This week, we learned that Chinese spies may have planted microchips in certain consumer electronics destined for the United States--including products from Apple and Amazon--in order to surveil device users. While your iPhone or Amazon Echo may or may not actually be compromised (both the U.S. government and the companies alleged to have been targeted have vehemently denied the story, which was first reported by Bloomberg), the possibility of such foreign intrusion into our internet of things devices would have massive implications for our national security and technology sectors. Josephine Wolff explains that though the story may not bear out, it still highlights China's power as one of the few manufacturers, testers, and packagers for many major tech firms--and how there might not be a way to truly secure this global supply chain. Elsewhere on Slate, we've been covering other stories about data security. Sharon Bradford Franklin wrote about a newly proposed law in Australia that could give U.S. law enforcement backdoor access to encrypted data and communications. Josephine Wolff argued that Google actually did a good job disclosing and handling a data vulnerability it found in Google Plus.

While the debate about artificial intelligence (AI) and augmented reality rages, virtual terrorists – those who operate primarily on the Dark Web – are getting smarter and thinking of new ways to benefit from both, creating methods to operate autonomously in this brave new world. Malware is being designed with adaptive, success-based learning to improve the accuracy and efficacy of cyberattacks. The coming generation of malware will be situation-aware, meaning that it will understand the environment it is in and make calculated decisions about what to do next, behaving like a human attacker: performing reconnaissance, identifying targets, choosing methods of attack, and intelligently evading detection. This next generation of malware uses code that is a precursor to AI, replacing traditional "if not this, then that" code logic with more complex decision-making trees. Autonomous malware operates much like branch prediction technology, designed to guess which branch of a decision tree a transaction will take before it is executed.

Google is secretly planning to launch a censored version of its search engine in China within the next year, a leaked transcript seems to reveal. According to The Intercept, Google's search engine chief Ben Gomes held a meeting in July to discuss the progress of a new search engine, dubbed Project Dragonfly. The platform would blacklist words and phrases like "human rights," "Nobel Prize," and "student protest," in order to conform with China's strict censorship laws. "You have taken on something extremely important to the company," Mr Gomes told the Google employees, according to the transcript obtained by the publication. "I have to admit it has been a difficult journey. But I do think a very important and worthwhile one. And I wish ourselves the best of luck in actually reaching our destination as soon as possible."

Great Ormond Street Hospital (GOSH) has paired up with Cambridge-based technology giant Arm to develop smart?person recognition?

AI may have sexist tendencies. But, sorry, the problem is still us humans. Amazon recently scrapped an employee recruiting algorithm plagued with problems, according to a report from Reuters. Ultimately, the applicant screening algorithm did not return relevant candidates, so Amazon canned the program. But in 2015, Amazon had a more worrisome issue with this AI: it was down-ranking women.

You are free to share this article under the Attribution 4.0 International license. Machine learning could help safeguard public health and spot environmental dangers, according to new research. As Hurricane Florence ground its way through North Carolina, it released what might politely be called an excrement storm. Massive hog farm manure pools washed a stew of dangerous bacteria and heavy metals into nearby waterways. More efficient oversight might have prevented some of the worst effects, but even in the best of times, state and federal environmental regulators are overextended and underfunded.

What effect will job displacement due to AI have on the worldwide economy? As outlined in my new book AI Superpowers, 40-50% of our jobs will be technically and economically doable by AI and automation over the next 15 years. So AI certainly cannot do most things that we humans can do. Disruption will hit the industry in areas with the largest number of routine jobs – manufacturing, call centers, banks, retail, etc. It will also cause existing players to compete on their speed of automation.

This is the incredible moment a social worker takes her first steps in 14 years - with the help of an £80,000 robotic suit. Lucy Dodd, from Aldershot, was suddenly struck by a rare congenital malformation of blood vessels and left paralysed from the waist down as a teenager. But now the social worker, who has been wheelchair-bound since she was 19, can move her legs again through a revolutionary exoskeleton. In moving footage of her using the bionic contraption that allows paraplegics to stand and move, Ms Dodd can be seen striding out. The 34-year-old is now desperately trying to raise the five-figure sum for the ReWalk exoskeleton in order to get her mobility back.

An NHS Trust has started using robots to make routine referrals as part of a drive to cut costs and boost efficiency. East Suffolk and North Essex NHS Foundation Trust (ESNEFT) is testing the ability of new artificial intelligence technology to conduct administrative work, such as submitting scan and blood test results from GPs to hospital consultants. It claims the system is eight times more productive than using human staff. The system has been in operation at Ipswich Hospital for the past three months and has saved staff more than 570 hours of work. The Trust claims the system will save them £220,000 in the next 9 months.

With the publication of proclaimed Mad Scientist P.W. Singer and co-author Emerson T. Brooking's LikeWar – The Weaponization of Social Media, Mad Scientist Laboratory addresses what is arguably the most powerful manifestation of the internet -- Social Media -- and how it is inextricably linked to the future of warfare. Messrs. Singer and Brooking's new book is essential reading if today's Leaders (both in and out of uniform) are to understand, defend against, and ultimately wield the non-kinetic, yet violently manipulative effects of Social Media.] "The modern internet is not just a network, but an ecosystem of 4 billion souls…. Those who can manipulate this swirling tide, steer its direction and flow, can…. They can foment violence, stoke hate, sow falsehoods, incite wars, and even erode the pillars of democracy itself."