Google's DeepMind artificial intelligence team has been based in the UK ever since it was acquired in 2014. However, it's finally ready to branch out -- just not to the US. DeepMind has announced that its first international research lab is coming to the Canadian prairie city of Edmonton, Alberta later in July. A trio of University of Alberta computer science professors (Richard Sutton, Michael Bowling and Patrick Pilarski) will lead the group, which includes seven more AI veterans. As Recode observes, you can chalk it up to a combination of familiarity and political considerations.

In the future, depending on the company size and business type, many organizations will need to consider adding the role of chief artificial intelligence officer. While a full-time dedicated position might seem to be excessive now, the role of a senior leader who is deeply knowledgeable in the broad domain of artificial intelligence is rapidly becoming critical.

It's rare for Canadians to come out and assert global leadership in anything (barring hockey and winter coats), but here we are, on the brink of adding artificial intelligence (AI) to the list. This is no small measure. It requires us to move away from the understated modesty that often defines our national character and demands that we take action to be able to declare our place on the world stage. Thankfully, we have the goods to declare. Seminal breakthroughs such as deep learning and reinforcement learning, which have resulted in unprecedented technological transformation and are currently fuelling the AI engine, were brought to life by Canadian universities.

IoT & Endpoints: IoT devices and other endpoints, including smartphones, tablets, and laptops within enterprise networks, pose a specific threat to individuals and organizations. Today's connected devices lack supporting infrastructure for robust security protocols. Old-school approaches to defending these devices include pushing security updates from the cloud to the device, but with the dynamic nature of malware today, connected devices do not have enough memory or computing power to effectively store protocols to deal with the multitude of threats that come their way. Instead, the new-school approach involves utilizing machine learning algorithms that can monitor network device traffic to model a baseline of "normal" device behavior, and subsequently flag when the normal behavior of an IoT ecosystem is compromised. Startups addressing the threats facing IoT and endpoints include: Fortscale Security, Tanium, and CUJO.

Recycling facilities use robotic sorting stations and object-recognition technology to identify and put garbage in its proper place. Filled with intricate mazes of high-speed conveyor belts carrying yesterday's garbage, high-tech recycling centers use sophisticated sensors to sort plastic from paper from aluminum. While this technology may streamline sorting, it's not smart or nimble enough to finish the job. Behind the scenes, recycling workers continue to sort the materials, making sure cereal boxes don't mix with soda cans. But the future of smart recycling is looking brighter.

NASA's Frontier Development Lab (FDL), a public-private research institute operated jointly by the space agency's Ames Research Center and the SETI Institute, announced it will use artificial intelligence to study methods of protecting the Earth from potentially hazardous asteroids and comets. The announcement was made on Friday, June 30, designated in 2014 as International Asteroid Day, an annual event that addresses potential threats from Near Earth Objects (NEOs). June 30 was chosen because it is the anniversary of the 1908 Tunguska impact, when an asteroid estimated to have been 120 feet wide exploded over the Stony Tunguska River in Siberia. The annual commemoration is the brainchild of astrophysicist and Queen lead guitarist Brian May and film director Grigorij Richters. Several years ago, Richters directed 51 Degrees North, a film depicting a fictional asteroid strike in London. For this year's event, FDL assembled a research team to discuss the ways artificial intelligence can assist in planetary defense.

The logic around artificial intelligence is fuzzy. Some people might argue that the heuristic algorithms used in antivirus to recognize potential threats are artificial intelligence. Others got a glimmer of hope -- outside of the security field -- with the landmark success of AlphaGo. In 2016, the DeepMind software won four out of five matches of the complex Chinese Go board game when it out-strategized top professional player Lee Sedol. The win astounded viewers and saved Alphabet Group, which acquired the London-based DeepMind in 2014, a million dollars of prize money.

The Department of Defense is consuming more and more chips and lines of code, which translates to more supply-chain vulnerability. Officials and industry leaders argue big data and artificial intelligence will be critical tools to manage that risk going forward. Speaking at an Intelligence and National Security Alliance and Defense One event, panelists described a rapidly expanding network of suppliers for weapons and components. For example, Northrup Grumman alone has some 5,000 suppliers in just one sector of its business. "You've got those 5,000, they in turn have additional suppliers, so you think about all of the potential points of entry ... in terms of hardware, software, design, delivery," said John Jordan, director of compliance for global supply chain for Northrop's Mission Systems Sector.

There have been recriminations about Secretary Clinton's use of a personal email account and server while she was Secretary of State, but there hasn't been enough examination of why Shadow IT is a bad thing. When an employee uses personal IT resources to do their job, that activity and data is out of view of the employer, in the so-called "shadows." An employer provides computer resources to employees and has a responsibility to maintain the systems, keep track of company data, back it up, secure it, and secure the network and devices. When employees use their personal computers and email accounts for work, it creates security risks. The employer can't secure systems or data it doesn't know about, and individuals might have worse cybersecurity practices than the employer.

There is a lot of hype and plenty of fear around artificial intelligence and its impact on the future of healthcare. There are many signs pointing towards the fact that AI will completely move the world of medicine. As deep learning algorithms and narrow AI started to buzz especially around the field of medical imaging, many radiologists went into panic mode. In his presentation at the GPU Tech Conference in San Jose in May 2017, Curtis Langlotz, Professor of Radiology and Biomedical Informatics at Stanford University, mentioned how he received an e-mail from one of his students saying he was thinking about going into radiology but does not know whether it is a viable profession anymore. But the assumption that the radiologist profession is dying, is just plain wrong.