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 TechNews
Silicon Valley Takes a (Careful) Step Toward Autonomous Flying
Several Silicon Valley startups are developing technology that can be applied to small helicopters and other passenger aircraft to allow for autonomous flight. ...
From ACM News
NASA's New Horizons Spacecraft Takes First Picture of Distant Rock It Will Visit
NASA's New Horizons spacecraft still has 100 million miles to go, but it has taken its first snapshot of the space rock that will be its date for New Year's Day...
From ACM News
'Weaponized Ad Technology': Facebook's Moneymaker Gets a Critical Eye
Facebook has made a mint by enabling advertisers to identify and reach the very people most likely to react to their messages.
From ACM Careers
As Cars Collect More Data, Companies Try to Move It All Faster
Cars need to get faster—not on the road, but on the inside.
From ACM News
Settling Arguments About Hydrogen With 168 Giant Lasers
With gentle pulses from gigantic lasers, scientists at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California transformed hydrogen into droplets of shiny liquid metal...
From ACM News
Banks and Retailers Are Tracking How You Type, Swipe and Tap
When you're browsing a website and the mouse cursor disappears, it might be a computer glitch—or it might be a deliberate test to find out who you are.
From ACM News
The Flourishing Business of Fake YouTube Views
Martin Vassilev makes a good living selling fake views on YouTube videos. Working from home in Ottawa, he has sold about 15 million views so far this year, putting...
From ACM News
A Generation Grows p in China Without Google, Facebook or Twitter
Wei Dilong, 18, who lives in the southern Chinese city of Liuzhou, likes basketball, hip-hop music and Hollywood superhero movies. He plans to study chemistry in...
From ACM News
Google, Seeking a Return to China, Is Said to Be Building a Censored Search Engine
Google withdrew from China eight years ago to protest the country's censorship and online hacking.
From ACM News
Facebook Identifies an Active Political Influence Campaign sing Fake Accounts
Facebook said on Tuesday that it had identified a political influence campaign that was potentially built to disrupt the midterm elections, with the company ...
From ACM News
How Robot Hands Are Evolving to Do What Ours Can
A robotic hand? Four autonomous fingers and a thumb that can do anything your own flesh and blood can do? That is still the stuff of fantasy.
From ACM News
Wild About Tech, China Even Loves Robot Waiters That Can't Serve
The mind-reading headsets won't read minds.
From ACM Opinion
Looking Through the Eyes of China's Surveillance State
They perch on poles and glare from streetlamps. Some hang barely visible in the ceiling of the subway, and others seem to stretch out on braced necks and peer into...
From ACM News
How Rare Earths (What?) Could Be Crucial in a .S.-China Trade War
Amanda Lacaze grabbed her iPhone and rattled off the names of the special minerals needed to make it.
From ACM News
Tracing Ghost Particles Back to a Distant Black Hole
It was the smallest bullet you could possibly imagine, a subatomic particle weighing barely more than a thought, and a cosmic blunderbuss, a supermassive black...
From ACM News
Facebook's Push for Facial Recognition Prompts Privacy Alarms
When Facebook rolled out facial recognition tools in the European Union this year, it promoted the technology as a way to help people safeguard their online identities...
From ACM News
Inside China's Dystopian Dreams: A.I., Shame and Lots of Cameras
In the Chinese city of Zhengzhou, a police officer wearing facial recognition glasses spotted a heroin smuggler at a train station.
From ACM Careers
Silicon Valley's Giants Take Their Talent Hunt to Cambridge
When you step off the train here and walk into the city square outside the railway station, you will not see the spires of King's College Chapel or the turrets...
From ACM News
It's Time for a Chemistry Lesson. Put on Your Virtual Reality Goggles.
There was a time when biochemists had a lot in common with sculptors.
From ACM News