As reported by John Markoff in his May 24, 2009 New York Times “Smart Circuitry” column, “The Coming Superbrain: Computers keep getting smarter, while we just stay the same,” Google and NASA have joined forces to support the Singularity University, co-founded by Dr. Ray Kurtzweil. The by-line for the Singularity University is “Preparing Humanity for Accelerating Technology Change.” Its goal is to “assemble, educate and inspire a cadre of leaders who strive to understand and facilitate the development of exponentially advancing technologies …” Well, isn’t that just dandy? These pioneers forecast that in 2045, the World will see machines with superhuman intelligence. That is, of course, if humanity doesn’t destroy itself first, which, Markoff writes, is something that William Joy, co-founder of Sun Microsystems, believes has a greater probability of occurrence than does such anticipated superintelligent computers creating Utopia.
While I certainly believe that significant progress will be made in this attempt to resurrect the faltering and much-maligned field of artificial intelligence, as an infosec professional, I am interested in the security and privacy implications of such exponential change, and I’m concerned that I see no mention of these implications in the NYT article or on the Singularity University website at www.singularityu.org.
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