21 Sep 2016
In 2016, researchers at MIT's Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence Laboratory developed a new device that uses wireless signals that measure heartbeats by bouncing off a person's body. The researchers claim that this system is 87% accurate in recognising joy, pleasure, sadness, or anger
10 Oct 2016
In 2016, rising awareness of the profits pharmaceutical and other medical companies make from personal data such as DNA samples and cell lines led to the rise of a "biorights" movement to ensure that patients retain greater control over their contributions. A federal complaint filed by the American
08 May 2016
Twitter requested one of its key B2B partners, Dataminr — a service that offers advanced social media analytics and early detection of major events like terrorist attacks or natural disasters — stop providing U.S. intelligence agencies with their tools and content. Dataminr isn’t ending its
23 Mar 2016
In 2016, the Big Data lab at the Chinese search engine company Baidu published a study of an algorithm it had developed that it claimed could predict crowd formation and suggested it could be used to warn authorities and individuals of public safety threats stemming from unusually large crowds. The
21 Apr 2016
According to the US security firm Statfor the Chinese government has been builsing a system to analyse the massive amounts of data it has been collecting over the past years. The company claims: "The new grid management system aims to help the Chinese government act early to contain social unrest
15 Apr 2016
Between 2010 and 2016, access control spyware implementing a remote "kill switch" was installed increasingly often in rent-to-buy laptops and cars financed by subprime loans. In a 2012 case the Federal Trade Commission settled with seven computer rental companies over their use of DesignerWare's
03 May 2016
In 2012, London Royal Free, Barnet, and Chase Farm hospitals agreed to provide Google's DeepMind subsidiary with access to an estimated 1.6 million NHS patient records, including full names and medical histories. The company claimed the information, which would remain encrypted so that employees
05 Apr 2016
In April 2016, Google's Nest subsidiary announced it would drop support for Revolv, a rival smart home start-up the company bought in 2014. After that, the company said, the thermostats would cease functioning entirely because they relied on connecting to a central server and had no local-only mode
09 Jun 2016
A new breed of market research companies are pioneering geoanalytics to find complex financial information. That is, they use machine learning algorithms to search for patterns in high-resolution satellite imagery that's refreshed daily and available at the scale of 1 meter per pixel. Much of the
A new examination of documents detailing the US National Security Agency's SKYNET programme shows that SKYNET carries out mass surveillance of Pakistan's mobile phone network and then uses a machine learning algorithm to score each of its 55 million users to rate their likelihood of being a
08 Mar 2016
In 2016 the Dutch Data Protection Authority (AP) ruled that the Personal Data Protection Act prohibits companies from monitoring their employees' health via wearables, even when employees have given their permission. The ruling concluded the AP's investigation into two companies; in one of them
