A hacker has defaced the website of the pcTattletale spyware application, found on the booking systems of several Wyndham hotels in the United States, and leaked over a dozen archives containing database and source code data.
As Vice reported three years ago, this stalkerware app was also found leaking real-time screenshots from Android phones.
Described by its developers as an “employee and child monitoring software,” pcTattletale is a consumer-grade spyware solution that was leaking guest details and customer information captured from the hotels’ check-in systems because of an API security vulnerability, according to TechCrunch.
When Descartes said “I think therefore I am” he probably didn’t know that he was answering a security question. Using behavioral or physical characteristics to identify people, biometrics, has gotten a big boost in the EU. The Orwellian sounding HUMABIO (Human Monitoring and Authentication using Biodynamic Indicators and Behavioral Analysis) is a well funded research project that seeks to combine sensor technology with the latest in biometrics to find reliable and non-obtrusive ways to identify people quickly. One of their proposed methods: scanning your brain stem. That’s right, in addition to reading your retinas, looking at your finger prints, and monitoring your voice, the security systems of the future may be scanning your brain.
How could they actually read your brain? What kind of patterns would they use to authenticate your identity? Yeah, that haven’t quite figured that out yet. HUMABIO is still definitely in the “pre-commercial” and “proof of concept” phase. They do have a nice ethics manual to read, and they’ve actually written some “stories” that illustrate the uses of their various works in progress, but they haven’t produced a fieldable instrument yet. In fact, this aspect of the STREP (Specific Targeted Research Project) would hardly be remarkable if we didn’t know more about the available technology from other sources.
A quantum internet would essentially be unhackable. In the future, sensitive information—financial or national security data, for instance, as opposed to memes and cat pictures—would travel through such a network in parallel to a more traditional internet.
Of course, building and scaling systems for quantum communications is no easy task. Scientists have been steadily chipping away at the problem for years. A Harvard team recently took another noteworthy step in the right direction. In a paper published this week in Nature, the team says they’ve sent entangled photons between two quantum memory nodes 22 miles (35 kilometers) apart on existing fiber optic infrastructure under the busy streets of Boston.
“Showing that quantum network nodes can be entangled in the real-world environment of a very busy urban area is an important step toward practical networking between quantum computers,” Mikhail Lukin, who led the project and is a physics professor at Harvard, said in a press release.
Advanced information processing technologies offer greener telecommunications and strong data security for millions, a study led by University of Maryland (UMD) researchers revealed.
I’m grateful to be here today with a group of kindred spirits focused on tackling some of the hardest problems we face at the intersection of technology and national security.
Ash Carter devoted his life to working in this arena, and many of you are here because of the impact he had on you and your careers.
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The nuclear reactions that power the stars and forge the elements emerge from the interactions of the quantum mechanical particles, protons and neutrons. Explaining these processes is one of the most challenging unsolved problems in computational physics. As the mass of the colliding nuclei grows, the resources required to model them outpace even the most powerful conventional computers. Quantum computers could perform the necessary computations. However, they currently fall short of the required number of reliable and long-lived quantum bits. This research combined conventional computers and quantum computers to significantly accelerate the prospects of solving this problem.
The Impact
The researchers successfully used the hybrid computing scheme to simulate the scattering of two neutrons. This opens a path to computing nuclear reaction rates that are difficult or impossible to measure in a laboratory. These include reaction rates that play a role in astrophysics and national security. The hybrid scheme will also aid in simulating the properties of other quantum mechanical systems. For example, it could help researchers study the scattering of electrons with quantized atomic vibrations known as phonons, a process that underlies superconductivity.
In 2024, security teams face new opportunities and obstacles, such as escalating geopolitical tensions, stricter compliance mandates, and the rise of generative AI — which will transform the industry in new and unexpected ways.
In the State of Security 2024: The Race to Harness AI, we identify organizations that are pulling ahead of their peers and share key characteristics and findings.
The problem of personal identity is a longstanding philosophical topic albeit without final consensus. In this article the somewhat similar problem of AI identity is discussed, which has not gained much traction yet, although this investigation is increasingly relevant for different fields, such as ownership issues, personhood of AI, AI welfare, brain–machine interfaces, the distinction between singletons and multi-agent systems as well as to potentially support finding a solution to the problem of personal identity. The AI identity problem analyses the criteria for two AIs to be considered the same at different points in time. Two approaches to tackle the problem are proposed: One is based on the personal identity problem and the concept of computational irreducibility, while the other one applies multi-factor authentication to the AI identity problem. Also, a range of scenarios is examined regarding AI identity, such as replication, fission, fusion, switch off, resurrection, change of hardware, transition from non-sentient to sentient, journey to the past, offspring and identity change.
Working To Reduce Global Catastrophic Biological Risks — Dr. Jaime Yassif, Ph.D. — VP, Global Biological Policy and Programs, Nuclear Threat Initiative.
Dr. Jaime Yassif, Ph.D. serves as Vice President of Global Biological Policy and Programs, at the Nuclear Threat Initiative (https://www.nti.org/about/people/jaim…) where she oversees work to reduce global catastrophic biological risks, strengthen biosecurity and pandemic preparedness, and drives progress in advancing global health security.
Prior to this, Dr. Yassif served as a Program Officer at the Open Philanthropy Project, where she led the initiative on Biosecurity and Pandemic Preparedness. In this role, she recommended and managed approximately $40 million in biosecurity grants, which rebuilt the field and supported work in several key areas, including: development of new biosecurity programming at several leading think tanks; cultivation of new talent through biosecurity leadership development programs; initiation of new biosecurity work in China and India; establishment of the Global Health Security Index; development of the Clade X tabletop exercise; and the emergence of a new discussion about global catastrophic biological risks.
Previously, Dr. Yassif was a Science and Technology Policy Advisor at the U.S. Department of Defense, where she focused on oversight of the Cooperative Threat Reduction Program and East Asia security issues. During this period, she also worked on the Global Health Security Agenda (GHSA) at the Department of Health and Human Services, where she helped lay the groundwork for the WHO Joint External Evaluations and the GHSA Steering Group.
Dr. Yassif’s previous experience includes work with Connecting Organizations for Regional Disease Surveillance, Chatham House, NTI, the Federation of American Scientists and the Tsinghua University Institute for International Studies.
