Information Assured

The past few weeks have revealed a global surge in cybersecurity threats, privacy concerns, and AI-driven vulnerabilities. Hackers are targeting critical infrastructure, nation-state cyber activities are escalating, and the ethical implications of AI are taking center stage. In the U.S., water utilities have become a prime target for cybercriminals, hacktivists, and state-sponsored actors, forcing some operators to switch to manual operations after breaches. Meanwhile, a significant Volkswagen data breach exposed the unencrypted location data of over 800,000 EVs, highlighting the risks associated with connected vehicles. Tesla also came under scrutiny for its extensive data-sharing practices, sparking fresh debates about surveillance and consumer privacy. China's cyber operations have taken a more aggressive turn, shifting from espionage to actively pre-positioning for potential attacks on U.S. critical infrastructure. The hacking groups Volt Typhoon and Salt Typhoon have infiltrat...

NY Times copyright suit wants OpenAI to delete all GPT instances. One of the sources used is a large collection of online material called "Common Crawl," which the suit alleges contains information from 16 million unique records from sites published by The Times. Advertisement OpenAI no longer discloses as many details of the data used for training of recent GPT versions. However, all indications are that full-text NY Times articles are still part of that process (Much more on that in a moment.) "Defendants’ GenAI tools can generate output that recites Times content verbatim, closely summarizes it, and mimics its expressive style, as demonstrated by scores of examples," the suit alleges. "Publicly, Defendants insist that their conduct is protected as 'fair use' because their unlicensed use of copyrighted content to train GenAI models serves a new 'transformative' purpose," the suit notes. "A GPT model completely fabricated that “The Ne...

  MP3 April 1st, 2023 Driverless taxis debut in Beijing, UK's NCA sets up fake DDoS-for-hire sites to catch criminals, Bitcoin ATMs hit by a zero-day bug, China's economic growth, Ferrari suffers a ransom attack, US court allows legal notice via NFT, and Huawei replaces US-banned components. Driverless cars ready for hire in suburban Beijing Driverless taxis are now available in suburban Beijing, marking a milestone in intelligent transport. Chinese tech giant Baidu and autonomous vehicle startup Pony.ai were granted licenses to run fully driverless robotaxi services, making it the first time a fully autonomous fleet can operate in a major city. Both companies have deployed 10 autonomous vehicles in a 60-square-kilometer area. Baidu plans to expand its service to 65 cities by 2025 and 100 by 2030. China's self-driving taxi market is projected to be worth $188.6 billion by 2030, accounting for 60% of the country's ride-hailing market. Despite current limitations, robota...