JEDI: A Way Out of the Legal Quagmire
May 14, 2020
DarkCyber noted “Bulging Deficits May Threaten Prized Pentagon Arms Projects.” The write up states:
The government’s $3 trillion effort to rescue the economy from the coronavirus crisis is stirring worry at the Pentagon. Bulging federal deficits may force a reversal of years of big defense spending gains and threaten prized projects like the rebuilding of the nation’s arsenal of nuclear weapons.
The cash crunch may be somewhat less problematic than the news report implies. JEDI, the multi-billion JEDI project, has spawned expensive litigation and interesting publicity for the Administration.
The budget crunch sets the stage for a simple, clean resolution: There’s no money to move forward.
Who wins?
Since a reset will create another round of bids, that’s difficult to say.
A reset becomes an option without besmirching the reputations of those involved.
The bean counters did it again.
Stephen E Arnold, May 14, 2020
Google: Responding to the Bezos Bulldozer Just Slowly
May 14, 2020
Bulldozers have a top speed of what 10 kilometers per hour, maybe less if grinding through abandoned retail store fronts? As part of the DarkCyber research for our Amazon blockchain report, we put in our files “Amazon considers Entering Insurtech Market.” The date of this write up was 2017. The bulldozer has been making progress. AWS seems to be making progress. Amazon’s outstanding online marketing and documentation provides a semi-clear picture of what the Bezos bulldozer has accomplished. See, for example, Insurance.
We found the “truth” centric Thomson Reuters’ story “Insurer Brit and Google Cloud to Launch First Digital Lloyd’s Syndicate” intriguing. We learned:
Insurance company Brit and Google Cloud are together launching the first digital Lloyd’s of London syndicate, accessible from anywhere and at any time.
Thomson Reuters’ perceives that insurers are “in a race to team up with tech giants such as Google.”
Several questions:
- Did the Amazon insurance push fizzle and Thomson Reuters miss the two year old story?
- Did Google overlook the Amazon announcements which began flowing in 2017? For instance, “Amazon Is Coming for the Insurance Industry – Should We Be Worried?”
- Will regulators pay more attention to the financial services push from US technology giants?
DarkCyber cannot answer these questions. However, it would be helpful if a time context for Google’s activities were provided. The information makes clear how quickly or slowly Google responds to the slow moving Bezos bulldozer which is chugging along in some interesting financial markets. Are those camels watching the bulldozer moving forward? Nah, the bulldozer is probably delivering groceries.
Stephen E Arnold, May 14, 2020
Anonymized Location Data: an Oxymoron?
May 13, 2020
Location data. To many the term sounds innocuous, boring really. Perhaps that is why society has allowed apps to collect and sell it with no significant regulation. An engaging (and well-illustrated) piece from Norway’s NRK News, “Revealed by Mobile,” shares the minute details journalists were able to put together about one citizen from location data purchased on the open market. Graciously, this man allowed the findings to published as a cautionary tale. We suggest you read the article for yourself to absorb the chilling reality. (The link we share above runs through Google Translate.)
Vendors of location data would have us believe the information is completely anonymized and cannot be tied to the individuals who generated it. It is only good for general uses like statistics and regional marketing, they assert. Intending to put that claim to the test, NRK purchased a batch of Norwegian location data from the British firm Tamoco. Their investigation shows anonymization is an empty promise. Though the data is stripped of directly identifying information, buyers are a few Internet searches away from correlating location patterns with individuals. Journalists Trude Furuly, Henrik Lied, and Martin Gundersen tell us:
“All modern mobile phones have a GPS receiver, which with the help of satellite can track the exact position of the phone with only a few meters distance. The position data NRK acquired consisted of a table with four hundred million map coordinates from mobiles in Norway. …
“All the coordinates were linked to a date, time, and specific mobile. Thus, the coordinates showed exactly where a mobile or tablet had been at a particular time. NRK coordinated the mobile positions with a map of Norway. Each position was marked on the map as an orange dot. If a mobile was in a location repeatedly and for a long time, the points formed larger clusters. Would it be possible for us to find the identity of a mobile owner by seeing where the phone had been, in combination with some simple web searches? We selected a random mobile from the dataset.
“NRK searched the address where the mobile had left many points about the nights. The search revealed that a man and a woman lived in the house. Then we searched their Facebook profiles. There were several pictures of the two smiling together. It seemed like they were boyfriend and girlfriend. The man’s Facebook profile stated that he worked in a logistics company. When we searched the company in question, we discovered that it was in the same place as the person used to drive in the morning. Thus, we had managed to trace the person who owned the cell phone, even though the data according to Tamoco should have been anonymized.”
The journalists went on to put together a detailed record of that man’s movements over several months. It turns out they knew more about his trip to the zoo, for example, than he recalled himself. When they revealed their findings to their subject, he was shocked and immediately began deleting non-essential apps from his phone. Read the article; you may find yourself doing the same.
Cynthia Murrell, May 12, 2020
YouTube and Objective Search Results
May 13, 2020
DarkCyber, working from a run down miner’s camp in rural Kentucky, does not understand the outside world. One of the DarkCyber research team who actually graduated from middle school spotted this article: “YouTube CEO Admits Users Don’t Like Boosting Of “Authoritative” Mainstream Channels, But They Do It Anyway.”
The article appears to present information implicating the most popular video service in Eastern Europe, including and the “stans” in some surprising activities.
The article asserts:
YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki admits that the company knows its users don’t like the video giant rigging its own algorithm to boost “authoritative” mainstream sources, but that they do it anyway.
The article notes:
For several years now, the company has artificially gamed its own search engine to ensure that independent content creators are buried underneath a wall of mainstream media content. This rigging is so severe that the company basically broke its own search engine, with some videos posted by independent creators almost impossible to find even if the user searches for the exact title.
One fascinating connection between the providers of content from Van Wives is:
the company’s disdain for its own user base was also underscored by its Chief Product Officer Neil Mohan insulting non-mainstream YouTube creators as basement-dwelling idiots. This followed a new policy by the company to remove any content that challenged the World Health Organization’s official coronavirus guidelines, despite the fact that those guidelines have changed numerous times.
Here in Kentucky, the world is shaped by individuals walking along empty roads and mostly unused trails in the hills.
When big city information like this reaches the DarkCyber research team, our first instinct is to search Google and YouTube, maybe Google News or the comprehensive Google Scholar indexes. But this write up suggests that the information displayed may be subjective, the team is confused.
The team believes that what appears in the Google search results is accurate.
Sometimes we don’t believe the state’s environmental officer who has recently decided to wear shoes. The information in the hollow is that yellow green water is safe to drink.
Does this person obtain information as we do? A Google search? Are those Google algorithms the digital equivalent of the local grocer who puts his grimy thumb on the scale when weighing kiwano and feijoa? Our grocer tells us that durian smells great too.
Stephen E Arnold, May 13, 2020
Zooming: Uber Lets Off Some Passengers
May 13, 2020
DarkCyber does not know if this story is spot on, but it is interesting. The estimable UK tabloid the Daily Mail (yes, the one with the videos one cannot turn off without five or six clicks) published “Today will be Your Last Working Day with Uber.” Other firms allegedly have used Zoom videoconferencing to inform the surplus humanoids that they can find their future elsewhere. (DarkCyber loves that phrase “Find your future elsewhere, don’t you, gentle reader?)
According to the estimable news service:
At least 3,500 Uber employees learned that they were being laid off in a three minute Zoom call last week.
The online version of the story includes the allegedly “real” video of an Uber person (still employed at the time) bid farewell to the Übermenschen.
The person nuking these individuals has a fascinating title; to wit:
Head of Uber’s customer service at Uber’s Phoenix Center of Excellence.
Zoom is in the news, but in this instance, it is not the insights of the video conferencing firm’s security advisor. The use of Zoom by a go go Silicon Valley firm makes the headline. DarkCyber wants to add that the Daily Mail’s headline is very Googley.
Stephen E Arnold, May 13, 2020
The Bezos Bulldozer Heads to Academia
May 13, 2020
Oxford University and AWS have teamed up for cloud based research.
Does this strike anyone else as an interesting and perhaps improbable combination? On its News and Events page, Oxford University announces, “Oxford University and Amazon Web Services Create a Test-Bed for Cloud-Based Research.” The post reveals:
“Today the University of Oxford is delighted to announce a new strategic collaboration with Amazon Web Services (AWS). The collaboration will focus on building a portfolio of new research projects relating to AI, robotics, cyber-physical systems, human-centered computing, and support to the University’s new ‘Lighthouse’ Doctoral Scholarships. This new university- industry collaboration, supported by a £7 million [about $8.7 million] gift from AWS to the Mathematical, Physical and Life Sciences Division, will accelerate advances in AI and Data Science across the entire research portfolio of the University. Professor Patrick Grant, Pro-Vice-Chancellor (Research) University of Oxford, said: ‘Cloud computing is an essential part of modern research. A streamlined operating model for using cloud services will benefit all of our researchers. The Oxford Robotics Institute, the Cyber Physical Systems Group, and the Human Centered Computing group are leading the initial projects in the short term, but I look forward to growing the collaboration to bring research benefits across our research work more broadly.’”
For its part, AWS is happy to demonstrate how its products can help academia. That is, after all, one more sector it can add to its collection of those becoming dependent on its platform. The press release quotes members of each Oxford department involved: the Applied AI Lab, the Robotics Institute, Human-Centered Computing, and the Cyber Physical Systems group. See the post for each of those perspectives. I am particularly curious about the Human-Centered Computing professor’s vision for an Institute of Responsible Technology, but details are not provided.
As for that Lighthouse Doctoral Scholarship program, it will fund 25 PhD students for the years 2020-2022 “who are applying to the Centre for Doctoral Training in Autonomous Intelligent Machines and Systems, or to the research laboratories of the supervisors in the human-machine collaboration initiative.” This will help the university toward its existing goal of adding 300 graduate scholarships between 2018 and 2023.
Between the funding, the scholarships, and the technology, both AWS and Oxford have high hopes for an advanced, multi-national, “cloud-first” research initiative.
Like IBM, tie ups with big name universities may payoff in useful ways: Recruitment, research, virtue signaling, etc.
Too bad for the University of Washington maybe?
Cynthia Murrell, May 12, 2020
Xooglers on the Move: Schmidt As a Thought Leader
May 13, 2020
We spotted this transcript of Eric Schmidt’s interview on Face the Nation. You can read the text in “Transcript: Eric Schmidt on “Face the Nation.” (May 10, 2020)
DarkCyber noted some interesting observations. The Schmidt statement is quoted and the DarkCyber team comment is in italics. Of course, you need to navigate to the CBS Web site, bask in the social media links, and pay close attention to the ads for other CBS “real news” offerings.
First:
We’re gonna have to reimagine how the workplace works. Observation: DarkCyber believes that only the top one percent of people will have jobs. Others will become gig workers. Why? Cost reduction and the inability of some firms to manage their employees. Who wants more Damores?
Second:
… Let’s figure out a way for people who don’t otherwise have access to computers through libraries or whatever, find a way for them to get access. Observation: Libraries! Yes. But has Google’s and other tech giants actions been a boon to libraries?
Third:
The public sector has lagged for whatever set of reasons. Observation: Most government agencies outsource software and support and have for decades. Why haven’t tech companies delivered better, faster, cheaper, easier to use solutions. The DarkCyber thinks that the tech companies exacerbate the problem in order to pull in government money.
Be sure the read the full transcript. It makes one message clear: Mr. Schmidt wants to be a thought leader first, a Xoogler second. And Google Go is the programming language of the future too. Perhaps Peter Thiel will be next week’s guest on Face the Nation?
Stephen E Arnold, May 13, 2020
Apple Channels Amazon
May 13, 2020
DarkCyber noted this Digital Reader article: “Apple Launched a Publishing Portal for Book Authors – And You Don’t Need a Mac to Use It!” The article reports:
Apple still doesn’t care if you want to read an ebook you buy from them on non-Apple hardware, but they have finally launched a publishing portal that anyone can access using a web browser.
The question is, “Why?”
Many years ago, DarkCyber prepared a report for a large and now mostly forgotten electronic database company. The point of the report was that self published books and monographs were likely to increase, dwarfing the hard copy new titles. The curves in the PowerPoint looked like Covid19 cases in New York City.
At that time, the electronic publishing company thought books were not interesting. For years, Apple was happy with putting actual and would be authors on the Apple bus.
Now Apple has changed its corporate mind. Why?
DarkCyber opines that:
- Amazon is likely to slam the door on epublishing and use one of those allegedly unpickable electronic locks which talk to Alexa. That’s bad, so Apple is changing its policy.
- Apple wants more money and content. Although the take off was frightening, Apple’s non rich media content offerings are gaining altitude. Books are a useful passenger. Revenue is revenue.
- Apple is just pulling a Silicon Valley me too. The benefit is that Apple wants to be in the book game. As the hip Silicon Valley person would say, “Books because.”
Whatever the reason, authors have a new channel. What about regular book publishing companies? Yeah, because. Like the online outfit that ignored books, there will be less attractive consequences of not embracing electronic publishing and book-like artifacts.
Stephen E Arnold, May 13, 2020
AWS Kendra: A Somewhat Elastic Approach to Enterprise Search
May 12, 2020
Elastic, Shay Banon’s Version 2 of Compass, has a hurdle to jump over. Elasticsearch has been a success. The Lucene-centric “system” which some call ELK has become a go-to solution for many developers. Like Lucidworks (It does?) and many other “enterprise search and more” vendors, Elasticsearch delivers information retrieval without the handcuffs of options like good old STAIRS III or Autonomy’s neuro-linguistic black box.
Amazon took notice and has effectively rolled out its own version of enterprise search based on … wait for it … the open source version of Elastic’s Elasticsearch. The service has been around since Amazon hired some of the Lucidworks (It does?) engineers more than five years ago after frustration with the revolving doors at that firm became too much even by Silicon Valley standards. Talk about tension. Yebo!
Amazon has reinvented Elasticsearch. The same process the Bezos bulldozer has used for other open source software has been in process for more than 60 months. Like the system’s Playboy bunny namesake, Kendra has a few beauty lines in her AWS exterior.
A tweak here (access to Amazon’s smart software) and a tweak there (Amazon AWS pricing methods), and the “new” product is ready for prime time, ready for a beauty contest against other contestants in the most beautiful IR system in the digital world.
“Amazon Launches Cognitive Search Service Kendra in General Availability” reports:
Once configured through the AWS Console, Kendra leverages connectors to unify and index previously disparate sources of information (from file systems, websites, SharePoint, OneDrive, Salesforce, ServiceNow, Amazon Simple Storage Service, relational databases, and elsewhere).
Does this sound like federated search or the Palantir Gotham approach to content?
Well, yes.
The reason is that most enterprise search vendors like Coveo, Attivio, X1, IBM Omnifind (also built on Lucene), and dozens of other systems make the same claims.
The reality is that these systems do not have the bits and pieces available within a giant cloud platform with quite a few graduates of an Amazon AWS training program ready to plug in the AWS solution. For example, if a government agency wants the search in Palantir, no problem. Palantir deploys on AWS. But if that government agency wants to use Amazon’s policeware services and include search, there’s Kendra.
You can get a free copy of the DarkCyber Amazon policeware report’s executive summary by requesting the document at this link.
What does Amazon bring to the enterprise search party?
The company has more than 200 services, features, component, and modules on the shelf. Because enterprise search is not a “one size fits all”, the basic utility function has to fit into specific enterprise roles. For most enterprise search vendors, this need for user function customization is a deal breaker. Legal doesn’t want the same search that those clear minded home economics grads require in the marketing department. Microsoft SharePoint offers its version of “enterprise search” but paints over the cost of the Microsoft Certified professionals who have to make the search system work Fast. (Yep, that’s sort of an inside search joke.)
Amazon AWS provides the engine and the Fancy Dan components can be plugged in using the methods taught in the AWS “learn how to have a job for real” at a company your mom uses to shop during the pandemic. Amazon and Microsoft are on a collision course for the enterprise, and the Kendra thing is an important component.
The official roll out is capturing headlines, but the inclusion of Lucene-based search invites several observations:
- Despite AWS’ pricing, an Amazon enterprise search system allows the modern information technology professional to get a good enough service with arguably fewer headaches than other options except maybe the SearchBlox solution
- Enterprise search becomes what it has been for most organizations: A utility. Basic information retrieval is now an AWS component and that component can be enhanced with SageMaker, analytics, and other AWS services.
- Amazon wins even if Kendra does not win the hearts and minds of IBM Omnifind, Inbenta, and Algolia users. Why? Most of the cloud based enterprise search vendors support the AWS platform. What are the choices? The wonky HP cloud? The “maybe we will kill it” Google Cloud? Azure, from the outfit that cannot update Windows 10 without killing user computers who activate game mode? Plus, dumping Kendra for another TV star inspired search system is easy. Chances are that, like Palantir, AWS hosts and supports that competitive system too.
Net net: The fight with Microsoft is escalating. The Bezos bulldozer will run over open source outfits and probably some AWS customers. But Kendra’s turning her gaze on the bountiful revenues of Microsoft in the enterprise. Will Amazon buy a vendor of Word, PowerPoint, and Excel clones?
Exciting times, maybe not just because of enterprise search? Why did those defectors from Lucidworks (It does?) embrace Lucene and not SOLR? Maybe they did that too?
Stephen E Arnold, May 12, 2020
Zoom: The Google Response Includes Me Too and a Multi Warhead Strategy
May 12, 2020
Zoom became an overnight sensation. Now Google and Microsoft are waking up to the buzz the company is generating. Where there is buzz, there is money to be made.
Google is notable for having numerous products and services. It has a reputation of abandoning projects when Googlers lose their enthusiasm for a product or service that will not advance their career.
“Google Meet vs Google Hangouts vs Google Duo: What’s the Difference?” asks a good question. The article does make clear that Google offers three services. Presumably Zoom will find itself surrounded and either sell out or just be squashed by the increased competitive pressure.
According to the Verge (a publication which combines wit with Harvard Business Review advice), “Google unifies all of its messaging and communication apps into a single team.” The new Zoom killing initiative will be guided by Javier Soltero, the person who developed the mobile email app Acompli. Soltero worked at Microsoft and is credited as making Outlook what it is today. (What happened to Messrs. Bhatia and Smith, the creators of Hotmail who had some influence on the fine Outlook system?)
From our redoubt in rural Kentucky, does Google need three services to deal with Zoom? Zoom is not a newcomer. The company was set up in 2011. In that period of time, Google had its own array of video meeting services, chat apps, and messaging services. Frankly, I cannot differentiate among Google’s offerings. Maybe sometime in the future enlightenment will arrive.
In terms of financial commitments, will Google consolidate its messaging products and services in order to reduce costs? Will Google innovate so that children of Google engineers will abandon their use of Zoom? Will Google gain organic traction in the video meeting space? Will Google stick with video meetings or abandon them as it did the Toronto smart city play? Will a user know to use Chrome to make group calls in Google Duo? (Even the question can make one’s head spin.)
These are questions which are difficult to answer. Google’s sudden focus on video meetings supports three observations:
- Google failed to develop a video meeting service with the organic popularity of Zoom
- Google’s response is a classic knee jerk reaction
- Google needed to hire a person to try and bring order to the Google entropy generating approach to product and service innovation.
Should Zoom be worried? Yes.
Will Microsoft step up its efforts to deal with Zoom and put speed bumps in front of Google’s information highway? Will Amazon become more active in video services?
Yes.
What’s this mean for Zoom? DarkCyber thinks that life for Zoom will become more challenging.
What’s this mean for Google? Whatever the company does, the actions may fan the flames of regulatory probes into the company’s practices.
Microsoft will thrash, and probably execute another Skype play? Skype, you remember, the dropped ball.
And Amazon? The Bezos bulldozer will grind into the space crushing those not agile enough to climb aboard or avoid getting mashed into the dirt.
And Zoom? I will think fondly of the company, its inept customer support, its icon litter, and its zero privacy approach to video services.
Google’s and Microsoft’s approach to innovation and competition are at least semi-amusing. Zoom, however, may not get much of a chuckle out of the stepped up competitive pressure.
Stephen E Arnold, May 12, 2020
-
- Subscribe to Beyond Search
Feature archive
News archive
-
