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Chinese cyber strategy-building deterrence

China’s public report on their own Cyber Security Strategy — don’t get too excited; it is a “public” version of their plan (mean nothing in depth).


New cyber warfare unit

While China was assessed to have cyber warfare capabilities for quite some time, the declaration by its Central Military Council of the formation of a new military branch focussed on digital battleground technically called Strategic Support Force on 1st Jan. 2016 confirmed this. This new force is mainly aimed at providing resources capable of protecting China’s cyber and space security. On this occasion Xi pointed out that this force is central to achieving the “Chinese Dream” suggesting its importance.

This development has not come as a surprise. Last year China had released it’s first-ever White Paper on military strategy [entitled “China’s Military Strategy”] which stressed on need to shift to “active defence” and emphasized China’s commitment to “winning informationized local wars” as also becoming a maritime power. The White Paper also contained the first official acknowledgement of China’s commitment to building a cyber force with the capability to engage in offensive cyber operations.

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Clueless In Cyber-Security Land

Very good read; and hints at something that I have been highlighting for a while around AI, NextGen transformation and adoption, etc. One very large brick wall that I highlighted in my latest posts around 5 areas that need to be address for AI to be adopted more broadly is Cyber Security.

If we do not get Cyber Security address soon around hackers, cloud, etc. AI (including robotics), brain interfaces, etc. will be either rejected or very limited in its adoption. It is just that simple.


What are CISO’s (Chief Information Security Officers) worrying about in 2016?

According to the recent 2016 Security Pressures report from Trustwave, theft of information from a successful breach or cyber-attack ranks as the top worrying outcome for nearly two-thirds of respondents.

With the Identity Theft Resource Center placing the number of records exposed from data breaches in 2015 somewhere around 170 million, it’s no surprise.

North Korea Aims For Submarine-Launched Nuclear Missiles

This story crosses into the realm of satellite launchers and commercial space, but has troubling implications for international security. I personally am a bit more worried about North Korea’s ability to secure ballistic sub-launched weapons of mass destruction since I think that they offer more stealth than an ICBM silo, which we can fairly easily detect.


North Korea’s potential intercontinental ballistic missile (ICBM) threat may be stealing headlines, but the rogue state’s interest in submarine-launched nuclear weapons is arguably even more worrisome.

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History: I know that we often write about the future, etc

However, one also must look at the past for insights and guidance on things that were done wrong to ensure bad history is not repeated.

Therefore, let me share with you a part of history that we need to be aware of and protect our future from ever repeating again.

Many folks have never heard of Poor Farms in the South and Poor Houses in some parts of the Midwest. Before soc. Security and Welfare we had poor farms/ houses. They date from the late 1800s until 1930s.

Poor farms/ houses were often filled with the elderly and others that had no money or anyone to take care them. People often worked the land for 16+ hours days, dressed in rags, and had very little to eat. Once you were there you could not leave ever until you died.

My grandfather always taught us that if Social Security and Welfare were ever eliminated, that a model of Poor Farms/ houses would return.


Poorhouses promised to be a much more efficient and cheaper way to provide relief to paupers.

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IoT Could Be Used by Spies, U.S. Intelligence Chief Says

More Intel Concerns


James Clapper tells senators the vulnerabilities in connected devices that hackers exploit can also be used for surveillance by foreign countries.

As the Internet of things has grown, so has the debate about security around it.

Much of the focus has been around the fact that with billions of new systems, devices and sensors connecting each year, the attack surface for hackers continues to widen. Add in a lack of security in many of these connected devices and their growing popularity in homes and businesses, and the issue becomes even more concerning.

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Yes, robots will steal our jobs — but don’t worry, we’ll get new ones

Again, I see too many gaps that will need to be address before AI can eliminate 70% of today’s jobs. Below, are the top 5 gaps that I have seen so far with AI in taking over many government, business, and corporate positions.

1) Emotion/ Empathy Gap — AI has not been designed with the sophistication to provide personable care such as you see with caregivers, medical specialists, etc.
2) Demographic Gap — until we have a more broader mix of the population engaged in AI’s design & development; AI will not meet the needs for critical mass adoption; only a subset of the population will find will connection in serving most of their needs.
3) Ehtics & Morale Code Gap — AI still cannot understand at a full cognitive level ethics & empathy to a degree that is required.
4) Trust and Compliance Gap — companies need to feel that their IP & privacy is protected; until this is corrected, AI will not be able to replace an entire back office and front office set of operations.
5) Security & Safety Gap — More safeguards are needed around AI to deal with hackers to ensure that information managed by AI is safe as well as ensure public saftey from any AI that becomes disruptive or hijacked to cause injury or worse to the public

Until these gaps are addressed; it will be very hard to eliminate many of today’s government, office/ business positions. The greater job loss will be in the lower skill areas like standard landscaping, some housekeeping, some less personable store clerk, some help desk/ call center operations, and some lite admin admin roles.


The U.S. economy added 2.7 million jobs in 2015, capping the best two-year stretch of employment growth since the late ‘90’s, pushing the unemployment rate down to five percent.

But to listen to the doomsayers, it’s just a matter of time before the rapid advance of technology makes most of today’s workers obsolete – with ever-smarter machines replacing teachers, drivers, travel agents, interpreters and a slew of other occupations.

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CBS News investigation: Liquid biopsy giving false sense of security about cancer risk?

Not good — CancerIntercept Detect and Monitor test is not providing accurate information in some results. The cancerIntercept test whole concept was to detect a growing tumor in the body, before the patient may notice symptoms — acting like a cancer stethoscope for detecting and monitoring cancer.


Pathway Genomics claims its liquid biopsy can detect cancer before patient shows symptoms — but expert says that promise is “years away”.

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Scientists Are Trying to Create An Untraceable ‘Quantum Internet’

Glad that Stanford is working on their own version because the US Government has their own and it has been online in Los Alamos for a while now; have more than one version to learn from only enriches the final version.


Researchers are a step closer to building a quantum technology that could help improve internet security.

Researchers from Stanford University in U.S. have created a novel quantum light source to help improve internet security. In other words, the scientists have designed a technology that might someday serve as the basis for quantum communication.

The physics of quantum communication is definitely complex. Standard lasers are in reality not useful for secure communication in the physics of quantum communication, as they release what is called ‘classical’ light.

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Investment platforms must get back in the game

Good article and perspective. And, I believe areas like Finance and Legal will be addressed over the next 5 to 7 years with AI. However, much of our critical needs are in healthcare particularly medical technology and Infrastructure (including security); and these need to get upgraded and improved now.


I recently read a thought provoking article by Klaus Schwab, called ‘The Fourth Industrial Revolution: what it means, how to respond’. At the beginning of the article Schwab describes the first three industrial revolutions, which I think we’re all fairly familiar with:

1784 – steam, water and mechanical production equipment.

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