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
In Attack on Vatican Web Site, a Glimpse of Hackers' Tactics
The elusive hacker movement known as Anonymous has carried out Internet attacks on well-known organizations like Sony and PBS. In August, the group went after its...
From ACM News
How Companies Learn Your Secrets
Andrew Pole had just started working as a statistician for Target in 2002, when two colleagues from the marketing department stopped by his desk to ask an odd question...
From ACM News
Flaw Found in an Online Encryption Method
A team of European and American mathematicians and cryptographers have discovered an unexpected weakness in the encryption system widely used worldwide for online...
From ACM News
Traveling Light in a Time of Digital Thievery
When Kenneth G. Lieberthal, a China expert at the Brookings Institution, travels to that country, he follows a routine that seems straight from a spy film.
From ACM News
For $2 a Star, an Online Retailer Gets 5-Star Product Reviews
In the brutal world of online commerce, where a competing product is just a click away, retailers need all the juice they can get to close a sale.
From ACM News
Build p Your Phone's Defenses Against Hackers
Chuck Bokath would be terrifying if he were not such a nice guy. A jovial senior engineer at the Georgia Tech Research Institute in Atlanta, Mr. Bokath can hack...
From ACM News
Pursuing Iphone Thief, Officer Knew Right Buttons to Push
As crime-solving tools go, it may not have the same pedigree as, say, the oversize magnifying glass.
From ACM News
When Self-Driving Cars and the Real World Collide
Even as Google tests its small fleet of self-driving vehicles on California highways, legal scholars and government officials are warning that society has only...
From ACM News
Sign Says What? Park at Your Peril
Writing is a craft whose basic purpose is to transmit meaning, but there are certain writers who seem to have different goals in mind: patent lawyers, many poets...
From ACM News
Digitizing Health Records, Before It Was Cool
The push to move the nation from paper to electronic health records is serious business. That's why a first look at the campus of Epic Systems comes as something...
From ACM News
How .s. Lost Out on Iphone Work
When Barack Obama joined Silicon Valley's top luminaries for dinner in California last February, each guest was asked to come with a question for the president.
From ACM News
Google Adds Posts From Its Social Network to Search Results
Google's popularity was built on its ability to help people find just the right Web pages. Then came the social Web, led by Facebook, where people go to see vast...
From ACM News
Teachers Resist High-Tech Push in Idaho Schools
Ann Rosenbaum, a former military police officer in the Marines, does not shrink from a fight, having even survived a close encounter with a car bomb in Iraq.
From ACM News
Apropos Appropriation
One recent afternoon in the offices of the Midtown law firm run by David Boies and his powerful litigation partners, a large black clamshell box sat on a conference...
From ACM News
Digital Data on Patients Raises Risk of Breaches
One afternoon last spring, Micky Tripathi received a panicked call from an employee. Someone had broken into his car and stolen his briefcase and company laptop...
From ACM News
A New Secret Weapon For Electronics Shoppers
There was a time not so long ago that buying a car was one of the worst shopping experiences. As you drove off the dealer's lot, you couldn't escape the feeling...
From ACM News
Drone Crash in Iran Reveals Secret .s. Surveillance Effort
The stealth C.I.A. drone that crashed deep inside Iranian territory last week was part of a stepped-up surveillance program that has frequently sent the United...
From ACM News
Software That Listens For Lies
She looks as innocuous as Miss Marple, Agatha Christie’s famous detective.
From ACM News
Dna Sequencing Caught in Deluge of Data
BGI, based in China, is the world’s largest genomics research institute, with 167 DNA sequencers producing the equivalent of 2,000 human genomes a day.
From ACM News