Welcome to the July 31, 2024 edition of ACM TechNews, providing timely information for computer professionals three times a week.
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The U.S. Senate on Tuesday passed bipartisan legislation aimed at protecting children online. The Kids Online Safety Act requires platforms to provide safeguards for minors, including restricting access to minors’ personal data and providing parents with tools to supervise minors’ use of a platform. The Children and Teens’ Online Privacy Protection Act amends the Children’s Online Privacy Protection Act of 1998 to strengthen protections relating to the online collection, use, and disclosure of personal information of minors.
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CNN; Shania Shelton (July 30, 2024)
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Facebook parent Meta agreed to pay $1.4 billion to settle a Texas lawsuit over the unauthorized use of biometric data from users. The suit, filed in 2022 by the state's attorney general, accused Meta of capturing and using the biometric data of millions of Texas residents from uploaded photos and videos on Facebook without permission, violating state law.
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CNBC; Dan Mangan (July 30, 2024)
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Elon Musk shared a manipulated video on his X social media platform that mimics U.S. Vice President Kamala Harris' voice without disclosing the video was originally released as a parody. The video uses visuals from a real ad released by Harris to launch her presidential campaign with an AI-generated voice that sounds like her but says things Harris did not say. Musk’s retweet of the video was viewed 119.9 million times as of Sunday afternoon.
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NBC News; Mirna Alsharif; Alexandra Marquez; Austin Mullen (July 28, 2024)
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To make the title transfer process more efficient and prevent fraud, the California Department of Motor Vehicles (DMV) digitized 42 million car titles, putting them on Ava Labs' Avalanche blockchain. This will allow California residents to claim their car titles via a mobile app and reduce in-person DMV visits. Additionally, with blockchain technology, a transparent and unalterable record of property ownership will be created, making it easier to detect lien fraud.
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Reuters; Akash Sriram (July 30, 2024)
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_logo.svg.png) ACM Computing Surveys received an impact factor of 23.8 in the latest Journal Citation Reports from Clarivate Analytics, placing it first of the 143 journals in the Computer Science, Theory & Methods category. Flagship journal Communications of the ACM had an impact factor of 11.1, placing it first in the Computer Science, Hardware & Architecture category for the second year in a row. Said ACM's Scott Delman, “We are thrilled by these latest figures, which we see as strong validation of ACM’s industry-leading path to sustainable and responsible Open Access."
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ACM Media Center (July 30, 2024)
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A report released Tuesday by the U.S. Department of Commerce's National Telecommunications and Information Administration (NTIA) said there is no pressing need for restrictions on "open-source" AI systems. However, the report said the U.S. government should continue to monitor the technology and be "prepared to act if heightened risks emerge." NTIA Administrator Alan Davidson said, "We continue to have concerns about AI safety, but this report reflects a more balanced view that shows that there are real benefits in the openness of these technologies."
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Associated Press; Matt O'Brien (July 30, 2024)
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A robotic system developed by Massachusetts Institute of Technology researchers mimics human movements to peel produce, including the ability to rotate fruits and vegetables in one hand and peel with the other. In tests under real-world conditions, the robot rotated a pumpkin, radish, and papaya using feedback from touch sensors while the peeling was performed by a human-controlled robot arm.
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New Scientist; Alex Wilkins (July 26, 2024)
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In a survey of 663 Java professionals by Java platform Azul Systems, 86% of respondents reported migrating away from Oracle Java. More than 50% of respondents cited costs, 47% said they preferred open source distribution, and 40% expressed concerns with ongoing changes in Oracle's pricing, licensing, and support. Another 25% cited possible Java usage audits, and a similar share indicated dissatisfaction with Oracle support.
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ITPro; Emma Woollacott (July 26, 2024)
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In documents filed in federal appeals court in Washington, U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) attorneys said TikTok employees sent sensitive data about U.S. users to engineers at parent company ByteDance in China via an internal Web-suite system. The Lark system was used to transmit data on users' views on sensitive topics like religion, abortion, and gun control; the data was stored on Chinese servers. DOJ expressed concerns about the potential for "covert content manipulation" by the Chinese government.
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Associated Press; Haleluya Hadero; Eric Tucker (July 27, 2024)
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An AI model developed by researchers at Uruguay's University of the Republic can reconstruct digital signals by intercepting electromagnetic radiation leaked from the HDMI cable that connects a computer and monitor. This would allow hackers to view a user's computer screen as they enter encrypted messages or personal information. Said the university’s Federico Larroca, “If you really care about your security, whatever your reasons are, this could be a problem.”
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Tom's Hardware; Jeff Butts (July 28, 2024)
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The U.K. government announced a £106-million (U.S.$136-million) investment in five new quantum hubs, with a focus on quantum sensing, networking, and positioning. Leading the project will be the U.K. Research and Innovation Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC). Said EPSRC CEO Charlotte Deane, “Technologies harnessing quantum properties will provide unparalleled power and capacity for analysis at a molecular level, with truly revolutionary possibilities across everything from healthcare to infrastructure and computing.”
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Computer Weekly; Cliff Saran (July 29, 2024)
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A CNN investigation has found election offices across the U.S. are being flooded with questionable complaints about inaccurate voter records, primarily driven by the Texas-based nonprofit True the Vote. The organization indicated nearly 7,000 users have challenged more than 500,000 voter records using the IV3 app, which lets users research voter data and submit voter-eligibility challenges to local election offices. CNN found a number of challenges riddled with errors, or aimed at vulnerable groups.
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CNN; Curt Devine; Yahya Abou-Ghazala; Kyung Lah (July 29, 2024)
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A robotic method of inspecting floating offshore wind farms, developed by researchers at Ireland's University of Limerick, could help increase their reliability while reducing operational costs. The researchers built a fleet of field robots, subsea remotely operated vehicles, and unmanned aerial vehicles to perform an intervention, repair, and maintenance survey of a semi-submersible floating wind farm off Portugal's coast. They used an adaptive control system to account for movement of the floating turbine, employed customized machine vision algorithms for image post-processing, and generated high-resolution 3D models of the wind farm structures above and below the waterline.
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Silicon Republic; Leigh McGowran (July 29, 2024)
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