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subjectSoftware
authorThe Washington Post
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An edited collection of advanced computing news from Communications of the ACM, ACM TechNews, other ACM resources, and news sites around the Web.


Can Alexa Help Solve a Murder? Police Think So—But Amazon Won't Give ­p Her Data.
From ACM News

Can Alexa Help Solve a Murder? Police Think So—But Amazon Won't Give ­p Her Data.

When police responded to a home in Bentonville, Ark., one Sunday morning last November, they discovered Victor Collins's dead body in the backyard.

Scientists Are Frantically Copying U.S. Climate Data, Fearing It Might Vanish Under Trump
From ACM Careers

Scientists Are Frantically Copying U.S. Climate Data, Fearing It Might Vanish Under Trump

Alarmed that decades of crucial climate measurements could vanish under a hostile Trump administration, scientists have begun a feverish attempt to copy reams of...

Pizzagate: From Rumor, to Hashtag, to Gunfire in D.c.
From ACM News

Pizzagate: From Rumor, to Hashtag, to Gunfire in D.c.

What was finally real was Edgar Welch, driving from North Carolina to Washington to rescue sexually abused children he believed were hidden in mysterious tunnels...

Why a Hacker Is Giving Away a Special Code That Turns Cars Into Self-Driving Machines
From ACM TechNews

Why a Hacker Is Giving Away a Special Code That Turns Cars Into Self-Driving Machines

The founder of startup Comma.ai has released a free software kit in an effort to accelerate autonomous vehicle technology without running afoul of regulators.

China's Plan to Organize Its Society Relies on 'big Data' to Rate Everyone
From ACM News

China's Plan to Organize Its Society Relies on 'big Data' to Rate Everyone

Imagine a world where an authoritarian government monitors everything you do, amasses huge amounts of data on almost every interaction you make, and awards you...

Nate Silver Blew It When He Missed Trump. Now He Really Needs to Get It Right.
From ACM Opinion

Nate Silver Blew It When He Missed Trump. Now He Really Needs to Get It Right.

Nate Silver is on the downtown 1 train. Possibly because he looks like a (modestly) hip math teacher, and hardly looks up from his phone, he goes unrecognized until...

The FCC Just Passed Sweeping New Rules to Protect Your Online Privacy
From ACM News

The FCC Just Passed Sweeping New Rules to Protect Your Online Privacy

Federal officials delivered a landmark ruling in favor of online privacy Thursday, limiting how Internet providers use and sell customer data, while asserting that...

China Has Now Eclipsed US in AI Research
From ACM News

China Has Now Eclipsed US in AI Research

Humanity may still be years if not decades away from producing sentient artificial intelligence.

Why Apple Can Be Forced to Turn Logs of Your Imessage Contacts Over to Police
From ACM News

Why Apple Can Be Forced to Turn Logs of Your Imessage Contacts Over to Police

When a user sends someone a message through Apple's iMessage feature, Apple encrypts that message between Apple devices so that only the sender and recipient can...

Confused About Those Emergency Cellphone Alerts? Here's How They Work.
From ACM News

Confused About Those Emergency Cellphone Alerts? Here's How They Work.

Many New York-area commuters on Monday were interrupted by this alert on their cellphones: "WANTED: Ahmad Khan Rahami, 28-yr-old male. See media for pic. Call 9...

The Science of Smartphone Batteries and How to Keep Them Charged
From ACM News

The Science of Smartphone Batteries and How to Keep Them Charged

Whenever a new iPhone gets announced, there's one feature that every Apple lover is hoping for: improved battery life.

The Bizarre World of Bitcoin 'mining' Finds a New Home in Tibet
From ACM News

The Bizarre World of Bitcoin 'mining' Finds a New Home in Tibet

Inside a metal shed in the Tibetan highlands of western China, thousands of microprocessors flank narrow corridors, generating a constant hum and stifling waves...

Who Would Win the Coding Olympics?
From ACM TechNews

Who Would Win the Coding Olympics?

U.S. programmers landed in 28th place in a HackerRank compilation of the results of 1.4 million coding challenges by approximately 300,000 developers.

Here's How Russian Hackers Could Actually Tip an American Election
From ACM Opinion

Here's How Russian Hackers Could Actually Tip an American Election

Reports this week of Russian intrusions into U.S. election systems have startled many voters, but computer experts are not surprised.

98 Personal Data Points that Facebook ­ses to Target Ads to You
From ACM News

98 Personal Data Points that Facebook ­ses to Target Ads to You

Say you're scrolling through your Facebook Newsfeed and you encounter an ad so eerily well-suited, it seems someone has possibly read your brain.

Putting a Computer in Your Brain Is No Longer Science Fiction
From ACM News

Putting a Computer in Your Brain Is No Longer Science Fiction

Like many in Silicon Valley, technology entrepreneur Bryan Johnson sees a future in which intelligent machines can do things like drive cars on their own and anticipate...

Tim Cook: Running Apple 'is Sort of a Lonely Job'
From ACM Opinion

Tim Cook: Running Apple 'is Sort of a Lonely Job'

On a sleek white coffee table in Apple CEO Tim Cook's fourth-floor office in late July, beneath framed posters of Robert F. Kennedy, the Rev. Martin Luther King...

Microsoft's President Explains the Company's Quiet Legal War For ­ser Privacy
From ACM Opinion

Microsoft's President Explains the Company's Quiet Legal War For ­ser Privacy

Apple's legal battle over encryption dominated headlines earlier this year, but another tech giant is fighting a quieter legal war over user privacy: Microsoft....

How Artificial Intelligence Could Help Warn ­S of Another Dallas
From ACM News

How Artificial Intelligence Could Help Warn ­S of Another Dallas

As the country reels from the spasm of gun violence that killed two black men and five police officers this week, a prominent digital vigilante is using an online...

Putin Signs New Anti-Terror Law in Russia. Edward Snowden Is ­pset.
From ACM News

Putin Signs New Anti-Terror Law in Russia. Edward Snowden Is ­pset.

Russian President Vladimir Putin on Thursday signed into law a controversial package of counterterrorism measures, including tougher sentences for extremism and...
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