Category Archives: Technology

Britain, Government, Internet, Society, Technology

The Home Office unveils new technology that detects hate content

INTERNET & ONLINE ACTIVITY

Home Office steps up fight against terror content with new technology.

INTERNET giants will have little excuse for allowing extremist propaganda on their websites after the Home Office unveiled new technology to detect hate content.

Web firms have been told to increase efforts to remove terror-related posts after the UK was hit by attacks in London and Manchester last year. All had an “online component”, the Home Office said.

Now the UK Government has revealed advanced technology that aims to automatically detect extremist and hateful videos and content before they become publicly available online.

Tests have shown the £600,000 tool can identify 94 per cent of the entire content in Islamic State propaganda videos. The breakthrough came as a Home Office analysis revealed IS supporters used more than 400 separate online platforms to pump out propaganda last year.

The Home Office said it would share the technology with firms to combat the abuse of their platforms. Home Secretary Amber Rudd welcomed the development as she visited San Francisco for talks with technology giants. She said: “Those who commit terror attacks on our streets are increasingly influenced by what they see online. I hope this new technology the Home Office has helped develop can support others to go further and faster.”

Using ‘advanced machine learning’, the technology analyses terror videos to pick out ‘subtle signals’ and determine whether it is IS related propaganda or something else, such as a news report. The systems can be adapted to look for other violent extremist content.

The chief executive of ASI Data Science, Marc Warner, whose firm developed the new model, said major organisations such as Google and Facebook could not “solve this problem alone”.

 

YET, we all know that no amount of moral pressure has so far made Facebook, Google and Twitter remove the deluge of hate-filled extremism, sick trolling and other disturbing extreme content that pollutes their sites. Hit them in their pockets and they might just begin to change their ways.

It is promising that large scale multiconglomerate companies such as the Anglo-Dutch company Unilever is threatening to pull all advertising from the three internet giants if they don’t clamp down on this filth. Unilever – which has a £6.8billion-a-year marketing budget – is thoroughly sick of seeing its products being placed next to terrorist propaganda or sexualised images of children and has decided enough is enough.

Other big firms – notably Procter and Gamble – are making similar threats. We should sincerely hope many more will follow.

All we ever hear from the tech giants are weasel words. They say they take down extremist or illegal material as soon as they are alerted to it, but this is demonstrably untrue. And why should they have to be alerted, rather than policing this kind of content themselves?

The Home Office has now unveiled a new system that can automatically detect 94 per cent of Islamic State propaganda on the web. Is it really beyond multibillion pound corporations that specialise in technology to do the same – or even better? They have run out of excuses.

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Government, Society, Technology, Transport

Autonomous-driving lorries ‘at risk of crashing in cyber-attack’

TRANSPORT

Self Driving Lorries

Self-driving and autonomous running vehicle platoons pose many risks. They include a ‘malicious takeover’ by cyber-attack putting the safety of road users at risk.

SELF-DRIVING lorries which are to be trialled on England’s motorways could be vulnerable to cyber-attack, an official report has warned.

A feasibility study of the Government’s plans said there was a risk of a ‘malicious takeover’ of the convoys, putting road users at risk.

Under the scheme, up to three wirelessly connected HGVs will move in a platoon, with acceleration and braking controlled by the lead vehicle. The lorries would still be steered by drivers.

The report, commissioned by the Department for Transport (DfT), concludes that the system has the potential to reduce accidents and emissions, while improving traffic flow. But it also outlines 20 risks, including cyber-attack and the potential for drivers in the middle and back vehicles to lose concentration.

Extreme weather conditions could lead to the sensing system keeping the vehicles a set distance apart malfunctioning. Other cars could enter the convoy by mistake, and the lead lorry could suffer a tyre blow-out.

The scheme is expected to be tried on major roads next year.

Driving in a convoy could see the front lorry push air out of the way, making the vehicles more efficient and lowering emissions. But Edmund King, AA president, said the safety of drivers must come first.

He said: ‘There have been causes of connected and autonomous vehicles and even road signs being hacked. The safety of the drivers is paramount.

‘If the platoon is hacked it could put on the brakes or try to make it accelerate.’

The study into “heavy vehicle platoons on UK roads” was carried out by the independent Transport Research Laboratory consultancy and others in 2014 but has only just been published.

One lorry drivers’ organisation, which was not named, told the authors it was worried about ‘the safety impact of running so close together,’ adding: ‘There is no fuel-saving amount that is worth risking road safety for.’

The report said the probability of a ‘malicious takeover of platoon (cyber-attack)’ was ‘very low’, but its impact would be ‘very high’ and would involve a ‘threat to road user safety, road infrastructure and reputation’ of the convoy system.

It said, ‘adverse environmental conditions’ such as fog and snow could ‘affect sensing capability’. The report also said other motorists could be unaware of the convoy and drive between the lorries. And the authors said ‘driver underload’ was a problem as they may lose concentration when they are not performing the full range of driving tasks. They suggest training drivers for ‘behavioural adaptation awareness’.

The document said: ‘It must be ensured that they will always be able to re-engage in the driving task within a few seconds.’

The report said it believed convoys would be safer overall, adding: ‘Around 90 per cent of accidents involve driver error. Automatic control (or driver assistance) reduces the magnitude of the risk of driver error.’ The DfT has not responded to a request for comment.

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Business, Government, Society, Technology

Empowering humanity comes through technological advance

TECHNOLOGY & HUMANITY

Technology Empowerment

Technology firms must adapt by making people’s goals their own priorities. Only then will they significantly add to the growth of society and to the economy.

The empowerment of the individual has radically changed through how we access and utilise technology. Consider, for instance, just the way and how we now watch television. The broader picture of technological development is no longer a take-it-or-leave-it template, but a bespoke service tailored to the individual.

Earlier television broadcasts were carefully scripted and delivered to present a highly curated programme, forcing us not to only share the same worldview, but also to watch on the terms being offered by the programme makers’.

The evolution of video fundamentally changed both our view of the world and how we interact with it. In less than a century, we’ve moved to an online and digital world with billions of viewpoints, coming from governments and businesses and more importantly from people. Everyone offers a unique perspective; and, we now have a truly live culture where technologies like Periscope and Facebook Live mean that anyone can broadcast what they want and tune in when they want – on their own terms.

This illustrates that the way we use technology today is to bend it to our own needs. Change may be endemic, but the key point is that the individual is now in control. It’s no longer the case that people are adapting to technology – rather, the technology is continuing to evolve and adapt to us.

The situation now is that every time an experience is personalised, or where technology anticipates our needs and wants, we are being thrusted forefront to realise or satisfy those needs. In terms of digital evolution, this is the age of human empowerment and it matters to business. With technology that truly responds to people, based on what they want, firms can evolve from being a supplier to one of being their customers’ partner.

IntelligentX, a London-based Brewing Company, has developed an Artificial Intelligence (AI) system to continuously collect and incorporate customer feedback. It utilises this information by incorporating it into its thinking to brew new versions of the company’s beers. The firm provides feedback into its algorithms: with people’s tastes changing faster than ever before, AI seems a logical and perfect way to respond.

This is how businesses will grow their role in people’s lives, and by establishing a place in the future of society. They need to become more than just a provider of products and services.

We might like to refer to it as the hyper-personalisation of technology. It is likely to drive commercial success at the scale of entire industries, not just at the individual or micro level. The digital leaders of the world, proactive as always, are making big calls in response.

Consider Electronics giant Philips. It is looking to transform healthcare into one that becomes connected, with a comprehensive experience that’s both intertwined and accessible throughout people’s lives. Through the development of new apps and connected devices that integrate into our lives, it will become possible for health professionals to live alongside each patient. This will allow them to build a closer, more personal relationship, and an opportunity to provide comprehensive – not just reactive – care packages.

Paradoxically, for patients, connected healthcare isn’t an improvement because of the technology itself. The draw is the empowerment it gives individuals over their own health – you only need to consider how wearable technologies are driving a tailored approach to personal fitness programmes.

Company conglomerates like Philips have the leading edge because their technological strategies focuses on the needs of the individual patient, and on their terms.

If any business is to become a true partner to people that process must start with technology. No doubt, the path ahead will have its challenges. But the foundations are built on matters of trust.

Yet, barely one in two members of the public say they trust businesses to do what’s right. Even fewer look on business leaders as credible sources of information. If people are to value these new partnerships, companies must work hard to gain and by keeping that trust.

One of the best ways of doing this is by putting the power in the hands of the customers. That can be achieved by designing technology that works for them. This will mean an end to technology tools whose power is only unleashed when customers adapt to or in learning how to use them.

Technology’s great new strength lies in its growing humanity. Tools that interact with people – structured in such a way that they learn from those exchanges – should be able to adapt for any future interaction that makes the experience of using them all the more human.

To put these new adaptive technologies to use, businesses must adopt people’s goals as their own. Technology is now crucially the agent of change and it should be enabled to empower people in an interactive and collaborative way.

When companies are aligned to people’s individual goals and aspirations, only then will they be contributing to the growth of society and the economy.

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