Frankfurt am Main (AFP) - German business software giant SAP published Tuesday an ethics code to govern its research into artificial intelligence (AI), aiming to prevent the technology infringing on people's rights, displacing workers or inheriting biases from its human designers. "SAP designed these guiding principles to steer the development and deployment of our AI software to help the world run better and improve people's lives," the firm said in a statement. Following in the footsteps of better-known US tech giants like Google and Microsoft, SAP -- which makes software for some 400,000 firms worldwide to manage data on customer relationships, payrolls or inventory -- is wrestling with how to impose values on AI's systems of algorithms designed to ape certain aspects of human intelligence. Public figures like entrepreneur Elon Musk or physicist Stephen Hawking have warned of the dangers of out-of-control AI. "The danger of AI is much greater than the danger of nuclear warheads by a lot," Musk said at a technology conference earlier this year. But rather than a scenario like those depicted in modern classics like "The Terminator" or "The Matrix" of computer programmes running amok over their human creators, SAP's concerns are closer to home.

Artificial intelligence is changing the way we recruit across almost all categories. We know that the technology can improve success in acquiring candidates, but what we need to discover whether it can go further when predicting candidate potential. AI is fueled by data: The more information you give it, the more it can tell you. But, as with all technology, it's only as smart as the data it has. So the better the information you give it, the better the results.

Companies and cities all over world are experimenting with using artificial intelligence to reduce and prevent crime, and to more quickly respond to crimes in progress. The ideas behind many of these projects is that crimes are relatively predictable; it just requires being able to sort through a massive volume of data to find patterns that are useful to law enforcement. This kind of data analysis was technologically impossible a few decades ago, but the hope is that recent developments in machine learning are up to the task. There is good reason why companies and government are both interested in trying to use AI in this manner. As of 2010, the United States spent over $80 billion a year on incarations at the state, local, and federal levels. Estimates put the United States' total spending on law enforcement at over $100 billion a year. Law enforcement and prisons make up a substantial percentage of local government budgets.

Artificial intelligence and cognitive computing will generate more than $150 billion in savings for the healthcare industry by 2025, according to a report by the market research firm Frost & Sullivan. Today, only 15 to 20 percent of health IT end users have actively used AI to drive changes in healthcare delivery. China is also dominant in the AI space, while Japan and India are growing their AI footprints. Europe has struggled to maintain a stronghold in AI due to the region's more restrictive data policies. More articles on artificial intelligence: Google Cloud taps Carnegie Mellon professor to lead AI Elon Musk suggests he's only months from'merging' the human brain with AI Indiana U School of Medicine partners with Fujifilm for AI research

There has only ever been on question to ask about each year's Fifa: is it worth getting? And there's usually been far more than one answer, all kinds of caveats about the kind of features you use and player you are. This year the answer is as simple as the question. The changes are subtle but they are everywhere, and offer something for every kind of player. If you're a fan of authenticity the Champions League will be worth it alone, but if you want silliness like games with no fouls then there's plenty of that too.

" I'm intrigued by the general trend towards empowering individuals to share their data in a secure and controlled environment. Democratisation of data in this way has to be the future. Imagine what we will be able to do in decades to come, when individuals have access to their complete healthcare records in electronic form, paired with high quality data from genomics, epigenetics, microbiome, imaging, activity and lifestyle profiles, etc., supported by a platform that enables individuals to share all or parts of their data with partners of their choice, for purposes they care about, in return for services they value – very exciting! I have interviewed Bryn Roberts, Global Head of Operations for Roche Pharmaceutical Research & Early Development, and Site Head in Basel. We talked about using AI and Data Analytics in Pharmaceutical Research.

Dr Marko Topalovic (PhD), a postdoctoral researcher at the Laboratory for Respiratory Diseases, Catholic University of Leuven (KU Leuven), Belgium, told the meeting that after training an AI computer algorithm using good quality data, it proved to be more consistent and accurate in interpreting respiratory test results and suggesting diagnoses than lung specialists. "Pulmonary function tests provide an extensive series of numerical outputs and their patterns can be hard for the human eye to perceive and recognise; however, it is easy for computers to manage large quantities of data like these and so we thought AI could be useful for pulmonologists. We explored if this was true with 120 pulmonologists from 16 hospitals. We found that diagnosis by AI was more accurate in twice as many cases as diagnosis by pulmonologists. These results show how AI can serve as a second opinion for pulmonologists when they are assessing and diagnosing their patients," he said.

A network that can fix and optimize itself without human intervention could become a reality soon – but not without some training. With the help of machine learning and artificial intelligence, software-defined networks can learn to help with network management by using operational data. Initial application of AI to WAN operations includes security functions such as DDoS attack mitigation as well as near real-time, automated path selection, and eventually AI-defined network topologies and basic operations essentially running on'auto-pilot'. Enhancing IT operations with artificial intelligence (AI), including configuration management, patching, and debugging and root cause analysis (RCA) is an area of significant promise – enough so that Gartner has defined the emerging market as "AIOps". These platforms use big data and machine learning to enhance a broad range of IT operations processes, including availability and performance monitoring, event correlation and analysis, IT service management, and automation (Gartner "Market Guide for AIOps platforms," August 2017).

It's no surprise that Google used its Cloud Next 2018 event in Tokyo today -- one of a number of international Cloud Next events that follow its flagship San Francisco conference -- to announce a couple of new initiatives that specifically focus on the Japanese market. These announcements include a couple of basic updates like translating its Machine Learning with TensorFlow on Google Cloud Platform Coursera specialization, its Associate Cloud Engineer certification and fifty of its hands-on Qwiklabs into Japanese. In addition, Google is also launching an Advanced Solutions Lab in Tokyo as well. Previously Google opened similar labs in Dublin, Ireland, as well as Sunnyvale and New York. These labs offer a wide range of machine learning-centric training options, collaborative workspaces for teams that are part of the company's four-week machine learning training program, and access to Google experts.

Sony has unveiled a shrunken version of its classic Playstation One video games console that comes pre-loaded with 20 classic titles. The £90 ($100) PlayStation One Classic is almost half the size of Sony's original 1994 console, making it small enough to hold in one hand. It is available for pre-order now ahead of its release on December 3 – exactly 24 years after the original release date for the console. Sony is following in the footsteps of fellow Japanese games-maker Nintendo, which has released miniature versions of two of its classic consoles in recent years. The nostalgic re-issues of the classic consoles have been hugely popular amongst Nintendo fans, with the most recent SNES Classic Mini has sold 5.28 million units worldwide since its launch in September 2017.