A new initiative by the US Army suggests "another significant step towards lethal autonomous weapons," warns a leading artificial-intelligence researcher who has called for a ban on so-called "killer robots." The Army Contracting Command has called on potential vendors in industry and academia to submit ideas to help build its Advanced Targeting and Lethality Automated System (ATLAS), which a Defense Department solicitation says will use artificial intelligence and machine learning to give ground-combat vehicles autonomous targeting capabilities. This will allow weapons to "acquire, identify, and engage targets at least 3X faster than the current manual process," according to the notice. Stuart Russell, a professor of computer science at UC Berkeley and a highly regarded AI expert, tells Quartz he is deeply concerned about the idea of tanks and other land-based fighting vehicles eventually having the capability to fire on their own. "It looks very much as if we are heading into an arms race where the current ban on full lethal autonomy"--a section of US military law that mandates some level of human interaction when actually making the decision to fire--"will be dropped as soon as it's politically convenient to do so," says Russell. The Defense Department contracting officer overseeing the solicitation did not immediately respond to a request for further details on ATLAS.

Washington says Huawei could be compelled by Beijing to spy on or disable foreign telecom networks that use its equipment. The Trump administration has been particularly focused on dissuading allies from using Huawei gear in their rollout of 5G--the next-generation mobile networks that promise to connect more things, including self-driving cars and factory components, to the internet. In a sign of the challenges ahead for U.S. officials, though, the trade show here has offered Huawei the opportunity to tout new deals with America's friends. It used this week's Mobile World Congress, rebranded this year as MWC Barcelona, to announce a high-profile agreement with the biggest carrier in the United Arab Emirates, one of America's closest Mideast allies, to build that country's first 5G network. Despite facing off on European soil, Huawei is benefiting from the sense of a home-court advantage here.

In 2016, a Microsoft chatbot went on racist, misogynistic Twitter rants. Later that same year, Facebook had to shut down two AI robots that had started communicating with each other in a new, unfamiliar language. And then in 2017, viewers nervously watched Google's deep learning machine system's stick figure teach itself how to walk, fumbling its way through the digital course onscreen and throwing its hands and legs up in the air to leap to the finish line. As intriguing as they can be, some of artificial intelligence's efforts at mimicking human behavior leave us feeling slightly sketched out. Now, a group of researchers from the University of Oxford, Boston University and University of Agder in Norway is working on AI that goes a little deeper than an animated paper clip.

Imagine a constantly evolving and evasive cyberthreat that could target individuals and organisations remorselessly. This is the reality of cybersecurity in an era of artificial intelligence (AI). AI has shaken up the cybersecurity industry, with automated threat prevention, detection and response revolutionising one of the fastest growing sectors in the digital economy. Hackers are using AI to speed up polymorphic malware, causing it to constantly change its code so it can't be identified However, as is so often the case, there's a dark side. What if cybercriminals get their hands on AI, and use it against public and private sector organisations? "The edge in cyberdefence is speed.

Kalashnikov, which is most famous for its AK-47 assault rifle, is moving into new territory with a drone that can carry up to three kilograms of explosives and detonate on impact. The KUB-UAV can travel at up to 130 kilometers per hour (78 mph) and stay in the air for 30 minutes. As if there were any doubt as to Kalashnikov's intention for the device, a YouTube video shows the drone attacking some remote targets. The company wants the KUB-UAV to be inexpensive and easy to operate. Kalashnikov demonstrated the device at a defense exhibition in Abu Dhabi this week.

This is not to say that people have lost interest in politics and policy-making. On the contrary, there is evidence of growing engagement in non-traditional politics, suggesting people remain politically engaged but have lost faith in traditional party politics. More specifically, voters increasingly feel the established political parties are too similar and that politicians are preoccupied with point-scoring and politicking. Disgruntled voters typically feel the big parties are beholden to powerful vested interests, are in cahoots with big business or trade unions, and hence their vote will not make any difference. Another symptom of changing political engagement (rather than disengagement) is the rise of populist parties with a radical anti-establishment agenda and growing interest in conspiracy theories, theories which confirm people's hunch that the system is rigged.

It's been a tough year or so for Air Force maintainers. High-profile aircraft failures plagued the service recently, including emergency landings of C-5 cargo aircraft, the grounding of the B-1 bomber fleet, and the loss of a C-130 propeller in mid-flight. The immediate causes of these accidents vary, the but root cause is the same: age. The average age of an Air Force aircraft is 28 years, and many planes are significantly older. Crews fly still fly the B-52 bomber, after all, with its average age of 56.

Artificial intelligence (AI) and machine learning (ML) are some of the latest tools being used in the fight against application security vulnerabilities. However, the complexities involved can make it hard to discern what's actually being used and what lives in a fictional Hollywood setting. I spoke to Ilia Kolochenko, CEO of web security company High-Tech Bridge to clear up any confusion. Scott Matteson: What is the overall state of application security today? Has it improved in the last 12 months?

The U.S. Army Artificial Intelligence (AI) Task Force was inaugurated when Commander General John Murray applied the U.S. Army Futures Command (AFC) patch to the left arm of Brigadier General Matthew Easley's uniform with a hearty slap. Easley is now officially in charge of the new taskforce. In close collaboration with Carnegie Mellon University (CMU), the U.S. Army has also established the first AI Hub to be located in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania and Carnegie Mellon's National Robotics Engineering Center. A key role of the AI Hub will be to increase collaboration with ANSYS and other academic, industry and government agency partners. The Army AI Taskforce will be focused on developing and prototyping AI capabilities for several critical areas of the Army -- including an on-going project focused on predictive maintenance.

SpaceX will send a spacesuit-clad crash test dummy to the International Space Station as part of a trial flight for its Crew Dragon spacecraft. The mission will take place on 2 March and will also deliver supplies to crew aboard the ISS. An array of sensors built into the mannequin's suit will help provide key data ahead of the first human passengers going aboard the capsule later this year. Nasa plans to send astronauts Bob Behnken and Doug Hurley into space in April using the Crew Dragon, with a further two scheduled to launch later this year. It will mark the return of human space flight capability to the United States for the first time since the Space Shuttle Program was retired in 2011.