Hate Speech is a thing! In a first-of-its kind study NYU researchers have shown links between online hate an offline crime. Hate speech on social media outlets are becoming more and more of a norm in today’s society. If you didn’t know, hate crimes are tracked by the Federal Bureau of Investigation, crimes that are motivated by race, ethnicity. and national origin represent the largest portion of hate crimes in the U.S.

In research led by Rumi Chunara, found that ” more targeted, discriminatory tweets are posted in a city related to a higher number of crimes”(Chunara). Although this data may not seem shocking, hate speech has been at an all time high not just on twitter but other social media outlets like Facebook and Instagram. The team at NYU also found that an average of “8% of tweets containing targeted discriminatory language generated by bots”(Hamilton and Harrison). These platforms seem to be slowly becoming used to spew hate to different race and ethnic groups instead of what they were initially created for.

https://www.nyu.edu/about/news-publications/news/2019/june/hate-speech-on-twitter-predicts-frequency-of-real-life-hate-crim.html

In the 1800’s steam engines were introduced to boost labor productivity, the introduction of robots during the 1990s as well as IT during the 2000’s also boosted labor production. Today in the 21^st century we have a new technology introduced to boost labor productivity, the introduction of Artificial Intelligence also known as AI

AI will boost GDP (Gross domestic product) by over 14% between now and 2030 according to the McKinsey report. These economic opportunities will cater to companies and workers worldwide, having tremendous economic benefits.

However, in addition to AI’s economic benefits, there are some negative consequences as well. There will most likely be a replacement of manual human driven labor with cost effective AI manufacturing labor, possible putting many workers out of jobs. With every major transformative technology positively impacting the economy there is always going to be some negative tradeoff one way or another.

https://blogs.wsj.com/cio/2018/11/16/the-impact-of-artificial-intelligence-on-the-world-economy/

The lack of diversity in the tech field is not a recent occurrence; in fact, it has been a consistent challenge for companies for many years. Much of this is solely due to the fact that these companies continue to draw from a small segment of the talent pool – mainly consisting of white men from elite educational institutions. The question is, when will there be change?

Despite many companies’ stated determination to bring more women into the field of technology, their efforts have shown otherwise. Most of these companies do not invest considerably in improving the gender gap in tech through their philanthropy. For instance, in 2017, about 5% of companies’ philanthropic dollars went towards women in tech.

This lack of representation is quite unfortunate. Creating a more diverse environment will only influence more creative thinking, innovation, and ultimately, will promote greater profitability. #LIS4022spr20

https://www.mckinsey.com/industries/technology-media-and-telecommunications/our-insights/closing-the-tech-gender-gap-through-philanthropy-and-corporate-social-responsibility

Automated License Plate Readers (ALPR) are a relatively new technology that is being implemented quite rapidly. The cameras look similar to regular security cameras, but are usually larger and may have multiple lenses. They are constantly scanning for vehicle license plates as they pass vehicles or as vehicles pass them. The cameras can be stationed in many places such as parking garages, beside streets, near the entrances to parking lots and even on top of police cars. University police has a few marked patrol cars which have the cameras mounted on top. They drive around using the cameras to scan plates and determine which cars have a valid parking permit. The technology makes sense and is neat in ways, but does pose a threat to privacy. The main reason as to why is because there is nothing you can do about. By law you are required to have a valid license plate on your vehicle and it is illegal to obstruct it in any way. Therefore, there isn’t a way to get around the ALPR systems. The uses for these systems aren’t malicious by nature, being parking enforcement, tracking down stolen vehicles, tracking criminal’s vehicles and more. It is still important to be aware of this technology and understand that the license plates being scanned are certainly being stored in a database somewhere potentially for many years. Also, misuse of the data collected by these systems is possible, such as by rogue officers at police departments. As these systems become more widely implemented, it will likely be possible to track a vehicle as it moves through an area or city in real time. This is something to be aware of, but unfortunately there aren’t any legal ways to combat it yourself at this time.

https://www.eff.org/pages/automated-license-plate-readers-alpr

Videogames are one of the most popular pastimes in developed countries around the world. Unfortunately, until a few years ago, most videogames were inaccessible to those who were visually or hearing impaired. However, many companies are committed to expanding their markets by adding accessibility.

One important factor in creating a more accessible gaming future was the CVAA (21st Century Communications and Video Accessibility Act), which stated that communications must be as accessible to those with disabilities as possible. However, this is very vague, and although it was signed in 2010, it was not until 2019 that Xbox had a promotional campaign that stated, “when everybody plays, we all win”. The article was written by a videogame design company, so it is important to note they may be biased. They viewed the act positively, which I agree with, it is a very good thing there can be legal recourse against those who create inaccessible materials. The article also can serve as promotional material for their company – it shows how accessible their games are, meaning they did not point out their own shortcomings.

One way games can be more accessible is for menu screens to state where inside the menu they are – the article refers to this as “the ramp”. The article delves into what it means for the player to choose where they are inside the screen and what design choices the company made as it designed “the ramp”.

Read the article here: https://uxdesign.cc/designing-main-menu-screens-for-visually-impaired-gamers-865a8bd76543

Zoe Jenkins, zgj18

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Cyberbullying is a common issue all around the world. In the United Kingdom, 35% of student stated they have never experienced cyberbullying but only 7% admit they have been. The most common age of cyberbullying in Europe us between the ages of 13 to 15.

In Asian countries, 48% of students stated they have had an embarrassing video posted online of them. Additionally, 47% of the same survey respondents stated they were a victim of hate speech.

In the United states, the most common types of bullying are offensive name calling, then false rumors, and lastly receiving unwanted explicit images. The social media platforms are the ideal environment for bullies due to the fact they can hid behind a screen and remain anonymous while interacting with their victim. This has led to people in the united states, 68% to be exact, are sharing less and less personal information online than they used to.

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Interested to learn more?

https://techjury.net/stats-about/cyberbullying/#gref

https://awsinsider.net/articles/2020/01/10/aws-autogluon-deep-learning.aspx

Amazon, a company known globally not only for its online shop, but also for its cloud computing and web services, has recently released the first version of their new open-source toolkit called AutoGluon which aims to make machine learning more accessible for a much wider audience than before. Machine learning is a subset of artificial intelligence, being an incredibly powerful tool with an endless list of applications, including pattern recognition, prediction, classification and fraud detection.

Previously, the process of setting up machine learning for use in an application was a complex, tedious process that was inaccessible for a large percentage of the population. A process that once took experienced programmers immense time to research, careful planning and many lines of code to initiate can now be achieved with as little as three lines of code thanks to AutoGluon. While this isn’t the first tool attempting to simplify the machine learning process, it seems to be the most promising. Opening the floodgates for anyone to be able to implement machine learning in their projects will help make technology better for us all.

https://www.healthcareitnews.com/news/investors-looking-toward-healthcare-it-innovators-2020

Reports are showing that industry leaders are predicting that Healthcare IT will continue to grow in the upcoming years. This is good news for those of us currently in school or looking to venture out of our comfort zones in looking for new and exciting careers in not just IT, but also as a way of helping others. We all tend to think of our jobs as important, but consider Healthcare IT as a way to contribute to the medical field without having to be a surgeon or other medical professional. Doctors, researchers, medical coders, lab assistants, surgeons, and many others all increasingly depend on technology to do their jobs. In many ways many places are behind the curve and looking to upgrade systems, in other ways they are expanding capabilities to new heights previously not attainable. Doctors are looking to use technology to make their day to day lives easier and get back to re-humanizing medical practices with their patients. Robotics and Artificial Intelligence are going to be two areas that coding and hardware will expand as more and more procedures require more precise and delicate movements. Medical coders will require System Administrators to keep their files and networks in order and secure as they deal with an ageing population looking for care. And researchers will be wanting to expand in ways to help assist with finding new ways to detect diseases and care in a more timely manner. In the coming years consider a region of our field that is growing and may just well be very rewarding.

https://www.newsweek.com/instagram-censoring-accounts-farsi-media-outlets-iranian-influencers-international-federation-1481609

Earlier this month, Iran’s major general Qassem Soleimani was killed under orders from the United States. With this killing came not only protests from Iran but also censorship from one of the most widely used social media apps in the world, Instagram. Instagram has chosen to censor the Instagram posts of many Iranian journalists and any Instagram users who mention anything positive about the Iranian major general. According to a recent news article by Newsweek, “the Association of Iranian Journalists in Tehran, Iran, called the censorship ‘unprecedented in the history of social networks and in conflict with the very innate actuality of media.'”

In my personal opinion, I think that it is completely inappropriate for Instagram to censor the posts of so many Iranian journalists and citizens. Social media has become such an important tool for communication, information, news, and for venting one’s opinion. By censoring posts from Iranian journalists and citizens, Instagram is unjustifiably taking away the Iranian people’s right to information, to communicate, and to news. Imagine being an innocent citizen of Iran and being denied access to important news and information about what is going on in your own country. I don’t believe that Instagram should have the right to censor important news and information about matters that could drastically affect so many people all over the world.

It’s just another day in who is trying to hack who news. This time, the nice guys may come as a surprise to many.

In a rare agency press release, the NSA urged Windows users to update their computers and said the “critical” vulnerability would be quickly understood by government-sponsored hackers.

The agency handed the flaw over to Microsoft, which published a fix on January 14.  Not so long go, the NSA would have simply used the exploit for its own offensive goals, but the country’s intelligence agencies have changed their strategy in the last decade. 

A hack that can affect millions of people is always just a click away and that is why hacking is such a big deal. As technology becomes more prominent, hacking and flaws in technologies will continue to be prominent as well. It will take securities like NSA to help combat hackers.