Opaque and potentially biased mathematical models are remaking our lives--and neither the companies responsible for developing them nor the government is interested in addressing the problem. This week a group of researchers, together with the American Civil Liberties Union, launched an effort to identify and highlight algorithmic bias. The AI Now initiative was announced at an event held at MIT to discuss what many experts see as a growing challenge. Algorithmic bias is shaping up to be a major societal issue at a critical moment in the evolution of machine learning and AI. If the bias lurking inside the algorithms that make ever-more-important decisions goes unrecognized and unchecked, it could have serious negative consequences, especially for poorer communities and minorities. The eventual outcry might also stymie the progress of an incredibly useful technology (see "Inspecting Algorithms for Bias").

It is hard to imagine a more scathing indictment of our ability to read another's thoughts and intentions than our inability to predict Donald Trump's next move. From the gross pre-election misjudgments to postelection bafflement, the best pundits are at a loss to accurately anticipate his response to matters like North Korean military aggressiveness or his moment-by-moment political gyrations and opinion reversals. Labeling Trump a narcissist, psychopath, megalomaniac or attention-impaired, or all of the above, might feel explanatory, but even when armed with the best psychoanalytic insights, we have no idea what he will do when presented with a new or unforeseen circumstance. If conventional psychology isn't up to the task, perhaps we should step back and consider a tantalizing sci-fi alternative -- that Trump doesn't operate within conventional human cognitive constraints, but rather is a new life form, a rudimentary artificial intelligence-based learning machine. When we strip away all moral, ethical and ideological considerations from his decisions and see them strictly in the light of machine learning, his behavior makes perfect sense. Consider how deep learning occurs in neural networks such as Google's Deep Mind or IBM's Deep Blue and Watson.

With gifts given and Christmas Day drawing to a close, drone expert Faine Greenwood is taking up a different kind of holiday tradition: rounding up all the spectacular drone crashes and accidents that take place mere hours after the airborne presents are unwrapped. Greenwood, an assistant researcher in the signal program on human security and technology at the Harvard Humanitarian Initiative, is compiling some of the best drone accident tweets of the day, and tagging them #DroneCrashmas. The mishaps are as frequent as they are varied, with drones falling victim to everything from 30-miles-per-hour gusts of wind to bodies of water to trees to innocent bystanders. My brother flew his drone into my sisters hair pic.twitter.com/B647NF6s6u RIP to my dad's new luxury drone who after two min of glorious flight now rests at the bottom of the vermillion river:( So, maiden voyage was successful.

When Britain leaves the European Union, many immigrants will be forced out of the country. But many of those people provide much-needed labor, and calls to automate the jobs they leave behind are impractical. Eighteen months after the U.K. voted to leave the EU, many details of the exit remain unnegotiated. But the process is broadly expected to have one big impact: a clampdown on immigration from EU countries. In fact, immigration has already declined since the vote, with the U.K.'s Office of National Statistics reporting that net migration into the U.K. is down from 336,000 in the 12 months preceding June 2016 to 230,000 in the 12 months preceding June 2017.

Much is said about artificial intelligence (AI), but it is still in the early stages. One way to watch the grown of AI, machine learning and natural language processing (NLP) is to look for acquisition of companies focused in those areas. One just announced acquisition is of AI voice response company Next IT by Verint. The announcement on the Next IT web site is backed up by reports of a $30 million (USD) acquisition price. That brings up two key concepts.

The release of the most recent Blade Runner film has further fueled the long-standing debate as to whether artificial intelligence (AI) should be subject to regulation. One domain that has been quick to adopt AI technology is marketing. There's little debate that AI will fundamentally alter the marketing landscape. Already, the use of chatbots--the likes of Apple's Siri, GoogleAssistant, Amazon's Echo, Microsoft's Cortana, etc.--has empowered marketers to increase and optimize engagement with consumers. As well, AI has enabled marketers to more effectively target consumers and develop more relevant personalized content.

A company in California just proved that an exotic and potentially game-changing kind of computer can be used to perform a common form of machine learning. The feat raises hopes that quantum computers, which exploit the logic-defying principles of quantum physics to perform certain types of calculations at ridiculous speeds, could have a big impact on the hottest area of the tech industry: artificial intelligence. Researchers at Rigetti Computing, a company based in Berkeley, California, used one of its prototype quantum chips--a superconducting device housed within an elaborate super-chilled setup--to run what's known as a clustering algorithm. Clustering is a machine-learning technique used to organize data into similar groups. Rigetti is also making the new quantum computer--which can handle 19 quantum bits, or qubits--available through its cloud computing platform, called Forest, today.

Facebook will soon begin alerting users of photos that feature them, based on facial recognition technology. Facebook is expanding its use of facial recognition software to alert users when photos of them are posted on the platform -- whether or not they are tagged in the photo. By default, Facebook users in the U.S. will be signed up for these face recognition alerts, unless they have previously opted out of a similar, more limited feature. But users can turn off face recognition, Facebook says. Additionally, the company says it will roll out new tools to alert users if someone else may be impersonating them with a misleading profile photo.

When Ayanna Howard was a little girl, her favorite TV show was the Bionic Woman. Growing up, Howard was obsessed with creating robots. She earned her Ph.D. in Electrical Engineering and by the time she was 27 she landed her dream job at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL). Howard leads a small team of engineers and scientists tasked with advancing the intelligence of robots for future Mars missions. In this video, Howard describes an experience early on in her career at JPL and how courage is a necessary part of the invention process.

Small-business owners are always on the hunt for opportunities that can give their businesses a leg up. In the past, small business owners have eagerly adopted software-as-a-service products, transitioned to cloud infrastructure and embraced self-service digital advertising. Today, one of the most exciting opportunities is the potential to leverage machine learning (ML) to give your business a competitive advantage. ML solutions automate workflows, enhance data-driven decisions and facilitate interactions with customers. Two factors that are making ML accessible to small businesses are the commoditization of machine learning algorithms and the democratization of pre-trained ML models.