republic.

Poinar is one of the world's leading experts on plant and animal life forms found preserved in amber, and it is he who popularised the idea of extracting DNA from insects in amber, which was adapted by Michael Crichton for the Jurassic Park book and films.

In the amber, he found the oldest ever fossilised evidence of ticks carrying Borrelia, a type of spirochete-like bacteria that causes Lyme disease.

The study, entitled "Spirochete-like cells in a Dominican amber Ambylomma tick (Arachnida: Ixodidae)" is published in the journal Historical Biology.

Submission + - Study: Stop Being So Cynical, You Could Give Yourself Dementia (ibtimes.co.uk)

Submitted by concertina226
concertina226 writes: Scientists from the University of Eastern Finland have found that people who have high levels of cynical distrust are three times as likely to suffer from dementia in later life, than those who have more faith in other people.

Their study is the first of its kind to look at the relationship between cynicism and dementia. Entitled: "Late-life cynical distrust, risk of incident dementia, and mortality in a population-based cohort", it is published in the latest issue of the journal Neurology.

Over a period of eight years, the researchers studied 1,499 people, who all had an average age of 71. The participants were given tests for dementia and a questionnaire to measure their level of cynicism, based on the Cook-Medley Scale.

Submission + - Iran Court Summons Mark Zuckerberg (securityweek.com)

Submitted by wiredmikey
wiredmikey writes: An Iranian judge has summoned Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg to answer allegations that his company's apps have breached people's privacy, it was reported Tuesday. The court in Fars province ordered that Zuckerberg address unspecified "violation of privacy" claims made by Iranians over the reach of Facebook-owned apps, ISNA news agency reported.

"Based on the judge's verdict, the Zionist manager of Facebook... should report to the prosecutor's office to defend himself and make compensation for damages," Rouhollah Momen-Nasab, a senior Iranian Internet security official, told ISNA.

Access to social networks, including Twitter and Facebook, are routinely blocked by Iranian authorities, as are other websites considered un-Islamic or detrimental to the regime.

Submission + - UK Piracy Crackdown Falls Short as Torrentz.eu Comes Back Online (ibtimes.co.uk)

Submitted by concertina226
concertina226 writes: Massive torrent search engine Torrentz.eu is once again accessible in the UK following a 24-hour ban, after the owners pointed out that its suspension was illegal.

Torrentz, which is the most popular search engine of its kind, was taken down when the site's Polish registrar Nazwa complied with a request from the UK's Police Intellectual Property Crime Unit (PIPCU) on Sunday and suspended the Torrentz.eu domain.

However on Monday a lawyer for the search engine contacted Nazwa and pointed out an ICANN ruling which stated a court order was needed to get a domain suspended.

The temporary removal of Torrentz.eu was part of a wider PIPCU operation over the weekend, which included the suspension of file-locker search engine FileCrop and sports streaming website Cricfree.tv on Saturday.

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