Communications of the ACM
An edited collection of advanced computing news from Communications of the ACM, ACM TechNews, other ACM resources, and news sites around the Web.
From ACM News
The nderwater Internet
In 1962, during a period of technological and political transition in the undersea-cable industry, the Keawaula cable station was built on Oahu’s west shore for...
From ACM Opinion
Hacking the Brain
The perfectibility of the human mind is a theme that has captured our imagination for centuries—the notion that, with the right tools, the right approach, the right...
From ACM News
Blueprint For a Better Human Body
When Elizabeth Wright smacks her right leg on a table, she says "ow."
From ACM News
Long-Range Iris Scanning Is Here
An officer pulls someone over on the side of the highway.
From ACM News
The Internet Mapmakers Helping Nepal
The night after the earthquake hit Nepal, people feared to sleep in their homes, worrying about powerful aftershocks toppling the few buildings left standing.
From ACM News
.s. Supreme Court: Gps Trackers Are a Form of Search and Seizure
If the government puts a GPS tracker on you, your car, or any of your personal effects, it counts as a search—and is therefore protected by the Fourth Amendment...
From ACM Careers
Watching the Universe in Real Time
Even though the sky looks about the same every night to those of us here on Earth, cataclysmic things happen in outer space constantly.
From ACM News
The Attention Machine
Human attention isn't stable, ever, and it costs us: lives lost when drivers space out, billions of dollars wasted on inefficient work, and mental disorders that...
From ACM Careers
The App Economy Is Now 'bigger Than Hollywood'
What is the major cultural force in America right now? It might just be apps and the web.
From ACM News
The Quiet Rise of the Satellite Spy Agency
As far as intelligence agencies go, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency has remained relatively low profile—attracting neither the intrigue of, say, the...
From ACM Careers
How Two Men nlocked Modern Encryption
In September of 1974, when he was 30 years old, Whitfield Diffie was obsessed with cryptography.
From ACM Careers
Vexed in the City: Starved For Tech Talent and Yet Nobody to Hire?
Darin Wedel made headlines in 2012 when his wife, Jennifer, asked President Barack Obama during a Google+ Hangout why her husband was still out of work while H-1B...
From ACM Opinion
How to Invent a Person Online
On April 8, 2013, I received an envelope in the mail from a nonexistent return address in Toledo, Ohio.
From ACM Careers
A Rare Look Inside the Air Force's Drone Training Classroom
Learning how to drop bombs and fire Hellfire missiles is more like sitting in a regular college classroom than you might expect.
From ACM News
Skip the Humans: Drug Discovery By Simulating Cells
The future of medicine, we're often told, will be personalized.
From ACM News
The Military Is Building Brain Chips to Treat Ptsd
How well can you predict your next mood swing?
From ACM Opinion
How Darpa's Augmented Reality Software Works
Six years ago, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) decided that they had a new dream. The agency wanted a system that would overlay digital tactical...
From ACM Opinion