A machine-learning revolution – Physics World

The groundwork for machine learning was laid down in the middle of last century. When your bank calls to ask about a suspiciously large purchase made on your credit card at a strange time, it's unlikely that a kindly member of staff has personally been combing through your account. Instead, it's more likely that a machine has learned what sort of behaviours to associate with criminal activity – and that it's spotted something unexpected on your statement. Silently and efficiently, the bank's computer has been using algorithms to watch over your account for signs of theft. Monitoring credit cards in this way is an example of "machine learning" – the process by which a computer system, trained on a given set of examples, develops the ability to perform a task flexibly and autonomously.