davejenkins (Slashdot reader #99,111) has come a long way from his days working at Red Hat. He's now the VP of Digital Technology at Iterate.AI, which makes a low-code platform for building production-ready AI applications. And this week he shared an unusual announcement with Slashdot. "We've developed an AI that uses computer vision to recognize guns, rifles, knives, robber masks and tactical vests.

"We want to help the community, so we've made an open-source version of this free (as in beer and speech) for schools and religious organizations. The code is on Github. We welcome deployments, refinements, and feedback!"

More details from the company here: Rather than selling the software and the design, Iterate.ai open-sourced its work, giving the technology away for free to non-profit groups and schools. "We believe that school tax dollars should go to buying computers and supplies (items needed every day) rather than paying for threat detection software which is unlikely to be needed — but potentially lifesaving in the event of an armed intruder situation," said Jon Nordmark, CEO, Iterate.ai.

The system was built by Iterate.ai's AI team, half of whom were part of Apple's Secret Products Group that invented the first iPhone. The team trained the model on more than 20,000 intrusion and armed robbery videos, and brought in a former DEA agent to assist with live tests. The software runs on NVIDIA GPUs and instantly detects dozens of gun types, Kevlar vests, balaclavas, and knives. The system's automatic detection capabilities prompt an instant reaction, even before a human sees a threat indicator.

"The power and potential for AI to improve our world — especially when it comes to lifesaving protections that make schools and other locations safe from physical threats — is too important to restrict within expensive or proprietary confines," said Brian Sathianathan, CTO of Iterate.ai. "We're immensely proud of the weapons detection and threat awareness technology we've created, and to share it as a free and open source technology for schools and nonprofits to achieve greater security and safety."
Read more about their tool in USA Today

Google is shutting down Duplex on the Web, its AI-powered set of services that navigated sites to simplify the process of ordering food, purchasing movie tickets and more. From a report: According to a note on a Google support page, Google on the Web and any automation features enabled by it will no longer be supported as of this month. Google introduced Duplex on the Web, an outgrowth of its call-automating Duplex technology, during its 2019 Google I/O developer conference. To start, it was focused on a couple of narrow use cases, including opening a movie theater chain's website to fill out all of the necessary information on a user's behalf -- pausing to prompt for choices like seats. But Duplex on the Web later expanded to passwords, helping users automatically change passwords exposed in a data breach, as well as assisted checkout for ecommerce retailers, flight check-in for airline sites and automatic discount finding. The promise of Duplex on the Web was that you'd be able to issue Google Assistant a command like "Book me a car from Hertz" and have Duplex pull up the relevant web page and automatically fill in details like your name, car preferences, trip dates, payment information (using information from Gmail and Chrome autofill), and more.

Tapping on images of traffic lights or deciphering squiggly text to prove you are human will soon be a much less common nuisance for iPhone users, as iOS 16 introduces support for bypassing CAPTCHAs in supported apps and websites. From a report: The handy new feature can be found in the Settings app under Apple ID > Password & Security > Automatic Verification. When enabled, Apple says iCloud will automatically and privately verify your device and Apple ID account in the background, eliminating the need for apps and websites to present you with a CAPTCHA verification prompt.

Mozilla will add a new security feature to Firefox in October that will make it harder for malicious web pages to initiate automatic downloads and plant malware-laced files on a user's computer. From a report: Called a drive-by download, this type of attack has been around for two decades and usually takes place when users visit a website that contains malicious code placed there by an attacker. The role of the malicious code is to abuse legitimate features in browsers and web standards to initiate an automatic file download or download prompt, in the hopes of tricking the user into running a malicious file. There are multiple forms of drive-by downloads, depending on the browser feature attackers decide to use. Browsers like Chrome, Firefox, and Internet Explorer have, across the years, gradually deployed various forms of protections against automatic drive-by downloads, but 100% protection can't be fully achieved because browser makers can't fully block legitimate web features and also because of the shifting landscape of web attacks, with attackers always finding a new hole to poke at.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Facebook, which has managed to transcend geographic borders to draw in a population equal to roughly a third of all human life on Earth, has made its final charter for a "Supreme Court" of Facebook public. The company pledges to launch this initiative by November of next year. The new Oversight Board will have five key powers, according to a charter (PDF) Facebook released yesterday. It can "request that Facebook provide information" it needs in a timely manner; it can make interpretations of Facebook standards and guidelines "in light of Facebook's articulated values"; and it can instruct the company to allow or remove content, to uphold or reverse a decision leading to content being permitted or removed, and to issue "prompt, written explanations of the board's decisions."

"If someone disagrees with a decision we've made, they can appeal to us first, and soon they will be able to further appeal this to the independent board," company CEO Mark Zuckerberg wrote in a letter (PDF). "As an independent organization, we hope it gives people confidence that their views will be heard and that Facebook doesn't have the ultimate power over their expression." The board will launch with at least 11 members and should eventually get up to 40. The entity will contract its services to Facebook. Participants will serve a maximum of three three-year terms each and will be paid for their time. Their decisions will "be made publicly available and archived in a database of case decisions," with details subject to certain data or privacy restrictions. Facebook can also contact the board for an "automatic and expedited review" in exceptional circumstances, "when content could result in urgent real world consequences," such as, for example, if a mass-murderer is livestreaming his crimes. The panel's decisions will be binding, Facebook added, and the company will implement its findings promptly, "unless implementation of a resolution could violate the law."

Roku-enabled TVs will be receiving a new OS update that will listen to what show or movie you're watching via your cable or satellite set-top or over-the-air antenna, in order to suggest internet-streaming content. "Compatible TVs will use automatic content recognition (ACR) technology to identify the content and then suggest additional viewing options available on via streaming services like Netflix, Hulu or Vudu," reports Variety. From the report: It may seem vaguely Big Brother-ish, but Roku is being careful about ensuring consumer privacy: Users will be required to enable the feature via an opt-in prompt. In addition, the "More Ways to Watch" feature can be turned off at any time (although Roku says viewing information collected prior to the feature being turned off will not be deleted). For now, the "More Ways to Watch" feature is available only in the U.S., and only for Roku-enabled television sets available from Best Buy's Insignia, Sharp, Hisense and TCL. It will be coming first to conventional HDTV models first, followed by support for 4K Roku TV models later this summer.

Facebook this year showed users a compilation of photos drawn from their own gallery of uploaded images, but the automatic nature of the collation and display of those photos inspired the need for an apology on Facebook's part to at least one reader who was upset by the compiled pictures. That may sound silly, but even innocent data-mashing can touch real nerves. "Eric Meyer, a web design consultant and writer, is one of those people. Earlier this year, he lost his daughter to brain cancer on her sixth birthday. For that reason, Meyer wrote in a blog post, he had actively avoided looking at previews of his own automatically generated summary post. But Facebook put a personalized prompt advertising the feature in his newsfeed, he wrote, prominently featuring the face of his dead daughter -- surrounded by what appears to be clip art figures having a party."

Last week you submitted questions for Dr. Herb Thompson, author of the latest Microsoft-sponsored Windows vs. Linux study. Here are his answers. Please feel free to ask follow-up questions. Dr. Thompson says he'll respond to as many as he can. He's registered a new Slashdot username, FFE4, specifically to participate in this discussion. All others claiming to be him are imposters. So read, post, ask, and enjoy.

Most of the questions we got for crypto guru Bruce Schneier earlier this week were pretty deep, and so are his answers. But even if you're not a crypto expert, you'll find them easy to understand, and many of Bruce's thoughts (especially on privacy and the increasing lack thereof) make interesting reading even for those of you who have no interest in crypto because you believe you have "nothing to hide." This is a *long and strong* Q&A session. Click Below to read it all.