Welcome to the May 23, 2025 edition of ACM TechNews, providing timely information for computer professionals three times a week.

Please note: In observance of the U.S. Memorial Day holiday, TechNews will not be published on Monday, May 26. Publication will resume Wednesday, May 28.

HEADLINES AT A GLANCE

• Ilias Diakonikolas Receives ACM Grace Murray Hopper Award
• NSF Funding at Lowest Level in Decades
• U.S., Europe Crack Down on Hacking Tool Used Worldwide
• Vulnerability Exploitation Probability Metric Proposed by NIST, CISA
• AI a Greater Threat to Women's Work Than Men's, UN Suggests
• Microsoft Brings Post-Quantum Cryptography to Windows, Linux
• The Tech Industry Is Huge; Europe's Share Is Small
• Push Back on Effort to Stop States from Regulating AI
• Half of Japan's New Chip Fabs Still Shy of Mass Production
• Major Flaws Found in VW's Connected Car App
• UAE Launches Arabic Language AI Model
• Russia Accused of Trying to Hack Border Security Cameras to Disrupt Ukraine Aid
• Researchers Scrape 2 Billion Discord Messages, Publish Them Online

Ilias Diakonikolas Receives ACM Grace Murray Hopper Award

University of Wisconsin, Madison professor Ilias Diakonikolas was named the recipient of the 2024 ACM Grace Murray Hopper Award in recognition of his contributions to the field of algorithmic robust statistics for high-dimensional data. Diakonikolas is best known for his work on robust statistical algorithms for high-dimensional data. Diakonikolas and colleagues in 2016 gave the first efficient algorithms for learning the parameters of a high-dimensional distribution.
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NSF Funding at Lowest Level in Decades

The U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) is awarding new grants at its slowest pace in at least 35 years. The funding decreases touch virtually every area of science, including computer science, which has seen a 31% reduction this year compared to the 2015-2024 average. Said Information Technology and Innovation Foundation president Robert Atkinson, “These cuts are the height of self-inflicted harm.”
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U.S., Europe Crack Down on Hacking Tool Used Worldwide

Global authorities on Wednesday announced a crackdown on the Lumma hacking tool that has been exploited by cybercriminals to attack airlines, universities, banks, hospitals and U.S. state governments. The U.S. Justice Department said it had seized the computer systems hackers used to access the tool, while Microsoft used a court order to seize or take offline 2,300 Web domains connected to the cybercriminal activity. Microsoft found some 394,000 computers around the world with Windows software infected by Lumma.
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Vulnerability Exploitation Probability Metric Proposed by NIST, CISA

A cybersecurity metric developed by researchers at the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) and the U.S. National Institute of Standards & Technology (NIST) calculates the likelihood a vulnerability has been exploited. The Likely Exploited Vulnerabilities (LEV) metric could help estimate the comprehensiveness of KEV lists and enhance KEV- and EPSS-based vulnerability remediation prioritization.
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AI a Greater Threat to Women's Work Than Men's, UN Suggests

A study by the UN's International Labor Organization found that AI is poised to transform 9.6% of jobs traditionally performed by women, versus 3.5% of jobs traditionally performed by men, particularly in high-income countries. The report stated, "We stress that such exposure does not imply the immediate automation of an entire occupation, but rather the potential for a large share of its current tasks to be performed using this technology."
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Microsoft Brings Post-Quantum Cryptography to Windows, Linux

Microsoft has released early support for post-quantum cryptography algorithms standardized by the U.S. National Institute of Standards and Technology (ML-KEM for key exchanges and ML-DSA for digital signatures) in the Windows Insider Canary Channel (Build 27852 and above) and in version 1.9.0 of SymCrypt-OpenSSL on Linux. This will enable organizations to experiment with quantum-resistant algorithms in their own operational environments.
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The Tech Industry Is Huge; Europe's Share Is Small

Europe is home to just four of the world's top 50 tech companies, and none of the top 10 companies investing in quantum computing. According to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology's Andrew McAfee, Europe created only 14 companies with a market capitalization of more than $10 billion from scratch during the last five decades, versus 241 created by the U.S. Europe's challenges include a smaller pool of venture capital, stricter regulations, and a risk-averse business culture.
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Push Back on Effort to Stop States from Regulating AI

A provision in a package of tax and spending cuts just approved by the U.S. House would institute a 10-year ban on state enforcement of laws or regulations governing AI models or automated decision systems. The provision has raised concerns among 141 organizations, including academic institutions, advocacy groups, and employee coalitions that signed a letter drafted by the nonprofit Demand Progress addressing their concerns to members of Congress.
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Half of Japan's New Chip Fabs Still Shy of Mass Production

Of the seven semiconductor plants built or bought in Japan in fiscal 2023 and 2024, just three have commenced mass production as of April, according to a Nikkei survey. Those companies, meanwhile, have scaled back their original expansion plans, reflecting low demand for chips used in applications other than AI. Japan's chip industry is expected to see about ¥9 trillion ($62 billion) in investment through 2029, and the government plans to contribute more than ¥10 trillion to semiconductors and artificial intelligence by fiscal 2030.
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Major Flaws Found in VW's Connected Car App

Cybersecurity researcher Vishal Bhaskar discovered serious vulnerabilities in Volkswagen's My Volkswagen app that could have exposed users' personal information. Bhaskar determined the app lacked a lockout mechanism for failed password attempts and wrote a Python script that was able to brute-force the password. Additionally, Bhaskar identified API endpoints that exposed telematics data and customer information. Volkswagen said it fixed the issues this month.
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UAE Launches Arabic Language AI Model

The United Arab Emirates this week launched a new Arabic language AI model. Falcon Arabic, developed by Abu Dhabi's Advanced Technology Research Council (ATRC), aims to capture the linguistic diversity of the Arab world through a "high-quality native (non-translated) Arabic dataset," according to a statement. Said ATRC Secretary General Faisal Al Bannai, "Today, AI leadership is not about scale for the sake of scale. It is about making powerful tools useful, usable, and universal."
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Russia Accused of Trying to Hack Border Security Cameras to Disrupt Ukraine Aid

The U.K. National Cyber Security Center said Russia tried to hack into border security cameras to spy on and disrupt the flow of aid entering Ukraine. A unit of Russia’s military intelligence services is accused of using a host of methods to target organizations delivering “foreign assistance" by hacking into cameras at crossings and railway stations and near military installations.
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Researchers Scrape 2 Billion Discord Messages, Publish Them Online

Researchers at Brazil's Federal University of Minas Gerais have published a database of more than 2 billion Discord messages from more than 4 million unique users scraped from 3,167 servers using Discord's public API. Published online as a series of JSON files, the database is intended to assist researchers in training bots, studying politics or mental health, and identifying patterns of at-risk behavior, among other things.
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