April 2019 - nexa - server-nexa.polito.it

Aral Balkan: Le aziende tecnologiche minacciano l'esistenza umana
by Giacomo Tesio April 25, 2019

April 25, 2019

Analisi interessante di Aral Balkan. Dei vari passaggi degni di nota qui ne trascrivo qualcuno. L'ultimo in particolare esprime bene un'intuizione di cui abbiamo discusso di recente in lista ed è un mio leit motif da tempo (anche se Aral si limita ai dati personali, mentre io ne faccio un discorso più generale). L'informazione (e i dati che la rappresentano) non è e non può essere un prodotto o un bene. E' parte dell'individuo, della persona che l'ha generata, sia essa una canzone, un software o un click su un link. E come parte di un essere umano, non può essere oggetto di proprietà. https://invidio.us/watch?v=xy9gNOnoR8M The problem with technology is who own and controls it so if we as individuals own and control our own technology and the data that gather with that and the insight that it gives us about our lives there is no problem here. That's a system who is compatible with democracy and it's compatible with human righrs. The problem is that there are technologies that are controlled by a handful corporations and that gives them a huge amount of power and insights over us. And that's is not compatible with democracy. [...] What does it mean when corporations know everything about you and you don't know anything about them. [...] We need solutions where we don't rely on benevolent kings. [...] We can do that differently, we can build peer-to-peer systems where we own the data, we own the technology, we own the algorithms. And that changes completely the power structures, that's a more egalitarian power structure. [...] A Peerocracy is a social system that at its heart has individuals, has people whose integrity are intact. We have this in the biological sense, we protect the integrity of the self of the person, of our biological body. We have human rights that protect that (or it should). What we don't have is the same thing in the digital and networked worlds, in the digital and networked age. That's all "Peerocracy" means. It's having that basic structure, the person, safeguarded [...] When we talk about personhood in the digital network age, we are not talking about something that exists just within your biological body but also on your phone to some extent [...] So personhood have to transcend the boundaries of your biological body so that we can protect it within human rights law.

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Facebook takes down far-right groups days before Spanish election | World news | The Guardian
by Alberto Cammozzo April 25, 2019

April 25, 2019

A conferma che serve una parte terza a monitorare i SN con elezioni in corso... <https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/apr/25/facebook-takes-down-far-right…> Facebook has taken down several networks that were spreading far-right content to nearly 1.7 million people in Spain, days before national elections that are expected to see a surge in support for the far-right Vox party. The networks were uncovered in an investigation by the campaign group Avaaz, and taken down only after it presented Facebook with its findings. The discovery of a large network, spreading politically sensitive content unmonitored days before a key European election, is likely to add to concerns about social media firms’ willingness and ability to control hate speech and criminal activity on their sites. On Wednesday British MPs condemned Facebook, Google and Twitter for their refusal to report users to the police when they remove criminal posts, except in rare cases when there is an immediate threat to life or limb. Quick guide Spain general election Avaaz found that the networks in Spain were spreading fake news, including a doctored photo of a political opponent giving a Hitler salute, and misogynist, Islamophobic and homophobic messages. They were also coordinating the publication of identical posts apparently designed to look like spontaneous messages. However, unlike its decision earlier this month to ban British far-right groups in a crackdown on hate organisations, Facebook said it had not taken down the Spanish pages because of their content, or for “coordinated inauthentic behaviour” – the network’s sanitised term for manufacturing and spreading fake news. Instead, Facebook said they were targeted for breaking network rules. “We have removed a number of fake and duplicate accounts that were violating our authenticity policies, as well as one page for name change violations,” a Facebook spokesperson said. “We aren’t removing accounts or pages for coordinated inauthentic behaviour. “As in other cases, we removed these accounts based on their behaviour, not the content they posted. Some additional pages were also disabled because they were administered solely by fake accounts.” The largest network – Unidad Nacional Española (UNE) – had more than 1.2 million followers, and others reached hundreds of thousands more. Together they had more than 7 million interactions, at a time of intense political activity and focus on the political rise of the upstart far-right party Vox. [...]

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25 aprile digitale
by don Luca Peyron April 25, 2019

April 25, 2019

Rivendicazioni sindacali in salsa digitale... davvero interessante sotto molti profili. dl https://torino.corriere.it/cronaca/19_aprile_25/non-lasciano-mancia-rider-m… www.universitari.to.it via XX settembre 83, Torino tel. 011 5156239

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Facebook just hired the co-author of the Patriot Act.
by J.C. DE MARTIN April 25, 2019

April 25, 2019

https://slate.com/technology/2019/04/facebook-new-general-counsel-patriot-a… (Sent from my wireless device; please excuse brevity and typos (if any))

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Nuovi diritti lavoratori gig economy
by Mauro Alovisio April 25, 2019

April 25, 2019

Gent.me/mi segnalo news di interesse: http://www.ansa.it/europa/notizie/rubriche/altrenews/2019/04/16/parlamento-… Un caro saluto Mauro Alovisio

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Britain lets Huawei into part of its 5G networks - Cyber-security
by J.C. DE MARTIN April 25, 2019

April 25, 2019

https://www.economist.com/britain/2019/04/24/britain-lets-huawei-into-part-… (Sent from my wireless device; please excuse brevity and typos (if any))

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Put the internet back under your control with the FreedomBox
by Giacomo Tesio April 24, 2019

April 24, 2019

https://www.zdnet.com/article/put-the-internet-back-under-your-control-with… In an interview, Moglen told me this: "Concentration of technology is a surprising outcome of cheap hardware and free software. We could have had a world of peers. Instead, the net we built is the net we didn't want. We're in an age of surveillance with centralized control. We're in a world, which encourages swiping, clicking, and flame throwing." With FreedomBox, "We can undo this. We can make it possible for ordinary people to provide internet services. You can have your own private messaging, services without a man in the middle watching your every move." We can, in short, rebuild the internet so that we, and not multi-billion dollar companies, are in charge. I like this plan.

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Paper: "New Frontiers of Philanthro-capitalism: Digital Technologies and Humanitarianism"
by J.C. DE MARTIN April 24, 2019

April 24, 2019

*New Frontiers of Philanthro‐capitalism: Digital Technologies and Humanitarianism* Ryan Burns First published: 15 April 2019 https://doi.org/10.1111/anti.12534 Abstract Digital technologies that allow large numbers of laypeople to contribute to humanitarian action facilitate the deepening adoption and adaptation of private‐sector logics and rationalities in humanitarianism. This is increasingly taking place through philanthro‐capitalism, a process in which philanthropy and humanitarianism are made central to business models. Key to this transformation is the way private businesses find supporting “digital humanitarian” organisations such as Standby Task Force to be amenable to their capital accumulation imperatives. Private‐sector institutions channel feelings of closeness to aid recipients that digital humanitarian technologies enable, in order to legitimise their claims to “help” the recipients. This has ultimately led to humanitarian and state institutions re‐articulating capitalist logics in ways that reflect the new digital humanitarian avenues of entry. In this article, I characterise this process by drawing out three capitalist logics that humanitarian and state institutions re‐articulate in the context of digital humanitarianism, in an emergent form of philanthro‐capitalism. Specifically, I argue that branding, efficiency, and bottom lines take altered forms in this context, in part being de‐politicised as a necessary condition for their adoption. This de‐politicisation involves normalising these logics by framing social and political problems as technical in nature and thus both beyond critique and amenable to digital humanitarian “solutions”. I take this line of argumentation to then re‐politicise each of these logics and the capitalist relations that they entail.

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"Who needs democracy when you have data?" (del 2018)
by J.C. DE MARTIN April 24, 2019

April 24, 2019

*Who needs democracy when you have data?** * /Here’s how China rules using data, AI, and internet surveillance.// / by Christina Larson Aug 20, 2018 In 1955, science fiction writer Isaac Asimov published a short story about an experiment in “electronic democracy,” in which a single citizen, selected to represent an entire population, responded to questions generated by a computer named Multivac. The machine took this data and calculated the results of an election that therefore never needed to happen. Asimov’s story was set in Bloomington, Indiana, but today an approximation of Multivac is being built in China. For any authoritarian regime, “there is a basic problem for the center of figuring out what’s going on at lower levels and across society,” says Deborah Seligsohn, a political scientist and China expert at Villanova University in Philadelphia. How do you effectively govern a country that’s home to one in five people on the planet, with an increasingly complex economy and society, if you don’t allow public debate, civil activism, and electoral feedback? How do you gather enough information to actually make decisions? And how does a government that doesn’t invite its citizens to participate still engender trust and bend public behavior without putting police on every doorstep? Hu Jintao, China’s leader from 2002 to 2012, had attempted to solve these problems by permitting a modest democratic thaw, allowing avenues for grievances to reach the ruling class. His successor, Xi Jinping, has reversed that trend. Instead, his strategy for understanding and responding to what is going on in a nation of 1.4 billion relies on a combination of surveillance, AI, and big data to monitor people’s lives and behavior in minute detail. [...] continua qui: https://www.technologyreview.com/s/611815/who-needs-democracy-when-you-have…

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"What Would More Democratic A.I. Look Like?"
by J.C. DE MARTIN April 24, 2019

April 24, 2019

What Would More Democratic A.I. Look Like? /A new movement is pushing for A.I.’s future to be in the hands of the people/ Andrew Burgess <https://medium.com/@ajburgess> Something curious is happening in Finland. Though much of the global debate around artificial intelligence (A.I.) has become concerned with unaccountable, proprietary systems that could control our lives, the Finnish government has instead decided to embrace the opportunity by rolling out a nationwide educational campaign. Conceived in 2017, shortly after Finland’s A.I. strategy <http://julkaisut.valtioneuvosto.fi/bitstream/handle/10024/160391/TEMrap_47_…> was announced, the government wants to rebuild the country’s economy around the high-end opportunities of artificial intelligence, and has launched a national program <https://www.politico.eu/article/finland-one-percent-ai-artificial-intellige…> to train 1 percent of the population — that’s 55,000 people — in the basics of A.I. “We’ll never have so much money that we will be the leader of artificial intelligence,” said economic minister Mika Lintilä at the launch. “But how we use it — that’s something different.” Artificial intelligence can have many positive applications, from being trained to identify cancerous cells in biopsy screenings, predict weather patterns that can help farmers increase their crop yields, and improve traffic efficiency. But some believe that A.I. expertise is currently too concentrated in the hands of just a few companies with opaque business models, meaning resources are being diverted away <https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2019-01-07/tech-giants-gorging-o…> from projects that could be more socially, rather than commercially, beneficial. Finland’s approach of making A.I. accessible and understandable to its citizens is part of a broader movement of people who want to democratize the technology, putting utility and opportunity ahead of profit. [...] continua qui: https://medium.com/s/story/what-would-more-democratic-a-i-look-like-ea729f5…

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10% of Americans don’t use the internet. Who are they?
by Giacomo Tesio April 24, 2019

April 24, 2019

https://www.pewresearch.org/fact-tank/2019/04/22/some-americans-dont-use-th… For instance, seniors are much more likely than younger adults to say they never go online. Although the share of non-internet users ages 65 and older has decreased by 7 percentage points since 2018, 27% still do not use the internet, compared with fewer than 10% of adults under the age of 65. Household income and education are also indicators of a person’s likelihood to be offline. Roughly three-in-ten adults with less than a high school education (29%) do not use the internet in 2019, compared with 35% in 2018. But that share falls as the level of educational attainment increases. Adults from households earning less than $30,000 a year are far more likely than the most affluent adults to not use the internet (18% vs. 2%). ____ Analisi interessante. Da affiancare a https://www.educationnews.org/technology/silicon-valley-tech-execs-sending-… Giacomo

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The Spurious Justifications for Eliminating Price Caps on .org and Other Legacy Domains
by Giacomo Tesio April 24, 2019

April 24, 2019

https://www.circleid.com/posts/20190423_spurious_justifications_for_elimina… ICANN is about to do serious damage to its reputation by making a precipitous, ill-considered leap into the unknown should it follow through on removing price constraints on several legacy extensions, most notably .org. Doing so would expose a global community of non-profits to the risk of quickly-escalating exploitative pricing. The rationale for eliminating price caps relies on three points, all of which are incorrect — 1) that the registries for the legacy gTLDs should be treated the same as the new gTLD registries, that is as owners entitled to capture the entire value of the name spaces, 2) that price competition will restrain prices, and 3) that it is not ICANN's role to set and to regulate prices.

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After the Bust, Are Bitcoins More Like Tulip Mania or the Internet?
by Giacomo Tesio April 24, 2019

April 24, 2019

Scusate, aggiungo in oggetto il titolo dell'articolo. Giacomo On 24/04/2019, Giacomo Tesio <giacomo(a)tesio.it> wrote: > Articolo interessante: sebbene cerchi diplomaticamente di non prendere > posizione sottolinea alcune delle criticità più evidenti dei software > basati sulla blockchain senza portare un singolo argomento a favore > della tecnologia. > Anche se non tratta gli enormi problemi teorici e tecnici, è più serio > di tanti altri. > > > https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/23/technology/bitcoin-tulip-mania-internet.… > > When you talk to tech industry insiders about where Bitcoin is > heading, two vastly different comparisons are inevitable: the tulip > bulb and the internet. > > Bitcoin’s critics say the digital tokens are like the tulip bulbs of > 17th-century Holland. They generated a wild, speculative rush that > quickly disappeared, leaving behind nothing but pretty flowers and > wrecked bank accounts. > > Bitcoin believers, on the other hand, want us to think about > cryptocurrencies as if they were the internet: a broad technology > category that took some time to reach its potential, even though > expectations got ahead of reality in the early years. If that’s true, > last year’s crash in Bitcoin prices was like the dot-com bust; a > temporary setback before the big ideas come to fruition. [...] > > Speculative transactions accounted for roughly 60 to 80 percent of all > transactions on the blockchain, according to Chainalysis, a start-up > that does analysis of the blockchain for big companies and > governments. Most of those transactions are Bitcoins moving between > cryptocurrency exchanges around the world. [...] > > Many if not most Bitcoin advocates I’ve encountered will admit it > doesn’t offer much of an improvement over traditional electronic > methods of payment. In several ways, it’s worse. Paying with Bitcoin > requires you to become a speculator on its volatile price for the time > you are holding on to tokens and waiting to pay. [...] > > The bigger problem facing Bitcoin is that the practical and legal uses > have struggled to outpace illegal or clearly unethical activity. > > The list of ways that Bitcoin has proved useful to criminals keeps > growing, from the ransom payments on locked-up computer files — or > even hostages — to illegal drug sales. [...] > > Many venture capitalists have made bets on Ethereum and EOS, > alternative cryptocurrency networks that can be programmed for more > sophisticated applications, like financial contracts, than Bitcoin’s > software allows. [...] > > But a majority of these Dapps still focus on legal gray zones, like > gambling. The most prominent use of Ethereum so far has been by > companies, many of them scams and frauds, that wanted to raise money > without complying with securities regulations, through so-called > initial coin offerings. > > I have seen little indication that any of the more legitimate uses > have worked easily enough to have any appeal beyond cryptocurrency > fanatics. [...] > > The latest big cryptocurrency player is Facebook, which is said to be > working on its own digital tokens. So are several other big messaging > companies. >

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(no subject)
by Giacomo Tesio April 24, 2019

April 24, 2019

Articolo interessante: sebbene cerchi diplomaticamente di non prendere posizione sottolinea alcune delle criticità più evidenti dei software basati sulla blockchain senza portare un singolo argomento a favore della tecnologia. Anche se non tratta gli enormi problemi teorici e tecnici, è più serio di tanti altri. https://www.nytimes.com/2019/04/23/technology/bitcoin-tulip-mania-internet.… When you talk to tech industry insiders about where Bitcoin is heading, two vastly different comparisons are inevitable: the tulip bulb and the internet. Bitcoin’s critics say the digital tokens are like the tulip bulbs of 17th-century Holland. They generated a wild, speculative rush that quickly disappeared, leaving behind nothing but pretty flowers and wrecked bank accounts. Bitcoin believers, on the other hand, want us to think about cryptocurrencies as if they were the internet: a broad technology category that took some time to reach its potential, even though expectations got ahead of reality in the early years. If that’s true, last year’s crash in Bitcoin prices was like the dot-com bust; a temporary setback before the big ideas come to fruition. [...] Speculative transactions accounted for roughly 60 to 80 percent of all transactions on the blockchain, according to Chainalysis, a start-up that does analysis of the blockchain for big companies and governments. Most of those transactions are Bitcoins moving between cryptocurrency exchanges around the world. [...] Many if not most Bitcoin advocates I’ve encountered will admit it doesn’t offer much of an improvement over traditional electronic methods of payment. In several ways, it’s worse. Paying with Bitcoin requires you to become a speculator on its volatile price for the time you are holding on to tokens and waiting to pay. [...] The bigger problem facing Bitcoin is that the practical and legal uses have struggled to outpace illegal or clearly unethical activity. The list of ways that Bitcoin has proved useful to criminals keeps growing, from the ransom payments on locked-up computer files — or even hostages — to illegal drug sales. [...] Many venture capitalists have made bets on Ethereum and EOS, alternative cryptocurrency networks that can be programmed for more sophisticated applications, like financial contracts, than Bitcoin’s software allows. [...] But a majority of these Dapps still focus on legal gray zones, like gambling. The most prominent use of Ethereum so far has been by companies, many of them scams and frauds, that wanted to raise money without complying with securities regulations, through so-called initial coin offerings. I have seen little indication that any of the more legitimate uses have worked easily enough to have any appeal beyond cryptocurrency fanatics. [...] The latest big cryptocurrency player is Facebook, which is said to be working on its own digital tokens. So are several other big messaging companies.

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How to hide from the AI surveillance state with a color printout - MIT Technology Review
by Antonio Vetro' April 24, 2019

April 24, 2019

https://www.technologyreview.com/f/613409/how-to-hide-from-the-ai-surveilla… av

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Why the huge growth in AI spells a big opportunity for transdisciplinary researchers
by Antonio Vetro' April 24, 2019

April 24, 2019

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-019-01251-1 "[…] current events around digital technology, along with debates about biased algorithms and ethical and regulatory challenges of autonomous systems, underscore the fact that AI is more than a technology of the future. It is impacting today’s sociopolitical climate. More importantly, current events and debates highlight the fact that AI management is more of a social and political issue than an engineering challenge. " Tendenzialmente mi trovo d’accordo con l’autore, pur senza sminuire le sfide tecnologiche. antonio v.

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«Google e Amazon? Vi spiego come l’Antitrust Ue regola i big di internet» - Corriere.it
by J.C. DE MARTIN April 24, 2019

April 24, 2019

https://www.corriere.it/economia/aziende/19_aprile_19/google-amazoncosi-tut… (Sent from my wireless device; please excuse brevity and typos (if any))

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Apple CEO says Europe is leading U.S. with tech regulation
by J.C. DE MARTIN April 23, 2019

April 23, 2019

https://www.cnbc.com/2019/04/23/apple-ceo-says-europe-is-leading-us-with-te… (Sent from my wireless device; please excuse brevity and typos (if any))

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New Frontiers of Philanthro‐capitalism: Digital Technologies and Humanitarianism - Burns - - Antipode - Wiley Online Library
by J.C. DE MARTIN April 23, 2019

April 23, 2019

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1111/anti.12534 (Sent from my wireless device; please excuse brevity and typos (if any))

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Is cyberwarfare war? Insurers balk at paying for some cyberattacks
by Alberto Cammozzo April 23, 2019

April 23, 2019

Interessante e ampia estensione al cyberwarfare della clausola di esclusione per conflitto armato nei contratti assicurativi. Immagino che possa ulteriormente complicare lo scenario IoT e dei sistemi di guida autonoma: l'assicurazione si defila se l'auto/aereo/drone a guida autonoma o il tostapane/lavatrice/friggitrice IoT causa vittime o danni per effetto di un attacco informatico riconosciuto come "bellico"... A questo punto chi paga? Il produttore dell'oggetto, il proprietario dello stesso (ammesso che non sia parte dannegiata) o nessuno? <https://thebulletin.org/2019/04/is-cyberwarfare-war-insurers-balk-at-paying…> [...] And US businesses may no longer be able to rely on insurance to cover their losses. In an era of unceasing cyberattacks, including cases of state-sponsored hacking, insurance companies are beginning to re-interpret an old line in their contracts known as the “war exclusion.” Stripping away the metaphorical connotation of the term “cyberwarfare,” big insurers like Zurich Insurance have decided that state-sponsored attacks are basically just plain warfare. This shift comes as the US government is increasingly attributing state-sponsored cyberattacks to their alleged perpetrators, a development that some argue is a means of holding bad actors accountable. But the policy certainly doesn’t seem to be doing any favors to the private sector. The New York Times fleshed out the insurance companies’ new legal strategy in a recent article about the woes of Modelez International, the maker of Oreo cookies and other mainstays of the snack food industry. Based in the Chicago suburbs, Mondelez was among the hundreds of companies hit in the so-called “NotPetya” attack of 2017. The Times reported that Mondelez expected its more than $100 million in losses to be covered by its Zurich insurance policy. But Zurich swatted back Mondelez’s claim, citing an exclusion for “hostile or warlike action in time of peace or war … by any government or sovereign power,” according to the complaint Mondelez filed in court last fall, which Crain’s Chicago Business obtained. In February 2018, the White House attributed the NotPetya attack to the Russian military, calling it the “most destructive and costly cyberattack in history.” By blaming the Russians, the government gave Zurich an opening, but not necessarily an airtight argument: “Zurich’s invocation of a ‘hostile or warlike action’ exclusion to deny coverage for malicious ‘cyber’ incidents was … unprecedented,” Mondelez’s complaint asserted. “The purported application of this type of exclusion to anything other than conventional armed conflict or hostilities was unprecedented.” “We still don’t have a clear idea of what cyberwar actually looks like,” cyber risk adviser Jake Olcott told the Times. “That is one of the struggles in this case. No one has said this was an all-out cyberwar by Russia.” [...]

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Deep Learning And The Limits Of Learning By Correlation Rather Than Causation
by J.C. DE MARTIN April 23, 2019

April 23, 2019

https://www.forbes.com/sites/kalevleetaru/2019/04/18/deep-learning-and-the-… (Sent from my wireless device; please excuse brevity and typos (if any))

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Apple Face-Recognition Blamed by New York Teen for False Arrest - Bloomberg
by Alberto Cammozzo April 23, 2019

April 23, 2019

Se casi come questi si moltiplicheranno, implementare riconoscimento facciale inaffidabile può cominciare a costare parecchio più di quanto rende. <https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-04-22/apple-face-recognition-b…> A New York student sued Apple Inc. for $1 billion, claiming the company’s facial-recognition software falsely linked him to a series of thefts from Apple stores. Ousmane Bah, 18, said he was arrested at his home in New York in November and charged with stealing from an Apple store. The arrest warrant included a photo that didn’t resemble Bah, he said in a lawsuit filed Monday. One of the thefts he was charged with, in Boston, took place on the day in June he was attending his senior prom in Manhattan, he said. Bah said he had previously lost a non-photo learner’s permit, which may have been found or stolen by the real thief and used as identification in Apple stores. As a result, Bah claimed, his name may have been mistakenly connected to the thief’s face in Apple’s facial-recognition system, which he said the company uses in its stores to track people suspected of theft. "He was forced to respond to multiple false allegations which led to severe stress and hardship,” Bah said in the complaint. Apple and Security Industry Specialists Inc., a security firm that’s also named as a defendant, declined to comment on the suit. The case is Bah v. Apple Inc., 19-cv-03539, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York (Manhattan).

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You're thinking about smart cities in completely the wrong way | WIRED UK
by J.C. DE MARTIN April 23, 2019

April 23, 2019

You're thinking about smart cities in completely the wrong way Technology gives us an opportunity to make cities more open, inclusive and democratic. But only if it's used in the right way, says Barcelona's chief technology officer, Francesca Bria By FRANCESCA BRIA 17 Apr 2019 https://www.wired.co.uk/article/reboot-britain-francesca-bria (Sent from my wireless device; please excuse brevity and typos (if any))

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How the Boeing 737 Max Disaster Looks to a Software Developer
by Alberto Cammozzo April 22, 2019

April 22, 2019

Come accade che 346 persone muoiano di software. <https://spectrum.ieee.org/aerospace/aviation/how-the-boeing-737-max-disaste…> [...] It is astounding that no one who wrote the MCAS software for the 737 Max seems even to have raised the possibility of using multiple inputs, including the opposite angle-of-attack sensor, in the computer’s determination of an impending stall. As a lifetime member of the software development fraternity, I don’t know what toxic combination of inexperience, hubris, or lack of cultural understanding led to this mistake. But I do know that it’s indicative of a much deeper problem. The people who wrote the code for the original MCAS system were obviously terribly far out of their league and did not know it. How can they can implement a software fix, much less give us any comfort that the rest of the flight management software is reliable? So Boeing produced a dynamically unstable airframe, the 737 Max. That is big strike No. 1. Boeing then tried to mask the 737’s dynamic instability with a software system. Big strike No. 2. Finally, the software relied on systems known for their propensity to fail (angle-of-attack indicators) and did not appear to include even rudimentary provisions to cross-check the outputs of the angle-of-attack sensor against other sensors, or even the other angle-of-attack sensor. Big strike No. 3. None of the above should have passed muster. None of the above should have passed the “OK” pencil of the most junior engineering staff, much less a DER. That’s not a big strike. That’s a political, social, economic, and technical sin. [...] It is likely that MCAS, originally added in the spirit of increasing safety, has now killed more people than it could have ever saved. It doesn’t need to be “fixed” with more complexity, more software. It needs to be removed altogether.

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The global race for 5G supremacy is not yet won
by J.C. DE MARTIN April 22, 2019

April 22, 2019

https://www.ft.com/content/339c74d8-61ff-11e9-b285-3acd5d43599e (Sent from my wireless device; please excuse brevity and typos (if any))

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