Communications of the ACM
The news archive provides access to past news stories from Communications of the ACM and other sources by date.
June 2015
From ACM News
The Filter Bubble: Is It Real? Does It Matter?
What are the consequences of the same searches yielding different results for different people?
From ACM News
In Search For Alien Life, Experts Reveal Cutting-Edge Science
Where can scientists find clues to help them locate and understand life beyond Earth?
From ACM News
Mind-Controlled Telepresence Robots Could Restore Mobility to the Disabled
It may not be able to do grocery shopping or hang out laundry to dry, but a project involving current telepresence technology could help people with limited mobility get around in the form of a robotic avatar.
From ACM News
Should a Driverless Car Decide Who Lives or Dies?
The gearheads in Detroit, Tokyo, and Stuttgart have mostly figured out how to build driverless vehicles. Even the Google guys seem to have solved the riddle.
From ACM TechNews
Streamlined Cockroaches Inspire Highly Maneuverable Robots
University of California, Berkeley researchers are trying to emulate in robots the ability of cockroaches to roll and scoot through gaps.
From ACM TechNews
Morgan State niversity Professor Kevin Kornegay Is Leading New Internet of Things Initiative
Research conducted at Morgan State University promises to make devices that make up the Internet of Things safer.
From ACM TechNews
Army Computer Scientist Streamlines Network Science
Researchers have developed an experimental infrastructure to dynamically create, deploy, and manage virtual clusters of heterogeneous nodes within a cloud.
From ACM TechNews
c Santa Cruz Team Introduces New Web-Based Tools For Finding Videogames
GameNet and GameSage are two Web-based tools to help game players find new games suited to their individual tastes.
From ACM Opinion
What Is the Big Secret Surrounding Stingray Surveillance?
Given the amount of mobile phone traffic that cell phone towers transmit, it is no wonder law enforcement agencies target these devices as a rich source of data to aid their investigations.
From ACM News
How the .s. Finally Tracked Down a Hacker Kingpin
For the U.S., the extradition of Ercan Findikoglu shows the value of patience when it comes to pursuing suspected hacker kingpins.
From ACM News
Building the Face of a Criminal from Dna
The face of a killer constructed from DNA left at the scene of a crime: it sounds like science fiction. But revealing the face of a criminal based on their genes may be closer than we think.
From ACM News
Ai's Next Frontier: Machines That nderstand Language
With the help of neural networks—vast networks of machines that mimic the web of neurons in the human brain—Facebook can recognize your face.
From ACM News
See-and-Tell AI Machine Can Describe Objects It Observes
Young children can look at whatever is in front of them, and describe what they see—but for artificial intelligence systems, that's a daunting task.
From ACM TechNews
3D Vision: tsc Computer Scientists Develop Better Way to Visualize Molecules
University of Toronto Scarborough researchers say they have developed a new way to determine the actual shapes of biological molecules such as proteins and viruses.
From ACM TechNews
This Ancient Paper Art Makes Flexible, Super Strong Electronics
Teams of researchers are using Kirigami, the Japanese art of paper cutting, as inspiration for developing flexible and stretchable electronics.
From ACM TechNews
New Project Will Develop Virtual Reality Counterterror Training
An innovative VR training program could help prepare security personnel in Europe to respond to physical threats and cyberattacks on critical infrastructure.
From ACM TechNews
Programming Intelligent nderwater Robots
Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology are testing a new method of programming autonomous underwater vehicles.
From ACM TechNews
How to Read a Digital Footprint
Researchers think a database of psychological scores and social media data could be used to usher in a new era of psychological big data.
From ACM News
Intriguing Geology of Ceres Revealed in New Pictures
Ceres, the largest asteroid in the Solar System, is finally getting its close-up. NASA's Dawn spacecraft arrived in March, and is now taking photographs from as close as 4,400 kilometres above the asteroid's surface.
From ACM TechNews
Automated Vehicles: One Eye on the Road, Another on You
The importance of tracking motorist behavior will grow as more automated vehicles are rolled out, especially as it relates to the issue of assigning liability in accidents.
From ACM News
A Disaster Foretold — and Ignored
LOpht's warnings about the Internet drew notice, but little action.
From ACM News
Facebook Can Recognise You in Photos Even If You're Not Looking
Thanks to the latest advances in computer vision, we now have machines that can pick you out of a line-up. But what if your face is hidden from view?
From ACM News
Drones Lack Autonomy
Researchers and engineers are exploring ways to help Unmanned Aerial Vehicles choose to fly themselves, and to fly more safely.
From ACM News
'epic' Fail—how Opm Hackers Tapped the Mother Lode of Espionage Data
Government officials have been vague in their testimony about the data breaches—there was apparently more than one—at the Office of Personnel Management.
From ACM Opinion
Will Millimeter Waves Maximize 5g Wireless?
Every decade or so since the first cellular networks appeared the companies that make mobile devices and the networks linking them have worked out new requirements defining transmission speeds, capacity and other technical characteristics…
From ACM TechNews
The Real Software Security Problem Is S
There are simple steps that can be taken to make software more secure and resilient, writes Carnegie Mellon University professor Jean Yang.
From ACM TechNews
Network Model For Tracking Twitter Memes Sheds Light on Information Spreading in the Brain
Indiana University researchers are working with colleagues in Switzerland to track the spread of information across the human brain.
From ACM TechNews
Supercomputers Surprisingly Link Dna Crosses to Cancer
University of Texas at Austin researchers used supercomputers to discover a surprising link between cross-shaped pieces of DNA, or cruciforms, and human cancer.
From ACM News
Europe's First Humans: What Scientists Do and Don't Know
Over the past two years, breakthroughs in ancient genomics and archaeology have revolutionized the story of the first humans in Europe—who are thought to have appeared some 45,000 years ago—and their relationship with the Neanderthals…
From ACM News
Facebook's New AI Can Paint, But Google's Knows How to Party
Facebook and Google are building enormous neural networks—artificial brains—that can instantly recognize faces, cars, buildings, and other objects in digital photos. But that’s not all these brains can do.