Month: September 2024

Enlarge (credit: Getty Images)

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), the federal body that sets technology standards for governmental agencies, standards organizations, and private companies, has proposed barring some of the most vexing and nonsensical password requirements. Chief among them: mandatory resets, required or restricted use of certain characters, and the use of security questions.

Choosing strong passwords and storing them safely is one of the most challenging parts of a good cybersecurity regimen. More challenging still is complying with password rules imposed by employers, federal agencies, and providers of online services. Frequently, the rules—ostensibly to enhance security hygiene—actually undermine it. And yet, the nameless rulemakers impose the requirements anyway.

Stop the madness, please!

Last week, NIST released SP 800-63-4, the latest version of its Digital Identity Guidelines. At roughly 35,000 words and filled with jargon and bureaucratic terms, the document is nearly impossible to read all the way through and just as hard to understand fully. It sets both the technical requirements and recommended best practices for determining the validity of methods used to authenticate digital identities online. Organizations that interact with the federal government online are required to be in compliance.

Amazon corporate office building in Sunnyvale, California. (credit: Getty Images)

An overwhelming majority of Amazon employees are “dissatisfied” with Amazon killing remote work and requiring them to be in the office five days a week next year. That's according to a survey of 2,585 employees by Blind, an online community where verified employees can discuss their work culture anonymously.

Since May, Amazon employees have been able to work remotely up to twice per week—a policy that Amazon has reportedly enforced by keeping track of badge swipes and how many hours workers spend in offices.

On September 16, Amazon CEO Andy Jassy sent a memo to employees stating that Amazon would require most workers to come into the office five days a week at the start of 2025. "We’ve observed that it’s easier for our teammates to learn, model, practice, and strengthen our culture; collaborating, brainstorming, and inventing are simpler and more effective,” the memo said.

Enlarge / An entomologist for the Louisville Metro Department of Public Health and Wellness in a swampland area on August 25, 2021 in Louisville, Kentucky collecting various mosquito species, and testing the samples for mosquito-borne diseases, such as EEE. (credit: Getty |)

New York is facing an unusual boom in mosquitoes toting the deadly eastern equine encephalitis (EEE) virus, which has already led to one rare death in the state and a declaration of an "imminent threat" by officials.

While the state's surveillance system typically picks up EEE-positive mosquitoes in two or three counties each year, this year there have been 15 affected counties, which are scattered all across New York, State Health Commissioner James McDonald said this week.

"Eastern equine encephalitis is different this year," McDonald said, noting the deadly nature of the infection, which has a mortality rate of between 30 and 50 percent. "Mosquitoes, once a nuisance, are now a threat," McDonald added. "I urge all New Yorkers to prevent mosquito bites by using insect repellents, wearing long-sleeved clothing, and removing free-standing water near their homes. Fall is officially here, but mosquitoes will be around until we see multiple nights of below-freezing temperatures."

Enlarge / Mira Murati, chief technology officer of OpenAI, speaks during The Wall Street Journal's WSJ Tech Live Conference in Laguna Beach, California, on October 17, 2023. (credit: PATRICK T. FALLON via Getty Images)

On Wednesday, OpenAI Chief Technical Officer Mira Murati announced she is leaving the company in a surprise resignation shared on the social network X. Murati joined OpenAI in 2018, serving for six-and-a-half years in various leadership roles, most recently as the CTO. Also on Wednesday, OpenAI Chief Research Officer Bob McGrew and VP of Research Barret Zoph resigned independently of each other, but perhaps precipitated by the Murati news, according to OpenAI CEO Sam Altman.

"After much reflection, I have made the difficult decision to leave OpenAI," Murati wrote in a letter to the company's staff. "While I'll express my gratitude to many individuals in the coming days, I want to start by thanking Sam and Greg for their trust in me to lead the technical organization and for their support throughout the years," she continued, referring to OpenAI CEO Sam Altman and President Greg Brockman. "There's never an ideal time to step away from a place one cherishes, yet this moment feels right."

At OpenAI, Murati was in charge of overseeing the company's technical strategy and product development, including the launch and improvement of DALL-E, Codex, Sora, and the ChatGPT platform, while also leading research and safety teams. In public appearances, Murati often spoke about ethical considerations in AI development.

Enlarge / The dual protagonists of Assassin's Creed Shadows. (credit: Ubisoft)

Assassin's Creed Shadows, the long-anticipated next major edition in the popular historical, open-world game franchise, has been moved back from its previously announced November 15, 2024 release date.

The new date is February 14, 2025, according to an open letter posted to X by franchise executive producer Marc-Alexis Côté. "We realize we need more time to polish and refine the experience, pushing further some of our key features," Côté wrote. "As such, we've made the decision to postpone the release date."

He went on to promise a same-day launch on Steam as well as the console platforms for that date.

Enlarge / Putting the "chat" in ChatGPT (credit: Getty Images)

In May, when OpenAI first demonstrated ChatGPT-4o's coming audio conversation capabilities, I wrote that it felt like we were "on the verge of something... like a sea change in how we think of and work with large language models." Now that those "Advanced Voice" features are rolling out widely to ChatGPT subscribers, we decided to ask ChatGPT to explain, in its own voice, how this new method of interaction might impact our collective relationship with large language models.

That chat, which you can listen to and read a transcript of below, shouldn't be treated as an interview with an official OpenAI spokesperson or anything. Still, it serves as a fun way to offer an initial test of ChatGPT's live conversational chops.

Even in this short introductory "chat," we were impressed by the natural, dare-we-say human cadence and delivery of ChatGPT's "savvy and relaxed" Sol voice (which reminds us a bit of '90s Janeane Garofalo). Between ChatGPT's ability to give quick responses—offered in in milliseconds rather than seconds—and convincing intonation, it's incredibly easy to fool yourself into thinking you're speaking to a conscious being rather than what is, as ChatGPT says here, "still just a computer program processing information, without real emotions or consciousness."