Many AIs are trained to understand human language by learning from a massive corpus known as the Common Crawl. The Common Crawl is the result of a large-scale crawl of the Internet in 2014 that contains 840 billion tokens, or words. Princeton Center for Information Technology Policy researcher Aylin Caliskan and her colleagues wondered whether that corpus--created by millions of people typing away online--might contain biases that could be discovered by algorithm. To figure it out, they turned to an unusual source: the Implicit Association Test (IAT), which is used to measure often unconscious social attitudes. People taking the IAT are asked to put words into two categories.

Many AIs are trained to understand human language by learning from a massive corpus known as the Common Crawl. The Common Crawl is the result of a large-scale crawl of the Internet in 2014 that contains 840 billion tokens, or words. Princeton Center for Information Technology Policy researcher Aylin Caliskan and her colleagues wondered whether that corpus--created by millions of people typing away online--might contain biases that could be discovered by algorithm. To figure it out, they turned to an unusual source: the Implicit Association Test (IAT), which is used to measure often unconscious social attitudes. People taking the IAT are asked to put words into two categories.

Uber has lost yet another executive after a vice president whose remit included the self-driving car division resigned in a blow to the company, which is currently fighting a high-profile lawsuit with Google about the autonomous technology.

My husband and I have a running joke where we have our Amazon Echo "compete" with our iPhones to see who does a better (i.e., more human-like) job of interacting with us. While there's no clear winner, Siri seems to have the edge for casual conversation, but Alexa can sing. I've noticed something else, too. We don't usually thank Siri or Alexa the way we would a clerk at a supermarket or an employee at an information kiosk, even though they're providing us with identical services. They don't care if we thank them, because they don't have feelings.

A trio of teens was charged with a violent plot to "kill everyone and anyone" at their Michigan middle school, according to court records. Lapeer County Assistant Prosecutor David Campbell read chilling words allegedly written by Gunnar Rice in Lapper County District Court on Monday, detailed what he allegedly planned to undertake at Zemmer Middle School in Lapeer, a city of roughly 8,000 about 20 miles east of Flint. Rice, 14, wrote that he wanted to "exterminate all the [expletive] animals at this school," Campbell said during Monday's arraignment, MLive.com "We'll kill everyone and anyone of our choosing." Rice was charged as an adult on charges of conspiracy to commit first-degree murder, using computers to commit a crime, conspiracy to commit terrorism and a false report of terrorism.

The use of digital devices, Big Data and artificial intelligence to take decisions previously made by humans represents one of the biggest challenges of our age. Seldom has technology had as much potential to benefit humanity and at the same time, to disrupt it. By delegating decisions to machines, do we rid ourselves of bias or instead, codify it, and how should the law, regulation and practice respond to the opportunities and risks presented by A.I. Our keynote speakers will be Professor Katie Atkinson, Head of Computer Science, University of Liverpool, an expert in artificial intelligence and its application to legal reasoning, and John McNamara, IBM Senior Inventor, who will speak on protecting trust in a world disrupted by machine learning. The conference is open to policy-makers, practitioners, academics and research students and in particular those working in law, computer-science, data science, information rights, privacy, compliance, statistics, law enforcement and justice, behavioural science and health & social care. This is organised by the Centre for Information Rights.

The company "will not stand by" as rivals "infringe on our intellectual property" by making similar competing machines, according to a statement. We've reached out to the companies targeted by the lawsuits and will let you know how they're responding, although it's safe to say they aren't likely to roll over. At first blush, the infringement claims appear to be part of a classic competitive strategy: if you're an early participant in an industry that's rapidly heating up, sue the competition to slow them down. While iRobot still has the best-known models, there's a very real chance that it gets overshadowed by latecomers -- especially anyone that can offer more for your money.

Los Angeles start-up Coin-In develops mobile games, pictured above, aimed at driving gamblers back into casinos. It's among companies recently backed by Tech Coast Angeles members. Los Angeles start-up Coin-In develops mobile games, pictured above, aimed at driving gamblers back into casinos. It's among companies recently backed by Tech Coast Angeles members. He says concern about missing the boat on Los Angeles' next big thing is the most noticeable local trend during the first quarter.

Google has been forced to open up Android to rival search engines and applications in Russia, after settling a two-year battle with competition authorities for 439m roubles (£6.2m). The deal sets a new precedent for Google, which until now has resisted permitting the pre-installation of rival search engines and certain applications on to the world's most popular operating system. In 2015, Russia's Federal Antimonopoly Service (FAS) ruled that the Android-maker was breaking the law and abusing its dominant position through restrictions on third-party manufacturers, fining Google 438m rubles (£6.2m) in August 2016. The FAS said that Google will no longer demand exclusivity of its applications on Android devices sold in Russia and will not restrict the pre-installation of rival search engines and other applications. Google will also develop a tool allowing users to choose the default search engine on new and existing Android devices, a similar measure put in place by Microsoft for browser choice on Windows following antitrust action by the European Commission.

AMSTERDAM– On March 25, the European Union celebrated the 60th anniversary of the Treaty of Rome, which gave birth to the European Economic Community and set the stage for the EU's creation. Like any birthday, it was an opportunity not just to celebrate, but also to consider what has been achieved – and what must change. At a time when member countries are increasingly pulling away from the EU – and the United Kingdom is actually leaving – the need for reform is clear. Discussions about how to bring the European Council, Commission, and Parliament closer to EU citizens, thereby closing Europe's "democratic deficit," are frequent and animated. But another institution that could benefit from more input from EU citizens is often left out of these discussions: the European Court of Justice.