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The DOJ makes its first known arrest for AI-generated CSAM

The US Department of Justice arrested a Wisconsin man last week for generating and distributing AI-generated child sexual abuse material (CSAM). As far as we know, this is the first case of its kind as the DOJ looks to establish a judicial precedent that exploitative materials are still illegal even when no children were used to create them. “Put simply, CSAM generated by AI is still CSAM,” Deputy Attorney General Lisa Monaco wrote in a press release.

The DOJ says 42-year-old software engineer Steven Anderegg of Holmen, WI, used a fork of the open-source AI image generator Stable Diffusion to make the images, which he then used to try to lure an underage boy into sexual situations. The latter will likely play a central role in the eventual trial for the four counts of “producing, distributing, and possessing obscene visual depictions of minors engaged in sexually explicit conduct and transferring obscene material to a minor under the age of 16.”

The government says Anderegg’s images showed “nude or partially clothed minors lasciviously displaying or touching their genitals or engaging in sexual intercourse with men.” The DOJ claims he used specific prompts, including negative prompts (extra guidance for the AI model, telling it what not to produce) to spur the generator into making the CSAM.

‘Flying car’ makes Tokyo debut at international tech event

A “flying car” took to the air in Tokyo for the first time on Friday during an international event showcasing cutting-edge technology.

About 500 spectators applauded as the vehicle hovered around 10 meters off the ground in a parking lot outside the Tokyo Big Sight convention center in the capital’s Koto Ward for SusHi Tech Tokyo 2024.

Flying vehicles are expected to become part of the next generation of human transportation and will be effective in dealing with traffic congestion and delivering supplies to disaster areas, the Tokyo metropolitan government and other organizers said.

UK completes world’s first flights for quantum navigation that could replace GPS

A British consortium with funding from the UK government has successfully tested what it calls “un-jammable” quantum navigation tech in flight.

Geopolitical tensions and warfare have introduced GPS jamming as a means of messing with enemy communication and navigation. This can cause disturbances for both military and civilian transportation and location services.

The quantum-based navigation system is called Positioning, Navigation, and Timing (PNT). Its developers are quantum technology firm Infleqtion’s UK subsidiary in collaboration with aerospace company BAE Systems and defence tech contractor QinetiQ, among others.

Enabling Quantum Computing with AI

Building a useful quantum computer in practice is incredibly challenging. Significant improvements are needed in the scale, fidelity, speed, reliability, and programmability of quantum computers to fully realize their benefits. Powerful tools are needed to help with the many complex physics and engineering challenges that stand in the way of useful quantum computing.

AI is fundamentally transforming the landscape of technology, reshaping industries, and altering how we interact with the digital world. The ability to take data and generate intelligence paves the way for groundbreaking solutions to some of the most challenging problems facing society today. From personalized medicine to autonomous vehicles, AI is at the forefront of a technological revolution that promises to redefine the future, including many challenging problems standing in the way of useful quantum computing.

Quantum computers will integrate with conventional supercomputers and accelerate key parts of challenging problems relevant to government, academia, and industry. This relationship is described in An Introduction to Quantum Accelerated Supercomputing. The advantages of integrating quantum computers with supercomputers are reciprocal, and this tight integration will also enable AI to help solve the most important challenges standing in the way of useful quantum computing.

Opinion: America Needs Apollo Program for AI Race

(TNS) — The global race for computational power is well underway, fueled by a worldwide boom in artificial intelligence. OpenAI’s Sam Altman is seeking to raise as much as $7 trillion for a chipmaking venture. Tech giants like Microsoft and Amazon are building AI chips of their own. The need for more computing horsepower to train and use AI models—fueling a quest for everything from cutting-edge chips to giant data sets—isn’t just a current source of geopolitical leverage (as with US curbs on chip exports to China). It is also shaping the way nations will grow and compete in the future, with governments from India to the UK developing national strategies and stockpiling Nvidia graphics processing units.

I believe it’s high time for America to have its own national compute strategy: an Apollo program for the age of AI.

In January, under President Biden’s executive order on AI, the National Science Foundation launched a pilot program for the National AI Research Resource (NAIRR), envisioned as a “shared research infrastructure” to provide AI computing power, access to open government and nongovernment data sets, and training resources to students and AI researchers.

China Shows Off Monkey With Brain Chip Allowing It to Control Robotic Arm

A Chinese company says it’s successfully developed a brain chip and implanted it into a monkey — who can now remotely control a robot arm with the device.

That’s according to state-run news media outfit Xinhua, putting Elon Musk’s startup Neuralink on notice that there will be international as well as domestic competition for his brain-computer interface venture.

The company, Beijing Xinzhida Neurotechnology, which is backed by the Chinese government, unveiled its device, the NeuCyber Array BMI (brain-machine interface) System at a technology convention in Beijing on Thursday, according to Reuters.

Bipartisan Effort Demands DEA Action on Marijuana Scheduling

Read how Congress is pressing the DEA to reclassify marijuana from a Schedule I drug to Schedule III.


Marijuana is currently classified as a Schedule I drug, meaning these are “drugs with no currently accepted medical use and a high potential for abuse.” However, a team of 21 bipartisan congressional leaders from both the Senate and House of Representatives hopes to change that as they recently sent a letter to the United States Drug Enforcement Administration (DEA) pushing them to “promptly remove marijuana from Schedule I of the Controlled Substances Act (CSA)”, noting that almost eight months had passed “since the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) recommended rescheduling marijuana to Schedule III — and 18 months since President Biden directed HHS and the Department of Justice (DOJ) to begin the process of reviewing marijuana’s scheduling.”

Examples of other Schedule I drugs include heroin, lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), marijuana (cannabis), 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (ecstasy), methaqualone, and peyote, while Schedule III drugs include Tylenol, ketamine, anabolic steroids, and testosterone. Additionally, the penalties between Schedule I and Schedule III drugs also demonstrate stark contrasts, as well.

The 21 congressional leaders take it even farther than requesting marijuana be reclassified as a Schedule III drug, as they state, “As explained in our prior letters, while a move to Schedule III would be a meaningful improvement, the only way to remedy the most concerning consequences of marijuana prohibition is to deschedule marijuana altogether.”

Dr. Sean Kirkpatrick, Ph.D. — Science And Technology For Emerging National Security Threats

Science And Technology For Emerging National Security Threats — Dr. Sean Kirkpatrick, Ph.D. — Nonlinear Solutions LLC — Fmr. Director, All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO), United States Department of Defense.


Dr. Sean Kirkpatrick, Ph.D. is Owner of Nonlinear Solutions LLC., an advisory group that provides strategic scientific and intelligence consulting services, with a focus on emerging science and technology trends, to clients in both the defense and intelligence communities.

Dr. Kirkpatrick recently retired from federal Senior Service in December 2023 and prior to his current responsibilities he answered to the Deputy Secretary of Defense to stand-up and lead the All-domain Anomaly Resolution Office (AARO — https://www.aaro.mil/) in early 2022, leading the U.S. government’s efforts to address Unidentified Anomalous Phenomena (UAP) using a rigorous scientific framework and a data-driven approach.

Dr. Kirkpatrick attended University of Georgia as an undergraduate, to study physics, where he also did his Ph.D. work in nonlinear and nonequilibrium phonon dynamics of rare earth doped fluoride crystals, and currently serves as an adjunct professor at UGA.

Dr. Kirkpatrick began his career in Defense and Intelligence related science and technology immediately out of graduate school. After receiving his Ph.D. in Physics in 1995, he subsequently took a postdoctoral position at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign, investigating laser-induced molecular vibrations of high explosives under an AFOSR program. In 1996, he was offered a National Research Council Fellowship at the U.S. Naval Research Laboratory in Washington D.C. investigating novel solid-state lasers for the Department of the Navy. In 1997, he was recruited by the Air Force Research Laboratory to build an Ultrafast Laser Physics Lab to investigate nonlinear optics, novel ultrafast spectroscopic methods, and nonlinear micro/nano-fabrication techniques for the Air Force.