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
What is Cyberwar?
At its core, cyberwarfare refers the use of digital attacks by one country or nation to disrupt the computer systems of another with the aim of create significant...
From ACM Opinion
For Safety's Sake, We Must Slow Innovation in Internet-Connected Things
Smart gadgets are everywhere.
From ACM Opinion
Google Chrome's Biggest Challenge at Age 10 Might Just Be Its Own Success
Exactly 10 years ago Tuesday, a newly promoted vice president named Sundar Pichai stood before a group of tech reporters in a conference room at Google's Mountain...
From ACM Opinion
Fake America Great Again
Guess what? I just got hold of some embarrassing video footage of Texas senator Ted Cruz singing and gyrating to Tina Turner. His political enemies will have great...
From ACM Opinion
Forgotten Heroes of the Enigma Story
Alan Turing's crucial unscrambling of German messages in the Second World War was a tour de force of codebreaking.
From ACM Opinion
Are We Ready for the Future of Warfare?
Warfare has always been about exerting political will.
From ACM Opinion
3-D Printed Gun Blueprints Are Back, and Only New Laws Can Stop Them
Attorneys general from 20 states celebrated on Monday when a district court judge in Seattle extended an injunction against the sharing of 3-D printed gun blueprints...
From ACM News
Here's What We Know about Google's Mysterious Search Engine
President Trump thinks Google's search engine is "rigged." By featuring more mainstream news outlets and relatively fewer conservative sites in the results he sees...
From ACM Opinion
Detecting 'DeepFake' Videos in the Blink of an Eye
A new form of misinformation is poised to spread through online communities as the 2018 midterm election campaigns heat up. Called "deepfakes" after the pseudonymous...
From ACM Opinion
The Four Ways that Ex-Internet Idealists Explain Where It All Went Wrong
A long time ago, in the bad old days of the 2000s, debates about the Internet were dominated by two great tribes: the Optimists and the Pessimists.
From ACM Opinion
Why the Future of Data Storage is (Still) Magnetic Tape
It should come as no surprise that recent advances in big-data analytics and artificial intelligence have created strong incentives for enterprises to amass information...
From ACM Opinion
Future Elections May Be Swayed by Intelligent, Weaponized Chatbots
The battle against propaganda bots is an arm's race for our democracy. It's one we may be about to lose.
From ACM Opinion
Welcome to the Age of Privacy Nihilism
A barista gets burned at work, buys first-aid cream at Target, and later that day sees a Facebook ad for the same product.
From ACM Opinion
I Just Hacked a State Election. I'm 17. And I'm Not Even a Very Good Hacker.
It took me around 10 minutes to crash the upcoming midterm elections.
From ACM Opinion
Who Needs Democracy When You Have Data?
In 1955, science fiction writer Isaac Asimov published a short story about an experiment in "electronic democracy," in which a single citizen, selected to represent...
From ACM Opinion
Are Blockchains the Answer for Secure Elections? Probably Not
With the U.S. heading into a pivotal midterm election, little progress has been made on ensuring the integrity of voting systems—a concern that retook the spotlight...
From ACM Opinion
Honoring the '80s, Def Con's Badge Is also a Text Adventure
Nearly 30,000 people came to Las Vegas last week for the 26th edition of DEF CON, the iconic security conference. And no small amount of the mental energy of that...
From ACM Opinion
Hackers Are Out to Jeopardize Your Vote
Russian hackers targeted US electoral systems during the 2016 presidential election.
From ACM Opinion
To Win the AI Race, We Need More Humans
The United States is trying to develop a national strategy on artificial intelligence (AI) but is ignoring its single greatest advantage: many of the world's brightest...
From ACM Opinion