In a new report called “Regulating Biometrics: Global Approaches and Urgent Questions,” the AI Now Institute says that there’s a growing sense among regulation advocates that a biometric surveillance state is not inevitable.
The release of AI Now’s report couldn’t be more timely. As the pandemic drags on into the fall, businesses, government agencies, and schools are desperate for…
Google Magenta’s Lo-Fi Player is an AI-based virtual music studio
September 4, 2020
Lo-Fi Player, a new project out of Google Magenta, wants to help people play around with music creation — no experience necessary. Lo-Fi Player is a pixelated, 2D virtual room that runs in a web browser. It lets you mix lo-fi hip hop tracks by clicking on different…
We’re entering the AI twilight zone between narrow and general AI
September 4, 2020
With recent advances, the tech industry is leaving the confines of narrow artificial intelligence (AI) and entering a twilight zone, an ill-defined area between narrow and general AI.
To date, all the capabilities attributed to machine learning and AI have been in the…
Myst AI, a startup developing a predictive energy usage platform, today closed a $6 million funding round. The proceeds will be used to expand Myst’s “forecasting as a service” offering as it seeks to acquire new customers, a spokesperson told VentureBeat via email.
The pandemic has prompted governments to institute shelter-in-place orders, quarantine mandates, and business closures. As…
AI researchers use heartbeat detection to identify deepfake videos
September 4, 2020
Facebook and Twitter earlier this week took down social media accounts associated with the Internet Research Agency, the Russian troll farm that interfered in the U.S. presidential election four years ago, that had been spreading misinformation to up to 126 million Facebook…
Google Maps is improving travel ETAs with DeepMind AI
September 3, 2020
Google Maps helps users navigate over one billion kilometers in more than 200 countries and territories daily, and Google says its estimated time of arrival (ETA) predictions have been consistently accurate for over 97 percent of trips. That’s not good enough for Google…
DeepMind today detailed a collaboration with Google that reportedly improved the accuracy of real-time driving ETAs in Google Maps and Google Maps Platform APIs by up to 50% in some regions, including Berlin, Jakarta, São Paulo, Sydney, Tokyo, and Washington D.C. Through the use of machine learning techniques, DeepMind claims it minimized traffic prediction inaccuracies by incorporating…
Qualcomm promises better AI for its next Snapdragon PC chip
September 3, 2020
Here’s a sign that the troubled Windows on Snapdragon platform isn’t going away anytime soon: Qualcomm is announcing today its new made-for-PC processor based on ARM design. The Snapdragon 8cx Gen 2 follows up 2018’s Snapdragon 8cx, and back then the company said the…
As physical retail struggles amid the global pandemic, storeowners are rapidly trying to adapt to new realities that also include growing competition from Amazon. But a French startup called Storelift believes it can create a new convenience store concept that leans on many…
Biofourmis raises $100 million for AI remote medical tools
September 3, 2020
Biofourmis, an AI health IT company based in Singapore, today announced it raised $100 million in a series C funding round led by SoftBank’s Vision Fund 2. CEO Kuldeep Singh Rajput said the company will use the proceeds to accelerate expansion, advance therapeutics pipelines, develop care pathways, and drive integration with health system, hospital, pharmaceutical, and research clients.
