Indian government has constituted a task force on artificial intelligence (AI) to digitize big industries of the country. Task force comprises of experts, academics, researchers including state owned defense research institution DRDO and industry leaders. It will explore possibilities to leverage AI for development across various fields. "With rapid development in the fields of information technology and hardware, the world is about to witness a fourth industrial revolution. Driven by the power of big data, high computing capacity, artificial intelligence and analytics, Industry 4.0 aims to digitize the manufacturing sector," Nirmala Sitharaman, India's Minister of Commerce & Industry said.

Researchers from BYU (Brigham Young University) were successful in giving common sense to the artificial intelligence agents with the help of Wikipedia. Walk into a room, see a chair, and your brain will tell you that you can sit in it, tip it over or lift it up, but you wouldn't even consider drinking it, promoting it or unlocking it. As humans, explains BYU computer science professor David Wingate, we know intuitively that certain verbs pair naturally with certain nouns, and we also know that most verbs don't make sense when paired with random nouns. "Consider the monitor on your desk: you can look at it, you can turn it on, you can even pick it up or throw it, but you cannot impeach it, transpose it, justify it or correct it," said Wingate. "You can dethrone a king or worship him or obey him, but you cannot unlock him or calendar him or harvest him." That intuition, for the most part, doesn't exist with computer artificial intelligence agents, who are good at identifying objects but less so in knowing what to do with them.

DUBAI – Iran said on Saturday it had successfully tested a new ballistic missile with a range of 2,000 km (1,200 miles) and would keep developing its arsenal despite U.S. pressure to stop. The United States has imposed unilateral sanctions on Iran, saying its missile tests violate a U.N. resolution, which calls on Tehran not to undertake activities related to missiles capable of delivering nuclear weapons. Iran says it has no such plans. U.S. President Donald Trump said on Twitter the missile test illustrates the weakness of the Iran nuclear deal reached by his predecessor Barack Obama. He also linked the action to recent aggressive moves by North Korea.

At the vast, windswept White Sands Missile Range in New Mexico earlier this year, nearly a dozen military contractors armed with laser guns, high-tech nets and other experimental systems met to tackle one of the Pentagon's most vexing counterterrorism conundrums: how to destroy the Islamic State's increasingly lethal fleet of drones. The militant group has used surveillance drones on the battlefield for more than two years. But an increase in deadly attacks since last fall -- mostly targeting Iraqi troops and Syrian militia members with small bombs or grenades, but also threatening American advisers -- has highlighted the terrorists' success in adapting off-the-shelf, low-cost technology into an effective new weapon. The Pentagon is so alarmed by this growing threat -- even as it routs the Islamic State from its strongholds in Mosul, Iraq, and Raqqa, Syria -- that it has launched a $700 million crash program overseen by two senior Army generals to draw on the collective know-how and resources of all branches of the armed services, Silicon Valley and defense industry giants like Boeing and Raytheon to devise tactics and technology to thwart the menace. One important piece of that effort was the contest in New Mexico.

In this special guest feature, Sekhar Sarukkai, Chief Scientist at Skyhigh Networks, discusses the power of machine learning and user behavior analytics in detecting and mitigating the effects of cyberattacks before financial loss occurs. Sekhar is responsible for driving innovations in cloud security technology. He brings more than 20 years of experience in enterprise networking, security, and cloud services development. Prior to founding Skyhigh Networks, Sekhar was a Sr. Director of Engineering at Cisco Systems responsible for delivering Cisco's market leading network access control products, including Cisco's Identity Services Engine. He started his career at NASA Ames Research Center after obtaining his MS/PhD in Computer Science from Indiana University.

When Apple's new iPhone X arrives next month, its Face ID technology will introduce a new era of convenience--but also new risks of broad face-based surveillance by corporations and governments. Apple's strong record on privacy means it's likely to deploy the facial recognition tool responsibly, but that doesn't account for third-party companies that plan to integrate Face ID into their apps. Such companies could seek to assemble their own databases of faces and, in the worst case scenario, use a facial database to identify consumers online and in the streets for ad purposes. Apple has yet to disclose full details of how Face ID will operate, though a source familiar with the tool says there is a plan to prevent app makers from violating user privacy. Meanwhile, outside of a single state law, consumers will have little recourse if companies begin to collect images of their face without consent.

Video Friday is your weekly selection of awesome robotics videos, collected by your Automaton bloggers. We'll also be posting a weekly calendar of upcoming robotics events for the next two months; here's what we have so far (send us your events!): Let us know if you have suggestions for next week, and enjoy today's videos. This video shows some impressively robust autonomous rough-terrain locomotion from ANYmal, but it's mostly worth watching for the epic ANYmal back massage (!) at the end: We present an architecture for rough-terrain locomotion with quadrupedal robots. All sensing, state estimation, mapping, control, and planning runs in real-time onboard the robot.

Google's AI chief has spoken out about what he feels are misconceptions and overstated dangers surrounding intelligent machines. John Giannandrea took particular aim at'unreasonable concerns' over the arrival of general artificial intelligence, or robots that can think like humans. Although he failed to name tech entrepreneur Elon Musk, who has been particular vocal over his fears about the technology, many have inferred this connection. Google's AI chief has spoken out about what he feels are misconceptions and overstated dangers surrounding intelligent machines. John Giannandrea took particular aim at'unreasonable concerns' over the arrival of robots that can think like humans Mr Giannandrea was born in Scotland.

China's programme to launch a mission to Mars in 2020 is'well underway' according to its top planner. As the country moves forward with its ambitious space programme, a probe that will will carry 13 types of payload is being developed. The Communist regime hopes to have both six rovers on the surface of the red planet, as well as seven vehicles in orbit, collecting vital data. This could one day lead to both a'robotic and human settlement' on the red planet, according to the project's leader. China's programme to launch a mission to Mars in 2020 is'well underway' according to its top planner.As the country moves forward with its ambitious space programme, a probe that will will carry 13 types of payload, including six rovers, are being developed (artist's impression) The Long March-5 carrier rocket will blast off from the Wenchang Space Launch Centre in the tropical island province of Hainan in July or August 2020.