ISLAMABAD – Pakistan's claim that the U.S. hit an Afghan refugee camp in a drone strike is "false," a U.S. spokesman said Thursday, as tensions between the uneasy allies ratchet higher over Islamabad's alleged support for militants. The apparent strike took place roughly 50 km (30 miles) inside Pakistani territory on Wednesday, according to local authorities. It killed a midlevel commander from the Taliban-affiliated Haqqani network, officials and a source close to the Islamist group have told AFP. The incident comes just weeks after Washington froze nearly $2 billion in aid to Pakistan over its alleged support for militants, a move that had sparked speculation that the U.S. could resume drone strikes or launch operations along Pakistan's border with Afghanistan. Local officials have told AFP that the predawn strike took place more than 50 km (30 miles) from the Afghan border, in the village of Mamuzai in Kurram agency, one of the districts in the country's semi-autonomous tribal region.

Now that Christmas and the New Year are behind us the nights are becoming a little longer with each passing day. Nevertheless, there's still loads of cold winter nights left to endure (unless you're in the Southern Hemisphere, in which case – throw me a shrimp on the barbie!). It's time to dust off your New Year resolutions from last year (remember those?) and get ready for a new start, a new you and learn some new data skills. I've thrown together a collection of five excellent (and free!) Data Science eBooks for your Kindle to sharpen up your ninja skills while you're on the long commute to work. Just try not to read them while driving!

Apple is moving forward with it autonomous technology ambitions. The company has just enlarged its self-driving test fleet in California to 27 cars, according to Bloomberg. Apple had previously received a permit from the state of California to test three self-driving cars last April. The state's DMV documents indicated Apple was certifying six drivers to test three modified 2015 Lexus RX450h vehicles. Since the initial three cars, Apple has registered 24 more Lexus RX450h sport-utility vehicles, California's DMV told Bloomberg.

One day after an American drone strike killed a leader of the militant Haqqani network in northwestern Pakistan, United States officials on Thursday rejected a claim by Pakistan that the strike had targeted an Afghan refugee camp. There were also conflicting accounts of the location of the drone strike and the number of people killed. A statement by Pakistan's Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Wednesday condemned the strike and maintained that it had "targeted an Afghan refugee camp in Kurram Agency" -- an assertion that the United States rejected on Thursday. "The claim in an M.F.A. statement yesterday that U.S. forces struck an Afghan refugee camp in Kurram Agency yesterday is false," said Richard W. Snelsire, the United States Embassy spokesman in Islamabad, Pakistan's capital. American officials said that there were no Afghan refugee camps in Kurram, a remote tribal region straddling the border with Afghanistan, where they said Wednesday's drone strike had taken place.

Artificial intelligence (AI) is already affecting our lives in many ways. From intelligent video curation on Alphabet's (NASDAQ:GOOG) (NASDAQ:GOOGL) YouTube and Google web search to Apple's (NASDAQ:AAPL) Siri personal assistant, AI is already making our lives easier. AI can also help corporations and customers fight against rapidly evolving cyberthreats. For instance, FireEye's (NASDAQ:FEYE) Helix cybersecurity platform is able to automate threat detection and prevention with the help of this emerging technology. The early adoption of AI by Alphabet, Apple, and FireEye could help them steal a march over rivals.

Theresa May is on her way to Davos, to speak at the World Economic Forum - and the papers are already stating that she is going to call for'safe and ethical' artificial intelligence. In my opinion, before we can even start to talk about'safe and ethical' artificial intelligence, we have to have ethical roboticists. Without a clear understanding of the ethical challenges that roboticists face, how can we establish standards for ethical artificial intelligence development – standards which are absolutely vital? But, 'Safe and ethical' artificial intelligence is a narrow approach. Whose moral compass will guide us through this revolution of technology?

As artificial intelligence is touching almost every part of our lives, delivering us smart voice systems, driverless cars and customer service bots for banking and health care, it is time for government to learn about and act on the promise of AI and its potential perils. Yet despite the promises and dangers of AI, the U.S. government is behind the curve. "We are "flying blind in our conversations and decision-making related to AI," according to researchers from Stanford, MIT and elsewhere. AI is too important to ignore, too complex for simple policy solutions and too interrelated to address in siloes. And no one is better positioned to start it than Congress, through the creation of a bipartisan National Commission on AI.

In this transcript from an interview conducted by insideHPC, Mike Bernhardt discusses the CANDLE project for cancer research with Rick Stevens from Argonne National Lab. The CANcer Distributed Learning Environment (CANDLE) is an ECP application development project targeting new computational methods for cancer treatment with precision medicine. What is CANDLE all about? It has to do with building a scalable deep-learning environment that can be applied to a variety of problems in cancer, initially. CANDLE is designed to run on the big machines that we have at the US Department of Energy (DOE). The goal is to have an easy-to-use environment that can take advantage of the full power of these big systems to search through large combinations of deep-learning models to find optimal models for making predictions in cancer.

Recently, my application for insurance for a classic car I'd bought was refused. It was a first for me and when I inquired why, I was told that the insurance company was concerned that I associate with'high-value individuals'. I don't, but even if I did, how could this possibly impact my access to insurance? The broker kindly investigated on my behalf and discovered that a robot -- or more accurately an'automated decision-making machine' -- used by the insurance company had scoured the internet and discovered that in the distant past I'd been the motoring editor of a national newspaper. I was no wiser as to why this might suddenly have made me a liability.

BEIJING – China's war for technology talent is intensifying. Tens of thousands of people are being hired to shore up cybersecurity, censor online content, and try to make China No. 1 in the application of artificial intelligence as capital pours into both startups and more mature businesses at a time when the government is demanding rapid development. "Companies are well-funded and are in serious competition for talent," said Thomas Liang, a former executive at Chinese search giant Baidu who is now running an AI-focused fund. He said that startups in hot sectors like AI often have to offer 50 to 100 percent pay raises to attract employees away from established technology firms. China's emergence as a global center for technology, with champions such as Alibaba and Tencent now worth more than $1 trillion combined, has led to a hiring boom and wage growth that has started to put salaries for the top talent within striking distance of those offered in Silicon Valley. And while that should please the Chinese government as it seeks to create higher-paying jobs and move up the value chain, it could also add to income inequality in China as wages in nontech jobs lag, and as the sector's recruitment and income gains tend to be concentrated in the biggest cities such as Beijing and Shenzhen.