Computer Security Team to Report Hacking Into
Defibrillator-Pacemaker
New York Times (03/12/08) P. C4; Feder, Barnaby J.
Computer security researchers say they were able to gain wireless access
to a combination heart defibrillator and pacemaker in a lab. The
researchers were able to reprogram the device, and to cause it to deliver
jolts of electricity that would potentially be fatal if the device was in a
person. The researchers were also able to obtain personal patient data by
monitoring signals from the tiny wireless radio that was embedded in the
implant as a way to enable doctors to monitor and adjust it without
surgery. However, the researchers say that people with implanted
defibrillators or pacemakers are not at risk yet since the experiment
required more than $30,000 worth of lab equipment and a sustained effort by
a team of specialists from the University of Washington and the University
of Massachusetts to interpret the data. Additionally, the device the
researchers tested was placed within two inches of the test gear. The
researchers say the test results suggest that too little attention is being
paid to security for the increasing number of medical implants equipped
with communication abilities. "The risks to patients now are very low, but
I worry that they could increase in the future," says University of
Washington lead researcher Tadayoshi Kohno.
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20th World Computer Congress
Italian Computer Association (03/12/08)
The Italian Computer Association (AICA) will organize the 20th IFIP World
Computer Congress from Sept. 7-10 in Milan, Italy. An innovative program
accommodates a record number of 13 technical and 17 industry conferences
with cross-links and presentations on national experiences and best
practices. Globalization in the Digital Scenario will be the subject of
the opening session. Hosted conferences include Women and Technology,
e-Inclusion, and the AICA's 46th National Congress. Industry conferences
at WCC 2008 will include e-Government, Web 2.0, Smart Grids, Intelligent
Building, Service Science, and ICT for Innovation in Finance. Technical
conferences include Distributed and Parallel Embedded Systems, Human
Computer Interaction, IFIP Artificial Intelligence 2008, 23rd IFIP
International Information Security Conference, Knowledge Management in
Action, Biologically Inspired Cooperative Computing, 1st IFIP Entertainment
Computing Symposium, Open Source Systems 2008, and the 5th IFIP
International Conference on Theoretical Computer Science. WCC 2008 will
also offer a topical session on Computer-Aided Innovation. AICA is
determined to make this event one of the best ever and extends a cordial
invitation to ACM members to join the international ICT community at the
Congress. For more information and to register, go to
www.wcc2008.org.
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Military Networks Increasingly Are Under Attack
Wall Street Journal (03/12/08) P. A7; Dreazen, Yochi J.
Gen. Kevin Chilton, the top U.S. commander in charge of cyberspace, said
the nation's military networks are being targeted by an increasing number
of attacks. Chilton said there is evidence that links China to many of the
incidents, though he did not formally accuse the Chinese government of
involvement. A recent Pentagon report said that China was expanding its
military power into cyberspace, which angered the Chinese. Although the
People's Liberation Army repeatedly denies being behind the hacker attacks,
the U.S. government has linked China to several cyber attacks, including
the hacking of a Pentagon email system used by the Secretary of Defense's
office. A 2007 Government Accountability Office report warned that the
nation's infrastructure, including water-treatment and power plans, are at
risk of being targeted by a cyber threat. Chilton said the military is
concerned that the increasing number of "mining" attempts could just be the
beginning of a growing cyber threat. He said hackers could eventually
attempt to knock out classified networks or slow down the nation's
government, media, and financial Web sites. "You don't shut the system
down completely, but you slow it down," Clinton says. "I would consider
that an attack."
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Study: Digital Universe and Its Impact Bigger Than We
Thought
Computerworld (03/11/08) Mearian, Lucas
In three years' time there will be a tenfold increase in the 180 exabytes
of electronic data created and stored in 2006, according to a white paper
from IDC. The report estimates that electronic receptacles for that data
are expanding 50 percent faster than the data itself, and that information
will be stored in over 20 quadrillion containers by 2011, producing a
massive management conundrum for consumers as well as businesses. The bulk
of the data consists of digital "shadows" such as surveillance photos, Web
search histories, financial transaction journals, mailing lists, and so on.
IDC chief research officer John F. Gantz says that a great deal of the
data being created by consumers outside of enterprises will require
enterprise protection, as 85 percent of that information sooner or later
goes through a corporate asset. IDC acknowledges an underestimation of
earlier digital figures for 2007, noting that the actual data total--281
exabytes--is 10 percent greater than it had projected earlier in its first
"Digital Universe" study, owing to more rapid growth in digital cameras,
televisions, and data, and improved comprehension of data replication. IT
organizations will need to accommodate the digital universe's rapidly
increasing size and sophistication by transforming their existing
relationships with business units; driving the development of
organization-wide policies for information governance such as security and
retention of information, data access, and compliance; and expediting new
tools and standards into the organization, from storage optimization,
unstructured data search, and database analytics to virtualization and
management and security tools.
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U.S. Tech Companies Add Five Workers for Each H-1B Visa
They Seek
InformationWeek (03/10/08) McGee, Marianne Kolbasuk
For each H-1B visa position request, U.S. technology companies increased
their employment by an average of five workers, reveals a new National
Foundation of American Policy (NFAP) report. NFAP, a non-profit,
non-partisan research organization, examined all H-1B Labor Condition
Applications (LCA) submitted by S&P 500 technology companies to the U.S.
Department of Labor between 2001 and 2005. The researchers used a
"regression model that controls both general market conditions and firm
size" to analyze the association between the number of positions required
in H-1B LCA documents and the percentage of total employment. The analysis
found that S&P 500 technology companies with more than 5,000 employees
added an average of five workers for every H-1B position requested, and
companies with fewer than 5,000 employees increased employment by 7.5 works
for each H-1B position requested. "At the minimum, this shows that H-1Bs
are complementary to other U.S. workers being hired, not displacing them,"
says NFAP executive director Stuart Anderson. NFAP did not examine the
types of jobs that companies added, or the pay for those positions.
Anderson also says the research did not conclude that companies added to
their employment because they were saving money by hiring H-1B workers.
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NSA Shifts to E-Mail, Web, Data-Mining Dragnet
CNet (03/11/08) McCullagh, Declan
The National Security Agency may be engaging in the widespread monitoring
of email, text messages, Web browsing, and other forms of electronic
data-mining, without court supervision, according to an article in the Wall
Street Journal. Meanwhile, documents released by a security consultant
indicate that an unnamed major wireless provider has given the government
access to its network, allowing customers' email, text messaging, and Web
use to be monitored. Last week, assistant attorney general for National
Security Kenneth Wainstein said that the surveillance of email was the real
concern raised by the debate over amending the Foreign Intelligence
Surveillance Act. Taken together, the reports indicate that the NSA is
developing a data-mining operation similar to the much-criticized Total
Information Awareness program, writes Declan McCullagh. The NSA says it
abides by U.S. law, and principal deputy director of national intelligence
Donald Kerr blames the critical reports on the NSA's culture of
"stand-offishness."
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Is There Really an IT Labor Shortage?
Baseline (03/05/08) Chickowski, Ericka
IT industry executives and analysts say that skilled IT professionals are
in short supply, yet a number of economists, academics, and industry
experts counter that there is no hard evidence to support this assertion.
Duke University professor Vivek Wadwha says that "this whole concept of
shortages ... shows a lack of understanding of the labor pool in the USA."
His most recent research backs his conclusion that skilled IT workers are
plentiful in the United States, and studies by RAND Corporation, the Urban
Institute, and Stanford University confirm Wadwha's findings. Rochester
Institute of Technology professor Ron Hira says the most cogent proof that
there is no IT worker shortfall is the fact that IT salaries have not
significantly spiked in years, while the Urban Institute's Hal Salzman says
the gap between employers' perception of a worker shortage and employees'
views of a contracting job market partly stems from impractical
expectations from IT industry leaders. A paper that Salzman and Georgetown
University's Lindsay Lowell prepared for the Urban Institute last fall
estimates that general science technology engineering and math (STEM)
enrollment at U.S. universities overtook the annual net increase of jobs
each year by at least a factor of two. Meanwhile, the paper says that up
to two-fifths of IT workers completely lack a STEM degree and learned the
technology on the job, thus widening the pool of qualified workers.
Salzman attributes a decline in enrollment for IT-related degrees to flat
wages that lessen the financial incentive to pursue IT careers, but he says
this is not an indication that there are insufficient graduates to fill IT
positions. Wadwha and others believe there is an abundance of experienced
IT workers who are unemployed or underemployed because of ageism or because
they dropped out of IT due to a lack of work following a downturn.
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Bringing Second Life to Life: Researchers Create
Character With Reasoning Abilities of a Child
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute (03/10/08) Cleveland, Amber
Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute researchers are engineering virtual
characters with belief systems and the ability to reason based on the
beliefs of others. The researchers say that the engineered characters will
be able to predict and manipulate the behavior of human characters. At a
recent conference on artificial intelligence, they unveiled a Second Life
character named Eddie that has the reasoning abilities of a 4-year-old
child. "Current avatars in massively multiplayer online worlds--such as
Second Life--are directly tethered to a user's keystrokes and only give the
illusion of mentality," says Selmer Bringsjord, lead researcher and head of
Rensselaer's Cognitive Science Department. "Truly convincing autonomous
synthetic characters must possess memories; believe things, want things,
remember things." Engineering these virtual characters requires combining
logic-based artificial intelligence and computational cognitive modeling
techniques with supercomputer processing power, Bringsjord says. The goal
is to build artificial agents that are able to ascribe the mental states of
other agents, making the virtual characters more interesting and useful.
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Cyber Preparedness Symposium Leaves Unanswered
Questions
Dark Reading (03/07/08) Wilson, Tim
At the recent National Symposium on Unifying Cyber Preparedness Efforts,
industry leaders and academic researchers agreed that better collaboration
is needed to prepare for cybersecurity threats, but they couldn't agree on
how to work together or even on what the threats are. The half-day
discussion wavered between defending against attacks on the nation's
government and infrastructure to resolving specific consumer PC
vulnerabilities. Capitol College organized the symposium to discuss how
government industry, critical infrastructure providers, Congress, and
academia can cooperate to build a cross-disciplinary effort to prepare for
and fight cyber threats. "We're simply stalled, as a nation, when it comes
to cyber security," says Capitol College's Vic Maconachy, former head of
the National Security Agency's information assurance training program. "We
can no longer wait for somebody to take the lead." Maconachy urged
government, industry, and academia to pledge to get involved in the cyber
security effort, and to identify, coordinate, and combine the "silos of
excellence" in cybersecurity.
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Web of Entities: Prepare to 'Okkamise'!
ICT Results (03/06/08)
European researchers are developing the Okkam project, semantic Web-based
technology designed to make it easier to publish, link, and find
information using a "Web of entities." Objects in Okkam can include
"entities" such as people, locations, organizations, and events, as well as
documents, says Trento University's Paolo Bouquet, an Okkam team member.
The core Okkam infrastructure will store and provide access to "global
identifiers," which can be used by anyone across formats and applications.
"One of the biggest risks we face is people thinking the identifiers are a
controlling device, a 'Big Brother' scenario," Bouquet says. He says the
information users gather "is the bare minimum to improve Web searches. So
you can quickly discern, for example, whether 'Paris' is the capital of
France or a bistro in Boston, and whether it's a Web-page or an obscure
mention in a Voltaire manuscript." He says large companies will be able to
quickly and accurately benchmark new products of processes against
competitors or run internal knowledge management tasks. Corporate partners
are testing how Okkam can help manage information on their public Web
portals, while other Okkam partners are defining the authoring environment
for scholarly and news content. Bouquet expects to have a base of about 1
million entities by the end of 2008, with the goal of adding a million more
each year through the life of the project.
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Saving Energy in Data Centers
Technology Review (03/11/08) Naone, Erica
Microsoft Research's Networked Embedded Computing group is working to make
data centers more energy efficient in two ways. First, new algorithms make
it possible to lighten the work load for servers and put them in sleep
mode. Then sensors are used to identify which servers would be the best to
shut down based on the environmental conditions in different parts of the
server room. Microsoft researchers says eliminating hot spots and
minimizing the number of active servers could reduce data center energy
consumption by 30 percent. The Web-enabled sensors monitor both heat and
humidity and can be networked and used with Web services. Microsoft's Feng
Zhao says he envisions the sensors, which are still just prototypes, as a
new type of scientific instrument that could be used in a variety of
projects. Meanwhile, the algorithms, which distribute the load to free up
servers during off-peak times so they can go into sleep mode, are designed
for connection servers, which are used with services users may log into for
several hours. The long sessions require complex planning to avoid
disconnecting users and other service problems. The researchers have
developed two algorithms, one that predicts how many servers will be needed
hours ahead of time, and one that distributes traffic according to those
predictions and shuts down relatively empty servers.
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Microsoft Researches User Interface for the
Illiterate
Computerworld (03/07/08) Gaudin, Sharon
Scientists in Microsoft Research's laboratory in Bangalore, India,
displayed a prototype of a user interface for the illiterate last week
during Microsoft's seventh annual TechFest. For people who are unable to
read, write, and interact with computers, "a textual interface where they
have to read and write just is not useful," says laboratory managing
director P. Anandan. "You can show a lot more in a picture." A new
interface would have to rely on better icons, Anandan says. He says iconic
images might mean different things to people in different countries,
different cultures, and even in different towns. But Anandan also believes
the creation of richer and more meaningful icons will ultimately improve
more traditional interfaces as well. Microsoft has been developing a user
interface for illiterate users since 2005, but has no plans to include the
technology in a product anytime soon.
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The Microchips That Could Heat Your Home
New Scientist (03/08/08) Graham-Row, Duncan
IBM engineers in Switzerland have developed a cooling system that uses
waste heat from computer chips to heat homes. IBM wants to recapture the
wasted heat from corporate data centers and use it to heat nearby homes and
offices. Computer circuits are normally cooled by blowing cold air over
them. Bruno Michel, an engineer specializing in thermal research at IBM's
Zurich lab, says because water conducts heat 4,000 times better than air,
switching to a water-cooled system would make it easier to recover waste
heat. IBM's home heating system uses a "microfluidic" heat sink made from
a network of water-carrying microchannels drilled into silicon on top of
the chip. Water is pumped into the silicon, where it absorbs the heat and
is pumped to a heat exchanger where the heat can be used for residential
heating. For the most efficient heat transfer, a thin layer of water has
to flow as close to the chip's electronics as possible, get as hot as
possible, and remove the heat quickly. Michel says the current prototype,
if integrated into the processor and memory chips used in servers, would be
able to recover as much as three-quarters of the energy computers use,
enabling a medium-sized data center that consumes 1 megawatt of electricity
to heat about 70 homes.
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Coming Soon: Nothing Between You and Your Machine
New York Times (03/09/08) P. BU4; Markoff, John
The concept of direct human/computer interaction is being furthered by the
convergence of more powerful and affordable computer hardware and a younger
generation of software designers who "come from a world of fluid media, and
... multitask at an extraordinary level," says former Yahoo executive Joy
Mountford. For example, the Cooliris startup's PicLens software plug-in
for Web browsers allows online images, video, and other digital media to be
explored directly without navigating Web pages through the elimination of
the browser frame and the establishment of a 3D space resembling an
infinite corridor of images. "People should think of a computer interface
less as a tool and more as a extension of themselves or as extension of
their mind," says Cooliris CTO Austin Shoemaker. Meanwhile, multitouch
displays have been realized by researchers at the consulting firm Applied
Minds and New York University's Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences,
who created a "touch table" world map that allows images to be manipulated
by direct tactile contact. Not only is new hardware fueling the switch to
more immersive displays, but so is a surge in more powerful programming
tools that offer sophisticated visual effects. In addition, a new
generation of consumer-oriented wireless handsets is being equipped to
employ voice commands as an interface tool. "The old paradigm is breaking
down," says Palm software director Paul Mercer. "It used to be that you
needed to be a visionary and technologist like Michelangelo, but we're
turning that corner."
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Purdue Leads Center to Simulate Behavior of
Micro-Electromechanical Systems
Purdue University News (03/07/08) Venere, Emil; Fiorini, Phillip
Purdue University has launched the Center for Prediction of Reliability,
Integrity and Survivability of Microsystems (PRISM) as part of a new
collaborative effort with the University of New Mexico and the University
of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign to research the behavior and reliability of
miniature switches. About 35 researchers, including faculty members,
software professionals, and students will be involved in PRISM, which is
backed by a five-year, $17 million agreement from the National Nuclear
Security Administration. Mechanical engineering professor Jayathi Y.
Murthy will serve as the director of the new center, which will advance the
emerging field of "predictive science," or using computational simulations
to predict the behavior of complex systems. PRISM is one five new centers
that will develop advanced science and engineering models and software for
simulations that predict the reliability and durability of
microelectromechanical systems. PRISM researchers will develop miniature
switches, or MEMS devices, to replace conventional switches and other
electronic components. MEMS, which combine electronic and mechanical
components on a microscopic scale, are far lighter and smaller than
conventional technology. MEMS can also be manufactured in large quantities
at low costs. The simulations will make it possible to accurately predict
how MEMS devices will stand up to the rigors of varying and extreme
environments, and what their lifespan will be in the field.
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IBM, Hitachi to Research Near-Atomic-Scale Chip
Characteristics
EDN (03/10/08) Mutschler, Ann Steffora
IBM and Hitachi have launched a two-year agreement to pursue semiconductor
metrology research. They believe their initiative will spur further
investigation into next-generation semiconductor technology, which will be
needed as the industry continues to strive for ways to improve the
performance of computer chips. "Hitachi's cutting-edge semiconductor
characterization capabilities and IBM's state-of-the-art CMOS research
capabilities can help the two companies accelerate the pace of
semiconductor innovation for the 32-nanometer generation and beyond," says
Bernie Meyerson, CTO for IBM's systems and technology group. "By combining
individual research strength and intellectual property we reduce the
significant costs associated with research needed to advance the next
generation of chip technology." The joint research will take place at
IBM's Thomas J. Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, N.Y., and at
the College of Nanoscale Science and Engineering's Albany NanoTech
Complex.
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The Digital Home: An All-In-One Device
Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft (02/26/08) Rose, Matthias
Fraunhofer researchers are working on wirelessly connecting electronic
devices for broadcasting and entertainment on home networks. Their
project, Wireless Media and Control at Home (WiMAC(at)home), is designed to
simplify home electronics by connecting HDTVs, DVD recorders, MP3 players,
surround sound systems, and computers together on one network. The system
centers on a specially-designed TV that can store music, videos, and
photos. Broadcast television can also be distributed in a protected
environment in compliance with copyright regulations. The TV can be
connected to automated home systems such as heating appliances, alarm
systems, and air conditioning, enabling users to control their environment
through the TV. All WiMAC devices configure themselves automatically, and
new components can be incorporated through Universal Plug and Play
technology. The system is based on specification from the Digital Living
Network Alliance, a global collaboration between computer and consumer
electronics manufacturers who have established standards for home
networking. WiMAC(at)home also automatically plays the music or video in
whatever room the user is in, switching rooms as the user moves about the
house. The user is tracked through a WLAN-enabled device such as a smart
phone.
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Out of the Blue
Seed (03/03/08) Lehrer, Jonah
The Blue Brain project at Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne is an
initiative to precisely replicate an actual brain's neuronal activity with
a supercomputer composed of thousands of microchips and capable of 22.8
trillion operations per second. Blue Brain is overseen by EPFL
neuroscientist Henry Markram, who is hopeful that the conceptual models the
project yields will give birth to an entirely new category of neuroscience
that integrates all the data the field has accumulated over the decades.
The project's feasibility phase, in which the supercomputer accurately
simulated a neocortical column, is concluding, and the next phase will
involve scaling it up so that an entire brain can be modeled. "Once we can
model a brain, we should be able to model what every brain makes," Markram
theorizes. "We should be able to experience the experiences of another
mind." A key challenge of the project was the simulation of ion channels,
and the Blue Brain team genetically engineers Chinese hamster ovary cells
to express a particular type of channel, and then subjects the cells to
various physiological conditions. A robot is utilized to record neuronal
activity and generate hundreds of data points daily, which are programmed
into the supercomputer to aid simulation. The virtual neocortical column
modeled by Blue Brain was stimulated by simulated electrical impulses,
which triggered interactions that accurately mirrored actual neural
activity. The researchers then refined the software to boost its level of
realism. Markram speculates that precisely simulating a human brain would
require an astronomical volume of processing capacity that would consume a
vast quantity of power, but he is confident that a single machine will be
able to model a complete human brain in 10 years or less if computing
speeds and energy efficiency continue to improve at their current rate.
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