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Creators struggling to understand AI decision processes: Quartz
 Artificial intelligence is seeping into every nook and cranny of modern life. AI might tag your friends in photos on Facebook or choose what you see on Instagram, but materials scientists and NASA researchers are also beginning to use the technology for scientific discovery and space exploration.

But there’s a core problem with this technology, whether it’s being used in social media or for the Mars rover: The programmers that built it don’t know why AI makes one decision over another.

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Modern artificial intelligence is still new. Big tech companies have only ramped up investment and research in the last five years, after a decades-old theory was shown to finally work in 2012. Inspired by the human brain, an artificial neural network relied on layers of thousands to millions of tiny connections between “neurons” or little clusters of mathematic computation, like the connections of neurons in the brain. But that software architecture came with a trade-off: Since the changes throughout those millions of connections were so complex and minute, researchers aren’t able to exactly determine what is happening. They just get an output that works.

At the Neural Information Processing Systems conference in Long Beach, California, the most influential and highest-attended annual AI conference, hundreds of researchers from academia and tech industry will meet today (Dec. 7) at a workshop to talk about the issue. While the problem exists today, researchers who spoke to Quartz say the time is now to act on making the decisions of machines understandable, before the technology is even more pervasive.

“We don’t want to accept arbitrary decisions by entities, people or AIs, that we don’t understand,” said Uber AI researcher Jason Yosinkski, co-organizer of the Interpretable AI workshop. “In order for machine learning models to be accepted by society, we’re going to need to know why they’re making the decisions they’re making.”

As these artificial neural networks are starting to be used in law enforcement, health care, scientific research, and determining which news you see on Facebook, researchers are saying there’s a problem with what some have called AI’s “black box.” Previous research has shown that algorithms amplify biases in the data from which they learn, and make inadvertent connections between ideas.

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For example, when Google made an AI generate the idea of “dumbbells” from images it had seen, the dumbbells all had small, disembodied arms sticking out from the handles. That bias is relatively harmless; when race, gender, or sexual orientation is involved, it becomes less benign.

“As machine learning becomes more prevalent in society—and the stakes keep getting higher and higher—people are beginning to realize that we can’t treat these systems as infallible and impartial black boxes,” Hanna Wallach, a senior researcher at Microsoft and speaker at the conference, tells Quartz in an email. “We need to understand what’s going on inside them and how they are being used.”

Mission-critical AI

In NASA’s Jet Propolusion Lab, artificial intelligence allows the Mars rover to operate semi-autonomously when exploring the surface of an unexplored planet. AI is also used to comb through the thousands of pictures taken by the rover when they’re transmitted back to Earth.

Why would they trust [AI] to control their Mars rover or orbiter if they don’t know why it’s making the choices it’s making?

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But Kiri Wagstaff, a JPL AI researcher and speaker at the workshop, says AI needs to be understood before it’s used, due to the high risks every decision brings in space.

“If you have a spacecraft in orbit around Mars, it’s 200 million miles away, it costs hundreds of millions of dollars, potentially even a billion dollars, to send there. If anything goes wrong, you’re done. There’s no way to repair, visit, replace that thing without spending an immense amount of money,” Wagstaff says. “So if we want to put machine learning in play, then the people running these missions need to understand what it’s doing and why, because why would they trust it to control their Mars rover or orbiter if they don’t know why it’s making the choices it’s making?”

Wagstaff works on building the AI that sorts through images captured in space by NASA’s various spacecraft. Since those images can number in the millions, having an AI pick out the interesting photos could be a big timesaver—but only if the AI knows what an “interesting” image looks like.

To Wagstaff, being able to understand what the AI is looking for is crucial to implementing the algorithm. If there was a mistake in how it learned to go through images, that could mean passing over data worth the millions of dollars the mission cost.

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“Just being presented with an image that a computer said ‘Oh this is interesting, take a look’ leaves you in this sort of limbo, because you haven’t looked at all million images yourself, you don’t know why that’s interesting, what ticked,” Wagstaff says. “Is it because of its color, because of its shape, because of the spacial arrangement of objects in the scene?”

Hidden knowledge

In 2007, Andrew Gordon Wilson, an AI professor at Cornell University and co-organizer of the Interpretable AI workshop, was working with a team to build a new kind of PET scanning machine. Since certain particles didn’t behave in the machine as they did in the rest of the physical world, he was tasked with tracking how a certain particle moved through a tank of xenon.

His adviser suggested trying to use neural networks, which were still relatively obscure at the time. Using the technology, Wilson was able to use the light emitted by the particle to locate it in the xenon chamber.

While he got the answer he was looking for, Wilson says that understanding the internal rules the algorithm had built to understand how light indicated the position of the particle could have opened a new avenue of research.

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“In a way, a model is a theory for our observation, and we can use the model not just to make predictions but also to better understand why the predictions are good and how these natural processes are working,” Wilson said.

Up for interpretation

But to make new ground on interpretability, one of the biggest challenges is simply defining it, says Wallach, the Microsoft researcher.

Does interpretability mean that AI experts know why Facebook’s algorithm is showing you a specific post, or that you understand yourself? Does a doctor using an AI-powered treatment recommendation system need to know why a specific regimen was suggested, or is that another role— like an AI overseer— that needs to be created in a hospital?

“If your system doesn’t work and you don’t know why it’s quite hard to improve it.”

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Wallach calls interpretability a latent construct: Something unobservable, but instead augured by testing how real people use and misunderstand AI systems. It’s not just a matter of lifting the hood of an algorithm and watching how the engine runs.

Understanding an algorithm isn’t just to fend against bias or make sure your rover won’t fall off a Martian cliff; knowing how a system fails can help AI researchers build more accurate systems.

“If your system doesn’t work and you don’t know why, it’s quite hard to improve it,” Uber’s Yosinski say. “If you do know why it’s failing, oftentimes the solution is a foregone conclusion.”

To figure out how one of its algorithms thinks, Google is trying to sift through the millions of computations made every time the algorithm processes an image. In a paper presented at the NIPS conference, Google researcher Maithra Raghu showed that she was able to fix the unwanted association between dumbbells and arms, only this time with tree bark and birds.

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By looking at which neurons in the network were activated when the AI looked at images of birds, Raghu was able to determine which were focusing on the bird and which were focusing on the bark, and then turn the bark neurons off. The success is a sign that, for all its complexity, translating a neural network’s work into something a human understands isn’t impossible.

“In school we ask students to put it in their own words to prove that they’ve understood something, to show their work, justify their conclusion,” Wagstaff says. “And now we’re expecting that machines will be able to do the same thing.”

Output: The creators of artificial intelligence (AI) are struggling to understand the choices it makes. Because AI relies on a complex neural network that makes millions of mathematic computations, researchers can only fully comprehend the output, rather than each minute calculation. However, in order to assimilate machine learning models into society, researchers will have to understand why AI makes the decisions it does, to avoid the amplification of bias and other issues.


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Deliveroo chooses the7stars agency for planning and buying
 Deliveroo has appointed independent media agency the7stars to handle media planning and buying on its behalf within the UK and Ireland.

Deliveroo delivers UK & Ireland media account to the7stars

The appointment caps a period of rapacious growth for the British company which specializes in delivering restaurant food direct to customers doors via its network of cyclists.

Output: Restaurant delivery service Deliveroo has handed the contract for its media planning and buying in the UK and Ireland to the7stars. The independent media agency counts Gumtree, Wagamama and Squarespace among its clients. The deal follows a period of swift growth for Deliveroo, which also recently partnered with Tripadvisor to offer city listings.


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Simility wins $17.5m backing for AI-powered anti-fraud system
 Missed the GamesBeat Summit excitement? Don't worry! Tune in now to catch all of the live and virtual sessions here.

Simility, which develops a fraud detection platform that uses machine learning, has announced a $17.5 million round of funding led by Accel, with participation from new strategic investor PayPal. Existing investors The Valley Fund and Trinity Ventures also contributed.

Founded in 2014, Palo Alto-based Simility is one of a number of companies using machine learning to help those working in the fraud detection realm collect and analyze data. Simility’s software is aimed at companies of all sizes, from enterprises to SMBs, and is designed to prevent various kinds of fraud. This includes account takeover (ATO) fraud, whereby someone tries to gain access to another person’s online account. Here, Simility looks at various session, device, and behavioral biometrics and builds a profile for what constitutes “normal” user login behavior.

Simility can also help prevent account origination fraud, where a bad actor tries to set up a new account using stolen or fake identities. For example, the company’s software analyzes various session-related indicators, including time spent across pages, keyboard patterns, and so on, while it may also use data garnered form third-party sources to establish the credibility of information provided during setup.

Simility had raised around $7.5 million prior to now, and with its latest cash influx the company said it plans to “accelerate global expansion” of its partner network, as well as growing its sales, customer service, and data science teams. More specifically, Simility is looking to push its sales operations in the U.S., Brazil, and Europe and to grow its data science teams in Europe.

PayPal is a notable addition to the company’s roster of investors and is indicative of Simility’s target markets: Finance and online retail industries are rife with fraud.

“Digital disruption in the financial and commerce sectors has resulted in the need for a fraud and risk management solution that goes beyond legacy, static rule-based offerings to offer protection in a digital first, big data analytics-focused environment,” said Simility cofounder and CEO Rahul Pangam. “This latest funding round will enable us to enter our next phase of growth by bolstering our world-class team of industry veterans in sales, customer success, and data science to meet market demand.”

Automated fraud detection has emerged as a key focal point for tech firms and investors. Paris-based Shift Technology, which offers a platform that uses AI to help companies combat insurance fraud, recently closed a $28 million funding round. Pindrop has nabbed some big-name backers, such as Google Capital, for its AI-based phone fraud detection service, and Israel-based Forter has grabbed big bucks to help retailers battle online fraud using machine learning.

Simility claims “multiple global Fortune 500 financial services organizations” as clients, including major U.S. banks.

Output: A company that uses artificial intelligence (AI) in its fraud detection system has received a $17.5m funding injection from investors including online payment platform PayPal. Simility, which was founded in 2014, uses machine learning software to assist with analysing user data and help spot suspicious activity that might indicate identity fraud. Increasing numbers of companies are using AI in fraud detection, with major investors backing the development of commercial systems that can reduce risks through effective data analysis.


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California looks to launch entirely online community college
 By Louis Freedberg, EdSource

With time running out on his governorship, Gov. Jerry Brown is pushing California’s 114-campus community college system to create one more college: a new fully online college that would have been unimaginable during his first term as governor.

To that end, he met recently with California Community Colleges Chancellor Eloy Ortiz Oakley and Vice Chancellor of Workforce and Digital Futures Van Ton-Quinlivan to consider several options for establishing the college. Last May, Brown sent Oakley a letter asking him “to take whatever steps are necessary to establish a new community college that — exclusively — offers a fully online degree program,” and to come up with plan for how to do so by last month.

Oakley, who formerly ran Long Beach City College, created a task force to study the concept. On Nov. 30 , the team completed its report, which included four options, and Oakley presented them to the governor.

One option is to create a separate online college to be housed at an existing college. Another is to set up a consortium of colleges to create the statewide online college. A third is to create a new online community college district within the chancellor’s office in Sacramento. In response to faculty concerns, Brown was presented with a newly added option — to just expand the community colleges’ existing online offerings.

Neither the chancellor’s nor the governor’s office were willing to comment on which of the four options appealed to Brown. The proposal is likely to be included in Brown’s proposed FY2019 budget — his last as governor — that he will present to the Legislature in January.

The proposed college is designed to serve the needs of a large population of Californians that the massive community college system — the largest higher education system in the world — currently doesn’t serve.

In an interview with EdSource, Oakley said that the online college will reach California residents who have received some college education, but never completed a credential, or have been in the workforce and have never been to college at all. Especially at risk are those whose jobs are threatened by automation and technological innovation generally. Oakley said these workers number between 2.5 million and 4 million and that they have become “very vulnerable” in the post-Recession period.

He cited the example of 50-year-old-plus workers who have some or no college education, have been working for 20 or 30 years, but have no way of advancing in the job market because they lack the skills to do so. “We call these individuals stranded workers,” he said. “They become targets of predatory or for-profit institutions that take advantage of their struggles and their desperation, offer them courses promising high wages at the other end, but all they do is saddle them with high debt.”

Already about one-third of the over 2.1 million students currently enrolled in the California Community Colleges are taking at least one online course. This fall the community college system established its Online Education Initiative to further promote online instruction. Jory Hadsell, its executive director, said contrary to stereotypes, for some students online instruction encourages greater, rather than less, participation than a regular classroom. “In the structured format of online courses, students are prompted to engage right from the beginning,” he said. “It is hard to hide in the back of the classroom, and let other students answer questions.”

He also said that students have a good deal of contact with an online course’s instructor. “Students don’t sign up for an online course, and never hear from anyone for a long time,” he said. “It is quite the opposite. Our online courses are really rigorous, and the result is students getting to know each other better than they would than if they were sitting in desks in a classroom.”

Since being elected governor for a second term in 2010, Brown has persistently pushed to increase online instruction at the state’s public universities, in part in response to their limited seat capacity at a time of increasing enrollment pressures. But the path has not been without obstacles or controversy. For example, a joint program at San Jose State University with the online firm Udacity, called SJSU Plus, floundered several years ago, in part because of faculty opposition.

Brown’s online community college proposal also generated considerable opposition from the faculty. The system’s Academic Senate said that the deadline set by Brown to get the college off the ground was rushed, and that the community colleges’ existing online programs could be expanded to meet the need, in lieu of creating a separate college.

“These are legitimate questions and concerns,” Oakley said. “We feel there are answers to those, and we feel there is experience and research throughout the country to address those concerns.”

Despite faculty opposition, Brown’s push for online instruction has arguably gotten the best response at the community colleges. The nature of the community college population — older, part-time students, many of whom are working — has put more pressure on community colleges than on the University of California and California State University to offer courses that give students greater flexibility. As a result, over the past dozen years, online enrollment at the community colleges have more than doubled, from 13 percent of students in 2005 to about one-third today.

The new online college, however, will serve a largely new population, presenting the sprawling system with new challenges. “This is a population that has a hard time getting to our brick and mortar colleges, or fitting into our traditional academic schedule,” Oakley said. “We will have a lot of work to do to reach these working age adults, and give them access to higher education and the support services they need to succeed.”

This story originally appeared on EdSource.org. EdSource is an independent journalism organization that works to engage Californians on key education challenges with the goal of enhancing learning success.

Output: California Governor Jerry Brown is looking to launch an all-online community college aimed at "stranded workers". According to California Community Colleges Chancellor Eloy Ortiz Oakley, the college will target residents who have received an incomplete college education, have never been to college, or whose jobs are generally at risk from automation and technology. A proposal is currently being worked upon by the Governor's office in collaboration with Oakley's office, and a final proposal is likely to be included in the Governor's 2019 budget, which will be presented to the legislature in January.


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ZoomDoc looks to expand its UK doctors-on-demand service
 A GP on demand service has launched a crowd-funding campaign to try and raise £500,000 so it can expand.

ZoomDoc, which was founded by Dr Kenny Livingstone, is a paid-for service which allows users to book an NHS-registered GP to come to their home.

The app, which promises a GP will see you within one hour, was soft-launched in the UK in May and has been downloaded 5,000 times since then.

Livingstone told Digital Health News that increasing demand for the app prompted the crowd-funding campaign and as a result it needed to recruit more GPs to enable further technological developments.

The cash-pot will also allow ZoomDoc GPs to cover other major towns across the UK as it is currently only being used in London, this includes investment in marketing to help raise awareness about the service.

His ‘frustration’ working as a GP and not being able to deliver care to enough patients was the driving force behind ZoomDoc.

“I wanted to create an app so a GP could work on demand and can work on their terms,” Livingstone said.

“I can log into the app wherever I am in the UK and choose how far I am willing to travel.”

ZoomDoc works by patients logging on to the app and then choosing a local doctor who is on call before requesting a home visit or telephone advice.

Home visits start at £99 while telephone advice starts at £25.

However the website states that these prices can increase during evening, weekends and bank holidays.

You can see how the app works in the video below.

Livingstone said ZoomDoc is aimed at those who are prepared to pay to see a doctor, adding that the app does not ‘cherry-pick’ patients which is what video consultation app, GP at Hand, was accused of.

He also said a recent call out was an example of how ZoomDoc can ease the pressures on A&E departments.

“I received a call from parents of a 14-week-old baby who could not get access to their GP and was told by NHS 111 to go to A&E.

“However I managed to see the child within 30 minutes because of ZoomDoc and the parents avoided a trip to A&E’.”

Looking to the future, Livingstone said he is hoping to eventually work with the NHS.

“We want to work with the NHS and support it,” he said.

Output: UK start-up ZoomDoc has launched a £500,000 ($672,000) crowdsourcing campaign as it seeks to expand its GP-on-demand service. The app is a paid service which lets users in London book a National Health Service-registered GP to come to their home. It has been downloaded 5,000 times since soft-launching in May. ZoomDoc Founder Dr Kenny Livingstone said increasing demand meant the company needed to raise money for recruiting more GPs and expanding across the UK. Advice over the phone starts at £25, while costs for home visits start at £99.


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AI healthcare start-up Prognos secures $20.5m
 Detection can be the difference between getting cured or succumbing to disease in many cases. As health records and diagnostics all go digital, a wealth of data is being created and recorded that can be used to prevent disease. Prognos sits at the center of this growing market and application. Leveraging AI and a number of sophisticated algorithms, the Prognos platform analyzes clinical lab results to drive decisions early. While we often read about AI being used to some trivial application, this startup has the potential to literally change the world with its ground breaking technology.

AlleyWatch sat down with CEO and cofounder, Sundeep Bhan to learn more about the startup, its origin, future plans, and most recent round of funding.

Who were your investors and how much did you raise?

This was a Series C round, which raised $20.5 million. Our existing investors are Merck Global Health Innovation Fund (GHI), and Safeguard Scientifics who also invested in Prognos during this round. The new investors are Cigna, GIS Strategic Ventures (the venture capital arm of the Guardian Life Insurance Company), Hermed, Hikma Ventures and Maywic.

Tell us about your Prognos.

Prognos has built the largest lab connectivity network in the U.S., processed and analyzed over 13 billion lab records for more than 180 million patients, and developed 1,000+ proprietary machine learning-enabled algorithms across 50 conditions, such as diabetes, asthma, and non-small cell lung cancer, for the lab data management and analysis.

What inspired you to start Prognos?

The understanding that anyone is vulnerable to the disease and, in many cases, if a disease is diagnosed and treated earlier, that may impact outcomes, particularly in oncology patients. Prognos concentrates on clinical lab results, which drive about 70% of medical decisions and are available in real time. Clinical lab data indicates – as soon as the lab test results are ready – how a patient is doing, if he or she needs a specific therapy or is ready for a change in therapy. Prognos originated as a concept of eradicating disease, and we started with answering the questions about improving health by tracking and predicting disease at the earliest using AI and lab data.

How is it different?

While other analytics vendors claim they use lab data, they typically use data from chart pulls, which is also limited in that EHRs only contain on average 40% lab data. Prognos is the only company in the U.S. that has built the direct lab connectivity network on such a scale.

What market you are targeting and how big is it?

According to Frost & Sullivan recent market analysis on Healthcare Artificial Intelligence Solutions Market, the addressable healthcare analytics market size for Prognos’s products has the potential to reach $6.7 billion by 2021 (growing at a staggering 40% CAGR).

What’s your business model?

We license our products to Life Science companies and payers.

Can you tell us more about how AI is changing healthcare?

We are moving towards accurate forward-looking and real-time insights. The way Prognos uses AI with lab data, often integrated with prescription and claims data, is to predict the diagnosis before it is made and identify therapy that will address the condition best based on the patient’s clinical profile. We are capable of saying, this patient has, for example, a 40% probability to develop a certain condition within the next 90 days.

What factors about Prognos led your investors to write the check?

The most significant factors are the total addressable healthcare market that we serve and the proven business model.

What are the milestones you plan to achieve in the next six months?

Prognos will continue to focus on enabling earlier identification of patients who can benefit from enhanced treatment decision-making to drive better outcomes. These new investments will enhance Prognos product offerings to help Life Science companies across the entire commercial lifecycle and our payer clients.

What advice can you offer companies in New York that do not have a fresh injection of capital in the bank?

Enter a large market and be able to articulate your business model.

Where do you see the company going now over the near term?

In the near-term, we are focused on expanding our Life Science portfolio to include healthcare media-focused, market access/RWE (e.g., value-based contracting), and R&D-centric offerings, all of which involve expanding to new audiences with some combination of existing and new products. We are also enhancing our existing commercially focused offerings–increasing speed of delivery, expanding delivery channels and creating end-to-end marketing programs–as we work with innovative clients on NextGen marketing initiatives. To better serve our diagnostic laboratory partners and clients, we are investing in market measurement services and also evaluating clinical trial services. Our payer portfolio is expanding beyond risk/care management products as we invest in underwriting capabilities.

Where is your favorite bar in the city for an after work drink?

Our offices are at WeWork, where we can chat over a beer at the end of the day.

Output: New York City start-up Prognos has raised $20.5m towards using artificial intelligence (AI) to help predict and prevent disease. The company has built a lab connectivity network in the US that processes more than 13 billion lab records for over 180 million patients. It has also developed more than a 1,000 machine-learning algorithms across 50 conditions including asthma and diabetes. The series C funding round included support from existing investors Merck Global Health Innovation Fund and Safeguard Scientifics, as well as new funders including Cigna and GIS Strategic Ventures.


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CBA to make 'tap-on-phone' contactless payments a reality
 Commonwealth Bank of Australia business customers will soon be able to accept a payment by simply tapping their phone with a contactless card or mobile wallet.

Commonwealth Bank will use a white label version of Mobeewave's SoftPOS technology and Digital Enablement from Idemia to deliver the service, which will me made available for Mastercard transactions on Samsung flagship devices from the second half of 2018.

The technology is a real threat to the dongle-dependent mPOS technology of firms like Square as it requires no additional hardware plug ins to accept payments. When Square launched in Australia last year, CBA initially moved to block payments over the card reader citing security concerns.

Sam Itzcovitz, Commonwealth Bank managing director commerce and platforms, says: “This solution gives Australian small businesses the ability to accept in person payments quickly and simply using just their phone so they can get on with running their business.”

Mastercard research has shown that more than four in five Australian consumers are using contactless payment at least once a week, but fewer are making use of mobile contactless payment services.

Matt Barr, SVP, core, digital and new payment flows of Mastercard Australasia, says: “This pilot brings us one step closer to our vision of 'enabling every device to become an acceptance device'. We all use our phones to make payments, why not use them to accept payments as well. With its high use of contactless technology, Australia is an ideal environment to roll out this type of “tap-on-phone” solution.”

Output: Small retailers in Australia will soon be able to accept card payments from customers using just a mobile phone. Commonwealth Bank of Australia (CBA) has signed a deal to allow its customers use the "tap-on-phone" SoftPOS system developed by Canadian tech firm Mobeewave, which enables customers to pay by simply tapping their card to the retailer's phone screen. Mastercard payments of up to AUD100 ($76.64) will be possible through the system.


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Driverless cars given human-like view of the world
 Eyes on the Road

We're closer to making self-driving cars a reality than ever before, but at the moment the best options available to the public are along the lines of Tesla's Autopilot system, which are assistive, rather than all-out, autonomy. To get to the next stage, many would agree that we need better sensors.

AEye, a company founded by Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and NASA veteran Luis Dussan, is aiming to produce just that. Dussan started out with a plan to create artificial intelligence that could underpin a self-driving car, but soon found that sensors were the weak link.

The majority of autonomous vehicles use lidar sensors, which use laser beams to take a reading of their surroundings. They're limited in two key areas: they're expensive, and they can only emit beams at preset angles.

AEye wants to use solid-state lidar sensors, which cast a laser beam back and forth across a scene. Most current applications of this technology utilize a regular scanning method, but Dussan wants to use two distinct types of scan instead: low resolution scans of a wide area, and high resolution scans of a smaller section, where the priority can be reprogrammed on the fly.

"You can trade resolution, scene revisit rate, and range at any point in time," Dussan says. "The same sensor can adapt." Much like the human eye, the hardware would be able to focus in on what's most important depending on the driving conditions present at any given time.

AEye isn't the only company looking to push the state of sensors forward. Apple has been working on a self-driving project in relative secrecy, but its AI chief Ruslan Salakhutdinov recently offered some details about what to expect.

Apple is said to be developing sensors that are capable of identifying objects even when the lens is affected or obscured by conditions, like rainfall. Localization and mapping techniques will be used alongside the sensors to create detailed 3D maps that help with decision-making.

Drive Safe

Of course, all these attempts to create better sensors have one goal in mind: safer roads. While the masses may take a while to warm up to the idea of self-driving cars, there's plenty of evidence that autonomy will make traveling by car much safer.

The wrinkle is that we'll only see the best results when most — if not all — cars are piloted by computers. Self-driving vehicles will be able to communicate among themselves with perfect clarity, but anticipating the actions of a human driver could cause complications.

Still, advanced sensors will help make this a reality, sooner. Whether we're talking human drivers or just pedestrians, self-driving cars will always have to deal with unpredictable human behavior. Receiving as much information as possible in an efficient manner via cutting edge sensors is one way to improve our the safety of our roads.

Output: AEye, a company founded by Lockheed Martin, Northrop Grumman, and NASA veteran Luis Dussan, is aiming to produce solid-state LIDAR sensors, which it says work more like a human eye, by focusing on what is most important, depending on the driving conditions present at any given time.


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China's Xiaomi may still enter India's car market
 Company says regulatory filing was not an application to sell cars and related components in India, though it considers the country its top market

Output: Chinese smartphone maker Xiaomi says it may build and sell cars in India at some point, but has no immediate plans to do so. The company has prioritised the world's second most populous market and plans to invest $1bn in 100 Indian start-ups over the next five years to create an ecosystem of apps for Xiaomi phones, founder and CEO Lei Jun said in November. The company is also considering selling other products ranging from laptops to financial services but it is one of the few Chinese technology giants not to have invested in autonomous vehicles.


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Tesco could face law suit over ‘fake farm’ branding
 Major UK supermarkets including Tesco, Aldi, Asda and Lidl are being urged to stop using controversial “fake farm” branding on own-brand meat products, with a food charity claiming they are misleading shoppers.

The Feedback charity is backing the owner of a genuine farm called Woodside Farm – a name Tesco has also used on its value pork range since 2016 – and is threatening legal proceedings if the retail giant does not drop the name Woodside Farms.

Its “Total Bull” campaign says it believes shoppers are being misled with “disingenuous” branding that gives the impression it comes from real farms.

“Let’s be clear – supermarkets are selling meat under fake farm names, deliberately encouraging consumers to believe that the meat is sourced from small-scale producers,” said Feedback’s campaign director, Jessica Sinclair Taylor. “We believe this is peddling a load of bull.”

In March 2016 Tesco, the UK’s largest retailer, sparked controversy after launching a budget range of seven own-label “farm” brands – including Woodside Farms and Boswell Farms for fruit and veg as well as meat – based on British-sounding but fictitious names. Some foods were imported from overseas and given British names to make them sound local.

In April, Asda reignited the row by relaunching its value Smart Price food range as Farm Stores while German discounter Aldi replaced its Wood Farm brand with Nature’s Pick earlier this year and Lidl has a “Birchwood Farm” meat range. Marks & Spencer sells “Scottish Lochmuir” smoked salmon and “Oakham” chicken – neither are real farms.

Advert for ‘Birchwood Farm’ meat from Lidl. Photograph: Ian Francis/Alamy Stock Photo

Richard Baugh of Woodside Farm in Nottinghamshire, raises free-range pigs for his own pork products sold under his farm name through his farm shop and website. But since Tesco replaced its Tesco Value brand with “Woodside Farms”, he says he has faced confusion from customers.

“We’ve been raising pigs at Woodside Farm for 20 years – this is our livelihood,” Baugh said. “When it first came out customers were asking all the time whether we were supplying Tesco. We don’t, our pork is free-range and we think it’s higher welfare and quality than the pork they’re selling, and we’re proud of that.

Feedback wrote to Tesco on behalf of Baugh, complaining that its labelling risks confusion with his farm name and reputation, while misleading consumers about the origins of their meat.

The non-governmental organisation, which is seeking to reform Britain’s “broken” food system, has also awarded Tesco its “Total Bull” award for the number of fake farm labels it uses, and is urging shoppers to write to Tesco to shame it into dropping the branding.

Tesco said it was aware of the threat of legal action and declined to comment, but directed the Guardian to the publication of its interim results for 2017/18 when it said: “Our exclusive fresh food brands continue to be popular with customers – featuring in over 70% of baskets.”

The National Farmers’ Union (NFU) and the Soil Association have also condemned fake farm brands as misleading for consumers and insulting to farmers. Last July, the NFU filed an official complaint about Tesco’s brands with Trading Standards, but the non-existent farm staple remains on supermarket shelves.

Output: UK supermarkets including Aldi, Asda, Lidl and Tesco, have been accused of misleading the public through their controversial use of “fake farm” branding on meat products, by food waste charity Feedback. The charity is supporting the owner of the real Woodside Farm, a name which Tesco has used on pork products since 2016, and is threatening to take the supermarket to court if it continues to use the name. The “Total Bull” campaign argues that consumers are being deceived by branding that falsely suggests that products come from small-scale UK suppliers.


Instruction: create a high quality summary of the given input

Input:
English rivers experiencing chronic insecticide contamination
 Rivers in England are contaminated with powerful insecticides, new testing has revealed, increasing concerns over the impact of the toxic chemicals on fish and birds.

Neonicotinoids were banned from use on flowering crops in the European Union in 2013 due to the harm they cause to bees and other vital pollinators. Following even more evidence of harm, an EU vote to extend the ban to all outdoor uses is expected soon.

However, evidence is also growing that neonicotinoids – the world’s most widely used insecticide – harm other species, such as songbirds. Neonicotinoids have been in use since the early 1990s and now contaminate landscapes around the world. But very little monitoring of their concentration in soils or water is done, a failing recently condemned by a UK government chief scientific adviser.

The first systematic testing of neonicotinoids in rivers in Britain was mandated by EU water regulations and conducted in 2016. The results, obtained by the conservation charity Buglife, show that half of the 16 rivers tested in England had either chronic or acute levels of contamination. Of the 23 rivers tested across Britain, neonicotinoids were not detected in six.

No official limits exist in the EU for neonicotinoid pollution in freshwater. But a peer-reviewed scientific analysis published in 2015 recommended chronic and acute levels that should not be exceeded “to avoid lasting effects on aquatic invertebrate communities”, and these were used by Buglife to asses the new river data.

Like flying insects, aquatic insects are vulnerable to neonicotinoids and provide the main source of food for many fish and birds. Recent research in the Netherlands has shown chronic neonicotinoid pollution in water led to sharp drops in insect numbers and was linked to heavy falls in bird numbers.

“We are devastated to discover that many British rivers have been heavily damaged by neonicotinoid insecticides,” said Matt Shardlow, CEO of Buglife.

Mark Lloyd, CEO of the Angling Trust, said: “These results are highly alarming in the context of widespread declines in aquatic insect life and fish populations. We urge the government to act urgently to ban continued use of these chemicals to protect wildlife, fisheries and drinking water.”

The most polluted river tested was the river Waveney on the Norfolk/Suffolk Border, where the acute harm level was exceeded for a whole month in the summer of 2016. Sugar beet fields are the most likely source of pollution, said Shardlow.

The nearby river Wensum, in a Special Area of Conservation for its river life, was also chronically polluted. Both rivers supply the Norfolk Broads, an internationally important wetland site and home to many endangered aquatic animals.

The proposed EU ban would still allow neonicotinoids to be used in greenhouses and as a flea treatment for pets. A new Greenpeace study suggests neonicotinoids are frequently found in waterways close to greenhouses where they have been used. The new tests found contamination in a stream in the Cairngorms, which Shardlow said is most likely the result of a treated dog entering the stream.

“It is vital that action is taken to completely ban these toxins, including in greenhouses and on pets, before another year of disgraceful pollution occurs,” he said.

Arlin Rickard, CEO of the Rivers Trust, said: “We work closely with farmers and growers to reduce and better target chemical and fertiliser usage, however some chemicals are just too damaging and persistent to be tolerated.”

A spokesman for the National Farmers Union said: “British farmers take their environmental responsibilities seriously and have high levels of pesticide stewardship through schemes like the Voluntary Initiative, which offer advice and actions designed to keep pesticides out of water. The Environment Agency closely monitors pesticides in rivers and we are not aware of it raising any specific concerns about high levels of neonicotinoids.”

Output: English rivers are contaminated with neonicotinoids, the world’s most widely used insecticides, according to 2016 tests carried out under European Union (EU) regulations and obtained by the Buglife charity. The tests show that of the 23 UK rivers tested, just six were free of neonicotinoids, with around half of the 16 tested in England indicating chronic or acute contamination. The EU has banned the use of neonicotinoids on flowering crops since 2013 due to their impact on pollinators. A ban on all outdoor use is expected soon. Evidence is growing that neonicotinoids harm other species, including birds and fish.


Instruction: create a high quality summary of the given input

Input:
Redrow Application granted for 158 houses and flats in Warrington
 Redrow Homes is to build 158 houses and flats on Omega South, Warrington following the granting of reserved matters consent. The application was submitted by Redrow and Omega Warrington Ltd.

Plans for a further 86 Redrow homes on neighbouring land are still under consideration.

With construction of 200 homes already underway by Miller Homes, the Redrow scheme will become phase two of the build-out of residential at Omega South. Through multiple housebuilders, up to 1,100 homes will be delivered over the next decade.

Colin Graham, development director at Omega Warrington Ltd, said: “Our selection of Redrow follows significant interest earlier this year from a variety of major national housebuilders when the opportunity to build phase two was put out to market.

“We believe Redrow’s credentials make them the right housebuilder to deliver the quality of new homes we have committed to at Omega.”

Redrow’s Omega operation will be in two phases – the initial 158 homes, on a 14.5-acre site off Sophia Drive, will be a mixture of 30 two-bedroom apartments, along with terraced and semi-detached housing. It will include 48 starter homes. The following 86 houses, off Omega Boulevard, will be larger three, four and five-bedroom homes.

Work will commence imminently to prepare the site for development. Redrow expects the project in full to take three years.

Warrington Borough Council granted outline consent in June 2016 for 1,100 homes on Omega South. Landowner the Homes & Communities Agency is a partner on the project. Omega Warrington Ltd is a partnership between Miller Developments and KUC Properties, part of Royal Bank of Scotland Real Estate Asset Management.

Output: Redrow has been granted planning permission for 158 hours and flats at the Omega South development in Warrington. The scheme will be the second phase of development on the land, where Miller Homes have already begun construction of 200 homes. Up to 1,100 properties are set to be built by multiple developers at the site over the next 10 years. Proposals for another 86 Redrow homes on neighbouring land are still under consideration.


Instruction: create a high quality summary of the given input

Input:
US healthcare industry on the brink of major tech disruption
 Photo: Patrick Hertzog/AFP/Getty Images

Health care, like many other industries, has undergone a massive transformation over the past decade, with huge changes in social norms and consumer behaviors. Ten years ago, it was unheard of to rent a stranger’s apartment instead of booking a hotel room, to publicly post your kids’ baby pictures for the world to see, or to get out of a taxi without opening your wallet. And yet here we are. Technological advancements, inefficiencies in supply, and shifts in consumer behaviors have wrought fundamental changes in industry after industry—retail, travel, entertainment, and yes, health care.

The incumbents in those industries seldom saw the change coming. They recognized the threat these changes posed to their core business but were unable to break out of their mental paradigms about how they traditionally win in the marketplace to alter their course. Walmart recognized the threat Amazon posed, but it tried to solve the problem like a large retailer rather than as a digitally native company.

Pattern Recognition: Seeing the Tipping Point

Identifying the next big tipping point comes down to pattern recognition. An industry is ripe for disruptive innovation when a number of conditions collide. First, you’ll see unhappy consumers, facing many hassles or frustrations, and you’ll also see waste or inefficiencies in the supply side of the system.

Then, you need a catalyst. It could be a regulatory push, a new technological advancement, or a shift in social norms to tip the industry and create conditions ripe for disruption.

We are seeing this dangerous mix of conditions right now in health care. Regulatory changes are enabling new reimbursement models; new data and insights promise to revolutionize diagnostic capabilities and to personalize care; and consumers are beginning to expect their doctors and health plans to offer the same convenience and personalization that online shopping or ordering an Uber does.

Are We Ready for the Tipping Point?

There hasn’t actually been much movement in health care. The Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services announced that by 2018, 50 percent of all payments must be tied to value. We are not yet seeing wholesale movement in that direction, particularly by incumbents, but we are seeing startups recognize the opportunity and enter.

Take Cityblock, a startup launched by Alphabet—Google’s parent company—that offers innovative, team-based primary care, behavioral health, and social services to Medicare and Medicaid patients. Imagine the implications of Alphabet/Google providing value-based care to low-income patients with severe chronic diseases, harnessing the power of the data graph they already own, and matching that to these new data streams. That could be a significant disruptor.

The changes coming to health care are immutable. The industry will be disrupted from outside if not from within.

Another metric to watch—that also suggests there hasn’t been enough movement in health care—is Net Promoter Score measures, which is a management tool used to gauge customer loyalty and serves as an alternative to traditional customer satisfaction surveys. Health care companies—health plans and primary care physicians— typically score in the high single digits/low double digits. And they are increasingly competing against retail and technology companies with scores in the high 60s or low 70s. Take Amazon, with a Net Promoter Score of 69. It’s playing an increasing role in health care with two notable developments, its partnership with Merck to do care management via Alexa and 1492’s foray into health care technology. That isn’t even a fair fight.

The Health Care Industry Will Need To Adapt

The changes we see coming to health care are immutable forces; the industry will be disrupted from the outside if not from within. Players in the industry will need to make purposeful business decisions—identifying where the sources of economic value and strategic control will be and ensuring they have the right assets and capabilities to secure them.

Click here to watch the full main stage session, “Industry Interrupted: Why Healthcare is Ripe for Disruption,” from this year’s Oliver Wyman Health Innovation Summit.

Output: The US healthcare industry is likely to be the next sector to face major disruption, argues management consultant Helen Leis. Regulatory changes, new ways of using data and improved diagnostic capabilities all enable more individualised care, just as the public is growing to expect the standard of service and personalisation offered by companies such as Amazon and Uber. For example, Cityblock, an Alphabet-backed start-up, aims to take advantage of the new requirement for 50% of medical payments to be tied to value by offering innovative data-based primary care and other services to Medicare and Medicaid patients.


Instruction: create a high quality summary of the given input

Input:
AIG introduces cyber risk score for clients
 NEW YORK--(BUSINESS WIRE)--American International Group, Inc. (NYSE: AIG) today announced a new cyber benchmarking model that quantifies and scores client cyber risk.

The AIG model evaluates a client’s cyber security maturity against 10 common attack patterns across 11 commonly used technology devices. The model incorporates critical security data, such as current threat intelligence from multiple sources, effectiveness of an organization’s cyber controls, potential impact of a cyber breach on an organization, and insights gained from the thousands of cyber claims handled by AIG.

AIG cyber clients, who provide the required information, can receive a report detailing security scores, peer benchmarking, and key risk mitigation controls to help quantify cyber risk.

“We developed the model based on historical insights and patterns of how companies experience cyber breaches – the points of entry and the types of attacks and vulnerabilities seen in the vast majority of cyber breach scenarios,” says Tracie Grella, Head of Cyber Risk Insurance, AIG. “Companies have been demanding a way to benchmark their cyber maturity against these known cyber risks to quantify what they are up against and where they stand.”

To further support its model, AIG is launching CyberMatics, a patent pending security approach with leading AI cyber security companies CrowdStrike and Darktrace. CyberMatics verifies inputs into AIG’s model from clients’ cyber security tools. This provides greater confidence in underwriting information, and ultimately allows for better tailored terms and conditions in cyber insurance policies.

“As an insurer, we gain a better understanding of the level of risk we are taking on with each client so we can react accordingly,” said Ms. Grella. “Our new model combined with CyberMatics can help our clients make informed and quantifiable decisions about their preparedness for cyber security risk events and insurance cover.”

AIG’s Cyber Risk Consultants, part of AIG Client Risk Solutions, can help clients act on risk scoring and evaluate data for system vulnerabilities and negative risk trends.

About CrowdStrike®

CrowdStrike is the leader in cloud-delivered endpoint protection. Leveraging artificial intelligence (AI), the CrowdStrike Falcon® platform offers instant visibility and protection across the enterprise and prevents attacks on endpoints on or off the network. CrowdStrike Falcon deploys in minutes to deliver actionable intelligence and real-time protection from Day One. It seamlessly unifies next-generation AV with best-in-class endpoint detection and response, backed by 24/7 managed hunting. Its cloud infrastructure and single-agent architecture take away complexity and add scalability, manageability, and speed.

About Darktrace

Darktrace is the world’s leading machine learning company for cyber security. Created by mathematicians from the University of Cambridge, the Enterprise Immune System uses AI algorithms to automatically detect and take action against cyber-threats within all types of networks, including physical, cloud and virtualized networks, as well as IoT and industrial control systems. A self-configuring platform, Darktrace requires no prior set-up, identifying advanced threats in real time, including zero-days, insiders and stealthy, silent attackers. Headquartered in San Francisco and Cambridge, UK, Darktrace has 30 offices worldwide.

American International Group, Inc. (AIG) is a leading global insurance organization. Founded in 1919, today AIG member companies provide a wide range of property casualty insurance, life insurance, retirement products, and other financial services to customers in more than 80 countries and jurisdictions. These diverse offerings include products and services that help businesses and individuals protect their assets, manage risks and provide for retirement security. AIG common stock is listed on the New York Stock Exchange and the Tokyo Stock Exchange.

Additional information about AIG can be found at www.aig.com | YouTube: www.youtube.com/aig | Twitter: @AIGinsurance www.twitter.com/AIGinsurance | LinkedIn: www.linkedin.com/company/aig. These references with additional information about AIG have been provided as a convenience, and the information contained on such websites is not incorporated by reference into this press release.

AIG is the marketing name for the worldwide property-casualty, life and retirement, and general insurance operations of American International Group, Inc. For additional information, please visit our website at www.aig.com. All products and services are written or provided by subsidiaries or affiliates of American International Group, Inc. Products or services may not be available in all countries, and coverage is subject to actual policy language. Non-insurance products and services may be provided by independent third parties. Certain property-casualty coverages may be provided by a surplus lines insurer. Surplus lines insurers do not generally participate in state guaranty funds, and insureds are therefore not protected by such funds.

Output: US insurer AIG is introducing a cyber score for its clients, allowing them to assess their readiness to face cyber threats while offering comparisons with peers. The score is calculated by assessing a client's response to 10 typical cyber attack patterns across 11 types of device. The firm is also launching a new cybersecurity initiative in collaboration with security firms CrowdStrike and Darktrace. The initiative, dubbed CyberMatics, will seek to verify information input into AIG's cybersecurity model by clients, aiming to increase the accuracy of underwriting.


Instruction: create a high quality summary of the given input

Input:
London insurtech Quantemplate raises $3.3m in funding
 Quantemplate, an InsurTech firm specializing in machine learning data transformation and analytics, raised $3.3 million in new funding to fuel its expansion plans in the UK, US. and European markets.

The London, UK-based startup has also appointed David Lundgren as CEO and board director.

Columbia Lake Partners participated in the new financing, which also included contributions from Quantemplate’s original investors: Route 66 Ventures and Anthemis (both specialists in InsurTech venture capital). TransAmerica Ventures and Allianz also participated.

Lundgren brings to Quantemplate deep insurance industry and operational expertise from firms such as Allianz, CUNA Mutual, General Electric, and AgPro Exchange, the company said. He currently serves on the boards of Jewelers Mutual and Bunker.

Quantemplate has raised $13.4 million overall since its founding five years ago.

Designed for insurers and reinsurers, Quantemplate automatically unifies the disparate types of data these companies have to process, solving issues of data integrity or compatibility through machine learning, the company said, explaining that traditional technologies and outsourcing have fallen short when faced with these problems.

By contrast, Quantemplate relies on analytics to provide business insights around market opportunity, underwriting profitability, claims and fraud, and MGA (managing general agent) integration, the company added.

Source: Quantemplate

Output: Insurtech Quantemplate has raised $3.3m in funding to help it expand in the UK, US and Europe. Targeted at insurers and reinsurers, the London-based fintech uses machine learning to unify and analyse the disparate types of data processed by these companies. Quantemplate has raised $13.4m since being founded five years ago. The new financing came from Columbia Lake Partners, with participation from Route 66 Ventures and Allianz, among others.


Instruction: create a high quality summary of the given input

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China adds DNA database to scrutiny of restive minority region
 Chinese authorities are collecting DNA samples, fingerprints and other biometric data from every resident in a far western region, Human Rights Watch has said.

Officials are also building a database of iris scans and blood types of everyone aged between 12 and 65 in Xinjiang, adding to controls in a place some experts have called an “open-air prison”.

The region is home to over 11 million Uighurs, a Muslim Turkic minority, and is occasionally hit by bouts of violence.

The data can be used for “surveillance of persons because of ethnicity, religion, opinion or other protected exercise of rights like free speech”, according to Human Rights Watch.

Part of the collection is being done through government-provided medical checkups, and it is unclear if patients are aware the exam is also designed to transmit biometric data to the police.

Although the checks are officially voluntary, one Uighur said local cadres “had demanded that they must participate in the physicals”. A story in a local newspaper encouraged officials to “work hard to convince them to participate”.

Nearly 19 million people have participated in the medical exams, dubbed Physicals for All, in 2017, according to state news agency Xinhua. For people determined to be “focus personnel” – a euphemism for those the government views as dangerous – their data will be collected regardless of age.

“The mandatory databanking of a whole population’s biodata, including DNA, is a gross violation of international human rights norms,” said Sophie Richardson, China director at Human Rights Watch. “It’s even more disturbing if it is done surreptitiously, under the guise of a free healthcare program.

“Xinjiang authorities should rename their physical exams project ‘Privacy Violations for All’, as informed consent and real choice does not seem to be part of these programs,” she added.

Officials in the region claim the scheme is meant to improve policies aimed at poverty alleviation. They also say it is targeted at “social stability”, a phrase commonly used to describe crackdowns on government critics.

In the massive effort to collect biometric data from millions of residents, police in Xinjiang bought DNA sequencers from the US company Thermo Fisher Scientific, according to Human Rights Watch. The company refused to directly address its products being used in Xinjiang, saying only: “We do expect all of our customers to act in accordance with appropriate regulations and industry-standard best practices.”

Biometric data collection also applies to people originally from Xinjiang who have moved to other parts of China, where they will be required to submit their information locally.

Xinjiang is one of the most tightly controlled parts of China, with the Uighur minority facing increased scrutiny in recent years. Heavily armed troops on city streets are a common sight and the authorities frequently hold mass rallies to bolster their support in the fight against the Islamic extremists Beijing blames for a series of attacks on government officials and civilians.

But rights groups say most of the violence stems from restrictions on religion, culture, language and expression, as well as a lack of economic opportunities in the impoverished region. Uighurs often complain high-paying jobs are given only to Han Chinese.

Output: Chinese officials are collecting DNA samples and building a database of iris scans and blood types from everyone aged between 12 and 65 in Xinjiang, a restive region that is home to more than 11 million minority muslim Uighurs. Human Rights Watch said the additional scrutiny in the far-western region amounts to building an "open-air prison". "The mandatory databanking of a whole population"s biodata, including DNA, is a gross violation of international human rights norms. It's even more disturbing if it is done surreptitiously, under the guise of a free healthcare programme," said China director Sophie Richardson.


Instruction: create a high quality summary of the given input

Input:
AI's inexperience may worsen the next stock-market crash
 Artificial intelligence is increasingly used to make decisions in financial markets. Fund managers empower AI to make trading decisions, frequently by identifying patterns in financial data. The more data that AI has, the more it learns. And with the financial world producing data at an ever-increasing rate, AI should be getting better. But what happens if the data the AI encounters isn’t normal or represents an anomaly?

Globally, around 10 times more data (pdf) was generated in 2017 than in 2010. This means that the best quality data is also highly concentrated in the recent past—a world that has been running on cheap money, supplied by central banks through purchases of safe securities, which is not a “normal” state for the market. This has had a number of effects, from causing a rise in “zombie” firms to creating generational lows in volatility to encouraging unusually large corporate buybacks (pdf).

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With so much data residing in this era, AI might not know what a “normal” market actually looks like. Robert Kaplan, the president of the Federal Reserve Bank of Dallas, recently pointed out some of the market extremes that exist today. The essay included a caution that growing imbalances in the economy could increase the risk of a rapid adjustment.

US stock market capitalization is now around 135% of GDP, the highest since 2000;

Corporate debt is at record highs;

Trading volume for 2017 on the New York Stock Exchange is down 51% from 2007, while the NYSE market capitalization is up 28%;

Record low volatility where the US market has gone 12 months without a 3% correction.

Today’s volatility is “extraordinarily unusual,” Kaplan noted. Cheap credit makes markets less volatile. When credit is easy, a company can rely on the promise of cheap debt to support itself so the value of equity becomes less volatile. Markets have experienced periods of low volatility before—and each time they have ended with a shock. If this current period ends violently, AI trained on predictable central-bank money flows will be unable to reconcile what it sees in new data from what it’s been trained on.

The Financial Stability Board, an international body based in Basel, Switzerland set up by the G20 in the aftermath of the last financial crisis, recently studied (pdf) the potential impacts of AI and machine learning on financial stability. One of the risks highlighted was the increased use of AI by hedge funds and market makers. Because AI is so effective at optimizing complex systems, its use can further tighten trading parameters that are vital for market stability, such as how much capital a bank has in relation to its outstanding trading positions.

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With its increasing use in financial markets, it will play a role in the next market correction, perhaps a critical one, as an era of low volatility, high debt, and cheap money comes to an end. AI will need sufficient data across a big enough timespan for the models to adapt to new market conditions without overreacting.

The question is, if and when a shock comes and an entirely unfamiliar situation arises, what will the financial AIs do? As the financial system gets more interconnected, AI could spread the impact of extreme shocks faster, making the entire system potentially less stable during a shock event. This is particularly true if data sources and AI strategies are shared, and then there is a shock to a particular data source.

Consider the example of a data shock in the case of self-driving cars. When Google was training its self-driving car on the streets of Mountain View, California, the car rounded a corner and encountered a woman in a wheelchair, waving a broom, chasing a duck. The car hadn’t encountered this before so it stopped and waited. When a Tesla driving on autopilot failed to recognize a truck turning across it on the freeway, it kept going. In both cases, the situations were unfamiliar—but one had a failsafe and the other simply failed.

AI simply isn’t good in situations it doesn’t yet recognize.

Output: Artificial intelligence (AI) platforms used to make investment decisions may exacerbate the next stock-market crash because they are not experienced enough to handle crises. AI systems perform badly in situations they don't recognise and they'll be ill-prepared to manage a crash because the data they use is culled from an unusually stable period of economic activity.


Instruction: create a high quality summary of the given input

Input:
Climate change tripled likelihood of Hurricane Harvey rains
 Hurricane Harvey’s unprecedented deluge, which caused catastrophic flooding in Houston in August, was made three times more likely by climate change, new research has found.

Such a downpour was a very rare event, scientists said, but global warming meant it was 15% more intense. The storm left 80 people dead and 800,000 in need of assistance.

The scientists from the World Weather Attribution (WWA) initiative usually publish their assessments of the role of climate change in extreme weather events around the world as soon as possible. However, in this case they waited for the work to be confirmed by peer review because of the current US government’s opposition to strong action on climate change.

The researchers said their new work shows global warming is making extreme weather events worse right now and in the US. The cost of the damage caused by Hurricane Harvey has been estimated at $190bn (£140bn), which would make it the most costly weather disaster in US history, more than Hurricanes Katrina and Sandy combined.

A series of new reports have found that extreme heatwaves, droughts, floods, storms and wildfires across the planet have been made more likely or more intense by rising global temperatures. The UK’s Energy and Climate Intelligence Unit (ECIU) analysed 59 studies of the influence of climate change on extreme weather published in the last two years and found warming has made matters worse in 70% of cases and better in just 7%.

Another report, published on Wednesday by the American Meteorological Society, assesses 21 different extreme weather events in 2016, from US snowstorms and South African drought to ocean hotspots and Arctic heating. Most of the events can be attributed, at least in part, to human-caused climate change, the scientists found.

Hurricane Harvey made first landfall on 25 August and then stalled over Texas, with torrential downpours dumping a year’s worth of rain on Houston and surrounding areas in a few days. In east Harris County, a record 132cm (52 inches) of rain fell over six days, the highest storm total in US history.

The WWA scientists used both historical rainfall records and high-resolution climate models to determine the influence of global warming. “This multi-method analysis confirms that heavy rainfall events are increasing substantially across the Gulf Coast region because of human interference with our climate system,” said Geert Jan van Oldenborgh, at the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute (KNMI) and lead author of the new study published in Environmental Research Letters.

“It was very a rare event – they were very unlucky,” said van Oldenborgh. But the research shows the chance of it happening was raised threefold by climate change.

The team also estimated that, even if the world limits warming to the internationally agreed 2C limit, the likelihood of such extreme downpours will triple again. “But, if we miss those targets, the increase in frequency and intensity could be much higher,” said Karin van der Wiel, also at KNMI.

“The link between global warming and more extreme weather is nowhere more obvious than in the US. Even if Donald Trump isn’t seeing the picture, many others are,” said Richard Black at the ECIU.

Friederike Otto, at Oxford University, said: “We’re now finding that for many kinds of extreme weather event, especially heatwaves and extreme rainfall, we can be quite confident about the effect of climate change. The ECIU report shows just how quickly knowledge is accumulating, and I think it’s only going to accelerate.”

Climate scientists have long predicted that global warming would increase extreme weather, based on simple physics that means warmer air can contain more water vapour and therefore lead to more intense rain.

Major storms are powered by the warmth of the water at the ocean’s surface, and therefore hotter seas lead to more violent storms. But the fast developing science of climate change attribution now means the role of climate change in many events happening today can be clearly seen.

Output: Hurricane Harvey’s intense rainfall, which led to extreme flooding in Houston earlier this year, was made three times more likely and 15% more intense due to climate change, according to research by the World Weather Attribution (WWA) initiative. The hurricane, which killed 80 people and left 800,000 needing help, is believed to be the most expensive weather-related disaster in US history, with an estimated total cost of $190bn.


Instruction: create a high quality summary of the given input

Input:
Social media firms should be be liable for abuse: UK committee
 Theresa May should consider the introduction of two new laws to deter the intimidation of MPs during elections and force social media firms to monitor illegal content, an influential committee has said.

The independent Committee on Standards in Public Life, which advises the prime minister on ethics, has called for the introduction within a year of a new specific offence in electoral law to halt widespread abuse when voters go to the polls.

The watchdog will recommend another law to shift the liability for illegal content on to social media firms such as Facebook and Google, a legal change which will be easier once Britain leaves the European Union.

Both changes form part of the hard-hitting conclusions of an inquiry into intimidation experienced by parliamentary candidates in this year’s election campaign.

Other recommendations include:

Social media firms should make decisions quickly to take down intimidatory content.

Political parties should, by December 2018, draw up a joint code of conduct on intimidatory behaviour during election campaigns.

The National Police Chiefs’ Council should ensure that police are trained to investigate offences committed through social media.

Ministers should bring forward rules so that council candidates will no longer be required to release their home addresses.

Lord Bew, the committee chair, said: “This level of vile and threatening behaviour, albeit by a minority of people, against those standing for public office is unacceptable in a healthy democracy. We cannot get to a point where people are put off standing, retreat from debate, and even fear for their lives as a result of their engagement in politics.

“This is not about protecting elites or stifling debate, it is about ensuring we have a vigorous democracy in which participants engage in a responsible way which recognises others’ rights to participate and to hold different points of view.”

A YouGov survey of 1,616 adults last month, commissioned by the committee, found that 49% either agreed or were ambivalent when asked if MPs who received abuse brought it upon themselves. But 62% found it highly unacceptable that any member of the public should send abusive messages to MPs on social media.

A majority of the public – 60% – found it unacceptable that MPs had been disrespectful to members of the public on social media.

MPs reported being subjected to weeks of abuse leading up to the general election, including racism, antisemitism and death threats.

The shadow home secretary, Diane Abbott, was found by Amnesty to have received 45% of all abusive tweets sent during the election, many of which were racist and sexist.

Dozens of MPs had already moved to improve their security after Labour MP Jo Cox was murdered by a rightwing extremist in 2016.

The report said that the intimidation of parliamentary candidates was of particular significance because of the threat it posed to the integrity of the democratic process.

“A new electoral offence of intimidating parliamentary candidates and party campaigners during an election should be considered. This would serve to highlight the seriousness of the issue, result in more appropriate sanctions, and serve as a deterrent,” it said.

Facebook, Twitter and Google “are not simply platforms for the content that others post” because they play a role in shaping what users see, and so “must take more responsibility for illegal material”, the committee said.

They were not liable “largely” due to a EU directive which treated them as “hosts” of online content, the watchdog said, but May’s commitment to Brexit means the government can introduce laws to make companies responsible once the UK leaves the EU.

The report said social media was “the most significant factor” driving harassment, abuse and intimidation of 2017 general election candidates, which included threats of violence and sexual violence, as well as damage to property.

“Some have felt the need to disengage entirely from social media because of the abuse they face, and it has put off others who may wish to stand for public office,” the report said.

“Not enough has been done. The committee is deeply concerned about the limited engagement of the social media companies in tackling these issues.”

The committee said it was concerned about the impact on the diversity of a representative democracy and said parties had an “important responsibility” to support female, black and minority ethnic and LGBT candidates.

Abbott welcomed the proposal for new obligations on social media companies but questioned whether it would be right to call for new legislation covering intimidation. “I’m not persuaded that yet more legislation is required. Intimidation, threatening behaviour and violence are all illegal. These laws need to be enforced for everyone,” she said.

She questioned whether she could work with all political opponents given that some were accused of being behind some social media campaigns. “Yes, of course, political parties should work together to combat intimidation. But some of my opponents have engaged in dog-whistle politics, and not just at election time,” she said.

Output: Social media firms should be made liable for illegal content and there should be a new electoral law to counter the intimidation of MPs during elections, according to the UK’s independent Committee on Standards in Public Life. The body, which provides ethical advice to the prime minister, has recommended the changes, which would be easier to implement after Brexit, following an inquiry into the abuse of MPs during this year’s general election. The committee also called for social media companies to remove intimidatory material quickly and for police to be trained to investigate offences committed on social media.


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Social media firms should be be liable for abuse: UK committee
 In recent years, the intimidation experienced by Parliamentary candidates, and others in public life, has become a threat to the diversity, integrity, and vibrancy of representative democracy in the UK.

The Committee reports on its review of intimidation in public life, including Parliamentary candidates and others.

The Committee makes a package of recommendations for action to government, social media companies, political parties, the police, broadcast and print media, and MPs and Parliamentary candidates themselves.

The Government’s response to the review was published in March 2018.

Please note that the recommendation that ‘The political parties must work together to develop a joint code of conduct on intimidatory behaviour during election campaigns by December 2018’ has since been revised. The Committee decided at their October meeting that, in view of the continuing evidence of intimidation in public life, this joint standard should apply at all times and not just during periods of general election campaigns.

Output: Social media firms should be made liable for illegal content and there should be a new electoral law to counter the intimidation of MPs during elections, according to the UK’s independent Committee on Standards in Public Life. The body, which provides ethical advice to the prime minister, has recommended the changes, which would be easier to implement after Brexit, following an inquiry into the abuse of MPs during this year’s general election. The committee also called for social media companies to remove intimidatory material quickly and for police to be trained to investigate offences committed on social media.


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Private equity circles RIA industry in search for new investments
 The secret is out: The independent financial advisory space is the hottest growth-investment strategy for deep-pocketed private investors.

“We’ve seen private equity money ebb and flow over the years, but over the last few years we’ve seen a surge and a change in the way PE firms are investing in the RIA space,” said Scott Slater, vice president of practice management and consulting at Fidelity Clearing & Custody Solutions.

In the latest testament to the success of the wealth management model, private equity firms have been pouring billions into the space to take advantage of a consolidation wave those same investors are helping to fuel.

For owners of financial advisory firms, this means an even steadier barrage of inquiries from PE firms looking to buy a stake in their businesses.

Phil Shaffer, an adviser who left Morgan Stanley earlier this year to launch Halite Partners, said he was getting solicitations from private equity investors even before he had any money under management.

“We are at an inflection point with private equity looking at the RIA space,” he said.

Why now?

The stars seem to be aligning on several fronts, including more adviser movement toward the independent space, consolidation of firms within that market and private equity sitting on a mountain of cash.

“The RIA space is very fragmented, with about three-quarters of firms managing less than $100 million, but at the same time it is growing at about two and a half times the pace of the wirehouses,” said Alois Pirker, research director at Aite Group.

(More: What advisers should consider before taking a capital infusion)

The trend lines from Cerulli Associates bear this out. The research firm reports that wirehouse and independent broker-dealer reps made up 53.7% of the industry in 2011, while registered independent advisers and hybrid RIAs made up 19.5%. In 2016, wirehouses and IBDs made up 49.7%, while RIAs made up 22.7%.

“I definitely think private equity is adding fuel to the fire of the independent channel,” said Marty Bicknell, chief executive of Mariner Wealth Advisors, whose parent company, Mariner Holdings, has $47 billion in assets. “And the momentum is absolutely on that side.”

PE firms now are investing about $3.3 billion a year into the financial advisory space, with the goal of capturing double-digit returns for relatively short-term commitments, said Daniel Seivert, chief executive of investment bank Echelon Partners. The amount invested in 2016 was $3.1 billion, up from $2 billion five years ago.

Advisory firms of all shapes and sizes should not be surprised by a stepped-up effort from PE firms to secure a piece of the action.

Consolidation capital

“Private equity firms are looking to take advantage of the kind of consolidation trend that has been present in other industries at different times,” said Rush Benton, senior director of strategic wealth at CapTrust. “Consolidation requires capital, and PE firms see that opportunity, which is why the trend is here to stay.”

While there are multiple ways a buyer or investor can gauge the value of an advisory firm, Mr. Shaffer said it is about increasing the value through scale.

PE firms’ investments in advisory firms Source: CB Insights and ECHELON Partners Analysis

“Most of the buyers are looking at firms with $3 billion to $5 billion under management and up,” he said. “But we’re also seeing private equity money looking at an operator that can put together $300 million. Or they might invest in five or six smaller RIAs and hire a guy to oversee them.”

In essence, the private equity influence is less about playing an active role in the wealth management business than it is about leveraging the trend toward scale across the industry.

For example, if an RIA with $300 million under management is valued at a five-times-earnings multiple, an RIA with $3 billion under management will be valued at twice the multiple.

“The real driver here is what is happening to the equity value at the firms,” Mr. Shaffer said. “The private equity guys get that. They can come in and buy lower-multiple firms, and build them up to create higher multiples.

(More: Broker-dealer M&A: Is your firm next?)

“You will not be able to buy a quality RIA with $300 million in assets for a five-times multiple five years from now,” he said. “People want to buy them because they are growth engines, and buyers will be competing for all the really good firms.”

Another factor spurring the PE buying binge, according to Preqin, a research firm focused on alternative investment assets, is the growing pile of money in private equity funds.

Swollen coffers

Of the more than $2.7 trillion in total private equity assets, nearly $1 trillion is uninvested “dry powder” still seeking investment opportunities.

By comparison, in 2012, total PE assets were less than $2 trillion, and the dry powder was around $560 billion.

“The private equity coffers are swollen, and they’re looking for good opportunities to deploy those funds,” said David DeVoe, managing partner of RIA consulting firm DeVoe & Co.

Private equity firms rarely buy entire RIA firms, but the deals almost always fuel merger and acquisition activity, which continues to pick up in the RIA space.

“Some investors are looking to get as much as they can, by taking 70% or 80% stakes,” Mr. Seivert said. “That kind of deal will feel more like an acquisition.”

Other deals will push the limits of ownership up to just under 50%, he said, and a third type will look more like a capital infusion, with the PE investors taking a 25% or 30% ownership position.

Limited terms

In almost every case, the PE ownership is limited to a term of about a half-dozen years before the private equity fund needs to provide its investors with liquidity. RIAs can find themselves linked to new ownership partners as part of a cycle that can last a long time.

Mr. Bicknell described the perpetual status of PE ownership as a “carousel,” and said RIAs should understand this on the way in. He has not yet sold any piece of his large firm to a private equity investor, but sees the trend as a positive thing.

“Private equity is going to lead to more consolidation, which I think is the best thing for this industry, and it’s also in the best interest of the clients,” he said. “As we professionalize this industry, the client wins because succession issues will no longer exist, and as more capital comes into the space, I believe it will attract more next-generation talent.”

Ron Carson, founder and chief executive of Carson Group, said the decision to sell a stake in his nearly $9 billion advisory firm for $30 million last year was all about growth.

(More: Ron Carson explains the origins of ‘Ronsense’)

“The private equity space is looking at a fragmented profession that is going to consolidate — because the larger the firm, the more valuable it is — and bigger firms are harder to mess up,” he said. “Unless firms get bigger, it will be more difficult to compete, and a lot of smaller firms that want to remain independent are going to lose their clients to larger firms.”

Mr. Carson does not buy into the notion of a rotating relationship with outside investors, like the recent $100 million deal between HighTower Advisors and Thomas H. Lee Partners. In HighTower’s case, the PE relationship provided liquidity to other institutional investors.

“I needed private equity for very specific things, and we have first right to buy our ownership back,” Mr. Carson said. “Based on where we are today, my guess is we will probably own 100% of our firm when they want to exit in four to six years. And as the deal is structured, I have complete control of the company; the only thing I can’t do is ruin it.”

But as Mr. Slater of Fidelity pointed out, there are multiple layers of pros and cons to consider when partnering with a private equity investor.

“There is a time line for classic private equity that raises the bar for performance for the firms they own,” he said. “What you may like is having very smart people coming alongside you and putting money into your business. But what you may not like is somebody pushing you to grow your business faster.

“You need to understand that you need an alignment of interests.” he said. “You can’t just take the money.”

Output: The registered investment advisory (RIA) space is becoming a key area for private investment, with interest peaking amid a growth of independent firms even as the industry consolidates. Private equity funds are also sitting on a large amount of unused cash. Around 75% of RIA firms manage less than $100m, but its pace of growth is high. Private equity investment in the financial advisory space has risen to $3.3bn from $2bn in the past five years, according to figures from Echelon Partners. Investors usually expect double-digit returns for relatively short-term commitments.


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Redrow Redrow to develop 295 apartments in Newham
 H ousing association giant Peabody on Monday named two builders it will partner to deliver nearly 1800 homes in London, kicking off at one of Arsenal FC’s former homes.

It said listed Berkeley Homes will create 1500 properties in west Thamesmead on a site that was home to the Premier League club until 1913 before it headed to north London.

The project is part of a wider regeneration of Thamesmead which is expected to deliver 20,000 new homes.

There will be 35% affordable homes in addition to properties for private sale at the Berkeley part of the scheme.

In Newham, Peabody has appointed FTSE-250 firm Redrow to develop 295 apartments. They will be a mix of studios and one to three bedrooms.

The company added it has acquired former Brent council land moments away from Wembley stadium. It wants to build 198 affordable homes there.

Peabody’s chief Brendan Sarsfield said it is looking “to deliver more desperately needed… homes”.

Output: Housing association Peabody will work alongside housebuilders Berkeley Homes and Redrow Homes to create almost 1,800 properties in London. Berkeley Homes will establish 1,500 properties in west Thamesmead, the former site of Arsenal FC until 1913, while FTSE-250 firm Redrow will develop 295 apartment homes, offering a mix of properties and studios of between one and three bedrooms.


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Collaboration between EMS and primary care physicians could reduce unnecessary emergency transport for fallen seniors
 A protocol that couples paramedic assessment with primary care physician consultation and timely follow up significantly reduced unnecessary ambulance transport for fallen elderly residents of assisted living facilities. The findings of a prospective cohort study are published in Annals of Internal Medicine.

Unintentional falls are the leading cause of nonfatal injury for adults aged 65 years or older who are treated in emergency departments in the United States. Residents of assisted living facilities who fall may not be seriously hurt, but policy still dictates that they be transported to the emergency department. These policies burden the health care system and place patients at risk for harms, such as unnecessary tests or exposure to infection. Therefore, limiting unnecessary transport is desirable.

Researchers from Wake County Emergency Medical Services sought to determine whether unnecessary transport to the emergency department could safely be avoided for patients who experienced a ground-level fall in an assisted living facility. Wake County Emergency Medical Services collaborated with Doctors Making Housecalls, a group of primary care physicians specializing in home care for older adults, to develop a protocol for specially trained paramedics to identify a subset of patients who would not be transported to the emergency department but instead would be scheduled for a visit with a primary care provider within 18 hours of the call for emergency medical services.

The study involved a convenience sample of 953 residents, 359 of whom had 840 ground-level falls over 43 months. The protocol recommended nontransport after 553 falls, which marked a substantial decrease (62.9 percent) in transports. The researchers concluded that 98 to 99 percent of nontransported patients received safe, appropriate care. If implemented on a widespread basis, this approach could potentially avoid large numbers of unnecessary ambulance transports to the emergency department for simple falls.

Output: Researchers from the Wake County Emergency Medical Services have found that utilizing a protocol that unites paramedic assessments of patients with primary care physician consultations significantly lowered the need for unnecessary ambulance transport for senior patients in assisted living facilities who had fallen from ground level. The top cause of nonfatal injures for those aged 65 and over admitted to emergency departments are unintentional falls. Those who live in assisted living facilities are usually transported to emergency departments as a matter of policy, even if the falls are not serious, putting unnecessary strain on health services and increasing the exposure of patients to risks such as unnecessary tests or infections. The Wake County Emergency Medical Services worked alongside the Doctors Making Housecalls service to create a protocol for specifically-trained paramedics to identify which patients required emergency transport and which could be provided with primary care provider assessment within 18 hours of the call to the emergency medical services. The study took into account 953 residents, with the group having 359 residents that suffered 840 ground-level falls over a 43-month period. The protocol found that transport was unnecessary after 553 falls, a 62.9 percent decrease in the usual level of transports. The report found that 98-99 percent of those treated by a primary care physician instead of being transported were given safe and appropriate care. The findings could lead to more effective resolution of the high numbers of unnecessary ambulance transports to an emergency department for this common issue.


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Under New Tax Plan, the Cost of Aging Could Rise
 Imagine two couples, both alike in incomes, in a state without income tax where we lay our scenario. They have $150,000 in income and $100,000 in medical expenses and take no other itemized deductions.

Now imagine that one gets a deduction for medical expenses and one does not. Using the 2017 tax brackets and a rule that would not allow medical deductions unless they exceed 10 percent of adjusted gross income, a couple that could access the deduction would end up with $15,547 more at the end of tax season than one that could not deduct and thus paid more in taxes, according to calculations that Ruth A. Sattig Betz, an accountant in Farmingdale, N.Y., ran for me.

Take the income down to $75,000 (where the extra $25,000 for the medical costs to pay the $100,000 in bills would come from sources or savings that are not subject to income tax) and the household with the ability to take the deduction would end the year with $6,826 more.

So the medical expenses clearly matter, a lot. “Two households may have identical incomes, but they do not at all have identical capacity to pay taxes,” said Cristina Martin Firvida, AARP’s director of financial security. “And it’s not because of a choice that one of them made.”

Indeed, to critical observers, it looks like Republican leaders in Congress are using the tax code to punish states with high income taxes. They use the bill to accomplish this by limiting how much of those state income taxes are deductible. That effectively penalizes some of those residents, who did choose to live in those states, with a higher total tax bill.

Output: The US government’s House of Representatives and Senate are currently debating two tax bills that could significantly affect the cost of aging. The revised tax bills could potentially erase a deduction for medical expenses, removing thousands of dollars in support for the sick and elderly. The medical deductions are permitted when they exceed 10 percent of a household’s adjusted gross income. The House bill has proposed removing this deduction entirely, whereas the Senate bill plans to leave medical expense deductions untouched. If the House bill is successful, those who spent more money on health expenses this year stand to lose more money in 2018. The AARP Public Policy Institute has evaluated IRS data from 2015 and calculated that 8.8 million Americans use the deduction annually, including the elderly, those with children with special needs, and the disabled. Around 55 percent of those claiming the deduction were over the age of 65, with 69 percent having incomes under $75,000. The average sum claimed was $9,904. Around 52 percent of those who are older than 65 will require extended care before they die, federal data has found, making the deduction important for many Americans requiring assistance. The Republicans in Congress could use the eradication of the deduction to penalize states with higher income taxes by reducing the deductibles that are permitted. However, it is likely that the move will cause sick and elderly citizens to rely more on state provisions through Medicaid, putting more pressure on the federal government.


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Subway consolidates US, Canadian creative teams with Dentsu Aegis
 Subway announced today it will consolidate its entire U.S. and Canadian (North American) media and creative business with Dentsu Aegis Network after a review launched in July.

Beginning in early 2018, the Franchise at Dentsu Aegis Network North America—which includes Carat New York, mcgarrybowen New York, Carat Canada and DentsuBos—will be responsible for the fast-food chain’s strategy across all channels. Employees out of the Japanese conglomerate’s New York, Toronto and Montreal offices will be tasked with expanding Subway’s brand vitality with consumers.

“This

Output: Sandwich chain Subway is consolidating its North American media and creative advertising accounts following a review of its marketing strategy. The company selected Dentsu Aegis Network North America, a network of agencies that includes existing Subway media agency Carat, Mcgarrybowen and DentsuBos, to look after its strategy across all channels. The brand had appointed BBDO as its creative agency in 2015 but dropped the firm in October 2016 and has been mostly using its previous partner MMB since, which participated in the review but will not be involved in future.