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dateMore Than a Year Ago
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An edited collection of advanced computing news from Communications of the ACM, ACM TechNews, other ACM resources, and news sites around the Web.


The Internet Mapmakers Helping Nepal
From ACM News

The Internet Mapmakers Helping Nepal

The night after the earthquake hit Nepal, people feared to sleep in their homes, worrying about powerful aftershocks toppling the few buildings left standing.

­.s. Supreme Court: Gps Trackers Are a Form of Search and Seizure
From ACM News

­.s. Supreme Court: Gps Trackers Are a Form of Search and Seizure

If the government puts a GPS tracker on you, your car, or any of your personal effects, it counts as a search—and is therefore protected by the Fourth Amendment...

The Attention Machine
From ACM News

The Attention Machine

Human attention isn't stable, ever, and it costs us: lives lost when drivers space out, billions of dollars wasted on inefficient work, and mental disorders that...

The Anti-Plagiarism Machine
From ACM Careers

The Anti-Plagiarism Machine

Every day, researchers add hundreds of new papers to ArXiv, the massive public database of scientific writing and research.

The Quiet Rise of the Satellite Spy Agency
From ACM News

The Quiet Rise of the Satellite Spy Agency

As far as intelligence agencies go, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency has remained relatively low profile—attracting neither the intrigue of, say, the...

Listening In: The Navy Is Tracking Ocean Sounds Collected By Scientists
From ACM News

Listening In: The Navy Is Tracking Ocean Sounds Collected By Scientists

In a retired shore station for transpacific communications cables on the western coast of Vancouver Island sits a military computer in a padlocked cage.

Vexed in the City: Starved For Tech Talent and Yet Nobody to Hire?
From ACM Careers

Vexed in the City: Starved For Tech Talent and Yet Nobody to Hire?

Darin Wedel made headlines in 2012 when his wife, Jennifer, asked President Barack Obama during a Google+ Hangout why her husband was still out of work while H-1B...

How to Invent a Person Online
From ACM Opinion

How to Invent a Person Online

On April 8, 2013, I received an envelope in the mail from a nonexistent return address in Toledo, Ohio.

A Rare Look Inside the Air Force's Drone Training Classroom
From ACM Careers

A Rare Look Inside the Air Force's Drone Training Classroom

Learning how to drop bombs and fire Hellfire missiles is more like sitting in a regular college classroom than you might expect.

Making Babies
From ACM News

Making Babies

Forty years ago, there was exactly one way for humans to reproduce.

Should ­.s. Hackers Fix Cybersecurity Holes or Exploit Them?
From ACM Opinion

Should ­.s. Hackers Fix Cybersecurity Holes or Exploit Them?

There's a debate going on about whether the U.S. government—specifically, the NSA and United States Cyber Command—should stockpile Internet vulnerabilities or disclose...

The Not-So-Distant Future When We Can All ­pgrade Our Brains
From ACM Opinion

The Not-So-Distant Future When We Can All ­pgrade Our Brains

In a decade, cognitive enhancement may have gone mainstream.

The First Look at How Google's Self-Driving Car Handles City Streets
From ACM News

The First Look at How Google's Self-Driving Car Handles City Streets

The first rule of riding in Google's self-driving car, says Dmitri Dolgov, is not to compliment Google's self-driving car.

Remembering Mit, When There Were Just 50 Women in a Class of 1,000
From ACM Opinion

Remembering Mit, When There Were Just 50 Women in a Class of 1,000

When Radia Perlman attended MIT in the late '60s and '70s, she was one of just a few dozen women (about 50) out of a class of 1,000.

Everything We Know About How the Nsa Tracks People's Physical Location
From ACM News

Everything We Know About How the Nsa Tracks People's Physical Location

Glenn Greenwald is back reporting about the NSA, now with Pierre Omidyar's news organization FirstLook and its introductory publication, The Intercept.

Stanford Researchers: It Is Trivially Easy to Match Metadata to Real People
From ACM Opinion

Stanford Researchers: It Is Trivially Easy to Match Metadata to Real People

In defending the NSA's telephony metadata collection efforts, government officials have repeatedly resorted to one seemingly significant detail: This is just metadata—numbers...

Intense Smog Is Making Beijing's Massive Surveillance Network Practically Useless
From ACM News

Intense Smog Is Making Beijing's Massive Surveillance Network Practically Useless

Beijing's surveillance network, one of the most extensive and invasive in the world, has been compromised by an unexpected foe: smog.

Of Course Gas Stations Will ­se Facial Recognition Tech to Serve 'Relevant' Ads
From ACM News

Of Course Gas Stations Will ­se Facial Recognition Tech to Serve 'Relevant' Ads

Say you're at a gas station. Say you're buying some supplies—bottled water, coffee, maybe some M&Ms—before you head back to your car.

Study: 80% of College Students Say They Text in Class
From ACM News

Study: 80% of College Students Say They Text in Class

From the front of his classroom, University of Nebraska-Lincoln associate professor Barney McCoy noticed that students’ smart phones were making regular appearances...

Why Today's Inventors Need to Read More Science Fiction
From ACM Opinion

Why Today's Inventors Need to Read More Science Fiction

How will police use a gun that immobilizes its target but does not kill? What would people do with a device that could provide them with any mood they desire? What...
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