Welcome to the August 5, 2024 edition of ACM TechNews, providing timely information for computer professionals three times a week.
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U.K. Prime Minister Keir Starmer warned social media companies they must uphold laws prohibiting incitement of violence online, after misinformation around a fatal mass stabbing earlier in the week sparked violent riots. "Let me also say to large social media companies, and those who run them, violent disorder clearly whipped up online: that is also a crime," Starmer said, adding there was a "balance to be struck" in handling such platforms.
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Reuters; Alistair Smout; Nick Vant (August 2, 2024)
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Chip maker Intel said Thursday it plans to lay off 15,000 people, more than 15% of its workforce. Intel had emerged as the big winner of the Chips for America program, with the Biden administration announcing $8.5 billion in grants and $11 billion in loans for the company this year to help bring some chip manufacturing operations back to the U.S. Intel has yet to receive those funds.
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The Washington Post; Eva Dou (August 1, 2024)
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A smartphone-based system developed by researchers in South Korea and Singapore detects counterfeit baby formula. The PowDew system allows users to capture an image of the baby formula with their smartphone’s camera; the app then observes the movement of water droplets on the powder’s surface to verify its authenticity. In tests involving six baby formula brands, the system demonstrated an accuracy rate of up to 96.1% in identifying counterfeit products.
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The Korea Bizwire; Ashley Song (August 3, 2024)
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A novel X-ray imaging technique developed by researchers in Switzerland and the U.S. can provide clear 3-D images of the inner workings of chips. The method has a resolution of four nanometers, providing images clear enough to map a chip’s wiring paths and reveal tiny transistor features without destroying the chip. The technique works by repeatedly illuminating the sample from different angles with a coherent beam of high-energy X-rays.
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IEEE Spectrum; Katherine Bourzac (July 31, 2024)
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San Francisco is set to become the first U.S. city to ban algorithmic software used to recommend rents. Aaron Peskin, president of San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors, said such tools enable price-fixing by large corporate landlords. The Board voted unanimously to block the products from being used in the city. Peskin said he introduced the ordinance after observing residential rents going up during and after the pandemic, even as people moved out of the city and downtown office vacancies climbed.
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Bloomberg; Rya Jetha (July 31, 2024)
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The U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) on Friday sued TikTok and its China-based owner ByteDance, alleging they violated a children’s privacy law by collecting data on millions of Americans younger than 13. According to the DOJ, TikTok made it too easy for children to create accounts and then collected data on those who did, constituting a “massive-scale” violation of the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act.
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The Washington Post; Drew Harwell (August 2, 2024)
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An appeals court on Thursday blocked the U.S. Federal Communications Commission's (FCC) attempt to reinstate net neutrality rules, saying broadband providers were likely to succeed in a legal challenge. The FCC voted in April to re-assume regulatory oversight of broadband Internet and reinstate open Internet rules adopted in 2015 that were rescinded under the previous administration. The court scheduled oral arguments for late October or early November on the issue.
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Reuters; David Shepardson (August 1, 2024)
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Researchers at the University of Colorado Boulder and University of Pennsylvania created a new method for 3D-printing adhesive materials that mimic the strength and flexibility of human tissue. Their Continuous-curing after Light Exposure Aided by Redox initiation (CLEAR) method intertwines long molecules in 3D-printed materials. The team hopes the technique will give rise to advanced biomaterials such as drug-infused heart bandages, cartilage patches, and needle-less sutures.
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Interesting Engineering; Mrigakshi Dixit (August 2, 2024)
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AI is being used to control variable speed limits on a 27-kilometer (16.8-mile) section of the I-24 freeway near Nashville, TN. Daniel Work at Vanderbilt University and colleagues trained an AI on historical traffic data to monitor cameras and make decisions on speed limits. The new automated system, launched in March, works accurately 98% of the time, but will occasionally call for a change in speed limit that is larger than 10 miles per hour, which violates federal law.
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New Scientist; Matthew Sparkes (July 30, 2024)
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A new village in Tanzania, built to house children who have experienced hardships, will feature a 3D-printed community center. The walls will be constructed using soil sourced from within 25 kilometers. The use of 3D printing allowed for an open, “porous” wall design that has already been prototyped up to a height of 2 meters.
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CNN; Tom Page (August 1, 2024)
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Researchers at the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) used a machine learning algorithm to teach a robot to adapt its propulsion mechanism in order to maintain its aquatic capabilities when damaged. Explains Caltech's Meredith Hooper, "The machine learning algorithm selects the top candidate trajectories based on how well they produced our desired force. The algorithm then comes up with another set of 10 trajectories inspired by the previous set."
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Interesting Engineering; Sujita Sinha (August 1, 2024)
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University of Minnesota Twin Cities researchers developed Computational Random-Access Memory (CRAM) technology which, they say, could dramatically cut the energy consumed by AI processing. With CRAM, a high-density, reconfigurable spintronic in-memory compute substrate is located within the memory cells themselves, where the data is processed. When used to perform an MNIST handwritten digit classifier task, CRAM was 2,500 times more energy-efficient and 1,700 times faster than a near-memory processing system using the 16nm technology node.
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Tom's Hardware; Jeff Butts (July 29, 2024)
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