IT and engineering salaries in the U.S. rose 3.9 percent in 2015, the second-highest annual increase since 2010, according to a survey from IEEE-USA. The median income for IT and engineering professionals rose to US 135,000 in 2015, up from 130,000 in 2014, IEEE-USA said. Salaries rose nearly 4.3 percent between 2013 and 2014, after rising just 0.6 percent in 2013. Engineers working in systems and control, including the subspecialties of robotics and automation, control systems, industrial electronics and cybernetics, saw the largest salary increases in 2015. Their salaries rose 8.7 percent to 130,000.

What do you do if your autonomous housecleaning robot breaks your stuff while it's cleaning or throws out valuable items along with clutter because it considers those actions shortcuts to its prime directive of efficiency? Those are some of the complex challenges policy officials will have to unravel as artificial intelligence blooms in the U.S. in the coming decades. The issues aren't as trivial as they sound because they are wrapped up in security and safety issues, according to a new White House report. Titled "Preparing for the Future of Artificial Intelligence," the report outlines possible future directions and considerations for AI technology development over the next 50 years. It was released a day ahead of the White House Frontiers Conference in Pittsburgh on Oct. 13 and unveiled in a blog post by Deputy U.S. CTO Ed Felten and Terah Lyons, policy adviser to the U.S. CTO. The report recommends that the White House convene a study of automation and the economy that results in a public report released by the end of the year, according to Felten and Lyons.

While the future of artificial intelligence is probably going to be driven by Silicon Valley, the folks in Washington, DC want their say about how it will work, too. In two official reports today, the White House outlined its strategy for promoting artificial intelligence research and development in the US. While most of the bigger questions were punted to future legislators ("more research is needed" is a key phrase), the executive branch did draw some lines in the sand. And most importantly to the research community, the White House is not pushing for AI to be broadly regulated--instead, the use of the technology will be held to specific standards in the automotive, aviation, and finance industries. Three key guiding philosophies were presented across the reports, titled "Preparing for the Future of Artificial Intelligence" and "National Artificial Intelligence Research and Development Strategic Plan": AI needs to augment humanity instead of replacing it, AI needs to be ethical, and there must be an equal opportunity for everyone to develop these systems.

Consider one of the more common applications of A.I. today, identifying faces in pictures. The task it is replacing is a painstaking, laborious one: go through photos, and see if a face matches an already-known face. When done by A.I., there is a front-end process of training the algorithm by having it learn millions of faces. Then, once trained, the algorithm can, with rapid speed, look at a new picture and see if the faces in it match any in its already existing deep knowledge of faces. The skill needed to do this the old-fashioned way is mostly patience and a good memory.

Federal agencies should be individually exploring how artificial intelligence could improve their operations, a White House report suggests. Agencies should consider building "DARPA-like organizations" for "high-risk, high-reward AI research and its application" in government, said the report, which outlined opportunities and challenges for the technology. The report was released Wednesday, months after the White House hosted a series of public workshops, including one focused on AI applications for social good. That document incorporated discussions from the workshops, and recommended the Executive Office of the President publish a second report by the yearend to delve deeper into the effects of AI on the U.S. job market and outline recommended policy responses. The White House recommended federal agencies prioritize open training data and open data standards for artificial intelligence so those systems could be trained to analyze government data sets.

The Obama administration may be headed for the exits, but it continues to focus on the impact of artificial intelligence on the economy and the nation at large. Artificial intelligence (AI) is an umbrella term for a group of technologies--including machine learning--that enable computers to learn new skills and capabilities based on the data they are exposed to, among other factors. The just-released report, titled "Preparing for the Future of Artificial Intelligence," does not downplay potential job loss due to the advent of ever-smarter computers, but still posits that the technology will open up new career opportunities for those versed in it or who have higher-level skills. It also holds that public policy, especially re-training programs, can mitigate the negative impact of increasing automation by preparing displaced workers for other jobs. Prepared for the White House by the National Science and Technology Council's Subcommittee on Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence, the report reiterates the conventional wisdom that AI-fueled automation will take over more jobs that could not be automated in the past.

A UK parliamentary committee has urged the government to act proactively -- and to act now -- to tackle "a host of social, ethical and legal questions" arising from growing usage of autonomous technologies such as artificial intelligence. "While it is too soon to set down sector-wide regulations for this nascent field, it is vital that careful scrutiny of the ethical, legal and societal dimensions of artificially intelligent systems begins now," says the committee. "Not only would this help to ensure that the UK remains focused on developing'socially beneficial' AI systems, it would also represent an important step towards fostering public dialogue about, and trust in, such systems over time." The committee kicked off an enquiry into AI and robotics this March, going on to take 67 written submissions and hear from 12 witnesses in person, in addition to visiting Google DeepMind's London office. Publishing its report into robotics and AI today, the Science and Technology committee flags up several issues that it says need "serious, ongoing consideration" -- including: "[W]itnesses were clear that the ethical and legal matters raised by AI deserved attention now and that suitable governance frameworks were needed," it notes in the report.

This creates the false impression that the algorithms already exist for malware detection too. That is not the case. We at Kaspersky Lab have spent more than 10 years developing and patenting a number of technologies. And we continue to carry out research and come up with new ideas because … well, that's where the next myth comes in. There is a conceptual difference between malware detection and facial recognition.

Scott Huffman, leader of Google Assistant engineering, is working on a high-profile example of practical AI. Artificial intelligence could be a huge an economic boon, but not if its benefits help only the highest-skilled workers, whose jobs computers can't replace, President Barack Obama believes. With AI research rapidly becoming AI products from Google, Apple, Microsoft, Facebook and other companies, the technology is no longer an academic curiosity. Obama expects great things of AI as it spreads to new industries, he said in an interview with Wired magazine published Wednesday. But his optimism was guarded.

I made a strategic decision Sunday -- to sit out the second round of presidential debates. Instead, I enjoyed a fascinating expose on artificial intelligence (AI) on "60 Minutes." We all have pre-conceived notions about AI. Stephen Hawking has said when machines are smarter than us, it will bring about the end of the world. Specifically, "The development of full artificial intelligence could spell the end of the human race." Most of us are familiar with the fictitious Terminator film and television franchise, unfolding the saga of John Conner versus Skynet, which follows Hawking's thinking.