Month: May 2021

Weekly Roundup Of Tech News – 05/23/2021

Healthcare: Telephones not computers played key role in pandemic TeleHealth 

What: According to Axios KFF survey reported that more than half of Medicare beneficiaries utilized telephone for their Telehealth visits.

How:  More than 56% of beneficiaries used telephone for the Telehealth. It was very high among hispanics (61%), rural (65%) compared to only 28% of people using video for telehealth.

Why it matters: Telemedicine conjures up video visits from the physician but this statistic provides an insight into the adoption by the end consumer. There could be challenges in the availability of broadband to the rural and minority communities. Until these challenges are addressed adoption of Telehealth will continue to be a challenge.

Artificial Intelligence: RAI’s certification to prevent AI turning into HALs

What: Responsible Artificial Intelligence Institute (RAI), a non-profit hopes to offer a more standardized means of certifying AI solutions.

How:  RAI has built a concrete framework of Build, Accredit, Audit and Certify process that has dimensions in Accountability, Bias and Fairness, Data Quality, Explainability and Interoperability and Robustness for Certifying AI solutions.

Why it matters: We have seen how AI’s can go rogue through in the fictional Space Odyssey’s HAL computer which eliminates the entire crew. More recently, Microsoft’s Tay debacle, Facebook’s algorithm spreading online hate and the Clearview’s surveillance systems’ facial recognition software caused public outrage due to their power and the opaqueness of algorithms’ logic creating fear about AI itself. By certifying the AI systems similar to LEED, it gives transparency and more adoption.

Worldwide Web: Linkrot and its impact on the web 

What: Research has shown that many important links in the web get lost to time. For e.g., quarter of The New York Times’ articles are now rotten, leading to completely inaccessible pages according to team of researchers from Harvard Law School. The following graph shows reverse view of link rot over time.

How: When an old article gets archived, the new location is not published. For example, let’s say an article was published in 1998 with a hard code the link and has been archived. The original link wouldn’t be active and someone else can publish a completely opposing view of the original content thereby affecting the integrity of the content. The study by Harvard Law School found that in 550,000 articles, which contained 2.2 million links to external websites  in New York Times, 72% of them were “deep” or pointing to a specific page rather than a general website. 6% in 2018 vs 72% links from 1998 were dead.

Why it matters: Imagine a situation where the original video or content succumb to linkrot and in its place something else is published that could create confusion and panic. One solution is by Wikipedia where it asks for page’s archive on sites like Wayback machine. Another solution by Perma.cc project attempts to fix the issue of link rot in legal citations and academic journals by providing archived versions of the page along with original source. There are many other areas that require this capability and certainly something for a startup to think about. Any takers?

Weekly Roundup of Tech News – 5/16/2021

Programming Languages: Python founder wants to improve its performance

    • What: Python founder, Guido von Rossum, wants to make Python work faster similar to its counterparts like C++.
    • How: Microsoft hired Guido von Rossum after he retired and allowed him to pursue whatever he wanted. He focused on improving the performance for Python with other developers hired by Microsoft.
    • Why it matters: Guido von Rossum committed that it will not break the existing code and will incrementally improve the language. This may allow application developers to pay attention to Python language which has been primarily used extensively in data communities.

CyberSecurity: Colonial Pipeline paid $5 million ransom to the hackers

    • What: According to Verge, Colonial Pipeline paid around $5 million ransomware money to the hackers who then released the keys for un-encrypting the servers and resuming operations.
    • How: Before the COVID19 pandemic, the systems were managed through intranet and the employees went to work. Due to the pandemic some of the network was opened through the internet and employees were working from home social distancing themselves in managing the network. Hackers gained access through the vulnerabilities and closed out the systems.
    • Why it matters: The hack exposed the vulnerability of public systems and enabled President Biden to sign a law into force to handle such cyber attacks. The executive order outlines a number of initiatives, including reducing barriers to information sharing between the government and the private sector, mandating the deployment of multi-factor authentication in the federal government, establishing a Cybersecurity Safety Review Board modeled after the National Transportation Safety Board, and creating a standardized playbook for responding to “cyber incidents.”

Quantum Computing: Honeywell released its quantum computing platform

What: Honeywell published an article claiming that its quantum computer can achieve the volume of 64 with only 6 qubits as opposed to 27-qubit processor of IBM.  This will significantly reduce the size of the devices.

How: Honeywell used trapped ion technology as opposed to the superconducting ions (used by IBM and Google) to power its device. This enabled the cross connectivity between the ions to encode more information.

Why it matters: With this new breakthrough in the quantum race, trapped ion technology has become a serious contender. Honeywell claimed that it will enable the company to release the world’s most powerful quantum computer within the next three months. This will pave the way to solve multitude of practical problems that are waiting to be solved with the limitation of computing power.

Weekly Roundup Of Tech News – 5/9/2021

  1. Software Development: US Supreme Court Rules on Key Software Development Practice
    • What: Supreme Court ruled in favor of Google about its usage of Java SE compatible programming interface for Android Development as “Fair Use” in a case filed by Oracle.
    • How: Even though Google used about four-tenths of a percentage of Java Code, and that such code was further incorporated into a totally different product was transformative enough use of the code at issue to qualify its fair use of that code.
    • Why it matters: What this means for the developers is that they can continue utilizing the open source APIs with the understanding that implementations matter more than the definition. As such a big win for the development community.
  2. Artificial Intelligence: USPS turns to AI to boost Package Processing
    • What: USPS handles roughly 129 billion pieces of mail and 7.3 billion packages last year. Tracking these have been difficult. A federal data scientist proposed to deploy the edge AI servers at the postal servicing processing centers system in an effort to gain and share more data points.
    • How: NVDIA working with USPS created Edge Computing Infrastructure Program or ECIP, a distributed edge AI system now running at USPS locations, via NVDIA EGX Platform.
    • Why it matters: The system used to take 8 to 10 people several days to track down items now takes one or two hours with the ECIP AI Program. This enables USPS to track down any item in transit to better manage the deliveries.
  3. Cryptocurrency:  Digital Dollar Project to launch currency pilots
    • What: U.S Nonprofit Digital Dollar Project said it will launch five pilot programs over next 12 months to test use cases for US Central Bank Digital Currency (CBDC)
    • How: Private-sector pilots are funded by Accenture Plc and involve financial firms, retailers and NGOs to generate data to help US Policy makers develop digital dollar through central banks.
    • Why it matters: The data derived can pave way for creating US CBDC that will assert its place as a digital currency and will help larger adoption of cryptocurrencies by the mainstream population.