Communications of the ACM
Innovation Is Overrated: A Provocation
Digital innovation is not working in the interest of the whole of society. It is time to radically rethink its purpose without…
From ACM Opinion
Is It Time To Stop Trusting Google?
Was Google's snooping on home Wi-Fi users the work of a rogue software engineer? Was it a deliberate corporate strategy? Was it simply an honest-to-goodness mistake...
From ACM News
Your Kinect Is Watching You
There is a wave of concern—completely justified, to my mind—over the privacy implications of our increasing reliance on Facebook and Google. What most people don’t...
From ACM Opinion
Occupy the Net!
What would George Orwell make of Facebook? Nothing really: His account would probably be deactivated by the company. If he were lucky, he would be told to produce...
From ACM News
Can Brain Research Keep S Safe?
Human conflict is often associated with the emergence of a new science or technology. The Civil War's Gatling gun changed battlefield tactics and led to modern...
From ACM Opinion
What Constitutes an Act of Cyberwar?
Before we get to that, there's a clue in the spelling of the word: cyberwar instead of cyber war. The U.S. Defense Department has determined that cyber is a fifth...
From ACM Opinion
Weiner's Law
The Web makes it easier than ever to cheat—and easier than ever for cheaters to get caught.
From ACM Opinion
Will Amazon's Recent Server Failures Slow the Rise of Cloud Computing?
Last Thursday morning around 5 a.m. eastern time, Amazon suffered a major data center outage. These sorts of outages happen now and then, but they seldom makewhy...
From ACM News
Every Day We Write the Book
What would happen if Facebook made its data available for research?
From ACM Opinion
Don't Stick It In: The Dangers of sb Drives
Talking to a computer security researcher about Stuxnet is like asking an art critic to describe the finer points of the Mona Lisa. The world's top cybersecurity...
From ACM Opinion
Facebook Knows Where You Are
The social network's new Places feature will make it more difficult to lie to your friends.
From ACM Opinion
Charging the Wikileaks Leaker with Treason Would Be Absurd
Should Pvt. Bradley Manning, the Army intelligence analyst charged with leaking troves of classified documents to WikiLeaks, be tried for treason? And what about...
From ACM Opinion
I'm Sorry, Dave, I'm Afraid I Can't Make a -Turn
When Toyota Prius owners take their cars to the dealer under the company's latest recall, they'll likely be out of the shop in about 30 minutes. Even though the...
From ACM Opinion