hatemail tech newsletter, 2023-05-08
Diffusing useful AI critique and AI doomers; Google losing edge; Anti-Trans lobby leaks thousands of files


Researcher Meredith Whittaker says AI’s biggest risk isn’t ‘consciousness’—it’s the corporations that control them
The former Googler and current Signal president Meredith Whittaker on why she thinks Geoffrey Hinton’s alarmism is a distraction from more pressing threats. [Fast Company]
‘I didn’t see him show up’: Ex-Googlers blast ‘AI godfather’ Geoffrey Hinton’s silence on fired AI experts
Former Google colleagues say machine learning pioneer Geoffrey Hinton failed to support them when they warned that AI could harm marginalized people. [Fast Company]
Cynthia Rudin Builds AI That Humans Can Understand
Cynthia Rudin wants machine learning models, responsible for increasingly important decisions, to show their work. [Quanta]
Google "We Have No Moat, And Neither Does OpenAI"
Leaked Internal Google Document Claims Open Source AI Will Outcompete Google and OpenAI. [SemiAnalysis]
Scientists Use GPT AI to Passively Read People's Thoughts in Breakthrough
An AI model similar to ChatGPT was combined with fMRI readings to non-invasively decode continuous language from subjects, a new study reports. [Vice]
Google Promised to Defund Climate Lies, but the Ads Keep Coming
Google said in 2021 that it would stop running ads alongside videos and other content that denied the existence and causes of climate change. [New York Times]
IBM to Pause Hiring for Jobs That AI Could Do
International Business Machines Corp. Chief Executive Officer Arvind Krishna said the company expects to pause hiring for roles it thinks could be replaced with artificial intelligence in the coming years. [Bloomberg]
Public Money, Public Code
A campaign for releasing publicly financed software as Free Software. [Public Money, Public Code]
Will a Chatbot Write the Next ‘Succession’?
As labor contract negotiations heat up in Hollywood, unions representing writers and actors seek limits on artificial intelligence. [New York Times]
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FBI seizes 9 crypto exchanges used to launder ransomware payments
The FBI and Ukrainian police have seized nine cryptocurrency exchange websites that facilitated money laundering for scammers and cybercriminals, including ransomware actors. [Bleeping Computer]
288 dark web vendors arrested in major marketplace seizure | Europol
This operation, codenamed SpecTor, was composed of a series of separate complementary actions in Austria, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Poland, Brazil, the United Kingdom, the United States, and Switzerland. [EuroPol]

Apple, Google partner on an industry specification to address unwanted tracking
Today Apple and Google jointly submitted a proposed industry specification to help address the misuse of Bluetooth location-tracking devices. [Apple]
On-by-default Edge feature seems to be sending all the URLs you visit to Bing
It seems to be a bug introduced in Edge version 112, released earlier in April. [ArsTechnica]
TikTok Tracked Users Who Watched Gay Content, Prompting Employee Complaints
The company logged categories of content and users on the app in effort to boost engagement. [Wall Street Journal]

Anti-Trans Doctor Group Leaks 10,000 Confidential Files
A Google Drive left public on the American College of Pediatricians’ website exposed detailed financial records, sensitive member details, and more. [Wired]
Four Proud Boys Convicted of Sedition in Key Jan. 6 Case
The verdict was a blow against the far-right group and another milestone in the Justice Department’s prosecution of the pro-Trump rioters who stormed the Capitol. [New York Times]

Discreetly, Berlin Confronts Russian Spies Hiding in Plain Sight
For years, Germany seemed to tolerate even flagrant Russian operations on its soil. But a new Cold War-like chill has now made the snooping difficult to ignore. [New York Times]
America’s Spies Are Losing Their Edge
New technologies and a lack of patriotism in Silicon Valley are leveling the playing field for Russia and China. [Bloomberg]
Apple is a Chinese company
The world’s most valuable company makes great products, but it may turn out that the biggest driver of its share price has been the close relationship CEO Tim Cook has cultivated with China. [Financial Times] [Non paywall version on Archive]
Ukraine downs Russian hypersonic missile with US Patriot
Ukraine’s air force claims to have downed a Russian hypersonic missile over Kyiv using newly acquired American Patriot defense systems, the first known time the country has been able to intercept one of Moscow’s most modern missiles. [AP]

A Brutal Sex Trade Built for American Soldiers
It’s a long-buried part of South Korean history: women compelled by force, trickery or desperation into prostitution, with the complicity of their own leaders. [New York Times]
AI Chatbots Have BeenUsed to Create Dozens of News Content Farms
A new report documents 49 new websites populated by AI tools like ChatGPT and posing as news outlets. [Bloomberg]
Outrage simmers in New York after the killing of Jordan Neely on a subway train
The attack on Monday has been called a semi-sanctioned vigilante response to homelessness and the mental health crisis. [The Guardian]
China Takes the Yuan Global in Bid to Repel a Weaponized Dollar
A string of new deals promote the Chinese currency as geopolitical risk spills into international finance. [Bloomberg]
Bricking Incident - Orqa Blog
Ransomware was programmed to ‘explode’ in a way to cause maximum crisis: it was timed so it activates on a spring Saturday, during a long weekend, when most of you should be flying, and most of our engineering team should be enjoying their well-deserved days off. Supposedly, this would put the Company in the panic mode, and give the perpetrator a sufficient leverage to extort his ransom. [Orqa]
Jeffrey Epstein Documents, Part 2: Dinners With Lawrence Summers and Movie Screenings With Woody Allen
Schedules and emails show deeper relationships between the disgraced financier and a range of prominent people, including the former Treasury Secretary and the filmmaker. [Wall Street Journal]
War, Weapons and Conspiracy Theories: Inside Airman Teixeira’s Online World
A review of more than 9,500 messages obtained by The New York Times offers important clues about the mind-set of a young airman implicated in a vast leak of government secrets. [New York Times]
Google engineer jumps to death in NYC, second worker suicide in months
A senior software engineer at Google jumped to his death from the search giant’s headquarters in Chelsea late Thursday, according to authorities and police sources. [NYPost]
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