Russia, Tor, and Maybe Sybil Are a Thing?
December 14, 2021
Dictatorships are in vogue, at least in some parts of the world. One interesting response to the Onion Router Technology has been to look up that well known person Sybil. That individual makes it possible to participate in onion routing. Then Sybil’s admirers can process assorted Internet metadata and time stamps in order to learn some interesting things. One of those interesting things is explained in “Russia Ratchets Up Internet Control by Blocking Tor.” Russia learned that it does not want the Onion Router within the land of vodka, bears, and forgotten gulags. Makes sense, doesn’t it?
The write up says:
GlobalCheck, a group that monitors websites’ accessibility in Russia, confirmed that blocking had begun.
Is it possible to block Tor?
Probably not 100 percent. But the steps, including the enabling legislation, suggest that getting caught might have consequences. Believe it or not, there is a person who gets some support from the Russian government to locate burial grounds associated with gulags.
Perhaps that individual will get the opportunity to have some new explorations to undertake?
Stephen E Arnold, December 14, 2021
Monopolies Know Best: The Amazon Method Involves a Better Status Page
December 13, 2021
Here’s the fix for the Amazon AWS outage: An updated status page. “Amazon Web Services Explains Outage and Will Make It Easier to Track Future Ones” reports:
A major Amazon Web Services outage on Tuesday started after network devices got overloaded, the company said on Friday [December 10, 2021] . Amazon ran into issues updating the public and taking support inquiries, and now will revamp those systems.
Several questions arise:
- How are those two pizza technical methods working out?
- What about automatic regional load balancing and redundancy?
- What is up with replicating the mainframe single point of failure in a cloudy world?
Neither the write up nor Amazon have answers. I have a thought, however. Monopolies see efficiency arising from:
- Streamlining by shifting human intermediated work to smart software which sort of works until it does not.
- Talking about technical prowess via marketing centric content and letting the engineering sort of muddle along until it eventually, if ever, catches up to the Mad Ave prose, PowerPoints, and rah rah speeches at bespoke conferences
- Cutting costs where one can; for example, robust network devices and infrastructure.
The AT&T approach is a goner, but it seems to be back, just in the form of Baby Bell thinking applied to an online bookstore which dabbles in national security systems and methods, selling third party products with mysterious origins, and promoting audio books to those who have cancelled the service due to endless email promotions.
Yep, outstanding, just from Wall Street’s point of view. From my vantage point, another sign of deep seated issues. What outfit is up next? Google, Microsoft, or some back office provider of which most humans have never heard?
The new and improved approach to an AT&T type business is just juicy with wonderfulness. Two pizzas. Yummy.
Stephen E Arnold, December 13, 2021
Will The Google PR Carpet Bombing about AI Deliver Victory?
December 13, 2021
The short answer is, “Yes.” The mass market and niche content marketing is the obvious part of the program. There are some less obvious characteristics which warrant some attention. Run a query for Snorkel. What does one get? Here’s my result page on December 9, 2021:
The pictures are for scuba snorkels. But the first hit is not an advertisement, at least one that an entity compensated the Google to publish. The number one with a bullet is the Snorkel AI company. There you go. That’s either great performance from the circa 1998 algorithm, spectacular SEO, or something of interest to some entity at the Google.
What happens if I run a query for “AI”? Here’s what I saw on December 9, 2021
Amazon bought an ad and linked to its free AI solutions. The number one hit is:
The Google.
So what? Nudging, great SEO, some engineer’s manicured hand on the steering wheel?
I do know that most people have zero idea about smart software. What’s my source for this glittering generality? Navigate to “Survey Suggests 84% of Americans Are Illiterate about AI — So Here’s a Quiz to Test Your Own AI IQ.”
Those nudges, the PR, and the search results may amount to something; for example, framing, reformation, and dissemination of what the Google magical “algorithms” find most relevant. Google wants to win the battle for its approach to really good training data for machine learning. Really wants to win.
Stephen E Arnold, December 13, 2021
Siren 12 Security Platform Relies on Elasticsearch
December 13, 2021
Here is an example of Elastic being stretched a different way. The Intelligence Community News announces, “Siren Releases Siren 12.” The new version of Siren’s security search and analysis platform relies heavily on Elasticsearch—it incorporates Elastic Platinum subscriptions and will support Elasticsearch v8 (still in alpha). Siren 12 consolidates investigative tools for law enforcement, intelligence, and cyber security organizations. Writer Loren Blinde specifies:
“Siren’s latest release makes it easier for users to organize and join data in a way that suits their requirements, with intuitive UI driven schema editing and ETL. It allows organizations to forensically analyze device data and link it to other available data sources. Siren 12 enables investigators to not only browse existing information, but also to create new records and edit graphs freely, for the first time merging the ‘analysis’, the ‘data entry’ and ‘hypothesis and presentation’ phases in investigation in a single intuitive interface. Lastly Siren doubles down on Investigative AI capabilities by introducing Siren Vision, a deep learning based toolkit for automatic image annotation and classification, integrating with Elastic’s anomaly and outlier detection in a way that is consistent with Siren Investigative use cases.”
We note the emphasis on AI; it seems the security field is not letting concerns over algorithmic bias slow it down. Siren execs call this version a huge step forward and hopes it will position their platform as the go-to global reference investigative intelligence platform. Founded in 2014, the company is based in Galway, Ireland.
Cynthia Murrell December 13, 2021
Rising Cyber Crimes Mean High Prevention Costs
December 13, 2021
The COVID-19 pandemic forced organizations to institute remote work. Many organizations were not prepared, because they lacked secure networks and other necessary security measures to prevent cyber crimes. It is not surprising when Read Write explains in “Lessons Learned From The Skyrocketing Cost Of Cyber Crime” are loss of revenue, obvious preventable issues, and that cyber security and cyber crimes are burgeoning industries.
The pandemic spurred a rise in cyber crime, especially in ransomware, phishing, malware, island hopping, and hyper-targeted nation state attacks. (Does spreading of misinformation count as a cyber crime?). Cloud computing company Iomart recorded that data breaches rose by 273% in the first quarter of 2020 compared to 2019. Cyber crime cost the US an estimated $3.5 billion and the UK $1.8 billion, but it could be more as many crimes are unnoticed.
The cost of cyber crimes are projected to rise exponentially and cause more economic damage than natural disasters. It is important that organizations take preventative measures:
“With all the realistic threats that lurk in the digital space, it’s imperative for companies to deploy best practices in cybersecurity to protect their data and other digital assets. Plus, companies need to do everything they can to avoid the burdensome financial costs associated with cybercrime. While we can’t always prevent cyber attacks, we can learn from them and apply tangible steps to protect ourselves and our businesses.”
Good cyber security practices include implementing and enforcing identification, robust encryption policies, strong data hygiene, patch management programs, using blockchain and crypto currency solutions, and use traditional measures like firewalls, antivirus software, and anti-spyware.
Whitney Grace, December 13, 2021
Thoughts about AI Bias: Are Data Non-Objective?
December 10, 2021
I read “Breaking Bias — Ensuring Fairness in Artificial Intelligence.” The substance of the write up is an interview with Alix Melchy, VP of AI at Jumio. Okay.
I did note a couple of interesting statements in the interview.
First, Mr. Melchy takes aim at Snorkel-type systems and methods. These are efficient and do away with most of the expensive human intensive training data set work. Here’s his statement:
… fairness bias …enters into AI systems through training data that contains skewed human decisions or represents historical or social prejudices.
Data sets which are not woke are, its seems, going to be biased.
Second, Mr. Melchy says:
bias can be damaging to the credibility of AI as a whole,
Does the AI methods manifested by big tech care? Nope, not as long as the money flows into the appropriate bank account in my opinion.
Third, Mr. Melchy notes:
… companies that don’t build an AI system with bias considerations from the start are never going to catch up to an industry-standard level of accuracy.
Okay, Google. Alexa, are you listening?
Stephen E Arnold, December 10, 2021
What Google Knows about the Honest You
December 10, 2021
I read this quote in a Kleenex story about Google’s lists of popular searches:
“You’re never as honest as you are with your search engine. You get a sense of what people genuinely care about and genuinely want to know — and not just how they’re presenting themselves to the rest of the world.”
The alleged Googler crafting this statement is a data editor. You can read more about the highly selective and unverified Google search trends in “What Google’s Trending Searches Say about America in 2021.”
For me, the statement allows several observations:
- A person acting in an unguarded way reveals information not usually disseminated in “guarded” settings; for example, a job interview
- The word “honest” implies an unvarnished look at the psycho-social factors within a single person
- A collection of data points about the psycho-social aspects of a single person makes it possible to tag, classify, and relate that individual to others. Numerical procedures allow a person or system with access to those data to predict certain behaviors, predispositions, or actions.
Thus, the collection of searches, clicks, and items created by an individual using Google services such as Gmail and YouTube create a palette of color from which a data maestro can paint a picture.
Predestination has never been easier, more automatable, or cheaper to convert into an actionable knowledgebase for smart software. Yep, just simple queries. Useful indeed.
Stephen E Arnold, December 10, 2021
Amazon Allegedly Deceives: Another Side of the Online Bookstore
December 10, 2021
I think Jeff Bezos, the designer of the Bezos bulldozer and its other market moving equipment, has some interest in the Washington Post. Maybe I am wrong. Will and editorial Zoom call be convened to discuss “Amazon’s Search Results Are Full of Ads Unlawfully Deceiving Consumers, New Complaint to the FTC Claims.” The story could have been given a bit more zing. (Not surprisingly, one will have to pony up some hard cash to read this Bezos related story in the Bezos associated source. What? You want something free from the Bezos centric products?) As it is, it reports:
More than a quarter of search results on Amazon are paid ads.
Yep, selling digital ad inventory is a heck of a lot easier than keeping the AWS warehouse and product fulfillment system online. And those employees? Wow. Just use scripts and smart software to plug in ads for stuff people want to buy. How does Amazon know what sells? I assume it is one of those black electronic control units found in modern vehicles and possibly the Bezos bulldozer line of market shapers.
The write up points out:
Ad sales are one of Amazon’s fastest-growing businesses, and the complaint alleges the lack of disclosures around these practices runs afoul of consumer protection law. The company delays labels indicating a search result is sponsored for several seconds after a page loads, the group claims, a practice that “deliberately obfuscat[es]” ads. The coalition’s researchers determined the company was “substantially or entirely out of compliance” with all of the federal guidelines to ensure ads can easily be distinguished from organic search results.
Like the newspapers grousing about Facebook and Google and those estimable firms’ approach to advertising, perhaps Amazon’s executives have been studying these companies’ methods. And why not? The write up says:
The research firm eMarketer estimates that Amazon’s digital ad business will hit $24.47 billion this year, up 55.5 percent from 2020, and will capture 11.6 percent of the digital ad market.
With Facebook facing headwinds and the Google getting into healing, Amazon may sense an opportunity to grows its ad market share.
Is this desire good or bad? For stakeholders, Amazon’s push into ads is good news. For those who are horrified that the online bookstore continues to diversify its revenue streams, Amazon is a dangerous driver of a Bezos branded piece of heavy equipment.
Now about that editorial meeting?
Stephen E Arnold, December 10, 2021
SEO Tips and Tricks Persist
December 10, 2021
SEO pros are working hard to keep the field relevant, despite the reality that buying Google ads is becoming the only productive solution. Search Engine Journal airily proscribes “5 Essential Enterprise SEO Trends to Watch in 2022.” Oddly, purchasing Google ads is not among the recommendations. Writer Lemuel Park explains:
“In 2022, [enterprise SEO strategy] will involve:
* Improving cross-channel and broader departmental collaboration.
* Advancing workflow and reporting processes and systems.
* Utilizing data and insights in real-time.
* Embracing and working with AI technology and automation.
Challenges in enterprise SEO can vary from organization to organization. However, the commonality is found in areas such as executive buy-in, internal collaboration, and wider digital integration (showcasing impact). With last year’s challenge comes next year’s opportunity – and with that in mind, let’s dig into the 5 key areas of focus to consider as you plan your enterprise SEO strategy for the year ahead.”
Here are the five suggestions: keep pace with search updates/ algorithms and best practices; take advantage of automation; squeeze insights from data; align SEO and Pay Per Click teams; and integrate SEO into all departments. Curious readers can see the write-up for details on each consideration. Some of these, especially the last point, seem like a lot of work. It would be much easier to give in to the Googlers’ machinations. Google Search is their platform, after all; it is no surprise when they tilt it toward their own pockets.
Cynthia Murrell December 10, 2021
Google and Its Big AI PR Campaign
December 9, 2021
I spotted “DeepMind Says Its New Language Model Can Beat Others 25 Times Its Size.” In my opinion, this is part of the Google play to sail forward with its alleged better, faster, cheaper method of training machine learning models. Most people won’t care or know what’s underway. That’s okay because “information” is now channeled through specific conduits. As long as an answer is good enough or the payoff is big enough for the gatekeepers, the engineering is doing its job.
The write up is happily unaware of this push to use 60 percent or “good enough” accuracy to create the foundation for downstream training set generation. But, oh, boy, is that relaxed supervision great for matching ads. Good enough burns down inventory and it allows machine learning models to be trained on content domains quickly and without the friction imposed by mother hen subject matter experts, rigorous analysis and tuning, and retraining using human intermediated data sets.
Plus, skew, drift, and biases are smoothed out or made to go away. Well, that’s the theory.
The jazzy name Retro is not old school. It is new school. The lessons users will learn will take a long time to understand and appreciate its nuances.
This is a big business play and its accompanying PR campaign is working. Just ask Dr. Timnit Gebru, that is the former Google employee who raised the specter of bias, wonky outputs, and the potential for nudging users down the Googley path.
For another example of Google’s AI PR push, navigate to “DeepMind’s New 280 Billion-Parameter Language Model Kicks GPT-3’s Butt in Accuracy.” Wow, just like quantum supremacy.
Stephen E Arnold, December 9, 2021
-
- Subscribe to Beyond Search
Feature archive
News archive
-
