We propose Radial Bayesian Neural Networks: a variational distribution for mean field variational inference (MFVI) in Bayesian neural networks that is simple to implement, scalable to large models, and robust to hyperparameter selection. We hypothesize that standard MFVI fails in large models because of a property of the high-dimensional Gaussians used as posteriors. As variances grow, samples come almost entirely from a `soap-bubble' far from the mean. We show that the ad-hoc tweaks used previously in the literature to get MFVI to work served to stop such variances growing. Designing a new posterior distribution, we avoid this pathology in a theoretically principled way. Our distribution improves accuracy and uncertainty over standard MFVI, while scaling to large data where most other VI and MCMC methods struggle. We benchmark Radial BNNs in a real-world task of diabetic retinopathy diagnosis from fundus images, a task with ~100x larger input dimensionality and model size compared to previous demonstrations of MFVI.

Traditional authentication systems use alphanumeric or graphical passwords, or token-based techniques that require "something you know and something you have". The disadvantages of these systems include the risks of forgetfulness, loss, and theft. To address these shortcomings, biometric authentication is rapidly replacing traditional authentication methods and is becoming an everyday part of life. The electrocardiogram (ECG) is one of the most recent traits considered for biometric purposes, and three typical use cases have been described: security checks, hospitals and wearable devices. Here we describe an ECG-based authentication system suitable for security checks and hospital environments. The proposed authentication system will help investigators studying ECG-based biometric authentication techniques to define dataset boundaries and to acquire high-quality training data. We evaluated the performance of the proposed system using a confusion matrix and also by applying the Amang ECG (amgecg) toolbox in MATLAB to investigate two parameters that directly affect the accuracy of authentication: the ECG slicing time (sliding window) and sampling time. Using this approach, we found that accuracy was optimized by using a sliding window of 0.4 s and a sampling time of 37 s.

Researchers at the University of Washington created a tool, which could potentially be developed into an application for smart speakers and smartphones, that uses algorithms and machine learning to identify instances of agonal breathing, a sign of cardiac arrest, with an accuracy of 97% at distances of up to 6 meters away. A contactless support vector machine (SVM), an artificial intelligence system that uses algorithms and machine learning, could be used by smart speakers and similar devices to detect agonal breathing, a symptom of potential cardiac arrest. The machine performs with 97% accuracy from a distance of up to 6 meters away, according to a study in Nature Partner Journals Digital Medicine. "A lot of people have smart speakers in their homes, and these devices have amazing capabilities that we can take advantage of," said sudy co-author Shyam Gollakota, PhD, associate professor at the University of Washington's Paul G. Allen School of Computer Science and Engineering, in a statement. "We envision a contactless system that works by continuously and passively monitoring the bedroom for an agonal breathing event, and alerts anyone nearby to come provide CPR. And then if there's no response, the device can automatically call 911."

As artificial intelligence (AI) systems permeate our world, the problem of implicit biases in these systems have become more serious. AI systems are routinely used to make decisions or support the decision-making process in credit, hiring, criminal justice, and education, all of which are domains protected by anti-discrimination law. Although AI systems appear to eliminate the biases of a human decision maker, they may perpetuate or even exacerbate biases in the training data [64]. Such biases are especially objectionable when it adversely affects underprivileged groups of users [3]. Although the most obvious remedy is to remove the biases in the training data, this is impractical in most applications.

We build upon probabilistic models for Boolean Matrix and Boolean Tensor factorisation that have recently been shown to solve these problems with unprecedented accuracy and to enable posterior inference to scale to Billions of observation. Here, we lift the restriction of a pre-specified number of latent dimensions by introducing an Indian Buffet Process prior over factor matrices. Not only does the full factor-conditional take a computationally convenient form due to the logical dependencies in the model, but also the posterior over the number of non-zero latent dimensions is remarkably simple. It amounts to counting the number false and true negative predictions, whereas positive predictions can be ignored. This constitutes a very transparent example of sampling-based posterior inference with an IBP prior and, importantly, lets us maintain extremely efficient inference. We discuss applications to simulated data, as well as to a real world data matrix with 6 Million entries.

In this article we investigate the outcomes of the standard Least Angle Regression (LAR) algorithm in high dimensions under the Gaussian noise assumption. We give the exact law of the sequence of knots conditional on the sequence of variables entering the model, i.e., the post-selection law of the knots of the LAR. Based on this result, we prove an exact of the False Discovery Rate (FDR) in the orthogonal design case and an exact control of the existence of false negatives in the general design case. First, we build a sequence of testing procedures on the variables entering the model and we give an exact control of the FDR in the orthogonal design case when the noise level can be unknown. Second, we introduce a new exact testing procedure on the existence of false negatives when the noise level can be unknown. This testing procedure can be deployed after any support selection procedure that will produce an estimation of the support (i.e., the indexes of nonzero coefficients) for any designs. The type~$I$ error of the test can be exactly controlled as long as the selection procedure follows some elementary hypotheses, referred to as admissible selection procedures. These support selection procedures are such that the estimation of the support is given by the $k$ first variables entering the model where the random variable $k$ is a stopping time. Monte-Carlo simulations and a real data experiment are provided to illustrate our results.

Protecting user credentials from compromise is a nearly impossible task. Billions of credentials uncovered in data breaches are circulating online, and every month millions more are exposed, either through intrusions or unprotected servers. In addition, phishing attacks continue to dupe users into coughing up their credentials voluntarily. You'll always need layers of security controls to secure credentials. But when credential controls are bypassed--either by an external threat actor or an insider--user and entity behavioral analytics (UEBA) can help.

Machine learning algorithms have been increasingly deployed in critical automated decision-making systems that directly affect human lives. When these algorithms are only trained to minimize the training/test error, they could suffer from systematic discrimination against individuals based on their sensitive attributes such as gender or race. Recently, there has been a surge in machine learning society to develop algorithms for fair machine learning. In particular, many adversarial learning procedures have been proposed to impose fairness. Unfortunately, these algorithms either can only impose fairness up to first-order dependence between the variables, or they lack computational convergence guarantees. In this paper, we use R\'enyi correlation as a measure of fairness of machine learning models and develop a general training framework to impose fairness. In particular, we propose a min-max formulation which balances the accuracy and fairness when solved to optimality. For the case of discrete sensitive attributes, we suggest an iterative algorithm with theoretical convergence guarantee for solving the proposed min-max problem. Our algorithm and analysis are then specialized to fair classification and the fair clustering problem under disparate impact doctrine. Finally, the performance of the proposed R\'enyi fair inference framework is evaluated on Adult and Bank datasets.

As we know by now, Alexa can play a song, order a pizza or do a quick online search. But now it can do something much more valuable: save your life. According to the results of a new proof-of-concept study, Alexa can accurately identify a specific pattern of breathing known as agonal breathing or gasping for air, that develops in the setting of an impending cardiac arrest, or when your heart stops beating. The research was published yesterday in the npj Digital Medicine. The implications for this novel form of contactless AI monitoring to detect cardiac arrest are broad, and offer the unique possibility to dispatch an ambulance to a victim who may be alone at home.

A substantial portion of the literature on fairness in algorithms proposes, analyzes, and operationalizes simple formulaic criteria for assessing fairness. Two of these criteria, Equalized Odds and Calibration by Group, have gained significant attention for their simplicity and intuitive appeal, but also for their incompatibility. This chapter provides a perspective on the meaning and consequences of these and other fairness criteria using graphical models which reveals Equalized Odds and related criteria to be ultimately misleading. An assessment of various graphical models suggests that fairness criteria should ultimately be case-specific and sensitive to the nature of the information the algorithm processes.