Month: December 2018

Facebook tracks Android users via apps, even if they aren’t Facebook users.

How Facebooks Tracks Non-Users via Android Apps by Tom Spring

“The reason we focused on Facebook, and not Google or any of the other tracking companies, is because the very fact that apps – like a period tracker or an LED flashlight [app] – share data with Facebook will come as a surprise to many people. And, especially for those who have made a conscious decision not to be on Facebook,” said Frederike Kaltheuner, researcher with Privacy International, during her talk on Saturday.

Facebook tracks Android users via apps, even if they aren’t Facebook users.

How Facebooks Tracks Non-Users via Android Apps by Tom Spring

“The reason we focused on Facebook, and not Google or any of the other tracking companies, is because the very fact that apps – like a period tracker or an LED flashlight [app] – share data with Facebook will come as a surprise to many people. And, especially for those who have made a conscious decision not to be on Facebook,” said Frederike Kaltheuner, researcher with Privacy International, during her talk on Saturday.

I would have thought the Android OS privacy feature would mitigate this risk. I guess not.

David Shanske Leaves the WordPress Project

Leaving the WordPress Project by David ShanskeDavid Shanske (david.shanske.com)

I’ve decided to leave the WordPress project. Not leave being a user of WordPress. but being part of the WordPress project as a contributor.

David Shanske resigns as a Pingbacks and Trackbacks component maintainer for WordPress.

Leaving the WordPress Project by David ShanskeDavid Shanske (david.shanske.com)

I’ve decided to leave the WordPress project. Not leave being a user of WordPress. but being part of the WordPress project as a contributor.

If Gutenberg is the future, then I have two years to plan my migration from WordPress to something else (not Jekyll).

2018-12-30 11.47.59

Google to open an artificial intelligence lab in Princeton and collaborate with University researchers.

The work in the lab will focus on a discipline within artificial intelligence known as machine learning, in which computers learn from existing information and develop the ability to draw conclusions and make decisions in new situations that were not in the original data. Examples include speech recognition systems that transcribe a wide spectrum of voices, and self-driving cars that process complex visual cues. In particular, the work will build on recent advances by Hazan, Singer and colleagues in optimization methods for machine learning to improve their speed and accuracy while reducing the required computing power.