The US Navy is funding the development of a million dollar robot surveillance system that can spy on humans. Researchers from Cornell University are planning to create a system to enable teams of robots to share information as they move around and carry out surveillance as a'single entity with many eyes'. A lump sum of $1.7m was handed over to the researchers by the U.S. Office of Naval Research, which is dedicated to developing new forms of military and civilian technology. Researchers from Cornell University are planning to create a system to enable teams of robots to share information as they move around and carry out surveillance as a'single entity with many eyes' It wants to develop a system which lets teams of surveillance robots gather and share intelligence'at the speed of light'. Beyond surveillance, the new technology might help when teams of robots relieve humans of dangerous jobs like disposing of landmines, cleaning up after a nuclear meltdown or surveying the damage after a flood or hurricane.

The importance of algorithms in our lives today cannot be overstated. They are used virtually everywhere, from financial institutions to dating sites. But some algorithms shape and control our world more than others -- and these ten are the most significant. Just a quick refresher before we get started. Though there's no formal definition, computer scientists describe algorithms as a set of rules that define a sequence of operations.

Last year, a strange self-driving car was released onto the quiet roads of Monmouth County, New Jersey. The experimental vehicle, developed by researchers at the chip maker Nvidia, didn't look different from other autonomous cars, but it was unlike anything demonstrated by Google, Tesla, or General Motors, and it showed the rising power of artificial intelligence. The car didn't follow a single instruction provided by an engineer or programmer. Instead, it relied entirely on an algorithm that had taught itself to drive by watching a human do it. Getting a car to drive this way was an impressive feat. But it's also a bit unsettling, since it isn't completely clear how the car makes its decisions. Information from the vehicle's sensors goes straight into a huge network of artificial neurons that process the data and then deliver the commands required to operate the steering wheel, the brakes, and other systems.

Intelligence agents and military operatives may come to rely heavily on machine learning to parse huge quantities of data, and to control a growing arsenal of autonomous systems. But the U.S. military wants to make sure that this doesn't lead to blindly trusting in any algorithm. The Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), a division of the Defense Department that explores new technologies, is funding several projects that aim to make artificial intelligence explain itself. The approaches range from adding further machine-learning systems geared toward providing an explanation, to the development of new machine-learning approaches that incorporate an elucidation by design. "We now have this real explosion of AI," says David Gunning, the DARPA program manager who is funding an effort to develop AI techniques that include some explanation of their reasoning.

Every brand wants to tell a story. But a new narrative analytics platform has launched to help brands figure out the stories that are actually being told about them. The platform is called Protagonist, from a company by the same name. Formerly called Monitor 360, the San Francisco-based firm was spun off three years ago from the consulting firm Monitor Group. Protagonist says its newly released platform is the first "specifically designed to analyze complex, cross-platform data to reveal the underlying beliefs and motivations of consumers." Customers include General Mills, MetLife, Warner Brothers and Microsoft.

Let's take a breath: Robots and artificial intelligence systems are nowhere near displacing the human workforce. Nevertheless, no less a voice than Bill Gates has asserted just the opposite and called for a counterintuitive, preemptive strike on these innovations. His proposed weapon of choice? Taxes on technology to compensate for losses that haven't happened. David Kenny (@davidwkenny) is IBM's senior vice president for Watson and the company's cloud platform.

This Morning After is brought to you by the death of phone calls on flights (hooray!), how Persona 5 manages to digitally manifest Tokyo and the news that the most valuable car company in the US is now Tesla -- with a lot of that value resting on the incoming cheaper Model 3. We'll write you a note'Planet Earth II' on Ultra HD Blu-ray is a good reason to buy a new TV If you've been waiting for some ideal 4K demo material, the sequel to HDTV-seller Planet Earth will do the trick. Thanks to the bitrate afforded by Ultra HD Blu-ray plus the expanded color range and contrast of HDR, Devindra Hardawar claims "it completely justifies the existence of the doomed disc format." Yesterday Spanish authorities reportedly arrested Peter Yuryevich Levashov, and according to a statement by his wife, linked him to alleged hacking of the US presidential election. Later, the US DoJ and FBI announced that Levashov is suspected of operating the "Kelihos" botnet that hijacked Windows computers to send spam, but did not mention any ties to the election. It's reportedly pumping up to $875 million into LG Display.Google might bring curved screens to its next Pixel phone Google is investing up to $875 million in LG Display to develop its own stable supply of flexible OLED screens for its Pixel phones, according to multiple reports.

In the 2012 sci-fi film Prometheus, scientists release small drones into a mysterious tunnel complex to create a detailed 3D map of the caverns in minutes. Australian researchers plan to use a similar approach to explore parts of old mines that are unsafe to visit. The drones, which are controlled by a pilot, will be able to carry out safety checks by monitoring the build-up of water and checking the extent of roof collapses, and search for valuable mineral deposits that may have been missed. They are being developed by Craig Lindley and his colleagues at the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation, Australia's government research agency. The researchers' model is based on a commercial quadcopter.

In The One Percent Doctrine, veteran journalist Ron Suskind described how former Vice President Dick Cheney, when told that a unlikely but dire threat had merely a one percent chance of happening, argued that, in terms of response, it should be treated as a certainty. The idea has a certain logic to it. Clearly, if the potential impact of an event is consequential enough, then it needs to be addressed whether it is likely to happen or not. After all, unlikely things happen all the time. However, nobody's resources are unlimited.

FILE - In his photo April 4, 2017 file photo, provided by the Syrian anti-government activist group Edlib Media Center, which has been authenticated based on its contents and other AP reporting, shows victims of a suspected chemical attack, in the town of Khan Sheikhoun, northern Idlib province, Syria. A senior U.S. official says the U.S. has concluded that Russia knew in advance of Syria's chemical weapons attack last week. FILE - In his photo April 4, 2017 file photo, provided by the Syrian anti-government activist group Edlib Media Center, which has been authenticated based on its contents and other AP reporting, shows victims of a suspected chemical attack, in the town of Khan Sheikhoun, northern Idlib province, Syria. A senior U.S. official says the U.S. has concluded that Russia knew in advance of Syria's chemical weapons attack last week. WASHINGTON (AP) -- The United States has made a preliminary conclusion that Russia knew in advance of Syria's chemical weapons attack last week, but has no proof of Moscow's involvement, a senior U.S. official says.