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TechNews Alert for Wednesday, February 11, 2004



Title: ACM TechNews (HTML)
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ACM TechNews
February 11, 2004

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HEADLINES AT A GLANCE:

  • Will the Election Be Hacked?
  • 1980s Technology Propels Mars Exploration
  • H-1B Training Program to Be Axed
  • IT Salaries Picking Up Momentum
  • Robot Dogs Get Social Conscience Installed
  • Privacy Reduction's Next Act
  • ACM Professional Development Centre Expands Learning Opportunities
  • Linux Security on the Ropes
  • Cyberinfrastucture Poised to Revolutionize Environmental Sciences and Other Disciplines
  • Lofty Goal: Computers People Can Talk With
  • Neural Software Could Become Soldier's Best Friend
  • The Virus Underground
  • Save Your Software! Recycle
  • Great Taste, Less Privacy
  • Can E-Mail Survive?
  • Reasoning on the Web With Rules and Semantics
  • Return of the Supercomputers
  • Rushing Toward Chaos
  • Smart Robot Pet Tricks
  • The E-Mail Mess

     

    Will the Election Be Hacked?

    The distrust people feel toward paperless touch-screen electronic voting systems is turning into a national movement, fueled by audits from RABA Technologies, Johns Hopkins, and others that uncovered serious flaws in machines from Diebold Election Systems--flaws that not only raise the ...

    [read more]

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    1980s Technology Propels Mars Exploration

    The twin Mars rovers Spirit and Opportunity are equipped with 20-year-old microprocessor technology that offers greater tolerance to radiation and extreme temperatures and vibrations common to space exploration. BAE Systems used an early version of IBM's PowerPC chip running at a speed of ...

    [read more]

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    H-1B Training Program to Be Axed

    The White House is calling for the cancellation of the H-1B Training Program in its proposed budget for fiscal 2005, claiming that the effort has not proven successful at improving the skills of American workers in specialized professions. Under the program, Americans are trained to fill ...

    [read more]

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    IT Salaries Picking Up Momentum

    Dice CEO Scott Melland reports that the modest 2 percent rise in technology salaries over the past year, recorded in the Dice Salary Survey Report, indicates a resurgence for tech professionals who have suffered wage drops over the 18 months or so. Government and defense salaries experienced the ...

    [read more]

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    Robot Dogs Get Social Conscience Installed

    Yale University mechanical engineer and computer scientist Natalie Jeremijenko has spearheaded the creation of "feral" robotic canines programmed to scan for the presence of toxic materials in public areas; the robot dogs also exhibit pack behavior and a social conscience. The robots, ...

    [read more]

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    Privacy Reduction's Next Act

    Declan McCullagh finds considerable fault with the recently introduced Fraudulent Online Identity Sanctions Act, which he describes as an attempt by the government to penalize domain name holders who withhold contact information from the Whois database, even when such anonymity is protected ...

    [read more]

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    ACM Professional Development Centre Expands Learning Opportunities

    ACM's Professional Development Centre, launched in 2002, is about to expand its course offerings. On Tuesday, February 17, the number of courses accessible from the Centre will climb from 250 to over 300; all are free to ACM members. New topics will ...

    [read more]

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    Linux Security on the Ropes

    The perception among Linux fans is that the open-source operating system is more secure than Windows, but others argue that Linux will prove to be less secure than Windows if it acquires more market share and thus becomes an even more attractive target to hackers and virus writers. Illuminata ...

    [read more]

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    Cyberinfrastucture Poised to Revolutionize Environmental Sciences and Other Disciplines

    The potential impact of a national "cyberinfrastructure" on environmental sciences and other disciplines will be the subject of two sessions of the AAAS Annual Meeting in Seattle on Feb. 13, 2004. Two directorates of the National Science Foundation (NSF), which has become increasingly involved ...

    [read more]

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    Lofty Goal: Computers People Can Talk With

    Making computers capable of understanding natural language to the degree that human beings can converse with them as if they too were flesh-and-blood is a long-term goal of the National Science Foundation (NSF). Thus far, research and commercial development of computer-language ...

    [read more]

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    Neural Software Could Become Soldier's Best Friend

    A real-time advice system for soldiers and other government agents in the field is being developed at Sandia National Laboratories, using neural-network software. The researchers' goal is to build a virtual mentor that can counsel people engaged in vital operations within a ...

    [read more]

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    The Virus Underground

    The year 2003 was a banner year for malware, with the release of network worms that spread with increasing rapidity and insidiousness, and such events are putting elite virus writers on the spot. Even though many top virus and worm authors have not technically transgressed any laws and ...

    [read more]

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    Save Your Software! Recycle

    Grant Larsen, an engineer at IBM's Rational software development tools division, believes the Re-usable Asset Specification (RAS) for recycling software code is edging toward standardization. RAS, which is expected to be ratified in July following its review by the Object Management Group, ...

    [read more]

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    Great Taste, Less Privacy

    Driver's licenses are being used for more than just identification, given the type and amount of information stored on the cards' bar codes and magnetic strips. The scanning of such licenses is usually a security measure--restaurants and bars do it to spot underage drinkers with fake ...

    [read more]

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    Can E-Mail Survive?

    Email reform is desperately needed, not only because of the convergence of spam and viruses, but because email is also threatening to collapse from overload. Legislation alone will not solve the problem: Laws such as the recently passed CAN-SPAM are unlikely to significantly reduce spam because ...

    [read more]

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    Reasoning on the Web With Rules and Semantics

    The European Commission, as part of its sixth Framework Programme, will launch REasoning on the WEb with Rules and SEmantics (REWERSE), a research "Network of Excellence" that will include 27 European research and development organizations designed to bolster Europe's expertise in Web ...

    [read more]

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    Return of the Supercomputers

    The ascendance of Japan's Earth Simulator to the ranking of world's fastest supercomputer has spurred calls among U.S. computer scientists and government officials for greater investments in fundamental, next-generation supercomputing research. "It's a technological race, and ...

    [read more]

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    Rushing Toward Chaos

    In his book "It's Alive," Nerve founder Christopher Meyer diagrams the American IT's economy progression over the next decade, outlining the transition of companies to a biological evolutionary model that focuses on the "adaptive enterprise," spurred by rapid advances in biotechnology and ...

    [read more]

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    Smart Robot Pet Tricks

    Sony's AIBO robot dog comes with a set of preprogrammed behaviors, but after a period of resistance, Sony issued software developer tools that allow programmers to modify and customize the dog's behavior, partly in the hopes of making the toy a research platform for artificial intelligence and ...

    [read more]

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    The E-Mail Mess

    Some states have strict laws against spammers, with some laws focusing on deceptive email and others trying to stop spam before it starts, but the new federal Can-Spam Act will hinder many of those laws. The federal legislation strengthens the rights of Internet users in states that lack ...

    [read more]

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