Category Archives: Computer

Facebook is cutting out the human element of [tagging the photo]

NPR the two-way: Facebook Expands Use Of Facial Recognition To ID Users In Photos.

“Facebook is expanding its use of facial recognition software to alert users when photos of them are posted on the platform — whether or not they are tagged in the photo.

By default, Facebook users in the U.S. will be signed up for these face recognition alerts, unless they have previously opted out of a similar, more limited feature. But users can turn off face recognition, Facebook says.

Additionally, the company says it will roll out new tools to alert users if someone else may be impersonating them with a misleading profile photo.”

“Das Ausmaß der Datensammlung verstößt gegen zwingende europäische Datenschutzwertungen”

Deutsche Welle: Bundeskartellamt: Facebook missbraucht Nutzer-Daten. “Das Onlinenetzwerk Facebook gerät unter Druck. Das Bundeskartellamt wirft dem Konzern das “missbräuchliche” Sammeln und Verwerten von Daten vor. Damit würde Facebook seine Marktmacht ausnutzen, so die Behörde.”

“Die Wettbewerbsbehörde sehe vor allem die Datensammlung außerhalb des sozialen Netzwerks und ihre Zusammenführung mit dem Facebook-Konto als “problematisch” an, erklärte Kartellamtspräsident Andreas Mundt in einer vorläufigen Einschätzung. Zu diesen Drittseiten gehören dem Kartellamt zufolge einerseits konzerneigene Dienste wie WhatsApp oder Instagram, aber auch Webseiten und Apps anderer Betreiber, auf die Facebook über Schnittstellen zugreifen kann. “Dies geschieht sogar schon, wenn man zum Beispiel einen ‘Gefällt Mir-Button’ gar nicht nutzt, aber eine entsprechende Seite aufgerufen hat, in die ein solcher Button eingebettet ist”, erklärte Mundt. Dies sei den Nutzern nicht bewusst.”

Eine Transaktion die gleiche CO2-Bilanz wie ein einstündiger Flug mit einer Boeing 747

Deutsche Welle: Die schmutzige Seite des Bitcoin-Booms. “Nur wenige Menschen nutzen Bitcoins, doch alle zahlen den Preis für die Auswirkungen der Kryptowährung auf die Umwelt. Verbraucht das digitale Schürfen der Bitcoins sogar mehr Elektrizität als ein komplettes Land?”

“Für die Goldsucher, die während des Goldrauschs im Kalifornien der 1860er Jahre vom schnellen Reichtum träumten, kam die Umwelt an allerletzter Stelle. […]

150 Jahren danach hinterlassen ihre Nachfahren aus dem Silicon Valley ähnlich schmutzige Spuren. Die neue digitale Währung Bitcoin, die zuletzt mit Rekordkursen von knapp 17.000 Dollar gehandelt wurde, ist immer mehr wegen ihrer exorbitanten Stromkosten ins Gerede gekommen.

Ihre Kritiker nennen die Kryptowährung aus einem ganz einfachen Grund schmutzig. Denn jeder Bitcoin – dieser unter nahezu undurchschaubaren Algorithmen begrabene virtuelle Goldklumpen – benötigt eine immense Computerenergie, um ‘gefördert’ zu werden.

Seit sich der Wert eines Bitcoins im Laufe des Jahres 2017 verzehnfacht hat, beziffert die Analysten-Website Digiconomist seinen jährlichen Energiebedarf auf rund 32 Terawattstunden (TWh). Damit rangiert der Bitcoin in derselben Liga wie kleinere Staaten.”

Is it 1984 yet?!

NPR: Aexa, Are You Safe For My Kids?

“Earlier this month, the toy-giant Mattel announced it had pulled the plug on plans to sell an interactive gadget for children. The device, called Aristotle, looked similar to a baby monitor with a camera. Critics called it creepy.

“Aristotle […] was designed to “displace essential parenting functions, like soothing a crying baby or reading a bedtime story,” says Josh Golin, executive director of the advocacy group Campaign for a Commercial-Free Childhood. “So that the children would form an attachment to it.” […]

But some of the concerns with Aristotle apply to Alexa and Google Home. In terms of privacy, both Alexa and Google Home are always “listening” to conversations. Once they hear a trigger word — such as “Ok Google” or “Alexa” — the device starts recording the conversation you’re having with it. Then it uploads the conversation to the cloud so it can learn better how to understand you and help you. Both Alexa and Google Home allow you to listen to the conversations, and the companies say you can delete them.”

Call me paranoid, but I would never in a million years install such a device in my home.

“There is no statute of limitation on the truth.”

The Guardian: Ex-FBI agent opens cold case review into who betrayed Anne Frank. “Vince Pankoke and his team will use new techniques to analyse large amounts of data to solve mystery of diarist’s capture.”

“A retired FBI agent has launched a cold case review into identifying those who may have betrayed the hiding place of Anne Frank and her family to the Gestapo in 1944.

Investigative techniques developed in the past decade, including the crunching of big data to uncover leads, are to be used by a team of 19 forensic experts led by Vince Pankoke.

The Anne Frank House in Amsterdam has made available its archives and welcomed the initiative, which is being filmed and chronicled online, as the investigators, including historians, psychological profilers and former police detectives, work through the evidence.

The cold case review team has supervised a reconstruction, using actors, of the day of the Frank family’s arrest. One of the founding fathers of the FBI’s behavioural science unit, Roger Depue, is analysing contemporary witness statements and interviews.”

The New York Times: Ultimate Cold Case: Who Betrayed Anne Frank?

“A former FBI agent is heading up a cold case team more than 70 years after Nazi occupation police stormed the secret Amsterdam canal house annex where Anne Frank was hiding and sent her to her death in a concentration camp.

Suspicions that someone betrayed the Frank family are not new, but the latest attempt will seek out new connections in the case of the Jewish girl whose diary has captivated millions of readers worldwide.

Retired agent Vincent Pankoke said he had high hopes of solving one of the biggest World War Two mysteries in the Netherlands with the help of Big Data and modern policing techniques.”

The Washington Post: Who betrayed Anne Frank? Artificial intelligence could finally solve the mystery..

“For nearly 75 years, some of the greatest investigative minds have tried to figure out who tipped off the Nazis about Anne Frank and the seven other Jews who were hiding behind a movable bookcase in Amsterdam.

Now, a former FBI investigator working with a production company hopes the decades-old mystery can be solved with the help of a new mind — an artificial one.”

The effort is crowd-funded, see Cold Case Dairy for more information.