Welcome to the March 7, 2022, edition of ACM TechNews, providing timely information for IT professionals three times a week.

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A bitcoin cryptocurrency exchange store in Kyiv. Ukraine Asked for Donations in Crypto. Then Things Got Weird.
The Washington Post
Nitasha Tiku; Jeremy B. Merrill
March 4, 2022


U.K. blockchain analytics firm Elliptic says Ukraine's government raised over $42 million in cryptocurrency in less than a week through crowdfunding. Kyiv-based crypto exchange Kuna.io says some donations have already been converted into traditional currency, mainly euros, and used to buy non-lethal equipment like drones and bulletproof vests. Western crypto advocates view this as an opportunity to test the argument that blockchain can advance open societies. They claim crypto has allowed Ukraine to raise money outside of governmental constraints or those of Silicon Valley technology platforms, while offering transparency on how contributions are spent. Skeptics are concerned such initiatives could encourage illegal activity, or could motivate authoritarian regimes to attempt similar efforts.

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Attackers Can Force Amazon Echos to Hack Themselves with Self-Issued Commands
Ars Technica
Dan Goodin
March 6, 2022


Researchers at the U.K.'s Royal Holloway University and Italy's University of Catania have authored a hack for hijacking Amazon Echo smart speakers and making them control other smart appliances, using the speaker to issue voice commands. They said the device will follow these commands, provided the speech contains the device wake word (typically "Alexa" or "Echo"), followed by a permissible command. Verbal confirmation of commands is easily bypassed by adding "yes" about six seconds after issuing the directive, while attackers also can exploit the full voice vulnerability, which enables Echos to make self-issued commands without temporarily reducing device volume. The Alexa vs. Alexa hack demands just a few seconds of proximity to a target device while it is activated, so an attacker can utter a verbal order to couple with an attacker's Bluetooth-enabled device.

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Start-up Avelo Airlines has started using autonomous sanitizing robots on its aircraft to stop the spread of COVID-19. Robots Will Sanitize Avelo Airlines Aircraft for COVID-19, Other Pathogens
Hartford Courant
Kenneth R. Gosselin
March 3, 2022


Houston, TX-based startup Avelo Airlines is using autonomous robots from Canadian manufacturer Aero HygenX to disinfect aircraft cabins for COVID-19 and other viruses. The airline deployed a RAY robot at Connecticut's Tweed-New Haven airport, where it uses ultraviolet-C light that Avelo's Jim Olson said "destroys 99.9% of all pathogens, including—but not limited to—COVID-19." Olson said a second RAY model is in operation at Avelo's West Coast base in Los Angeles, adding the devices also disinfect the aircraft's galleys, lavatories, flight decks, and terminal spaces at the end of each day. Avelo chairman Andrew Levy said, “RAY is safer, faster, more cost-effective and [a] more sustainable solution than the conventional chemical-based manual disinfection process used by most airlines.”

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A new machine learning technique can pinpoint potential power grid failures and cascading traffic bottlenecks in real time. Using AI to Find Anomalies Hiding in Massive Datasets
MIT News
Adam Zewe
February 25, 2022


A machine learning model developed by researchers at the MIT-IBM Watson AI Lab can identify anomalies in massive data streams automatically, in real time. The researchers used artificial intelligence (AI) to model the interconnectedness of the power grid to better detect glitches, without needing annotated data on power grid anomalies for training. This means the model could be applied in real-world situations where the availability of high-quality, labeled datasets is limited. The researchers indicated the model could be applied to other circumstances where a large number of interconnected sensors collect and report data. The framework was tested on power grid, traffic, and water system datasets that contained anomalies previously identified by humans, and outperformed the baselines by identifying a higher percentage of true anomalies in each dataset.

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Observing Time Crystals
University of Melbourne (Australia)
Stephan Rachel
March 3, 2022


Researchers at Australia's University of Melbourne observed a time crystal in action, with the help of quantum computing technology. Time crystals are a unique arrangement of particles in perpetual, repeating motion in both time and space. Researchers are studying the use of time crystals as the basis for a new memory device for use with future quantum computers. When building a time crystal, the individual components must be isolated from the environment to avoid thermalization; the components of quantum computers also need such isolation. The researchers used IBM's Quantum Hub to turn a quantum computer into a time crystal. Despite the "noisiness" of the quantum simulation on the IBM quantum computer, the researchers observed a time crystal in which the configuration of qubits perpetually repeated, meaning the system never forgets this initial state, so it never loses its memory.

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Portl’s $65,000 holographic booth. When Your Boss Becomes a Hologram
Bloomberg Businessweek
K Oanh Ha
March 3, 2022


Technology companies are developing holographic communications for businesses, which appeal to corporations forced by the pandemic to reconsider work protocols. Los Angeles-based firm Portl sells a booth that displays a life-sized three-dimensional (3D) hologram for remote interaction, using a camera, light, microphone, and backdrop. Meanwhile, Google is testing a booth with cameras and a glass screen where users can talk face-to-face with 3D images of each other; Microsoft produces holograms seen through virtual reality headsets. Some critics say Portl and its competitors provide two-dimensional holographic projections rather than true holograms. ARHT Media's Larry O'Reilly in Canada says full-size holograms demand more data than modern networks typically can relay.

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'Fingerprint' ML Technique Identifies Bacteria in Seconds
KAIST (South Korea)
March 4, 2022


Researchers at the Korea Advanced Institute of Science and Technology (KAIST) combined surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy and a deep learning model to identify bacteria in seconds with up to 98% accuracy. Their model, named DualWKNet (dual-branch wide-kernel network), was trained to identify the "fingerprint" spectra of the molecular components of multiple bacteria. Said KAIST's Sungho Jo, "We demonstrated a markedly simple, fast, and effective route to classify the signals of two common bacteria and their resident media without any separation procedures." Jo added, "Ultimately, with the use of DualWKNet replacing the bacteria and media separation steps, our method dramatically reduces analysis time."

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The malleable arm is mostly bendy, with a rigid part at the end. Bendy Robotic Arm Twisted into Shape with Help of AR
Imperial College London (U.K.)
Caroline Brogan
March 3, 2022


A robotic arm developed by researchers at the U.K.'s Imperial College London (ICL) can move in all directions, guided by users wearing augmented reality (AR) goggles. The robot's flexibility is enabled by layers of mylar sheets that slide over one another and lock into place. The system allows users wearing smart glasses and using motion-tracking cameras to configure the robot by viewing templates and designs superimposed onto the real-world environment. Once the robotic arm is adjusted to match the template, the template turns green and the robot’s configuration may be locked into place. ICL’s Nicolas Rojas said, "We've shown that AR can simplify working alongside our malleable robot. The approach gives users a range of easy-to-create robot positions, for all sorts of applications, without needing so much technical expertise."

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Traffic-Based Analyses Advance Smart City Capabilities
Oak Ridge National Laboratory
Elizabeth Rosenthal
March 3, 2022


Researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy's Oak Ridge National Laboratory (ORNL) and the Smart City division of Chattanooga, TN's Department of Information Technology measured daily energy consumption of commercial buildings based on commuter traffic. The team analyzed traffic data from sensors at downtown intersections, and utilized Voronoi diagrams to produce occupancy schedules that calculated vehicle arrival and departure times, as well as approximate numbers of people in specific buildings over the course of a year. ORNL's Andy S. Berres said, "Basically, we're trying to get a better idea of how many people are where at what times of day."

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Cutting Through the Clutter
Harvard Medical School News & Research
Ekaterina Pesheva
March 2, 2022


Harvard Medical School (HMS) scientists created the vibration of effects (VoE) auditing tool to improve the reliability of studies that explore the relationships between things. "At its most basic, the vibration of effects model analyzes how the modeling choices a researcher makes can influence what they will discover," explained former HMS researcher Braden Tierney. The tool applies brute-force computation to test the reliability of research findings, and researchers can use it to vet their own results before submission for publication. The tool was used to analyze connections between various gut microbes and six diseases in 15 published studies. High-scoring studies were found to be less reliable because their VoE results exhibited significant variation when run through multiple testing models, while low-scoring studies were found to be more reliable because they identified associations that remained consistent even when processed by different models.

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Images of the SIBELIUS-DARK simulation. Supercomputer Simulation of the Universe Creates Structures Very Similar to Milky Way
SciTechDaily
Matt Williams
March 5, 2022


An international team of researchers led by Finland's University of Helsinki created the most accurate cosmological simulation to date as part of the Simulations Beyond the Local Universe (SIBELIUS) project. The researchers used the DiRAC COSmology MAchine distributed computing network at Durham University in the U.K. to execute the simulation, which applied known physics to define how dark matter and cosmic gas evolved, in order to determine if modern observations correspond with the standard Cold Dark Matter model of cosmology. The researchers found the simulation matched the locations and properties of actual cosmological structures, including models of the Milky Way and the Andromeda galaxy within its core. Helsinki's Stuart McAlpine said, "This project provides an important bridge between decades of theory and astronomical observations."

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Malware Now Using Nvidia's Stolen Code Signing Certificates
BleepingComputer
Lawrence Abrams
March 5, 2022


Computer systems design services company Nvidia has verified that hacker extortion group Lapsus$ stole employee credentials and proprietary data. The gang claimed to have stolen as much as a terabyte of data, and started leaking it after Nvidia rejected its demands. The leak includes two code-signing certificates used by developers to sign drivers and executables; security researchers determined they were being used to sign malware and other tools used by malefactors. Although both certificates have expired, Windows will still permit a driver signed with the certificates to be loaded in the operating system. Microsoft's David Weston tweeted that admins may configure Windows Defender Application Control policies to limit which Nvidia drivers can be loaded.

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