Following large investments in quantum computing followed by the ensuing advancement of this technology in recent years, as well as looking forward to benefits this could bring, there is also the growing threat of ‘quantum hacking.’

Quantum Computers 

Quantum computers can carry out complex calculations at high speed. Whereas traditional computers store data in binary ‘bits’ (ones and zeros) and work by creating and storing long strings of these ‘bits,’ quantum computing’s ‘qubits’ (quantum bits) can do both at once. This is because a qubit can hold a zero, a one, or any proportion of both zero and one at the same time, while an array of qubits can use something called ‘superposition’ to represent all 2^64 possible values at the same time. This means that quantum computers can store more data in fewer bits (i.e. much more information can be stored in fewer qubits), therefore information can be processed much more quickly than with a traditional computer. The power of a quantum computer is stated in its quantum volume number/how many qubits, for example, a 14-qubit system.

As a result, quantum computers can be used to dramatically speed up tasks that have traditionally taken a long time, such as finding new drug molecules for example. The results can be astounding, where crunching numbers that would take a classical computer a week, could take a quantum computer less than a second.

The power of quantum technologies offers possible solutions to some of the world’s biggest and most pressing challenges, e.g., global warming, healthcare, energy and more.

Investment 

Governments and private investors have been pledging and ploughing much more cash into developing quantum computing technology in recent years. For example:

– In March this year, the UK announced it ‘National Quantum Strategy’ whereby there will be a £2.5 billion investment.

– The US National Quantum Initiative Act was signed into law in 2018, providing over $1.2 billion in funding over 5 years for quantum computing research and development.

– In 2021, investment in quantum R&D reached $1.7bn, which was a 20 times increase from five years previously and US quantum startups raised double ($870m) what they raised in 2020 (McKinsey & Company).

The Threat 

Although quantum computers are powerful enough to help solve some of the world’s biggest challenges, this power could also mean that they could soon also pose a threat.  For example, quantum computers have the potential to break many of the commonly used encryption schemes that are used today, including RSA and elliptic curve cryptography (ECC). These encryption schemes rely on mathematical problems (such as factoring large numbers or computing discrete logarithms) which are difficult to solve using classical computers but can be solved efficiently using quantum algorithms.

With a powerful enough quantum computer, the risk is that an attacker could use these algorithms to break the encryption keys used to protect sensitive data, such as financial transactions, medical records, and government secrets. This could result in the exposure of confidential information, financial loss, and even threats to national security.

Quantum Hacking Threat 

As quantum computing technology advances, some tech and security commentators have warned of the risk of ‘quantum hacking.’ This refers to the use of quantum computing techniques to break cryptographic schemes that are commonly used to protect sensitive information. Quantum hacking takes advantage of the properties of quantum systems, such as superposition and entanglement, to perform certain operations much faster than classical computers can.

In the context of cryptography, quantum hacking means using a quantum computer to perform certain mathematical operations that are difficult or infeasible to perform using classical computers. For example, Shor’s algorithm is a quantum algorithm that can efficiently factor large numbers, which is the basis of many widely used cryptographic schemes. By using Shor’s algorithm on a powerful enough quantum computer, an attacker could break the encryption keys used to protect sensitive data.

Quantum hacking also includes attacks that exploit vulnerabilities in quantum communication systems, such as quantum key distribution (QKD). QKD is a method for securely distributing cryptographic keys using quantum properties, but it is vulnerable to certain types of attacks, such as photon number splitting attacks, which can be carried out using quantum technology.

There are also reports that cyber criminals now steal encrypted data in the hope that the encryption can be cracked at a later date, perhaps using quantum computers (‘harvest now, decrypt later’ attacks).

As quantum computing technology continues to advance, the risk of quantum hacking increases, highlighting the need for new cryptographic schemes that are resistant to attacks by quantum computers, known as post-quantum cryptography.

What Is Post-Quantum Cryptography, And How Could It Help? 

Post-quantum cryptography refers to cryptographic algorithms that are designed to resist attacks by quantum computers. As outlined, quantum computers have the potential to break many of the widely used cryptographic schemes in use today.

Post-quantum cryptography includes a variety of cryptographic algorithms that are based on different mathematical problems that are believed to be hard – even for quantum computers. Examples include lattice-based cryptography, code-based cryptography, hash-based cryptography, and multivariate cryptography, among others.

The goal of post-quantum cryptography is to provide a long-term security solution that can withstand the potential emergence of powerful quantum computers. While quantum computers are still in their early stages of development, research in post-quantum cryptography is ongoing to ensure that secure cryptographic algorithms will be available when the time comes that they are needed.

Public-Key Algorithms

Public-key algorithms are thought to be particularly vulnerable to the quantum hacking threat. For example, the US National Cybersecurity Center of Excellence (NCCoE) has recently highlighted how once access to practical quantum computers becomes available, all public-key algorithms and associated protocols will be vulnerable to criminals, competitors, and other adversaries. The advice is, therefore, that “It is critical to begin planning for the replacement of hardware, software, and services that use public-key algorithms now so that information is protected from future attacks.”

What Does This Mean For Your Business?

Quantum computers offer the chance to solve complex problems and save vast amounts of time in doing so. Not only could quantum computers help with challenges such as developing new medicines, helping find solutions in the climate crisis, and making many other dramatic scientific discoveries, they could also help solve problems in a variety of more mundane industries. For example, quantum computers could be used to optimise supply chains or model financial data in new ways. However, with huge investment and advancement in quantum technologies that could help businesses and humanity comes the risk that they could also be used to crack encryption, leading to the theft and exposure of confidential information, financial loss, and threats to national security. Ways to counter the threat of quantum hacking include advancing and investing more in and implementing post-quantum cryptography, alongside the replacement of hardware, software, and services that use public-key algorithms. Other ways that businesses could protect themselves from the threat of quantum hacking include:

– Monitoring developments in quantum computing and quantum communication technology and staying informed of new attacks and vulnerabilities as they emerge so that appropriate steps can be taken to mitigate these risks.

– Using secure communication protocols, such as Transport Layer Security (TLS), and implementing proper key management practices to protect sensitive data in transit.

– Upgrading encryption algorithms to those that are believed to be resistant to attacks by classical computers.

The discovery of new quantum materials with magnetic properties could bring ultra-fast, more energy efficient, and sustainable computers and mobile devices.

Quantum Breakthrough In Sweden 

A research team at team at Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden have reported making a quantum breakthrough by being the first to make a device made of a two-dimensional magnetic material that works in at room temperature. Previous efforts have only seen new quantum materials with magnetic properties work in extremely cold temperatures.

Two-Dimensional Magnetic Materials 

The search for two-dimensional magnetic materials has been motivated by the rapid IT expansion generating vast amounts of digital data that needs to be stored, processed, and communicated, and the ever-increasing need for energy.

The Two-dimensional magnetic materials that are being researched and developed to help meet these challenges are formed in sheets and are only a few atoms thick.

Following the development of graphene, a single atom-thick plane of graphite, that resulted in the 2010 Nobel Prize in Physics, two-dimensional materials with magnetic properties were discovered for the first time in 2017.

A First – 2D Magnet-Based Devices At Room-Temperature 

In this latest discovery, researchers at Chalmers University of Technology have been able to demonstrate, for the very first time, a new two-dimensional magnetic material-based device at room temperature. The material is an iron-based alloy (Fe5GeTe2) with graphene which can be used as a source and detector for spin polarized electrons.

Bing Zhao, post-doc in Quantum Device Physics and first author of the study said of discovery: “These 2D magnets can be used to develop ultra-compact, faster and more energy-efficient memory devices in computers. They may also be used to develop extremely sensitive magnetic sensors for a wide range of applications, including biomedical and environmental monitoring, navigation, and communication.” 

What Does This Mean For Your Organisation? 

Two-dimensional quantum materials such as these magnetic ones are more sustainable because they are atomically thin, and they offer unique magnetic properties. This makes them ideal for developing new energy-efficient and ultra-fast applications for sensors and advanced magnetic memory and computing concepts. For computer and device manufacturers, if at the right price, these materials could enable a new generation of ultra-fast, more energy efficient, and sustainable devices. All of these qualities are likely to be appealing to end customers too, and the discovery of these quantum materials with magnetic properties could open up a range of new opportunities in many different markets for a wide variety of devices and offer a more environmentally friendly component in a world that’s already struggling to deal with a climate crisis and a growing pile of electronic waste.

This Week in History : April 23, 2005: A Trip to the Zoo and $1.6 Billion Later …

On April 23, 2005, at exactly 8:31:52 pm local time, the first ever YouTube video was uploaded. It was titled ‘Me at the Zoo’ and is a 19 second recording of the co-founder of YouTube (Jawed Karim) standing in front of an elephant enclosure. It’s grainy and with poor audio – yet it made history.

If you’d like to see this seemingly insignificant clip, link to it is here https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jNQXAC9IVRw … so far it’s had over a quarter of a billion views.

The recording was taken by Yakov Lapitsky, Karim’s high school friend at the San Diego Zoo and the top comment made by the San Diego Zoo amassing around 2.8 million likes, making it the second most liked comment on YouTube. The first one being ‘I’m the bald guy’ by SethEverman on the ‘Billie Eilish – Bad Guy’ music video.

3 former PayPal employees founded YouTube – Chad Hurley, Steve Chen and Jawed Karim in February 2005. We all know YouTube as a video sharing platform yet their original idea was for YouTube to be a dating platform. It even had its very own slogan: “Tune In, Hook Up.” The idea was that people would upload videos of themselves talking about their dream partner. But that idea proved troublesome from the beginning and in desperation for actual dating videos the founding trio turned to craigslist to offer women $20 to upload to the site. But- nobody came forward and the trio decided to open the site up to any video, and the rest is history.

Shortly after YouTube became successful and grew, the 3 founders sold it to Google in November 2006 for a total of $1.6 billion. Sequoia Capital, YouTube’s venture backer walked away with approximately $500M after investing around $10M into the startup. Not too shabby! Today, YouTube is the second most visited site in the world and over 70% of viewers watch YouTube using their mobile phones and spent around 23.1 hours monthly using the app. That’s around 6 books read, or 11 movies watched. All this indicating that YouTube has become a major player in the entertainment industry, outcompeting other leisure activities in the bid for our attention.

So, how did Google’s investment back in 2006 work out? In 2022, YouTube’s annual Ad revenue amounted to $29.24 billion, higher than the $28.84 billion in the previous year. That is 18x what Google paid to acquire YouTube in just one year’s revenue.

Jawed Karim went on to create Youniversity Ventures which offers startup capital and consultation services to young entrepreneurs in the technology sector and is simply known as YVentures. Notably, Karim became a seed investor for Airbnb in 2009 making him one of the first investors.

Chen and Hurley would join forces once more to create MixBit a competitor to Vine and Instagram in the video sharing market. However, it ceased operations on 21st April 2018.

The Moral? Selling a successful startup can generate generational wealth off just one deal. However, they are also highly risky. You can buy established businesses and secure significant advantages (financial, operational, strategic) with a lot less risk.

If you’d like to personalise who you’re chatting to by using their photo as a background in the chat, or you’d simply like to change and brighten up your WhatsApp experience, you can easily change the default background to chats. Here’s how:

Within a chat for a particular person, tap on the three dots (top right) and select ‘Wallpaper’.

Choose from the options – Bright, Dark, Sold Colours, or choose a photo that you associate with that person from your phone’s gallery by tapping on ‘My Photos’.

When you’re happy with your selection, tap on ‘Set Wallpaper’.

One recent example of how ChatGPT may be the subject of a defamation lawsuit after it reportedly created completely incorrect (and highly damaging) content is in the case of Brian Hood, the mayor of Hepburn Shire, 120km northwest of Melbourne, Australia. Mr Hood reported being told by members of the public that ChatGPT had (falsely) named him as a guilty party in a foreign bribery scandal involving a subsidiary of the Reserve Bank of Australia in the early 2000s. In reality, Mr Hood had been the whistleblower in the scandal, hadn’t been convicted in a crime, and hadn’t served time in prison as claimed in ChatGTP’s output about the scandal.

Even though ChatGPT can produce some convincing looking outputs, as shown in this case, it is still capable making things up or getting things wrong, so here are some ways to check the facts quickly for yourself.

How Can ChatGPT Get Things Wrong? 

As an AI language model, ChatGPT uses algorithms to generate responses based on patterns and associations learned from substantial amounts of data. ChatGPT is a machine learning AI language model and not a human being, so it may not always provide perfect responses. As OpenAI says: “Current deep learning models are not perfect. They are trained with a gigantic amount of data created by humans (e.g. on the Internet, curated and literature) and unavoidably absorb a lot of flaws and biases that long exist in our society.”

How ChatGPT Could Get Things Wrong 

Clearly, it’s possible for ChatGPT to give out incorrect/inaccurate information and even OpenAI’s boss Sam Altman has said in interviews that he thinks regulators and society should be involved with the new generative chatbot technology to guard against potentially negative consequences. Some of the main ways that ChatGPT can get things wrong include:

– Limited knowledge.  ChatGPT’s knowledge is based on the data it was trained on, which has a cut-off date of September 2021. If there is new information or developments that have occurred after that time, ChatGPT may not be aware of them. This situation may, however, soon improve when ChatGPT uses plugins, such as a web browsing plugin, to bring its answers up to date.

– It is also possible that, since ChatGPT relies on the context of the conversation to generate appropriate responses, if the context is unclear or ambiguous, ChatGPT may generate a response that is irrelevant or incorrect.

– The data that ChatGPT was trained on may contain biases that can affect the responses it generates. For example, if the training data contains a disproportionate amount of biased information on a particular topic, ChatGPT may generate responses that are biased towards that topic. Critics have also noted gender biases and other biases may be present which could skew answers.

Can’t Verify The Accuracy Of Its Answers 

It’s important to note also that ChatGPT does not have the ability to verify the accuracy of the information it provides. Therefore, as ChatGPT says itself, it’s always a good idea to fact-check any information received from ChatGPT with other sources to ensure its accuracy.

What Are The Best Ways To Fact Check?

To ensure that any ChatGPT outputs that you use are accurate, there are several ways to fact-check information, including:

– Cross-checking with other reputable source such as news articles or academic publications. If the information matches up across multiple sources, it is more likely to be accurate.

– Looking for supporting evidence such as statistics or quotes from experts. This can help you verify the accuracy of the information provided.

– Checking the credibility of the source for the information it provides, e.g. looking for information about the author, the publisher and the publication date to ensure the source is reputable and up to date.

– Using fact-checking websites such as Fullfact.org, Snopes, or FactCheck.org to verify the accuracy of information. These websites specialise in investigating and verifying information to ensure that it is accurate.

– Consulting with experts in the relevant field (if you’re able to). If you are still unsure about the accuracy of the information provided by ChatGPT, consider consulting with experts.

What Does This Mean For Your Business? 

ChatGPT is certainly a time-saving tool but is also just a machine learning AI language algorithm, albeit an impressive one. As such, given the incorrect data source and/or context, it can get things wrong so it’s worth spending a little time reading its outputs and carrying out some basic fact-checking before publishing its outputs on a website or blog. As in so many areas of business, building checks into processes can help reduce mistakes and retain quality and this is the same with using the output of generative chatbots. However, with the introduction of GPT-4 and the use of plugins, such as a web browsing plugin, ChatGPT may soon be able to produce answers that are more up-to-date and contain fewer mistakes.

With ChatGPT’s makers OpenAI facing a possible defamation lawsuit from an Australian mayor, we look at the legal aspects of online writing and publishing.

Defamed? 

Last November, when ChatGPT was first released for public use, Brian Hood, the mayor of Hepburn Shire, 120km northwest of Melbourne, was told by members of the public that ChatGPT had (falsely) named him as a guilty party in a foreign bribery scandal involving a subsidiary of the Reserve Bank of Australia in the early 2000s. In fact, Mr Hood had been the whistleblower in the scandal, hadn’t been convicted in a crime, and hadn’t served time in prison as claimed in ChatGTP’s output about the scandal. Mr Hood is, therefore reported to have instructed lawyers to send a letter of concern to OpenAI on giving the company 28 days to fix the errors about him or face a possible defamation lawsuit.

Can An AI Algorithm Defame Someone? 

Although this is a relatively new area, it could be argued that because ChatGPT is an AI language model and does not have the intent or awareness to defame someone, it may not be as clear a case as it sounds. Defamation requires a statement that is false, communicated to a third party, and causes harm to the reputation of an individual. Since ChatGPT does not have the ability to communicate with a third party outside of the conversation, it is unlikely that its responses could cause harm to an individual’s reputation in a way that would meet the legal standard for defamation.

Could The Third-Party Source Be Liable? 

However, if the information provided by ChatGPT is based on false or defamatory information from a third-party source that is repeated by ChatGPT, that third party may potentially be liable for defamation. In this case, the individual who is harmed by the false information may (as in the case of Mr Hood) be able to pursue legal action against the original source of the information.

It’s important to remember that the legal standards for defamation can vary depending on the jurisdiction, and it is always advisable to consult with a legal expert for guidance on specific cases.

What Are The Main UK Laws Relating to Online Publishing? 

Publishing online information about people is, of course, covered by laws and for publishers of content of all kinds, plus it’s worth being aware that these exist and should be adhered to. For example, in the UK, there are several laws and regulations that relate to online publishing. The main ones are:

– The Defamation Act 2013. This law sets out the rules for defamation, which occurs when a false statement is made that harms someone’s reputation. It applies to online publishing, including social media and websites.

– The Electronic Commerce (EC Directive) Regulations 2002. This regulation requires website owners to provide certain information to users, such as the website owner’s name and address, and details about any professional body or trade association they belong to.

– The Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988. This law protects original works such as text, images, videos, and music from being copied or used without permission. It applies to online publishing as well as offline publishing.

– The Computer Misuse Act 1990. This law makes it a criminal offense to access or modify computer systems without authorisation. This applies to online publishing, including hacking and malware attacks.

– General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR). This EU regulation, which was adopted in the UK (and made into the UK’s own version following Brexit), sets out rules for the collection, use, and storage of personal data. It applies to online publishing, including websites and social media.

– The Obscene Publications Act 1959. This law makes it an offense to publish material that is obscene, or that is likely to be harmful to the general public. This applies to online publishing, including websites and social media.

What Does This Mean For Your Business?

Although there has always been a culture of sharing and a degree of free speech on the web, uploading content to a website or platform that’s publicly available should still be regarded as publishing and, therefore, subject to many different publishing laws. In the case of ChatGPT, it’s an algorithm that has been trained on content gathered from third-party sources online and, therefore has no ‘intent’ to defame anyone, even though it has now become a popular and trusted source of information itself.

In the case of Mr Hood, it could be argued that being a public figure such as a mayor, his public reputation is of particular significance and that the third-party sources that ChatGTP’s system got the information from, and the apparent inability of ChatGPT to check the accuracy of what it produces may be central points in the case, should it go to court. When businesses use ChatGPT to produce content that they intend to publish online it is therefore worth conducting some basic fact checks, particularly where specific people and organisations are named. ChatGPT’s existence, however, shouldn’t change the fact that businesses should always be aware that there are many laws to adhere to when publishing online and that compliance is always an important issue.