The news: An open letter from a growing coalition of AI researchers is calling out scientific publisher Springer Nature for a conference paper it reportedly planned to include in its forthcoming book Transactions on Computational Science & Computational Intelligence. The paper, titled "A Deep Neural Network Model to Predict Criminality Using Image Processing," presents a face recognition system purportedly capable of predicting whether someone is a criminal, according to the original press release. It was developed by researchers at Harrisburg University and was due to be presented at a forthcoming conference. The demands: Citing the work of leading Black AI scholars, the letter debunks the scientific basis of the paper and asserts that crime-prediction technologies are racist. It also lists three demands: 1) for Springer Nature to rescind its offer to publish the study; 2) for it to issue a statement condemning the use of statistical techniques such as machine learning to predict criminality and acknowledging its role in incentivizing such research; and 3) for all scientific publishers to commit to not publishing similar papers in the future.

Following a proposal by the Conference of Presidents (president and chairs of political groups), plenary set out the responsibilities, numerical strength and term of office of three special committees and the tax subcommittee. Lists of members will be announced in a subsequent plenary session. After a series of special committees and a committee of inquiry, created to delve into the various tax leaks and scandals of recent years, Parliament today established a more permanent setup to shed light on the matter. The subcommittee on tax matters will be composed of 30 members. It will deal particularly with the fight against tax fraud, tax evasion and tax avoidance, as well as financial transparency for taxation purposes.

Zoom has said it will give all users of its video calling platform end-to-end encryption, starting with a beta test next month. The company wrote in a blog post that free and paid users will have access to the feature. Recently, Zoom had been criticised for its lack of end-to-end encryption. Zoom then announced it would roll out the feature – but only to people with paying accounts. CEO Eric Yuan had said that the decision was so Zoom could allow law enforcement access to its calls.

Amazon SageMaker Ground Truth now supports labeling 3D point cloud data. For more information about the launched feature set, see this AWS News Blog post. In this blog post, we specifically cover how to perform the required data transformations of your 3D point cloud data to create a labeling job in SageMaker Ground Truth for 3D object tracking use cases. Autonomous vehicle (AV) companies typically use LiDAR sensors to generate a 3D understanding of the environment around their vehicles. For example, they mount a LiDAR sensor on their vehicles to continuously capture point-in-time snapshots of the surrounding 3D environment.

Now Amazon employees are getting some help to make sure they adhere to social-distancing rules, thanks to artificial intelligence and machine learning applied to good, old-fashioned video footage, the company announced today. The Distance Assistant features a 50-inch monitor, which surrounds each person on camera with a green circle. If the individual walks within six feet of a coworker, both of their circles turn red. People can see themselves in real time and separate. "Working backwards from a concept of immediate visual feedback, and inspired by existing examples like radar speed check signs, our'Distance Assistant' provides employees with live feedback on social distancing," Brad Porter, an Amazon vice president and engineer who leads the company's robotics initiatives, wrote in a blog post.

Law enforcement's use of facial recognition technology was always controversial. Amazon's surprise announcement that it would put a moratorium on police use of its facial recognition software for the next year underscores the big questions surrounding the technology as protests spark a nationwide debate about police brutality and surveillance tactics. Amazon's brief news release never mentioned the words George Floyd, but my Post colleague Jay Greene notes the company hinted that recent events drove this decision. "We've advocated that governments should put in place stronger regulations to govern the ethical use of facial recognition technology, and in recent days, Congress appears ready to take on this challenge," the company said in a statement. "We hope this one-year moratorium might give Congress enough time to implement appropriate rules, and we stand ready to help if requested."

WIRE)--New data presented today at the 80th American Diabetes Association Scientific Sessions – A Virtual Experience unveiled a new AI algorithm from January.ai. In an in-house study of 1,022 participants, the algorithm effectively predicted individualized glycemic response to specific meals in people with type 2 diabetes and pre-diabetes. This algorithm is critical to the company's goal of developing and offering a program that provides people with highly personalized food and activity recommendations that drive positive behavior change and improved health. In the Sugar Challenge study, January.ai After a few days of data-gathering to develop an individualized model, the algorithm accurately predicted glucose response to future meals in the absence of any further CGM data, a finding that supports further exploration of the impact of AI models with intermittent CGM use.

Autonomous and semi-autonomous trucks promise to help an industry facing a shortage of drivers and increasing e-commerce demand, but they need to demonstrate efficiency for logistics adoption. Einride AB, which has been developing electric and autonomous trucks, today launched its Intelligent Freight Mobility Platform. The system is intended to help logistics fleet managers and drivers plan routes and loads, track shipments, and monitor energy efficiency. In February, Einride began recruiting the first remote operators for its trucks. The Stockholm-based startup also announced the beta of the Intelligent Freight Mobility Platform.

IBM's CEO said the company will no longer offer facial recognition software while questioning how similar technology is used by law enforcement. In a letter to Congress submitted Monday, IBM CEO Arvind Krishna said the company will not support any technology that could lead to mass surveillance, racial profiling or "violations of basic human rights and freedoms." "We believe now is the time to begin a national dialogue on whether and how facial recognition technology should be employed by domestic law enforcement agencies," wrote Krishna. The letter follows protests demanding change among police forces nationwide in the wake of the death of George Floyd, who died while in police custody in Minneapolis last month. It's official:The US is in a recession, ending longest expansion in history The CEO also advocates for federal rules to hold police more accountable, as well as a national policy to improve technology used to maintain transparency, including body cameras and modern data analytics techniques.

With the COVID-19 pandemic outbreak, businesses are at a halt, and that has created a significant impact on the artificial intelligence-based startups, who are continuously struggling to stay afloat amid this downturn. In fact, a recent report has confirmed that 90% of tech startups, including the ones working with artificial intelligence and machine learning, in the country, are facing a significant decline in revenues due to the impact of COVID-19 pandemic. And approximately 30-40% of those startups are in the process of closing down due to halted operations and having no financial back up to continue the business. This pandemic has injured the backbone of the economy, which, in turn, poses a lot of dilemmas for investors to finance businesses amid this crisis. Venture capitalists have already warned startups about the difficult times ahead.