Communications of the ACM
Generative AI Degrades Online Communities
How large language models are influencing online communities.
From ACM Opinion
Why the Html5 Standard Fight Matters
Today, EFF announced that it was making a formal objection to including consideration of digital rights management (DRM) in the First Public Working Draft from...
From ACM Opinion
Flame One Year Later
It's been a year since the first reports of the Flame malware surfaced, and looking back at the 12 months since then, it seems more and more each day that the discovery...
From ACM Opinion
Government Plan to Build 'back Doors' For Online Surveillance Could Create Dangerous Vulnerabilities
Recently, the FBI has been attacking the "going dark" problem—that is, its inability to read all electronic communications—from both legal and technological angles...
From Communications of the ACM
Access to the Internet Is a Human Right
Connecting Internet access with freedom of expression and creativity.
From Communications of the ACM
Cybercrime, Cyberweapons, Cyber Wars: Is There Too Much of It in the Air?
Where reality stops and perception begins.
From Communications of the ACM
Swamped By Automation
Whenever someone asks you to trust them, don't.
From Communications of the ACM
Thumb Numbers
Rules of thumb stated as numerical rules are enticing, but many are folk theorems that may not apply in your critical situation.
From Communications of the ACM
Learning from the Past to Face the Risks of Today
The Space Shuttle software program can provide guidance to today's projects.
From ACM Opinion
Will Giving the Internet Eyes and Ears Mean the End of Privacy?
The Internet has turned into a massive surveillance tool.
From ACM Opinion
Calea Ii: Risks of Wiretap Modifications to Endpoints
I join a group of twenty computer scientists in issuing a report criticizing an FBI plan to require makers of secure communication tools to redesign their systems...
From ACM Opinion
Should Patents Be Awarded to Software?
The goal of the U.S. patent system is clear: to provide individuals or companies with an incentive to innovate by offering them 20 years of exclusive rights to...
From ACM Opinion
At Google Conference, Cameras Even in the Bathroom
The future came crashing down on me this week at the Google I/O developer conference while I stood at a bathroom urinal.
From ACM Opinion
Strongbox and Aaron Swartz
Aaron Swartz was not yet a legend when, almost two years ago, I asked him to build an open-source, anonymous in-box.
From ACM Opinion
The Coming Political Battle Over Bitcoin
Given that Bitcoin first broke into mainstream attention when Gawker explained how to use it to buy drugs, perhaps the surprise is that it took federal regulators...
From ACM Opinion
Hear Ye, Future Deep Throats: This Is How to Leak to the Press
We now live in a world where public servants informing the public about government behavior or wrongdoing must practice the tradecraft of drug dealers and spies...
From ACM Opinion
4 Big Problems with Social Security Numbers
A Social Security number is like a skeleton key, able to unlock a kingdom of untold riches for identity thieves.
From ACM Opinion
What Is the Syrian Electronic Army Trying to Accomplish, Anyway?
In June 2011, just a few short months after protests first erupted in Syria, the country's president, Bashar Al-Assad, made a speech in which he thanked a group...
From ACM Opinion