Welcome to the July 15, 2024 edition of ACM TechNews, providing timely information for computer professionals three times a week.

HEADLINES AT A GLANCE

• CISA Urges Software Makers to Eliminate OS Command Injection Vulnerabilities
• U.S. Creates High-Tech Global Supply Chains to Blunt Risks Tied to China
• NATO Backs Effort to Save Internet by Rerouting to Space
• Computer Skills Lacking, Say EU IT Workers
• Quantum Computer Smashes 'Quantum Supremacy' Record
• Birds Fight Drones Patrolling NYC Beaches
• App Identifies Impacts of Climate Change on Plants
• AI Boom Lifts CIO Paychecks
• Germany to Phase Out Chinese Components from Its 5G Core Network
• COVID-19 App Provides Real-Time Data
• Sea Drones in Russia-Ukraine War Inspire New Tactics
• For Older People Who Are Lonely, Is the Solution a Robot Friend?

CISA Urges Software Makers to Eliminate OS Command Injection Vulnerabilities

An alert issued by the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) and the FBI calls on software manufacturers to eliminate "entirely preventable" operating system (OS) command injection vulnerabilities. The alert said designing and developing software that trusts user input without proper validation or sanitization “can allow threat actors to execute malicious commands, putting customers at risk." The agencies indicated OS command injection vulnerabilities can be avoided with clear separations between user input and a command's contents.
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U.S. Creates High-Tech Global Supply Chains to Blunt Risks Tied to China

Under the Biden administration's plan to develop high-tech global supply chains as part of an effort toward "chip diplomacy," the U.S. is seeking investments from foreign companies in U.S. chip manufacturing and is working to identify partner countries where factories could be set up to handle final assembly. The goals are to address security concerns from China amid threats against Taiwan, and to reduce the risks of supply-chain disruptions like those that occurred during the pandemic and the war in Ukraine.
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NATO Backs Effort to Save Internet by Rerouting to Space

Researchers from the U.S., Iceland, Sweden, and Switzerland are taking part in a NATO-funded project focused on maintaining Internet communications in the event of a natural disaster or an attack on the subsea cable system. Researchers participating in the Hybrid Space and Submarine Architecture to Ensure Information Security of Telecommunications (HEIST) project, to be formally launched later this month at a Cornell University symposium, will consider how to reroute Internet traffic from subsea cables to satellite systems if necessary.
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Computer Skills Lacking, Say EU IT Workers

In the annual Computer Weekly/TechTarget IT salary survey, nearly 40% of 324 European IT workers said the organizations for which they work lack workers with AI skills, while a third (37%) of respondents cited a lack of cybersecurity skills. Another 27% of respondents said they lacked IT-specific certifications. Additionally, 17% of respondents said their companies were seeking new hires with AI, machine learning, and data science skills in the coming year.
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Quantum Computer Smashes 'Quantum Supremacy' Record

Researchers at Quantinuum, JPMorgan, the California Institute of Technology, and Argonne National Laboratory built a 56-qubit H2-1 quantum computer that has broken the quantum supremacy record held by Google's Sycamore machine. The H2 quantum computer achieved a linear cross entropy benchmark (XEB) score of about 0.35, meaning it can generate results without an error 35% of the time. This compares to the 53-qubit Sycamore's XEB score of about 0.002.
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Birds Fight Drones Patrolling NYC Beaches

Drones patrolling New York City’s beaches for signs of sharks and struggling swimmers are being targeted by local shorebirds. Since the drones began flying in May, flocks of birds have repeatedly swarmed the devices, forcing adjustments to the drones' flight plans. The attacks are fueling concern from wildlife experts about the impact on threatened species nesting along the coast.
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App Identifies Impacts of Climate Change on Plants

Flora Incognita, a mobile app developed by researchers at Germany's Liepzig University, iDiv, MPI-BGC, and TU Ilmenau, lets users identify wild plants by snapping a photo. The app also logs observations with timestamps and exact locations to help researchers monitor the impact of climate change on plant life. The researchers developed an algorithm using close to 10 million observations of nearly 3,000 plant species by Flora Incognita users in Germany from 2018 to 2021, identifying ecological patterns and seasonal variations.
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AI Boom Lifts CIO Paychecks

A report from consulting firm Janco Associates found that over the past year, compensation for chief information officers (CIOs) rose an average 7.48% among large enterprises and 9% among midsize enterprises, with IT job categories recording the largest gains. Meanwhile, IT executive recruiting firm Heller Search Associates reported a more than 20% jump in CIO and chief technology officer compensation since 2019. The gains come as more companies seek executives with knowledge of generative AI.
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Germany to Phase Out Chinese Components from Its 5G Core Network

German Interior Minister Nancy Faeser said "a clear and strict agreement" has been made with telecom providers Deutsche Telekom, Vodafone, and Telefonica Deutschland to phase out the use of components from Huawei, ZTE, and other Chinese companies from Germany's 5G network products by 2029. The agreement is intended to protect Germany's critical infrastructure from potential security risks posed by China.
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COVID-19 App Provides Real-Time Data

An analysis of data from mobile phone apps used during the COVID-19 pandemic found that digital contact tracing provides helpful real-time insights into the spread of infectious diseases. Researchers from the U.K. used data collected by the National Health Service’s COVID-19 app for England and Wales to calculate the average number of times each person with the virus passed it on to someone else, seeing changes five days earlier than other methods.
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Sea Drones in Russia-Ukraine War Inspire New Tactics

The success of Ukraine's naval drones in its war with Russia has prompted the U.S. and other governments to consider the role of drones in future naval operations. The Magura V5 can carry a 300-kilogram warhead and move autonomously via GPS and connections to SpaceX's Starlink satellites. The larger Sea Baby can carry around 800 kilograms of explosives, is equipped for surveillance and logistics, and can be remotely controlled via Starlink and GPS.
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For Older People Who Are Lonely, Is the Solution a Robot Friend?

In the past two years, the New York State Office for the Aging has given free AI-powered, voice-activated robot companions to around 900 older adults to address feelings of loneliness and isolation. The ElliQ robot from Israel's Intuition Robotics can start conversations, share top news stories, play games, tell jokes, remind users to take their medication, and engage in discussions about religion and other complex subjects.
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