Lifeboat Foundation

The evidence that self-driving vehicle manufacturers aren’t always upfront with the public hasn’t helped either. An excoriating October New Yorker investigation into the early years of the Google self-driving research project that eventually became Waymo found that the company had performed reckless road tests early in its work — and hadn’t always reported accidents.

Road Ahead

Musk’s promise to accelerate fully autonomous research, along with a call for more internal Tesla testers for the program, run precisely counter to that narrative. That’s not surprising: the eccentric Musk is known for imagining futures that are still years away — and using his wealth and influence to attempt to steer history toward or away from them.

Quantum computing will break most of the encryption schemes on which we rely today. These five tips will help you get ready.

Search on the phrase “quantum computing,” and you’ll find a furious debate. On the one hand, you’ll read breathless articles predicting groundbreaking advances in artificial intelligence, genomics, economics, and pretty much every field under the sun. On the other, you’ll find the naysayers: It’s all hype. Large-scale quantum computers are still decades away — if they’re possible at all. Even if they arrive, they won’t be much faster than standard computers except for a tiny subset of problems.

There’s one area, however, where you’ll find all sides agree: Quantum computing will break most of the encryption schemes on which we rely today. If you’re responsible for your organization’s IT or security systems, and that sentence made the hair on the back of your neck stand up, good. To get ready for a post-quantum world, you should be thinking about the problem now.

Continue reading “Start Preparing Now for the Post-Quantum Future” »

In 2018, AI bested humans at following fauna, diagnosing disease, mapping the moon and more.

The technology still has a long way to go despite progress in 2018. The EU, U.S. and China are all determined not to be left behind.

AI-powered robots may soon be doing some procedures faster, more accurately and with fewer complications than humans.

• By Sandip S. Panesar on December 27, 2018

In factories across the world, machines are beginning to work more intimately with humans without sending them to the unemployment line—or the grave.

Behind the broad, swift market slide of 2018 is an underlying new reality: Roughly 85% of all trading is on autopilot—controlled by machines, models, or passive investing formulas, creating an unprecedented trading herd that moves in unison and is blazingly fast.

The majority of trades come from machines, models, or passive investing formulas that move in unison and blazingly fast. This quarter’s sharp declines are symptoms of the modern market’s sensitivities, the same ones that drove gains through the first three-quarters of the year.

The stunning success of AlphaZero, a deep-learning algorithm, heralds a new age of insight — one that, for humans, may not last long.

Facial recognition is going mainstream. The technology is increasingly used by law-enforcement agencies and in schools, casinos and retail stores, spurring privacy concerns. In this episode of Moving Upstream, WSJ’s Jason Bellini tests out the technology at an elementary school in Seattle and visits a company that claims its algorithm can identify potential terrorists by their facial features alone.