Microsoft today further proved its commitment to artificial intelligence through the acquisition of Maluuba. Maluuba -- a Montreal-based startup that impressed during TechCrunch's 2012 San Francisco Startup Battlefield competition -- uses natural language processing and machine learning to achieve a singular goal: achieving artificial general intelligence (AGI). AGI is the unicorn, at least so far, in the artificial intelligence and machine learning segments but if (once) achieved it'll lead to machines that can perform tasks at least as well as humans. Last year, Facebook's VP of Design thought the TNW Conference main stage was the best she'd ever been on. Currently the company taps the power of reinforcement learning (and deep learning) to train computer-based systems to perform general tasks like answering questions and making decisions.

As Iraqi Security Forces attempt to drive ISIS out of Mosul, a large city in Northern Iraq that the terrorist organization has occupied since 2014, it's facing an arsenal of improvised, experimental weapons. One of ISIS' newest hand-made weapons is the armed drone: a commercial quadcopter equipped with the ability to drop grenade-size explosives. It's well-known that ISIS uses weaponized drones, but new images out of Mosul confirm that the group is now using the quadcopters as bombers as well as single-mission vehicles. Kurdish media network Rudaw reported last week that the explosive-dropping drones have killed civilians and damaged equipment. So far, ISIS has not used these drones to deliver chemical weapons, Rudaw said.

Former astronaut Gene Cernan, the last of only a dozen men to walk on the moon who returned to Earth with a message of "peace and hope for all mankind," has died. Cernan died Monday following ongoing heath issues, his family said in a statement released by NASA spokesman Bob Jacobs. NASA said Cernan was surrounded by his family. "Even at the age of 82, Gene was passionate about sharing his desire to see the continued human exploration of space and encouraged our nation's leaders and young people to not let him remain the last man to walk on the Moon," the family said. Cernan, commander of NASA's Apollo 17 mission, set foot on the lunar surface in December 1972 during his third space flight.

We've all seen a drone flying around at some point or another, but seeing what it actually does to the air around it is something else entirely. Researchers at NASA's Ames Research Center in California have used computer models to create an animation of the air flow around a quadcopter drone. They developed the animation for the DJI Phantom 3 quadcopter - a battery-powered drone with four rotors. For years, NASA has used similar computer models to simulate the flow of air around aircraft to improve the performance of the vehicles of the future. The phantom drone relies on four rotors to generate enough thrust to lift it up into the air. The animation revealed the complex movements of the air caused by the interaction of the drones rotors and its X-shaped frame.

The EU's legal affairs committee is walking blindfold into a swamp if it thinks that "electronic personhood" will protect society from developments in AI (Give robots'personhood', say EU committee, 13 January). The analogy with corporate personhood is unfortunate, as this has not protected society in general, but allowed owners of companies to further their own interests – witness the example of the Citizens United movement in the US, where corporate personhood has been used as a tool for companies to interfere in the electoral process, on the basis that a corporation has the same right to free speech as a biological human being. Electronic personhood will protect the interests of a few, at the expense of the many. As soon as rules of robotic personhood are published, the creators of AI devices will "adjust" their machines to take the fullest advantage of this opportunity – not because these people are evil but because that is part of the logic of any commercial activity. Just as corporate personhood has been used in ways that its original proponents never expected, so the granting of "rights" to robots will have consequences that we cannot fully predict – to take just two admittedly futuristic examples, how could we refuse a sophisticated robot the right to participate in societal decision-making, ie to vote?

TEHRAN, Iran – Sustained gunfire rang out over central Tehran on Monday afternoon as anti-aircraft guns targeted what officials said was a drone flying over the Iranian capital. Many residents ran to rooftops and craned their necks to see what was happening. Others sought shelter as bursts of machine gun fire echoed through the streets. The semi-official Tasnim news agency quoted Tehran Governor Isa Farhadi as saying that the gunfire targeted a drone near restricted airspace in the capital. It wasn't clear who owned the drone, which he described as a quadcopter. That suggests it may have been operated by a local hobbyist or aerial photographer rather than a foreign government.

The waste from discarded electronic gadgets and electrical appliances has reached severe levels in East Asia, posing a growing threat to health and the environment unless safe disposal becomes the norm. China was the biggest culprit with its electronic waste more than doubling, according to a new study by the United Nations University. But nearly every country in the region had massive increases between 2010 and 2015, including those least equipped to deal with the growing mountain of discarded smartphones, computers, TVs, air conditioners and other goods. On average, electronic waste in the 12 countries in the study had increased by nearly two thirds in the five years, totaling 12.3 million tons in 2015 alone. A worker arranges used electronic equipment at a repair shop in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

Dubbed the'Sea Hunter', the 132ft ship is designed to travel thousands of miles out at sea without a single crew member on board. Now, the 132-foot Sea Hunter trimaran, is set to get an upgrade - turning it into a stealthy killing machine. The Navy has revealed plans to expand the mission portfolio of the craft so that it can conduct surface warfare missions, fire weapons and launch electronic attacks. The 132ft-long (40-metre) unarmed prototype, dubbed Sea Hunter, is the naval equivalent of Google's self-driving car, designed to cruise on the ocean's surface without a crew. The ship's projected $20 million (£14.2 million) price tag and its $20,000 (£14,300) daily operating cost make it relatively inexpensive for the navy The 132ft-long (40-metre) unarmed prototype, dubbed Sea Hunter, is the naval equivalent of Google's self-driving car, designed to cruise on the ocean's surface without a crew.

With the use of data-centric business models and big data services on the rise, it is becoming increasingly harder to detect threats and data breaches. Cybersecurity experts are finding themselves hard pressed to keep tabs on the reams of data that are being generated by their companies and organizations. Attackers on the other hand are finding it easier to hide their malicious packets in the flood of data that is being exchanged over corporate networks. Last year, Facebook's VP of Design thought the TNW Conference main stage was the best she'd ever been on. A solution to this dilemma might be found in the use of machine learning, the hot trend that is taking the world by storm and is transforming numerous industries in ways that were previously inconceivable.

The company behind the globally successful Angry Birds video game has chosen London for the site of its first game studio outside Scandinavia, shrugging off any concerns over the future of the City's tech industry in the face of Brexit. In a statement on Monday, Rovio said that it aims to build a team of over 20 in London over the next two years. The studio will be the Finnish developer's fifth. The company currently has three in Espoo, Finland and one in Stockholm, Sweden. "Our business is profitably growing and London is the most logical place for us to found a new studio," said Antti Viitanen, a senior vice president for studios at Rovio.