Two security researchers have been crowned the top hackers in this year's Pwn2Own hacking contest after developing and testing several high profile exploits, including an attack against an Amazon Echo. Amat Cama and Richard Zhu, who make up Team Fluoroacetate, scored $60,000 in bug bounties for their integer overflow exploit against the latest Amazon Echo Show 5, an Alexa-powered smart display. The researchers found that the device uses an older version of Chromium, Google's open-source browser projects, which had been forked some time during its development. The bug allowed them to take "full control" of the device if connected to a malicious Wi-Fi hotspot, said Brian Gorenc, director of Trend Micro's Zero Day Initiative, which put on the Pwn2Own contest. The researchers tested their exploits in a radio-frequency shielding enclosure to prevent any outside interference.

Researchers in Japan and at the University of Michigan recently said that they had figured out how to take control over Google Home, Amazon's Alexa or Apple's Siri devices from several feet away by shining laser pointers, and even flashlights, at the devices' mouthpieces. What brought this one was the ascent of the voice-controlled digital assistants, introduced a couple of years back and the security experts have expressed their worries that systems like Apple's Siri and Amazon's Alexa were a privacy danger and could be effectively and easily hacked. Kevin Fu, an associate professor of electrical engineering and computer science at the University of Michigan with respect to the usage of laser pointers said that "This opens up an entirely new class of vulnerabilities, it's difficult to know how many products are affected because this is so basic." The computer science and electrical engineering researchers -- Takeshi Sugawara at the College of Electro-Interchanges in Japan and Mr. Fu, Daniel Genkin, Sara Rampazzi, and Benjamin Cyr at the College of Michigan -- all of them released their findings regarding the same issue in a paper on the 4th of November. The researchers said they had informed Tesla, Portage, Amazon, Apple, and Google to the light vulnerability and the companies all responded saying that they were'studying' the conclusions in the paper that was released.

Today, technologies like Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML) have integrated into our lives in such a way that it is impossible to imagine a world without them. Think about the smart virtual assistants (Siri and Alexa), the recommendation engines on online shopping platforms (Amazon and Netflix), self-driving cars and smart homes, they all are applications of ML. Certainly, the inclusion of these radical technological innovations has made our lives so much more comfortable. Although ML has been around for a long time (for instance, Turing's Enigma machine), it's only recently that the interest in this concept has peaked. As more companies are getting inclined towards advanced ML solutions and technologies, it is encouraging students and professionals to take up a machine learning course. In simple words, ML is a subset under the broad umbrella of AI.

A specialist in Apple IT, Bob Gendler, was curious as to how Siri suggests contacts and other information to macOS users. Naturally, he rolled his sleeves up and started digging into the tech. Writing on Medium, Gendler explained how this led him to discover a "suggestions" folder containing multiple files. The significant discovery, however, came when he looked into some of these macOS database files that stored information from applications such as Apple Mail. However, Gendler found that this database was storing some of the text from encrypted Apple Mail emails in readable, unencrypted, plaintext form.

Something very interesting is happening within the tech world: the biggest tech giants in Silicon Valley are racing to make your home a vast new playground for all of their new tech devices and platforms. But whatever you do – don't call it the "smart home." According to Google executives, the term "smart home" has fallen out of favor at the company, presumably because it conjures up all kinds of images of surveillance cameras and smart home devices that are constantly monitoring, tracking and listening to you. A better term, according to top Google executives, is the "helpful home." A "helpful home" respects consumer privacy and comes with all sorts of features and benefits to make your life easier.

DUBLIN--(BUSINESS WIRE)--The "Innovations in Sensors, Quantum Dot Displays, Virtual Assistants, Cyber Analytics Tools, Artificial Intelligence, and Brain-computer Interfaces" report has been added to ResearchAndMarkets.com's offering. This edition of the Inside R&D TechVision Opportunity Engine (TOE) features trends and innovations in sensors, quantum dot displays, virtual assistants, cyber analytics tools, artificial intelligence, and brain-computer interfaces. The TOE also covers innovations in cancer detection and treatment of neurodegenerative diseases. Inside R&D TechVision Opportunity Engine covers global innovations that are in research and development in virtually all technology areas. We provide intelligence and insights on innovations spanning a wide variety of industry areas, including automation, electronics, sensors, information and communication technologies, manufacturing, health, wellness, medical devices, pharma, biotechnology, materials, coatings, renewable fuels, automotive, power systems, sustainable energy solutions and innovations that contribute to a cleaner and greener environment.

Microsoft's Cortana has been undergoing an identity crisis in the last few years. As Windows Phone wound down, Microsoft tried, in vain, to push Cortana as a consumer option with the Invoke speaker and GLAS thermostat. But Microsoft's ambitions for smart AI and Cortana seems to now be finding its groove. The company recently unveiled Play My Emails for Outlook Mobile along with some significant enhancements to Outlook calendar. Could this new Cortana finally be the path forward for Microsoft?

There's been a lot of hype around AI technologies over the last several years. As 2020 approaches, we can expect to see many of these technologies making their way out of the lab and into full production. This may come in the form of improved software systems to intelligent assistants deployed across enterprises to help humans contact IT and HR. From customer service to fraud prevention, AI will have an impact on how humans complete their everyday responsibilities, enabled by smarter and accelerated insights. With voice assistants readily available in homes and cars, humans are becoming increasingly comfortable talking to machines.

Five years ago today, Amazon surprised the tech press by unveiling Alexa and the Echo, its first smart speaker. "Well this one came out of nowhere," was the reaction of Verge reporter Chris Welch. Five years later, Alexa is a household name -- literally. If you have children and an Alexa device, they probably know how to ask the robot to play their favorite songs at breakfast. You might have Alexa in your kitchen, on your bedside table, or even in your car. But half a decade after Alexa launched, there's a lingering question: has Amazon's assistant actually become more useful?

Natural language processing, the technology that lets computers read, decipher, understand and make sense of human language, is the driving force behind internet search engines, email filters, digital assistants such as Amazon's Alexa and Apple's Siri, and language-to-language translation apps. Now, Johns Hopkins Medicine researchers say they have given this technology a new job as a clinical detective, diagnosing the early and subtle signs of language-associated cognitive impairments in patients with failing livers. They also report finding evidence that cognitive functioning is likely to be restored following a liver transplant. In a new paper in the journal npj Digital Medicine (formerly Nature Digital Medicine), the researchers describe how they used natural language processing, or NLP, to evaluate electronic message samples from patients with end-stage liver disease (ESLD), also known as chronic liver failure. ESLD has been associated with transient cognitive abnormalities such as diminished attention span, loss of memory and reduced psychomotor speed, an individual's ability to detect and respond to the world around them.