Welcome to the January 17, 2025 edition of ACM TechNews, providing timely information for computer professionals three times a week.

In observance of Martin Luther King Jr. Day/Indigenous Peoples' Day, TechNews will not be published on Monday, January 20. Publication will resume on Wednesday, January 22.

HEADLINES AT A GLANCE

• Biden Warns of "Tech Industrial Complex"
• BCI Helps Paralyzed Patients Feel Objects, Shapes
• Executive Order: New Standards for U.S. Cybersecurity
• New NATO Mission to Protect Undersea Cables in Baltic Region
• New U.S. Rules Restrict Flow of Advanced Chips to China
• Nearly All Americans Use AI; Most Dislike It
• U.S. Universities Offer 'Integrated Majors' to Boost Enrollments
• Robot Bees Break Pollination Records
• MD Gov. Moore Launches $1-Billion 'Capital of Quantum' Initiative
• Real-World 'Schrödinger's Cat' Brings Quantum Computing Breakthrough
• Tech Skills Driving the Biggest Salary Increases
• Apple Joins Consortium to Help Develop Next-Gen AI Datacenter Tech
• Robot Assists Astronauts Aboard China's Space Station

Biden Warns of "Tech Industrial Complex"

In his farewell address to the nation on Wednesday, President Biden warned of the "potential rise of a tech industrial complex," an allusion to Dwight Eisenhower's 1961 farewell warning of a "military-industrial complex." Americans "are being buried under an avalanche of misinformation and disinformation enabling the abuse of power," Biden said. He also referred to AI as the "most consequential technology of our time, perhaps of all time."
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BCI Helps Paralyzed Patients Feel Objects, Shapes

Two individuals with spinal cord injuries that left them unable to control their limbs manipulated a bionic arm to “feel” objects with the help of an implanted brain-computer interface (BCI). Researchers from the universities of Pittsburgh and Chicago and Northwestern University developed the implants that were inserted into the sensor and motor region of the patients' brains responsible for hand and arm movement. When asked to control a bionic arm, the patients reported feelings and sensations like edges and curves.
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Executive Order: New Standards for U.S. Cybersecurity

The Biden administration on Thursday announced an executive order on cybersecurity that imposes new standards for companies selling to the U.S. government and calls for greater disclosure from software providers. As part of the order, the U.S. General Services Administration will have to set policy requiring cloud providers to publish information for clients on how to operate securely. The order further directs the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology to develop guidance for handling software updates safely.
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New NATO Mission to Protect Undersea Cables in Baltic Region

The North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) is launching a new mission to protect undersea cables in the Baltic Sea region, following a string of incidents attributed to sabotage. The Baltic Sentry mission will include naval drones to provide “enhanced surveillance and deterrence," said NATO Secretary-General Mark Rutte. Rutte noted that more than 95% of Internet traffic is secured via undersea cables, and 1.3 million kilometers (808,000 miles) of cables enable an estimated $10 trillion worth of financial transactions daily.
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New U.S. Rules Restrict Flow of Advanced Chips to China

The U.S. on Wednesday unveiled regulations aimed at keeping advanced chips produced by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. and other producers from China. The latest measures call for chip producers to step up their scrutiny and due diligence of customers, especially Chinese firms. The curbs impose sanctions on 16 Chinese companies that are “acting at the behest of Beijing” to build their country’s chip industry, the Commerce Department said in a press release.
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Nearly All Americans Use AI; Most Dislike It

A Gallup-Telescope survey of 3,975 U.S. adults conducted Nov. 26-Dec. 4, 2024, found that of the approximately 99% of respondents who used at least one AI-enabled product in the prior week, close to 67% were unaware they were doing so. Gallup's Ellyn Maese said there is "a lot of confusion when it comes to what is just a computer program versus what is truly AI and intelligent."
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U.S. Universities Offer 'Integrated Majors' to Boost Enrollments

A consortium of 10 universities are considering offering "integrated majors," in which computer science is combined with another major, as part of an initiative headed by Northeastern University's Center for Inclusive Computing and funded by the National Science Foundation. Northwestern offers 270 combined majors across numerous disciplines, with 8,401 students enrolled. The goal is to get students not otherwise interested in computer science to enter the field, particularly students from under-represented demographics.
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Robot Bees Break Pollination Records

Robotic bees developed by Massachusetts Institute of Technology researchers can fly in swarms to pollinate crops. Improvements to previous versions of the robots enable them to hover for more than 1,000 seconds, or 100 times longer than before, and they can be equipped with small sensors or batteries to enable independent flight. The robots can roll and flip, trace precise paths, and fly at a top speed of 35 cm/s.
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MD Gov. Moore Launches $1-Billion 'Capital of Quantum' Initiative

Maryland Governor Wes Moore launched the "Capital of Quantum" Initiative at the University of Maryland (UMD) earlier this week. The initiative partners the State of Maryland, UMD, and private and federal entities to unlock more than $1 billion in investments over the next five years. “Quantum has the potential to transform every part of our economy and society," said Moore. “Together, we will make Maryland the quantum capital of the world."
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Real-World 'Schrödinger's Cat' Brings Quantum Computing Breakthrough

Researchers at Australia's University of New South Wales (UNSW) achieved a breakthrough in quantum computing by using the nuclear spin of an antimony atom to encode data. Because an antimony atom can store eight different values ("0" and "1," with six others in between), a single error would not be enough to interfere with the quantum encoding and flip "0" to "1." Likening it to the metaphor of Schrödinger's cat, UNSW's Xi Yu (pictured, second from the left) explained, "Our metaphorical 'cat' has seven lives; it would take seven consecutive errors to turn the '0' into a '1'!"
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Tech Skills Driving the Biggest Salary Increases

Dice's most recent tech salaries report lays out the skills that saw the biggest average salary increases during the past year. Natural language processing ranked first, with an average salary gain of 21% over last year’s levels. This was followed by AWS CodeWhisperer (16%), Amazon Redshift (15%), BigQuery (15%), COBOL (15%), Ruby (13%), AI (12%), Blockchain (12%), Oracle eBusiness (12%), and application delivery (11%). The report shows a nearly 18% premium for AI skills versus other tech roles.
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Apple Joins Consortium to Help Develop Next-Gen AI Datacenter Tech

Apple has joined the Ultra Accelerator Link Consortium, a group working to develop the UALink standard to connect AI accelerator chips, from GPUs to custom-designed chips, to accelerate the training, fine-tuning, and running of AI models. The first UALink products, based on AMD's Infinity Fabric and other open standards, are expected to be released in the next few years. Other consortium members include Intel, AMD, Google, AWS, Microsoft, Meta, Alibaba, and Synopsys.
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Robot Assists Astronauts Aboard China's Space Station

Astronauts on China's Tiangong space station are working with a robot, named Xiao Hang, to study human-robot interactions in microgravity. Using advanced software, the station’s crew are performing experiments to assess Xiao Hang's ability to navigate various situations and study how it moves alongside them within the space station. The goal is to have the robot undertake in-cabin inspections, resource management, and other functions so the astronauts can focus on more demanding and complex tasks.
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