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
My Thoughts Are My Password, Because My Brain Reactions Are nique
Your brain is an inexhaustible source of secure passwords—but you might not have to remember anything. Passwords and PINs with letters and numbers are relatively...
From ACM Opinion
How the Blockchain Could Break Big Tech's Hold on A.I.
Pairing artificial intelligence and the blockchain might be what you would expect from a scammer looking to make a quick buck in 2018.
From ACM Opinion
'This Is How Donald Trump Stays President for Four More Years'
Donald Trump often claims Facebook and Google are "rigged" to favor the political left. Now he's building a 2020 campaign infrastructure that can circumvent them...
From ACM Opinion
Paper and the Case for Going Low-Tech in the Voting Booth
In September 2017, barely two months before Virginians went to the polls to pick a new governor, the state's board of elections convened an emergency session. The...
From ACM Opinion
I Fell for Facebook Fake News. Here's Why Millions of You Did, Too.
The Facebook video is nuts, but I can't tear my eyes away. A plane, struggling in a huge storm, does a 360-degree flip before safely landing and letting out terrified...
From ACM Opinion
Brain Implants: Will They Be sed to Heal or for Control?
Would you trust a Manchurian Candidate or a Terminator to heal you? Shouldn't you automatically distrust anyone who has received a brain implant by the military...
From ACM Opinion
No, A.I. Won't Solve the Fake News Problem
In his testimony before Congress this year, Mark Zuckerberg, the chief executive of Facebook, addressed concerns about the strategically disseminated misinformation...
From ACM Opinion
Why the Search for Aliens Could nite s Here on Earth
If aliens are trying to talk to us (or even if they are not), Jill Tarter will be the one to find them.
From ACM Opinion
Blockchains Won't Fix Internet Voting Security, and Could Make It Worse
Looking to modernize voting practices, speed waiting times at the polls, increase voter turnout and generally make voting more convenient, many government officials—and...
From ACM Opinion
Evolution Is at Work in Computers as well as Life Sciences
Artificial intelligence research has a lot to learn from nature.
From ACM Opinion
There May Soon Be Three Internets. America's Won't Necessarily Be the Best.
In September, Eric Schmidt, the former Google chief executive and Alphabet chairman, said that in the next 10 to 15 years, the internet would most likely be split...
From ACM Opinion
You're Expecting Too Much Out of Boston Dynamics' Robots
At the WIRED25 festival in San Francisco Sunday evening, Boston Dynamics' SpotMini robot got onstage and did what no other quadruped robot has done before: It danced...
From ACM Opinion
Trolling, Hacking and the 2016 S Presidential Election
Late in 2016, then-US President Barack Obama mused in an interview with The New Yorker magazine that he had probably been elected because his campaign had begun...
From ACM Opinion
A Future Where Everything Becomes a Computer Is as Creepy as You Feared
More than 40 years ago, Bill Gates and Paul Allen founded Microsoft with a vision for putting a personal computer on every desk.
From ACM Opinion
Editing the Internet's Second Screen
The great social media cleanup of the past two years hasn't seemed to leave it much cleaner.
From ACM Opinion
How Do You Find an Alien Ocean? Margaret Kivelson Figured It Out
The data was like nothing Margaret Kivelson and her team of physicists ever expected.
From ACM Opinion
How Sci-Fi Like WarGames Led to Real Policy During the Reagan Administration
This year, John Badham's WarGames—one of the movies most beloved by hackers, techies, and tech policy wonks (like me!)—celebrates its 35th anniversary.
From ACM Opinion