Communications of the ACM
The Russians Will Be Back. Will We Be Ready?
In recent days, our nation's response to the continued threat of foreign meddling in American elections has taken something of…
From ACM Opinion
Spreading Fake News Becomes Standard Practice for Governments Across the World
Campaigns to manipulate public opinion through false or misleading social media postings have become standard political practice across much of the world, with...
From ACM Opinion
Why Haven't Reporters Mass-Adopted Secure Tools for Communicating With Sources?
In the months since Donald Trump took office, Washington has been leaking like a sieve.
From ACM Opinion
Students are Better Off without a Laptop in the Classroom
As recent high school graduates prepare for their migration to college in the fall, one item is sure to top most students' shopping wish lists: a laptop computer...
From ACM Opinion
Teddy Roosevelt Wouldn't Understand the E.U.'s Antitrust Fine Against Google
Back in 1980, Milton Friedman, the University of Chicago economist, starred in a public-television series called "Free to Choose," in which he presented his free...
From ACM Opinion
For Google, Everything Is a Popularity Contest
When I saw that Google had introduced a "Classic Papers" section of Google Scholar, its search tool for academic journals, I couldn't help but stroke my chin professorially...
From ACM Opinion
The IPhone's Turning 10. What Will It Look Like at 20?
You wake up refreshed. Ever since you got that alarm clock that adapts to your sleep cycle, your calendar, and the traffic report, you practically leap out of bed...
From ACM Opinion
Why Net Neutrality Matters Even in the Age of Oligopoly
Next month, Amazon, Netflix, and dozens of other companies and organizations will host a "day of action" aimed at saving net neutrality as we know it.
From ACM Opinion
Building Privacy Right Into Software Code
When I was 15, my parents did not allow me to use AOL Instant Messenger. All of my friends used it, so I had to find a way around this rule.
From ACM Opinion
The Next iPhone Could Have a Lot in Common with Google Glass
A new report from UBS Securities analyst Steven Milunovich offers some interesting possibilities of how Apple may use augmented reality on its next iPhone.
From ACM Opinion
Before the Internet
Before the Internet, you would just sit in an armchair with a book open on your lap, staring into space or staring at a decorative broom on the wall—kind of shifting...
From ACM Opinion
The iPhone Is 10 Years Old. Here's the Story of Its Birth.
Before anybody outside Apple was aware of it, the project that would become the iPhone was referred to internally by the code name Purple.
From ACM Opinion
Minitel, the Open Network Before the Internet
In 1991, most Americans had not yet heard of the internet.
From ACM Opinion
Humans Can't Expect AI to Just Fight Fake News for Them
Here's some news that's not fake: Not everything you can read on the internet is true.
From ACM Opinion
Privacy in the Cellphone Age
Odds are you need to use that phone in your pocket many times a day—and doing so leaves you no choice but to constantly relay data revealing your location and movements...
From ACM Opinion
Why Apple Is Struggling to Become an Artificial-Intelligence Powerhouse
In 2011, Apple became the first company to place artificial intelligence in the pockets of millions of consumers when it launched the voice assistant Siri on the...
From ACM Opinion
How to Call B.S. on Big Data: A Practical Guide
"Nothing that you will learn in the course of your studies will be of the slightest possible use to you," the Oxford philosophy professor John Alexander Smith told...
From ACM Opinion
7 in 10 Smartphone Apps Share Your Data with Third-Party Services
Our mobile phones can reveal a lot about ourselves: where we live and work; who our family, friends and acquaintances are; how (and even what) we communicate with...
From ACM Opinion
Here's How Trump's FCC Affects You
President Trump rarely spoke about the Federal Communications Commission during his campaign or after entering the White House.
From ACM Opinion
The VR Future Is Here but No One Can Agree on a Name for It
At the VR keynote at Google's IO developer conference, a slide appeared on screen to start the morning's presentation. Clay Bavor, head of AR and VR for Google,...
From ACM Opinion