Google has announced on its blog that it will be replacing Google Drive with a new (and less bandwidth and hard-disk space-hungry) desktop app called Drive File Stream.

What Is Google Drive?

Google Drive has been Google’s file storage and synchronization service for the last 5 years. Encompassing Google Docs, Sheets and Slides and an office suite, it allows users to store files in the cloud, share files, and synchronize them across devices. It also offers offline capabilities.

Shut Down Early Next Year

Google has confirmed that not only will Google Drive for Mac no longer be supported from 11th December this year, but it will be shut down completely on 12th March 2018. Users will be reminded of the impending shut down with notifications from October 2017.

Two Replacement Options

Google intends to move customers towards choosing one of two replacement apps depending on whether they are business customers or consumers. These replacements are:

1. For business users – Drive File Streamer.
2. For a consumers – Backup and Sync (to replace both Google Drive and Google Photos Uploader apps). It’s free and you it can be used to back up the contents of your entire computer, or just selected folders.

What’s Better About File Drive Stream?

File Drive Stream, as the name suggests, streams a user’s Drive files directly from the cloud directly to their Mac or PC. This means that users are not using up the disk space on their computers, they’re not using up the valuable company network bandwidth, and they’re not worrying about syncing problems. This (with a fast and reliable broadband connection) should mean time and cost savings for businesses e.g. no waiting for files to download on an over-stretched company network, and no slowing down and clogging up of computers as they fill up with large files.

There is also the added security bonus of not storing important files on computers that could be lost, stolen, damaged or fall victim to hacks.

What Does This Mean For Your Business?

If File Drive Stream saves time, disk space, and hassle, and enables easy synchronization across the company, then it will be likely to save costs and add value, a combination that should be good news for businesses.

As far as the nitty gritty details go, Google has said that Drive File Stream has already been turned on, but download links will only be shown in the Drive interface if you currently show them for Backup and Sync / Google Drive for Mac/PC. Google suggests that businesses should consult its Help Centre for information on how to turn Drive File Stream on or off in a domain.

Also, Google advises that if you’re running both Drive File Stream and Backup and Sync on the same machine, you will be prompted to stop syncing My Drive with Backup and Sync in order to save disk space. Team Drive editors will find that they won’t be able to edit their Team Drive files when they’re opened in Drive File Stream (they’ll only be able to view them), and in order to edit these files, they’ll need to open them in Drive on the web.

US Credit Rating Company Equifax was hacked last Friday with 143 million customer details stolen, 44 million of which may have come from UK customers.

Largest Hack

The hack, which many experts believe is the largest in US history, is thought to have happened after hackers found a way through a vulnerability on the website.

Equifax has received criticism for trying to save money on cyber protection at the expense of customer data-protection and had a lawsuit filed against it in Portland, Oregon for allegedly not maintaining adequate technological safeguards.

Waited 40 Days

What many have found most shocking about the hack is that, not only is Equifax reported to have known about the attack some 40 days before informing the public that it had happened, but that three senior executives at the company (which is a New York Stock Exchange-listed firm) are believed to have sold-off shares worth almost £1.4m before the breach was publicly announced. After the public announcement was made, Equifax’s stock fell by more than 14%.

What Kind of Details Were Stolen?

It is believed that the customer details stolen in the attack included names, US social security numbers, dates of birth, addresses, driver’s license details, and also around 209,000 credit card numbers.

Although 44 million is the possible number of UK customer details stolen, it is not clear how much UK customer data was held in the US, and the word from Equifax at the present time is that limited personal information from British and Canadian residents had been compromised in the hack.

The Information Commissioner’s Office (ICO) has now asked Equifax to alert affected UK customers at the earliest opportunity.

It has been reported in some areas of the media that British customers of Equifax include companies such as BT, Capital One, and British Gas may have been affected by the hack.

There May Be Trouble Ahead

The hack may be particularly dangerous for US citizens because they use their social security number for verification of their IDs, and a large number of social security numbers were stolen in the attack.

What Does This Mean For Your Business?

As security commentators have pointed out in this case, there is an awful irony because hackers have been able to compromise the companies that internet users rely on to safeguard their identities and finances. The scale and severity of this hack shouldn’t be underestimated, and it affects the whole credit reporting system in the United States.
Unfortunately, Equifax is likely to have held a lot of data about individuals who are not directly customers as well as storing information about businesses. Equifax hold the data of 820 million consumers and 91 million businesses. Many businesses are direct customers of Equifax, and although the extent of theft of data relating to UK companies and individuals is unknown, it may be wise to take proactive action anyway. This means monitoring your credit report (which will show any credit accounts set up in your name), and reporting any evidence of identity fraud to Action Fraud. You should also be vigilant for any suspicious and unsolicited emails (avoid clicking on links from unknown sources), or phone calls which could be from cyber criminals in the wake of the attack.

This story also illustrates how important it is to invest in keeping security systems up to date and to maintain cyber resilience on all levels. This could involve keeping up to date with patching (9 out of 10 hacked businesses were compromised via un-patched vulnerabilities), and should extend to training employees in cyber security practices, and adopting multi-layered defences that go beyond the traditional anti-virus and firewall perimeter.

Companies need to conduct security audits to make sure that no old, isolated data is stored on any old systems or platforms. Companies may now need to use tools that allow security devices to collect and share data and co-ordinate a unified response across the entire distributed network.

The reported behaviour of Equifax in this case (waiting 40 days before reporting the hack, and some executives selling stock) is clearly reckless and is likely to damage the reputation and brand of the company. The hack itself and the associated problems also illustrate the importance of having workable, updated Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery Plans in place.

An AI algorithm developed by researchers at Stanford University has been able to identify men and women as gay or straight just by studying photographs, with up to 91% accuracy.

Why?

The study by Stanford’s Michal Kosinski and Yilun Wang used AI to test a theory that sexual orientation stems from exposure to certain hormones before birth, meaning people are born gay, and that female sexual orientation is more fluid. The study also tested the hypothesis that faces contain more information about sexual orientation than can be perceived and interpreted by the human brain, and that a computer AI program could discover that information using an algorithm. The study was, therefore, intended to advance understanding of the origins of sexual orientation and the limits of human perception.

What Happened?

The study used the facial images of 35,326 men and women, and their stated sexuality that had been publicly posted on a US dating website. The researchers then used a sophisticated mathematical system known as ‘deep neural networks’ to extract various facial features from the images. These features were then entered into a logistic regression in order to attempt to classify the sexual orientation of the people in the photos, and this data was then matched with their stated sexuality to determine accuracy.

How Accurate?

After the AI system was able to succeed with single images, the accuracy of the algorithm increased dramatically to 91% when 5 images of the person were used. The overall results of the study showed that the algorithm could tell gay men from straight men with 81% accuracy and lesbians from straight women with a 74% accuracy.

This not only illustrates the idea that gay men and women tend to have gender-atypical features, expressions and grooming styles, but that the study appeared to show that a computer program is better at perceiving these than humans. For example, humans who looked at the same images were only able to tell gay from straight men with 61% accuracy, and lesbians from straight women with only 54% accuracy.

Criticism and Concerns

Although some have criticised the study as being more about stereotyping, the results have prompted many to express concern that tools like this algorithm could pose a threat to the privacy and safety of gay men and women, and could potentially be abused by anti-gay groups to target their hate-crimes, or by other organisations as a means of discrimination. Some commentators have expressed a worry that the billions of facial images of people stored on social media sites and in government databases could be used without consent, and that some governments could even use the technology to ‘out’ and target populations and to prosecute and punish LGBT people.

It is also easy to imagine that this kind of profiling could possibly be used in the future to identify other traits and behaviours such as telling the truth / lying, or even if someone is being unfaithful or hiding something.

What Does This Mean For Your Business?

From a business perspective, identifying and profiling of people e.g. employees and customers should always be done in a way that is ethical, and protects the privacy and security of individuals.

Businesses already use psychometric profiling, and this kind AI algorithmic tool (not just based on photos) could, therefore, be used in a positive way to help organisations select staff.

Some business people may also be using Facebook and other social media data to reach conclusions about personality and compatibility with a company, and judgements made this way raise their own ethical questions.

The authors of this study’s findings have made the point that this technology already exists and its capabilities are important to expose so that governments and companies can proactively consider privacy risks and the need for safeguards and regulations. Some would say, therefore, that this study and its results have in fact made a clear statement about how powerful this kind of technology can be, and have exposed the need for protections now, before the technology is used further e.g. for the kind of negative profiling that has been identified as a real worry.

It is also interesting to note that the report authors for this study have also suggested that AI could now conceivably be used explore links between facial features and other phenomena, such as political views, psychological conditions or personality. Findings along these lines could clearly have a value to companies, organisations, and governments.

It has been reported that since May of last year, Microsoft and Amazon have been working in partnership to enable their respective AI digital assistants ‘Cortana’ and ‘Alexa’ to work together.

What Does This Mean?

In short, this partnership should mean that some of the skills, functions and strengths of Alexa will be available through Cortana, and vice versa. The initial integration will mean that users will be able to tell one digital assistant to open the other e.g. “Alexa, open Cortana”. The partnership has created what is essentially the largest combined platform in the world with a pool of over 200 million users.

This should mean that value will be added to each digital assistant with customers benefitting from the leverage and synergies, and both companies being able to gain greater reach with their products, and to advance their AI work.

Momentous

Some technical commentators have described the move by Microsoft and Amazon to share and join forces on their AI assistants as being as momentous as when AOL and Compuserve opened their platforms up to interchange, and moved away from the confines of curated, separate platforms towards a more open Internet.

But Why?

There are many reasons why this partnership could benefit both companies as well as consumers. These include:

• Microsoft and Amazon may have missed the smartphone revolution but are out in front in what is known as the ‘Voice First’ revolution. This refers to voice activated devices e.g. Amazon Echo. This is a way to further their lead in a lucrative and growing market. For example, there is an estimated 33 million voice-first devices in circulation (VoiceLabs figures).
• Microsoft and Amazon joining forces will put a lot of pressure on competitors
  Apple and Google. Many tech commentators believe that Apple will not be able to combine forces with Google directly, and this will put Amazon and Microsoft even further out in front in this new market. Many still think, however, that Apple will advance with Siri in 2018 by opening it up to Workflow and deeper iMessage connections.
• Both Amazon and Microsoft can gain from increased distribution of their products, and increased overlap into each-others’ markets e.g. Alexa getting into smartphones and PCs.

What Does This Mean For Your Business?

This story illustrates how strategic alliances can be mutually beneficial, help advance products / markets through synergy, and be an effective competitive tactic that can bring market advantages.

In the case of Microsoft and Amazon working together with their digital assistants, for business customers, this can mean easier access to the leveraged power of shared advanced technology (as a business tool) and a step towards simplification.
Alexa and Cortana’s relationship should be a step towards creating an open way to communicate and interconnect with AI platforms. While we are currently limited to in the short term to choosing one platform as a favourite, this move may contribute to (in the longer term) the creation of only one platform. For the business user (and customers using voice-activated devices) this will be a much simpler way of orchestrating multiple tasks and AI activities.

The  second-hand electronics and video game store CEX have reportedly been hacked, and as many as two million customer details may have been stolen.

What Happened?

Hackers breached online security for CEX’s WeBuy.com online shop and were able to steal two million customer details. The details stolen are believed to include names, addresses, email addresses, some phone numbers, and a small number of encrypted credit card details. CEX has said that the credit / debit card information dated back to 2009 and any cards left on the system would have long-since expired.

CEX described the hack as a “sophisticated breach”.

Hashed Passwords Taken

Passwords were also reported to have been taken although they were hashed. It is still, however, possible that weak passwords could be broken.

Security Measures?

The company has stated that they had a robust and regularly updated security programme in place at the time of the breach, but have acknowledged that additional security measures were required to prevent the kind of hack that took place.

The company has stated that since the breach it has hired a cyber security specialist to review its systems and to implement extra defences.

CEX also has bricks and mortar stores, but customer details from these were not taken by the hackers because they are handled separately to WeBuy.com customer details.

About CEX : Buy with Bitcoin

Electronics and video game retailer CEX was founded in 1992 and now has physical stores in 11 countries including the UK, USA and Australia. CEX customers can buy and exchange technology products such as mobile phones and video games, and the company WeBuy.com provided the first online marketplace where customers could do this. It is also interesting to note that shoppers are able to pay with the crypto currency bitcoin in CEX’s UK stores.

Another High Profile Hack This Week

CEX was not the only high profile company targeted by hackers this week. A bug in the Facebook-owned social media platform Instagram reportedly made the personal details of six million users publicly accessible. As a result, email addresses and phone numbers have reportedly been harvested by hackers and there are reports of them now being sold on the dark web.

Instagram has since announced that it is working with law enforcement, the bug has been fixed, and that no passwords were stolen in the incident. Instagram has also advised customers to be vigilant about the security of their account, and to be cautious if they observe any suspicious activity e.g. unrecognised incoming calls, texts, or emails.

What Does This Mean For Your Business?

These hacks underline the importance of keeping a robust cyber and data security protection programme in place. This should start from basic activities such as keeping up to date with patching (9 out of 10 hacked businesses were compromised via un-patched vulnerabilities), and should extend to training employees in cyber security practices, and adopting multi-layered defences that go beyond the traditional anti-virus and firewall perimeter. Companies need to conduct security audits to make sure that no old, isolated data is stored on any old systems or platforms. Companies may now need to use tools that allow security devices to collect and share data and co-ordinate a unified response across the entire distributed network. It is also important to have workable, updated Business Continuity and Disaster Recovery Plans in place.

As business users of online services we should all remember to take precautions such as not revealing passwords, Pins, or ID numbers to anyone, not using the same password for multiple sites, not opening emails (with attachments) from unknown sources, and not clicking on links from unknown sources.