Communications of the ACM
The news archive provides access to past news stories from Communications of the ACM and other sources by date.
February 2010
From ACM TechNews
Smokey Bear Now Studies Computer Science
Innovative computer mapping tools and airborne imaging technology are being used by researchers with access to supercomputers to predict wildfire behavior. By simulating past fires and hypothetical future fires, the researchers…
From ACM TechNews
'Rugged' Initiative Brings Secure Software Development to the Masses
The Rugged Software Development Initiative (RSDI) was recently launched by security experts in an effort to ensure that the software writing process considers security from the very start. RSDI will encourage developers to create…
From ICT Results
When Cars Go to Driving School
Posh cars already learn how you like your seat and steering wheel adjusted. The next generation of cars may be smart enough to learn how you drive and warn you when you're not driving safely.
From ACM News
Stanford's Robotic Audi to Brave Pikes Peak Without a Driver
A team of researchers at the Center for Automotive Research at Stanford (CARS) has filled the trunk of an Audi TTS with computers and GPS receivers, transforming it into a vehicle that drives itself. This September, the car will…
From ACM TechNews
Google to Enlist Nsa to Help It Ward Off Cyberattacks
Google and the U.S. National Security Agency (NSA) are collaborating to fortify defenses against future cyberattacks. NSA will assist Google in studying an assault that allegedly originated in China and targeted Google's computer…
From ACM TechNews
Brewing p Java Skills For the Knowledge Economy
University College Dublin's School of Computer Science and Informatics will offer a second round of Java courses to companies that do not have the time and money to train their own employees.
From ACM TechNews
The Dozens of Computers That Make Modern Cars Go (and Stop)
Modern cars and trucks contain as many 100 million lines of computer code, more than in some jet fighters. "It would be easy to say the modern car is a computer on wheels, but it's more like 30 or more computers on wheels,"…
From ACM TechNews
Code Defends Against 'stealthy' Computer Worms
Pennsylvania State University researchers have developed an algorithm that defends against the spread of local scanning worms that search for hosts in "local" spaces within networks or subnetworks.
From ACM TechNews
Darpa's New Plans: Crowdsource Intel, Edit Dna
The U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency's (DARPA's) future plans call for crowdsourcing military intelligence, creating an immune system for Defense Department networks, and conducting research that could lead to editing…
From ACM TechNews
Indo-German Center on Computer Science Opened at Iit, Delhi
The Indian government and the Max Planck Society have formally unveiled a new center in Delhi that will serve as a hub for collaboration between computer scientists from India and Germany.
From ACM TechNews
Madly Mapping the niverse
Researchers at Berkeley Lab's National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center are designing computational tools to create maps of the cosmic microwave background.
From ACM TechNews
Interactive Board Games Will Come to Life
Queen's University researchers have built the prototype of an interactive board game that enables users to touch tiles together or "pour" the contents of a tile onto another to make virtual villages rise up from the ground or…
From ACM News
.s. Scientists Given Access to Cloud Computing
The National Science Foundation and the Microsoft Corporation have agreed to offer American scientific researchers free access to the company’s new cloud computing service.
A goal of the three-year project is to give scientists…From ACM News
Seven CS Researchers Selected For Recovery Act Early Career Funds
Seven computer science researchers supported by the U.S. Department of Energy's Office of Advanced Scientific Computing Research (ASCR) are among 69 scientists who will share $85 million in funding under the American Recovery…
From ACM News
.s. House Passes Bill to Bolster Cybersecurity
The U.S. House of Representatives on Thursday (February 4) overwhelmingly approved a bill aimed at protecting the Internet and vulnerable computer networks by funding cybersecurity research and training. The legislation was approved…
From ACM News
De-Worming Software More Effective at Detecting Infected Network Computers Before Contagion Can Spread
More than a year after being launched by hackers on a campaign to infect computers running Microsoft Windows, the Conficker worm's effects are still being felt. England's Greater Manchester Police department, for example, has…
From ACM News
Tech Spending Bounces Back as Profits Rise
Business spending on technology goods and services is returning as the economy mends, pumping new life into suppliers such as Cisco Systems Inc., though it has been slower to reach other sectors.
The big maker of networking …From ACM News
Nasa and Gm Develop 'robonaut2' Robot
Engineers from NASA and General Motors have jointly developed what they tout as "the world's most dexterous robot" called "Robonaut2" to supplement human activity both in space and in the factory.
The robot, called "R2" for …From ACM TechNews
Data Defenders
University of California, Irvine researchers are developing new cybersecurity methods designed to thwart botnets and other types of cyberattacks.
From ACM TechNews
Researchers Develop Way to Catch Online Gaming Cheats
University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill researchers have developed a way to identify cheating in online games.
From ACM TechNews
MSU Pushing Robot Development
Michigan State University (MSU) researchers are developing robots that can climb walls, detect breast cancer and test protective clothing worn by soldiers.
From ACM News
Google to Enlist NSA to Help It Ward Off Cyberattacks
The world's largest Internet search company and the world's most powerful electronic surveillance organization are teaming up in the name of cybersecurity.
Under an agreement that is still being finalized, the National Security…From ACM News
Oak Ridge Fan Upgrade Improves Jaguar's Efficiency
A fan upgrade that will save Oak Ridge National Laboratory's computing complex $150,000 a year in energy costs is just the latest step by the laboratory to reduce its computing carbon footprint.
From ICT Results
Grid Computing For the Masses
Having helped scientists study the building blocks of the universe, peer inside the human body in miniscule detail and monitor climate change, grid computing could soon be put to more mundane uses by your home or office computer…
From ACM News
Police Want Backdoor to Web Users' Private Data
count likely knows that police can peek inside it if they have a paper search warrant.
But cybercrime investigators are frustrated by the speed of traditional methods of faxing, mailing, or emailing companies these documents…From ACM News
U.S. Cyberwar Strategy: The Pentagon Plans to Attack
The China-U.S. diplomatic spat over cyberattacks on Google has highlighted the growing significance of the Internet as a theater of combat.
Deputy Defense Secretary William Lynn recently warned of its appeal to foes who are…From ACM News
What's Inside the Ipad's Chip?
Despite widespread speculation, nothing beyond what Steve Jobs announced last week is known about the A4 chip at the heart of the Apple iPad.
Jobs described the chip with typical restraint during the unveiling of the iPad. "It's…From ACM TechNews
Nonlinear Thinker
Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor Pablo Parrilo has developed a set of techniques that makes it easier to understand nonlinear systems. Parrilo uses algorithms for analyzing nonlinear systems, which takes away…
From ACM TechNews
Obama Budget Boosts Science, Innovation
U.S. President Barack Obama has proposed spending $3.7 billion on science, technology, engineering, and math education in his 2011 budget, including increasing funding of K-12 education by nearly 40 percent from a year ago to…
From ACM TechNews
Mind-Control Mobile-Phone Games
Brain Maze is a mobile phone game developed by Lancaster University researchers that requires players to use their brain waves to move a marble around a course.