For the last few years, internet security has been based on a combination of anti-virus software, isolation techniques and encryption software. Government bodies and security companies would track traffic on the internet and look for suspicious materials based upon their signature. These techniques focused on running anti-malware software after the facts. They enabled the segregation between good data and malware. But if malware was undetected, it could lurk in the background of systems for months or even years and become active later in time. The consumer world is rapidly changing.

In partnership with PBS KIDS, this year's competition will look at advancements in early childhood education. The results will lead to better designed games and improved learning outcomes, empowering children, parents, caregivers, and educators across the globe with insights into how young children learn through media and which approaches work best to help them build on foundational learning skills. The 90-day Data Science Bowl competition will award winning participants with a share of $160,000 in cash prizes. Research shows much of the most critical brain development in children takes place before they even reach kindergarten. Child development experts indicate it is during these first 5 years that children develop linguistic, cognitive, social, emotional, and regulatory skills that predict their later functioning in many domains.

DeepMind says it has created the first artificial intelligence to reach the top league of one of the most popular esport video games. It says Starcraft 2 had posed a tougher AI challenge than chess and other board games, in part because opponents' pieces were often hidden from view. Publication in the peer-reviewed journal Nature allows the London-based lab to claim a new milestone. But some pro-gamers have mixed feelings about it claiming Grandmaster status. DeepMind - which is owned by Google's parent company Alphabet - said the development of AlphaStar would help it develop other AI tools which should ultimately benefit humanity.

As organizations increasingly replace human decision-making with algorithms, they may assume these computer programs lack our biases. But algorithms still reflect the real world, which means they can unintentionally perpetuate existing inequality. A study published Thursday in Science has found that a health care risk-prediction algorithm, a major example of tools used on more than 200 million people in the U.S., demonstrated racial bias--because it relied on a faulty metric for determining need. This particular algorithm helps hospitals and insurance companies identify which patients will benefit from "high-risk care management" programs, which provide chronically ill people with access to specially trained nursing staff and allocate extra primary-care visits for closer monitoring. By singling out sicker patients for more organized and specific attention, these programs aim to preemptively stave off serious complications, reducing costs and increasing patient satisfaction.

For the last several years, Russia has been steadily improving its ground combat robots. Just last year, Kalashnikov, the maker of the famous AK-47 rifle, announced it would build "a range of products based on neural networks," including a "fully automated combat module" that promises to identify and shoot at targets. According to Bendett, Russia delivered a white paper to the UN saying that from Moscow's perspective, it would be "inadmissible" to leave UAS without any human oversight. In other words, Russia always wants a human in the loop and to be the one to push the final button to fire that weapon. Worth noting: "A lot of these are still kind of far-out applications," Bendett said.

Once considered futuristic, artificial intelligence has been made more accessible and integral to contractors in recent years by several burgeoning startups, through programs such as OpenSpace and Smartvid.io. Alice, an AI-based simulation platform for construction, announced yesterday that it has closed $8 million in Series A funding round led by Merus Capital with participation from Foundamental, Blackhorn Ventures and Lightspeed Venture Partners. Founded by Stanford scholar and inventor Rene Morkos in 2018, Alice uses AI to help analyze the flows of labor and equipment throughout a jobsite. In use by firms such as DPR Construction, Mortenson and Parsons, the technology allows users to explore a variety of building plans in real-time and understand the impact of key construction decisions on project cost and duration. The firm says that its customers have cut project duration by 16% and labor costs by nearly 15%.

Brian Cantwell Smith is Reid Hoffman Professor of Artificial Intelligence and the Human at the Univer-sity of Toronto, where he is also Professor of Information, Philosophy, Cognitive Science, and the History and Philosophy of Science and Technology. His latest book is The Promise of Artificial Intelligence.

App marketplaces are bridging the gap between AI creators and users. Words such as "democratize" and "ecosystem" are making their way from government and biology textbooks into the radiology lexicon, as a community of developers, engineers, and clinicians are interacting to establish AI marketplaces. These electronic storefronts are gathering places where vendors and consumers can share ideas and technology to create and use a variety of AI imaging tools. Within an AI marketplace, radiologists have equal opportunity to pick and choose from any of the available apps. They can also share feedback with developers as to how an app worked for them or even assist in the development of new apps customized for their clinical practices. And, they can be active participants in the development process without any knowledge of writing code. "With AI, there's a whole ecosystem of participants--industry leaders, health care startups, and research institutions--getting involved in creating apps and marketplaces where they can be made available to everyone," says Abdul Hamid Halabi, director of healthcare with NVIDIA.

With a gigantic bottleneck in tech talent, companies are turning to tech to speed up the recruitment process. But baked into hiring startups' algorithms are biases and prejudices as old as time – and it's unsure whether more AI is making things better or worse. Of the many revelations to come from The Inventor, HBO's blockbuster film about the rise and fall of medtech startup Theranos, one of the more personal is how founder Elizabeth Holmes artificially lowered her voice to a baritone, slipping out of character every now and then; giving the game away. While many found the detail funny, others understood exactly why Holmes did it. Holmes was mimicking a man.

As companies increasingly look to artificial intelligence ("AI") solutions to streamline their business practices, a new area has popped up: the use of artificial intelligence in analyzing videos of job interview applicants. For companies with tremendous volumes of job applicants, AI can be helpful in sorting through the applicant pool to narrow down the applicants who companies may want to bring in for in-person interviews or hire. As with most things technology, the laws are struggling to keep up with the rapid pace of innovation. However, Illinois continues to lead the nation in increasingly regulating the use of advancing technology. Though riddled with undefined terms and ambiguities, the Illinois Artificial Intelligence Video Interview Act (the "Act")--effective January 1, 2020--requires businesses who utilize AI to evaluate job applicants' video interviews to provide notice and obtain prior consent before doing so, and includes restrictions on video sharing and retention.