Communications of the ACM
The news archive provides access to past news stories from Communications of the ACM and other sources by date.
January 2013
From ACM TechNews
Pentagon to Boost Cybersecurity Force
The Pentagon has approved plans to expand its cybersecurity force more than fivefold to protect the U.S.'s critical computer systems and conduct offensive computer operations against foreign enemies.
From ACM Careers
Google Offers $3.14159 Million in Total Rewards For Chrome Os Hacking Contest
Google has never been stingy when it comes to paying for information about security vulnerabilities in products.
From ACM TechNews
The Job Market of 2045
Rice University professor Moshe Vardi predicts that by 2045 artificial intelligence machines will be able to perform a significant percentage of human work. "We seem to be blindly developing the technology without worrying about…
From ACM News
How Vegas Casinos Wage War on Cheating
"I think most people feel that if you can find a way to beat the casino, more power to you," says Arnold Synder, his eyes, those telltale features, hidden behind a pair of black sunglasses.
From ACM News
Intel's New Interface Idea Is a Mash-up of All the Others
At this year's Consumer Electronics Show, chipmaker Intel demoed its latest big idea: "perceptual computing."
From ACM TechNews
Liability Issues Create Potholes on the Road to Driverless Cars
Although widespread commercial use of driverless cars is still years away, Google and others are already testing the technology on roads and automakers have raised concerns about liability laws.
From ACM TechNews
Web Founder Berners-Lee: Share Info, Improve the World
Sharing information online has the potential to improve society worldwide, said World Wide Web founder Sir Tim Berners-Lee at the recent 2013 World Economic Forum.
From ACM TechNews
Ford's Open-Source Kit Brings Era of Smart Car Apps
Ford Motor Co. recently released OpenXC, an open source hardware and software toolkit that will allow the hacker community to experiment with the computer systems that run its cars.
From ACM TechNews
Swipe, Shake, CTRL Z? Web Spec Aims to End Input Overload
The World Wide Web Consortium recently published the draft of Indie UI, a specification aimed at making it easier for developers to build Web applications that can be controlled by different devices.
From ACM News
Google to sers: Here's How We Deal with Requests For Your Information
What happens if the local police, the FBI or any government agency asks Google for information about your Gmail or YouTube account?
From ACM News
Texas, Where Science and History Have Become Ideological Battlegrounds
Some of the most important decisions that influence the public's knowledge aren't made by scientific societies and they don't take place in Washington D.C.
From ACM Opinion
Ito: Think Twice About Immortality and the Singularity
Ray Kurzweil's vision of the "singularity"—when nanobots make humans immortal and computer progress is so fast that the future becomes profoundly unknowable—is a bad idea.
From ACM News
Will Smart Machines Create a World Without Work?
They seem right out of a Hollywood fantasy, and they are: Cars that drive themselves have appeared in movies like "I, Robot" and the television show "Knight Rider."
From ACM Careers
Ayasdi: Stanford Math Begets a Data Company
Like most of his peers, Gunnar Carlsson spends his time thinking about hairy, theoretical math problems.
From ACM TechNews
IBM Predicts Cognitive Systems as New Computing Wave
IBM expects cognitive computing systems to usher in a new era of computing by being capable of learning and adapting through their mimicry of human senses. Some of the technology to enable cognitive computing already exists,…
From ACM TechNews
An Explosion in Innovation
Innovation in eight emerging areas of science and technology is poised to skyrocket as the number of people online grows from 2 billion in 2010 to 5 billion by 2020, says X PRIZE Foundation CEO Peter Diamondis.
From ACM News
U.s. Homeland Chief: Cyber 9/11 Could Happen 'imminently'
Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano warned on Thursday that a major cyber attack is a looming threat and could have the same sort of impact as last year's Superstorm Sandy, which knocked out electricity in a large swathe…
From ACM TechNews
MIT Scientists Achieve Molecular Data Storage Breakthrough
MIT researchers have developed a method for storing data on individual molecules at room temperature, which could lead to a 1,000-fold improvement in storage density.
From ACM TechNews
Google Declares War on the Password
Google's Eric Grosse and Mayank Upadhyay have published a research paper that explores hardware-based alternatives to the traditional password.
From ACM Opinion
Neil Degrasse Tyson: Science Funding Can 'guarantee Your Economic Future'
Neil deGrasse Tyson came to Washington on Wednesday to deliver the science-specific version of President Barack Obama's second inaugural address.
From ACM Opinion
IBM Predicts Cognitive Systems As New Computing Wave
At year's end, IBM selects a new innovation that has the potential to change the world.
From ACM News
Goodbye Silicon, Hello Dna. The Future of Data Storage?
One night a few years ago, two biologists sat in a bar in Hamburg, discussing DNA.
From ACM TechNews
Isis Plays Key Role in Efforts to Revolutionize Military Manufacturing
Vanderbilt University's Institute for Software Integrated Systems (ISIS) is helping develop the engineering software used in the U.S. Marine Corps' competition to design a new amphibious infantry fighting vehicle.
From ACM TechNews
Robot Makers Spread Global Gospel of Automation
A book by two Massachusetts Institute of Technology economists argues that the pace of automation is accelerating and robotics development is taking away jobs from white-collar workers.
From ACM News
Google Report Reveals Continued Rise in .S. Government Requests for Data
Google has revealed the full scale of the U.S. government's use of controversial legislation that bypasses judicial approval to access the online information of private citizens.
From ACM TechNews
London School Wins National Code Breaking Challenge
Students from the City of London School have won Britain's National Cipher Challenge. More than 6,200 schoolchildren from 725 schools across the country participated in the event, breaking code of increasing complexity over…
From ACM TechNews
Disease Outbreaks Trackable With Twitter, Study Says
Health officials could get a head start on flu outbreaks from posts on Twitter that mention symptoms, according to new research.
From ACM Careers
Applying Search Engine Techniques to Physics Data, Yandex Partners p with Cern
The European Organization for Nuclear Research, or CERN, is perhaps best-known for two things: (probably) locating the elusive Higgs Boson, and being the birthplace of the Web.
From ACM News
Military Moves Closer to Truly Autonomous Drones
Imagine a flying machine equipped with bombs and missiles, navigating the skies stealthily without human control.
From ACM News
Nasa's Veteran Mars Rover Ready to Start 10th Year
NASA's Mars Exploration Rover Opportunity, one of the twin rovers that bounced to airbag-cushioned safe landings on Mars nine years ago this week, is currently examining veined rocks on the rim of an ancient crater.