Cham : Springer International Publishing : Imprint: Springer, 2018.

Cham, Switzerland : Springer, 2018

Non-railway websites or apps do not immediately update changes in train timetables, say officials

A police spokesperson said that Babar is using Kashmiris as couriers for raising and passing on funds to different groups to carry out terrorist acts in the valley

She was addressing the graduating students of IIIT-H at its 23rd convocation here on Saturday

An educational website that answers queries on sexual health and sexuality anonymously

The communication from the Information and Broadcasting Ministry said there is a view that a small group exercises editorial control on its pages

CERT-In, part of MeitY, has issued a warning for high-risk vulnerabilities in multiple Apple products including iPhones, iPads, Macs Apple Watch and Safari 

The proposed changes to SEBI's definition of UPSI are aimed at increasing regulatory clarity and consistency

The top hydroelectric power news for May 2014

Collection of articles related to hydropower technology

The former president was also critical of the Justice Department directing prosecutors to drop their case against Michael Flynn, warning that the “rule of law is at risk.”

These country notes contain indicators which compare the political and institutional frameworks of national governments as well as revenues and expenditures, employment, and compensation. They include a description of government policies on integrity, e-government and open government.

As part of continuing efforts to boost transparency by multinational enterprises (MNEs), Gabon, Hungary, Indonesia, Lithuania, Malta, Mauritius and the Russian Federation have now signed the Multilateral Competent Authority Agreement for Country-by-Country Reporting (CbC MCAA), bringing the total number of signatories to 57. Lithuania and Hungary joined the Agreement in October and December 2016 respectively.

These country notes contain indicators which compare the political and institutional frameworks of national governments as well as revenues and expenditures, employment, and compensation. They include a description of government policies on integrity, e-government and open government.

This report provides an overview of existing data and statistics in the fields of information security, privacy and the protection of children online. It highlights the potential for the development of better indicators in these respective fields showing in particular that there is an underexploited wealth of empirical data that, if mined and made comparable, will enrich the current evidence base for policy making.

The Global Forum on Transparency and Exchange of Information for Tax Purposes has released peer review reports assessing the tax systems of 13 jurisdictions for information exchange.

These country notes contain indicators which compare the political and institutional frameworks of national governments as well as revenues and expenditures, employment, and compensation. They include a description of government policies on integrity, e-government and open government.

This report provides a brief review of how national government policies and guidelines apply to or regulate the use of environmental labelling and information schemes (ELIS) in selected OECD countries. The report reviews definitions relevant to environmental claims and identifies four types of potentially false or misleading environmental claims.

This report explores potential effects of the recent rapid growth in Environmental Labelling Information Schemes (ELIS) around the world, with a focus on the implications of ELIS multiplication for environmental effectiveness and international trade.

These country notes contain indicators which compare the political and institutional frameworks of national governments as well as revenues and expenditures, employment, and compensation. They include a description of government policies on integrity, e-government and open government.

Agreeing on skill needs is fundamental to develop a coherent response to skills imbalances. This can only be achieved if information is disseminated to all stakeholders in a pro-active way. For this, in turn, there is the need for the developers of skills anticipation exercises to engage their audience more effectively

Vast amounts are lost to illicit financial flows, including tax evasion, money laundering, bribery and corruption. These crimes threaten the strategic, political and economic interests of both developed and developing countries. In a world of limited resources and increasing complexity, it is essential for government authorities to work closely together in a “whole of government” approach to best address these challenges.

This Biosafety document aims to serve as an aid to risk assessors and regulators; providing guidance on handling the aspects of an environmental safety assessment, accessing and using information in situations of low-level presence (LLP) of transgenic plants in seed and grain commodities.

The OECD eChemPortal, a web portal which offers comprehensive information on chemical substances, has been updated to offer better access to chemical classifications according to the Globally Harmonized System of Classification and Labelling of Chemicals (GHS).

German database Information system für gefährliche Stoffe IGS is now linked to eChemPortal. The IGS provides public access to a variety of information on chemical and microbiological substances mostly in German. The focus is on regulatory information reflecting German and European, as well as Swiss, US and selected other legislation and assessments. Beside this, information on substance data and emergency procedures is available.

The OECD releases a video tutorial on how to find GHS information in eChemPortal through the substance search and how to search by GHS classification. Currently 11 databases provide GHS information, independent of whether the classifications have undergone a review by a regulatory body or intergovernmental organisation or are based on self-classifications by the producers or importers.

This report outlines the customisation opportunities for IUCLID version 6. It also gives an overview of what IUCLID offers to regulatory bodies and industry as a key application to record, store, maintain and exchange data on chemicals. IUCLID is used in a variety of countries and regulatory contexts, therefore the report describes to which extent it is customisable to facilitate the management of chemical data across these contexts.

Mark Zuckerberg held a phone press conference from the comfort of his home to announce Facebook's 'Coronavirus Information Center' that will provide authoritative information to users.

The disconnect between civil society and government has led to successive generations of policy and implementation failures. The India Together editorial.

The key to understanding information and communication technologies is that their potential for development does not lie in their electronic wizardry, but rather in the information that is communicated by their use, and the subsequent informed actions of citizens. Ashwin Mahesh on the much-touted ICTs.

Conceived as an anti-poverty effort, the Navodayam project in Andhra Pradesh has grown with government support into a full-fledged media entity taking up coverage of serious local issues. Its members see themselves playing a vital role, and making a difference to the lives of lakhs of women in their districts. Shoma Chatterji reports.

Archives, Room Use Only - PN4864.B56 1994

The information gained by making a measurement, termed the Kullback–Leibler divergence, assesses how much more precisely the true quantity is known after the measurement was made (the posterior probability distribution) than before (the prior probability distribution). It provides an upper bound for the contribution that an observation can make to the total likelihood score in likelihood-based crystallographic algorithms. This makes information gain a natural criterion for deciding which data can legitimately be omitted from likelihood calculations. Many existing methods use an approximation for the effects of measurement error that breaks down for very weak and poorly measured data. For such methods a different (higher) information threshold is appropriate compared with methods that account well for even large measurement errors. Concerns are raised about a current trend to deposit data that have been corrected for anisotropy, sharpened and pruned without including the original unaltered measurements. If not checked, this trend will have serious consequences for the reuse of deposited data by those who hope to repeat calculations using improved new methods.

Here come the stinkbugs...With the cooler temperatures of fall the brown marmorated stinkbug begins a determined quest to find a warm place to spend the winter. Crowding around window screens and searching for other ways to get inside, homeowners in the United States will share their indoor living space this winter with millions of brown marmorated stinkbugs. In this video Gary Hevel, an entomolgist at the Smithsonian's National Museum of Natural History, shares some information about these interesting creatures, as well as some advice about how to deal with those that inevitably gain entry to your home.

The post Smithsonian entomologist Gary Hevel gives information and advice about stinkbugs in your home appeared first on Smithsonian Insider.

The explosive growth of information technology is having a profound impact on our lives.

Welcome to the public release of the latest Institute of Medicine report on the quality of health care in America.

To significantly reduce the tens of thousands of deaths and injuries caused by medical errors every year, health care organizations must adopt information technology systems that are capable of collecting and sharing essential health information on patients and their care, says a new report by the Institute of Medicine of the National Academies.

We are pleased to announce that the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine are exploring ways to mobilize our expertise to counter misinformation on the web related to science, engineering, and health.

The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicines Task Force on the 2020 Census today issued a letter report and submitted it as a public comment to the U.S. Department of Commerce, which recently requested public comments on the 2020 Census.

Medicine regulatory authorities — including the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) — should strengthen cooperation with other countries’ regulators to ensure the quality, safety, and efficacy of medicines, says a new report from the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine.

National Academies host three events to explore ways to expand the reach of accurate science and health information online

"Deepfakes" are digitally altered images that make incidents appear real when they are not. Such altered files could have broad implications for politics.; Credit: /Marcus Marritt for NPR

Sophisticated fake media hasn't emerged as a factor in the disinformation wars in the ways once feared — and two specialists say it may have missed its moment.

Deceptive video and audio recordings, often nicknamed "deepfakes," have been the subject of sustained attention by legislators and technologists, but so far have not been employed to decisive effect, said two panelists at a video conference convened on Wednesday by NATO.

One speaker borrowed Sherlock Holmes' reasoning about the significance of something that didn't happen.

"We've already passed the stage at which they would have been most effective," said Keir Giles, a Russia specialist with the Conflict Studies Research Centre in the United Kingdom. "They're the dog that never barked."

The perils of deepfakes in political interference have been discussed too often and many people have become too familiar with them, Giles said during the online discussion, hosted by NATO's Strategic Communications Centre of Excellence.

Following all the reports and revelations about election interference in the West since 2016, citizens know too much to be hoodwinked in the way a fake video might once have fooled large numbers of people, he argued: "They no longer have the power to shock."

Tim Hwang, director of the Harvard-MIT Ethics and Governance of AI Initiative, agreed that deepfakes haven't proven as dangerous as once feared, although for different reasons.

Hwang argued that users of "active measures" (efforts to sow misinformation and influence public opinion) can be much more effective with cheaper, simpler and just as devious types of fakes — mis-captioning a photo or turning it into a meme, for example.

Influence specialists working for Russia and other governments also imitate Americans on Facebook, for another example, worming their way into real Americans' political activities to amplify disagreements or, in some cases, try to persuade people not to vote.

Other researchers have suggested this work continues on social networks and has become more difficult to detect.

Defense is stronger than attack

Hwang also observed that the more deepfakes are made, the better machine learning becomes at detecting them.

A very sophisticated, real-looking fake video might still be effective in a political context, he acknowledged — and at a cost to create of around $10,000, it would be easily within the means of a government's active measures specialists.

But the risks of attempting a major disruption with such a video may outweigh an adversary's desire to use one. People may be too media literate, as Giles argued, and the technology to detect a fake may mean it can be deflated too swiftly to have an effect, as Hwang said.

"I tend to be skeptical these will have a large-scale impact over time," he said.

One technology boss told NPR in an interview last year that years' worth of work on corporate fraud protection systems has given an edge to detecting fake media.

"This is not a static field. Obviously, on our end we've performed all sorts of great advances over this year in advancing our technology, but these synthetic voices are advancing at a rapid pace," said Brett Beranek, head of security business for the technology firm Nuance. "So we need to keep up."

Beranek described how systems developed to detect telephone fraudsters could be applied to verify the speech in a fake clip of video or audio.

Corporate clients that rely on telephone voice systems must be wary about people attempting to pose as others with artificial or disguised voices. Beranek's company sells a product that helps to detect them and that countermeasure also works well in detecting fake audio or video.

Machines using neural networks can detect known types of synthetic voices. Nuance also says it can analyze a recording of a real known voice — say, that of a politician — and then contrast its characteristics against a suspicious recording.

Although the world of cybersecurity is often described as one in which attackers generally have an edge over defenders, Beranek said he thought the inverse was true in terms of this kind of fraud detection.

"For the technology today, the defense side is significantly ahead of the attack side," he said.

Shaping the battlefield

Hwang and Giles acknowledged in the NATO video conference that deepfakes likely will proliferate and become lower in cost to create, perhaps becoming simple enough to make with a smartphone app.

One prospective response is the creation of more of what Hwang called "radioactive data" — material earmarked in advance so that it might make a fake easier to detect.

If images of a political figure were so tagged beforehand, they could be spotted quickly if they were incorporated by computers into a deceptive video.

Also, the sheer popularity of new fakes, if that is what happens, might make them less valuable as a disinformation weapon. More people could become more familiar with them, as well as being detectable by automated systems — plus they may also have no popular medium on which to spread.

Big social media platforms already have declared affirmatively that they'll take down deceptive fakes, Hwang observed. That might make it more difficult for a scenario in which a politically charged fake video went viral just before Election Day.

"Although it might get easier and easier to create deepfakes, a lot of the places where they might spread most effectively, your Facebooks and Twitters of the world, are getting a lot more aggressive about taking them down," Hwang said.

That won't stop them, but it might mean they'll be relegated to sites with too few users to have a major effect, he said.

"They'll percolate in these more shady areas."

This content is from Southern California Public Radio. View the original story at SCPR.org.

In a recent experiment in Norway, electrical appliance stores increased their sales of energy-efficient tumble driers when consumers were made aware of their cheaper lifetime operating costs by shop staff and a new product labelling system.

Building Information Modelling (BIM) can enhance the design of a building, reduce costs and save energy. However, little research has been carried out on its impact on sustainable practices. A US survey illustrates that many practitioners do not see sustainability as a primary application, suggesting that more effort is needed to encourage the integration of ‘green’ design and construction into BIM.

Public authorities in EU Member States are encouraged to purchase more environmentally-friendly goods and services through Green Public Procurement (GPP). A recent survey of purchasing managers in Italy has identified some factors that influence their adoption of this strategy, and suggests that a broad knowledge of GPP is key to its implementation.

Providing information to consumers on the environmental and social impacts of their food purchases could help change their consumption choices, research from Norway suggests. In a psychological study, researchers noted an increase in the number of organic and fair trade products bought per week when participating consumers were informed of the products’ benefits for the environment and the wellbeing of producers.