Communications of the ACM
The news archive provides access to past news stories from Communications of the ACM and other sources by date.
January 2015
From ACM News
New Rules in China pset Western Tech Companies
The Chinese government has adopted new regulations requiring companies that sell computer equipment to Chinese banks to turn over secret source code, submit to invasive audits and build so-called back doors into hardware and…
From ACM News
Shopping Habits Reveal Personal Details in 'anonymized' Data
Details about where and when you use your credit card could help reveal your identity to data thieves—even if they don't know your name, address and other personal information.
From ACM TechNews
Can Drones Hunt With Wolf Pack-Like Success? DARPA Thinks So
The U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency wants to enable groups of drones to operate collaboratively under the supervision of a single human commander.
From ACM TechNews
China Further Tightens Grip on the Internet
Chinese officials this week acted to block the functioning of several virtual private networks its citizens use to circumvent China's online censorship apparatus.
From ACM TechNews
Business Secretary Cable Announces Partners in the Alan Turing Institute
The U.K.'s Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council has selected five universities to lead the Alan Turing Institute.
From ACM TechNews
Qubits With Staying Power
Researchers say they have developed a new technique that could enable the indefinite extension of quantum-secured communication links.
From ACM TechNews
Csi Computer Science: Your Coding Style Can Give You Away
Researchers have developed a code stylometry using natural language processing and machine learning to determine the authors of source code based on coding style.
From ACM News
Gullies on Vesta Suggest Past Water-Mobilized Flows
Protoplanet Vesta, visited by NASA's Dawn spacecraft from 2011 to 2013, was once thought to be completely dry, incapable of retaining water because of the low temperatures and pressures at its surface.
From ACM News
Portable Mind-Reader Gives Voice to Locked-In People
You wake up in hospital unable to move, to speak, to twitch so much as an eyelid.
From ACM TechNews
Coder Creates Smallest Chess Game For Computers
French coder Olivier Poudade has created BootChess, which is only 487 bytes in size, and the code can run on Windows, Mac OS X, and Linux computers.
From ACM News
Will Nano Technology Soon Allow You to 'swallow the Doctor'?
Imagine a swarm of microscopic robots, so tiny that a teaspoon can hold billions of them.
From ACM News
The Technology that nmasks Your Hidden Emotion
Paul Ekman, perhaps the world's most famous face reader, fears he has created a monster.
From ACM Careers
Charles H. Townes, Who Paved Way For the Laser in Daily Life, Dies at 99
Charles H. Townes, a visionary physicist whose research led to the development of the laser, making it possible to play CDs, scan prices at the supermarket, measure time precisely, survey planets and galaxies, and even witness…
From ACM TechNews
Bitcoin Scams Steal at Least $11 Million in Virtual Deposits From nsuspecting Customers
Fraudulent schemes have scammed at least $11 million in Bitcoin deposits from unsuspecting cyber customers over the past four years, say researchers.
From ACM TechNews
What Does Privacy 'look' Like? Carnegie Mellon Project Seeks Drawings
Privacy Illustrated, a Carnegie Mellon University project, invited people to draw what privacy means to them and already has amassed hundreds of drawings.
From ACM TechNews
New Pathway to Valleytronics
The optical Stark effect can be used to control valley excitons in MX2 semiconductors, say researchers at the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.
From ACM TechNews
The Search Engine of the Future Will Be All-Seeing, All-Knowing 'watcher in the Sky'
Stefan Weitz, until recently senior director of search at Bing, observes the Internet has become much more massive since Google was conceived in the 1990s.
From ACM News
Top Technews Stories of 2014
ACM delivers the TechNews computer science and technology newsletter to nearly 100,000 ACM members three times each week.
From ACM Opinion
In the Future, Your Touchscreens Will Touch You Back
You comfort your grieving friend online over chat, but you can't reach out and touch their shoulder.
From ACM News
Laser Flight Path Caught On Camera For the First Time
Pew pew! Researchers have created the first video of a laser bouncing off a mirror.
From ACM Opinion
Netflix's Secret Special Algorithm Is a Human
On the opening night of this year's Sundance Film Festival, two films, as usual, had their premières, gaining maximum exposure to reporters and critics.
From ACM Opinion
AI Will Not Kill s, Says Microsoft Research Chief
Microsoft Research's chief has said he thinks artificial intelligence systems could achieve consciousness, but has played down the threat to human life.
From ACM News
Virtual Dissection Method Could Reinvigorate Zoology
Last summer, researchers demonstrated that non-invasive imaging combined with a staining technique enables the fast comparison and study of earthworm species and other animals in unprecedented detail.
From ACM TechNews
New Search Engine Lets sers Look For Relevant Results Faster
Researchers at the Helsinki Institute for Information Technology believe they have developed technology that will make Web searches more efficient.
From ACM TechNews
New Programming Language For Fast Simulations
SINTEF researchers have developed a new language for faster programming and simulations.
From ACM TechNews
More Students Earning STEM Degrees, Report Shows
The prevalence of science, technology, engineering, and mathematics degrees increased between 2004 and 2014 at the bachelor's, master's and doctoral levels.
From ACM TechNews
Mass Surveillance 'endangers Fundamental Human Rights,' Says Study
A leading European human rights body warns mass Internet surveillance is a threat to basic human privacy rights and has not apparently prevented terrorist attacks.
From ACM TechNews
A Machine Can Learn to Identify Sign Languages
A team of researchers is working to train a computer program to quickly identify the sign language of signers.
From ACM Careers
The App Economy Is Now 'bigger Than Hollywood'
What is the major cultural force in America right now? It might just be apps and the web.
From ACM TechNews
Ftc Says Internet-Connected Devices Pose Big Risks
Internet-connected devices present serious data security and privacy risks, according to a U.S. Federal Trade Commission report released this week.