A collective of more than 1,000 researchers, academics and experts in artificial intelligence are speaking out against soon-to-be-published research claims to use neural networks to “predict criminality.” At the time of writing, more than 50 employees working on AI at companies like Facebook, Google and Microsoft had signed on to an open letter opposing the…
Vaping is a controversial habit: it certainly has its downsides, but anecdotally it’s a fantastic smoking cessation aid. The thing is, until behavioral scientists know a bit more about who does it, when, how much and other details, its use will continue to be something of a mystery. That’s where the PuffPacket comes in. Designed…
Privacy researchers in Europe believe they have the first proof that a long-theorised vulnerability in systems designed to protect privacy by aggregating and adding noise to data to mask individual identities is no longer just a theory. The research has implications for the immediate field of differential privacy and beyond — raising wide-ranging questions about…
Jorge Conde is a General Partner at Andreessen Horowitz where he leads investments at the cross section of biology, computer science and engineering. Much of Silicon Valley mythology is centered on the founder-as-hero narrative. But historically, scientific founders leading the charge for bio companies have been far less common. Developing new drugs is slow, risky…
The growing popularity of 3D printing machines and companies like Thingiverse and Shapeways have given previously unimaginable powers to makers, enabling them to create everything from cosplay accessories to replacement parts. But even though 3D printing has launched a new world of customized objects, most of us are still buying clothes off the rack. Now…
Researchers from two universities in Europe have published a method they say is able to correctly re-identify 99.98% of individuals in anonymized datasets with just 15 demographic attributes. Their model suggests complex datasets of personal information cannot be protected against re-identification by current methods of ‘anonymizing’ data — such as releasing samples (subsets) of the…
