Bitcoin Just Suddenly Surged Toward $12,000 But Now Might Not Be The Time To BuyHeres Why – Forbes

Bitcoin, after a prolonged period of stability, has suddenly leaped higherjumping over the closely-watched $10,000 per bitcoin level for the first time since June and surging toward $12,000.

The bitcoin price has added some 20% over the last seven days, hitting highs of $11,420 on the Luxembourg-based Bitstamp exchange, amid equity market jitters and a rally in the price of gold, considered a safe haven asset.

However, some market watchers have warned the recent bitcoin price gains might not lastwith the options market signalling just a 7% probability of bitcoin returning to its all-time high of around $20,000 before the end of 2020.

The bitcoin price has surged higher, following the price of gold.

"Our view for the balance of 2020 is still high volatility with a year end of around $7,000 [per bitcoin] with a drive higher to new highs in 2021," Gavin Smith, the chief executive of bitcoin and crypto consortium Panxora, said via email following the publication of Finder's latest cryptocurrency prediction report, adding he expects "a short term washout this year before the true rally takes hold."

"Our view is that we still believe the markets are pulled on the one hand by the inflation hedge story driving bitcoin higher while at the same time the global economy is suffering a massive demand shock with the potential to drive bitcoin lower."

In March, the bitcoin price fell sharply, in line with global stocks and other commodities, as the coronavirus pandemic spread around the world and countries went into lockdown to contain it.

The bitcoin price quickly bounced back, boosted by a highly-anticipated supply squeeze and bullish signals including investment giant Paul Tudor Jones revealing he was buying bitcoin as a potential hedge against the inflation unprecedented central bank stimulus measures designed to prop up coronavirus-hit economies could bring.

Smith's warning chimes with comments made by Binance chief executive Changpeng Zhao (CZ) last week, who said bitcoin is still tied to the stock market and a future crash could send the bitcoin price lower.

"People should not take the description of bitcoin as a safe haven asset too literally," CZ told Bloomberg.

The bitcoin price suddenly rallied over the last couple of days after trading sideways since early ... [+] May.

Others have also warned the bitcoin price could be heading lower in the short term.

"There wont be as much money going into bitcoin while people try to survive," Jimmy Song, author of Programming Bitcoin, said in Finder's Cryptocurrency Predictions 2020 report.

"Until the prices rise in the grocery store, bitcoin wont really start taking off. I suspect thatll take another nine months or so."

Finder's report, released last week ahead of bitcoin's surge toward $11,000, revealed half of the 28 bitcoin and crypto experts surveyed thought it was the right time to buy bitcoin, with 32% recommending investors hold and 18% saying it was time to sell.

Another panelist, University of New South Wales associate professor of finance, Elvira Sojli, said she expects the bitcoin price to be under $10,000 by December 31 2020. The panel's consensus was for the bitcoin price to climb to just under $13,000 by the end of the year.

"If anything, the second or third wave of Covid-19 may drive [the bitcoin price] down," Sojli said, pointing to the coronavirus' devastating economic impact.

Meanwhile, as bitcoin began its rally to $12,000, the bitcoin options market was signalling just 7% probability of the price returning to its all-time high of $20,000 per bitcoin, data from crypto derivatives analytics firm Skew revealed, with the market putting the odds of $10,000 per bitcoin by Christmas at around 50%.

"Options market is repricing quickly the probability of [new highs] by the end of the year, from 4% to 7% over the last week," Skew chief executive Emmanuel Goh told bitcoin and crypto news site Coindesk.

Bitcoin options data suggests there's less than a 10% chance the bitcoin price will return to its ... [+] all-time highs this year.

Elsewhere, others are confident the bitcoin price is going to continue to soar.

"There are significant changes since March in the way that institutional investors view bitcoin," Joe DiPasquale, the chief executive of BitBull Capital, said via email.

"Now that institutions have moved into bitcoin in 2020, the price has shown more support over the last couple of months. We will not see a repeat of the March crash, but bitcoin will still remain somewhat more volatile than equities."

"I think the price needs to take a bit of breatherit has moved quite a lot in a short-period of time," Bill Herrmann, the managing partner of hedge fund Wilshire Phoenix, said via email, adding he could see the bitcoin price hit its all-time highs by the end of the year "if we continue to receive regulatory clarity and continued institutional adoption," pointing to last weeks decision by the U.S. Office of the Comptroller of the Currency to allow banks in the country to custody digital assets as triggering the latest rally.

"It is huge for the space and that should serve as a tailwind for quite some time."

Trying to forecast bitcoin price moves has proven difficult, however, and some have warned against trying to predict market moves.

"Predicting the price of bitcoin on an exact timeline is a fools errand," Peter Wall, the CEO of UK-listed crypto miner Argo Blockchain, said via email, though adding he is "very optimistic in the medium to long-term, as we believe bitcoin will again be one of the best performing asset classes in the coming months and years."

More:
Bitcoin Just Suddenly Surged Toward $12,000 But Now Might Not Be The Time To BuyHeres Why - Forbes

HBO Max and Their Strange Streak of Censorship – Kirkwood Community College

OpinionImage courtesy of HBO.

You may have seen plenty of advertising lately for the fairly new streaming service, HBO Max, one of many streaming services flooding the market as television companies adapt to stream rather than broadcast.

Recently, HBO Max has taken some moves in censoring or altering the content in their library, the two most notable would be taking down Gone With the Wind and, strangely enough, giving the Looney Tunes character Yosemite Sam a scythe instead of his classic revolvers and rifle.

The first choice has its merits with re-educating people that racial stereotyping is wrong in this age where almost everyone is aware of that. A similar practice to this, (without removing, of course) was in the descriptions of older Disney Plus films, where there is a warning describing outdated cultural depictions into films such as Dumbo or Peter Pan for obvious reasons of racial stereotyping in their films.

HBO Max put the film back onto their service, with two videos that extend this beyond what Disney Plus did, having two videos alongside it to describe how the film brushes past issues of slavery. One could more so call it a thought-check before you watch the movie, then censorship. Everyone in this modern age can agree that slavery was wrong, and that the aspects of fantasizing that such an ugly detail of the civil war is wrong, so why would there be videos pouring into that detail? Does watching it without that context immediately make the viewer a victim of propaganda, or the streaming service racist?

Something that does not make sense to methough, is the exclusion of guns in the new Looney Tunes animation, exclusive to HBO Max. This could turn into a debate on media and mental health, or if violence is good to have on television, but it feels like this was more of a precautionary decision for backlash. Considering the issue of gun violence within the U.S., I would not be surprised if this kicked off the decision to axe cartoony lead-spitters. No one cares about the guns in Fortnite or any movie that Dwayne Johnson is in, so what gives? Feel free to give your input in the comments.

Image courtesy of HBO

Read more from the original source:

HBO Max and Their Strange Streak of Censorship - Kirkwood Community College

Social media censorship is hindering investigations, researchers say – Reclaim The Net

According to YouTube itself, as many as 6.1 million videos have been deleted from the platform since the start of this year alone, mostly coinciding with an unprecedented wave of online censorship launched at the start of the coronavirus pandemic.

YouTube is not alone in this, as other major social networks started strictly policing speech of users in order to allow only information about the disease favored by governments and the World Health Organization (WHO), from whom most governments get their cues.

Things deteriorated even further when racial and social unrest hit the US later in the year, causing a surge in online cancel culture and grandstanding by big brands, who demanded even more censorship, this time of hate speech.

As things began to go from bad to worse, traditional corporate media didnt seem to mind very much at all. Now, however, some of them are looking at the price that the ramping up of censorship.

Double your web browsing speed with today's sponsor. Get Brave.

But still, the likes of the Washington Post dont seem to care much about ordinary users entrusting their speech and data to social media giants: the concern is focused on what removal of such massive quantities of content, and the process by which this is done, cold end up doing to some activists and NGOs (at least, ones they like). And they argue in favor of deleted data to be publicly unavailable but retained for study.

Theres the example of the Syrian Archive, which is said to be dedicated to collecting information about human rights abuses in Syria and other countries. The group says that they and others are getting caught in the censorship dragnet that is supposed to be removing misinformation, as well as opposition voiced by users who disagree with the way these crises are being handled.

Its not exactly news, but tech giants overreliance on automated, machine learning-powered algorithms to get the job done is not working well. These algorithms are still effectively basic and really bad with understanding context, therefore resulting in unintended censorship.

The author of the report seems to think that more involvement from human moderators would fix the problem (and also, that they had to be sent home during the epidemic and were for that reason working less than usual?) However, its amply clear that moderators come with a set of their own problems, unique to humans: such as bias. So, maybe the answer is to pump the brakes on rampant censorship and not rely so heavily on either machines or moderators?

That, of course, is not an idea the Washington Post is willing to entertain. Instead, the Covid and civil upheaval era censorship is viewed as fully justified if only it could somehow bypass the Syrian Archive and other activists and journalists in war-torn regions.

But it isnt, since Facebooks moderation is apparently poor at telling apart documented war crimes and atrocities from users posting such content to promote it. However, Facebook says that in cases when accounts are deleted for this type of offense, they are also restored.

Syria-focused activists are not having a great time on YouTube either this year, saying that the number of deleted uploads has doubled. For its part, YouTube cited its infamous policy of allowing users to issue counter takedown notices, and claimed that human reviewers actually deal with this (not a statement many creators who have been burned in the process, without ever receiving even an explanation of what it was they had done wrong, would necessarily agree with.)

The Syrian Archive and more that 40 other groups have pleaded with social media giants not to permanently delete content related to human rights activism, and that data on content removed during the pandemic will be invaluable to those working in public health, human rights, science and academia.

Others are worried about YouTubes lack of transparency that leads to guesswork as to the overall extent of automated moderations effect on legitimate content.

The argument in favor of preserving data instead of deleting it was heard in April and boils down to keeping this data for future research into how online information can affect health outcomes and to evaluate the consequences of specific moderation practices like using heavy automation.

Another request from a letter sent to giant social networks was to be transparent about the way content is removed, how successful any appeals are, and the like. The signatories acknowledge privacy implications of long data retention and making it only available to a select group of researchers but add that the need for immediate preservation is urgent.

Read more from the original source:

Social media censorship is hindering investigations, researchers say - Reclaim The Net

New Book Provides More Evidence of the Trump-Stone Russia Coverup – Mother Jones

For indispensable reporting on the coronavirus crisis and more, subscribe to Mother Jones' newsletters.

When President Donald Trump earlier this month commuted the prison sentence of his longtime adviser Roger Stone,the media coverage generally missed a critical fact: This brazen act of cronyism was the culmination of a cover-up that aimed to hide Trumps wrongdoing. But a new book out this week provides more evidence of this conspiracy and offers additional information suggesting that Trump lied to special counsel Robert Mueller during the Russia investigation and, in doing so, possibly committed a crime.

The book, A Case for the American People: The United States v. Donald J. Trump, was written by Norman Eisen, who served as special counsel to congressional Democrats during Trumps impeachment. In this work, Eisen, who previously was ethics czar for President Barack Obama and US ambassador to the Czech Republic, presents the inside story of the third impeachment in US history, detailing the internal debates and conflicts among House Democrats and sharing juicy, behind-the-scenes anecdotes of the trial. The book reveals that the House Judiciary Committee initially drafted a wide-ranging list of 10 articles of impeachment for Trump before narrowing the case to two articles related to the Ukraine scandal.

In the book, Eisen sharply (but respectfully) criticizes Mueller for a failure to go the distance. He contends that Mueller let the republic down by not pursuing an obstruction of justice case against Trump all the wayto the end. (In his final report, Mueller presented evidence indicating Trump committed obstruction, but he reached no firm conclusions and determined that under Justice Department policy, he did not have the authority to indict a sitting president.) The refusal to admit there were at least five chargeable crimes was his shortcoming, not his lack of style, Eisen writes of Mueller. I understood his old-fashioned restraint under the special counsel regulations and typical prosecutorial standards. But he had leeway under the rules to do much, much more, and he didnt.

One example of Muellers dereliction, Eisen contends, is the Roger Stone case.

Stone was prosecuted by Muellers team for lying to Congress during the Trump-Russia investigation and for witness tampering. He was found guilty by a jury and sentenced to 40 months in prisonand then Trump eradicated the sentence shortly before Stone was to report to a federal prison. Stone had lied to Congress about his efforts during the 2016 campaign to be in contact with WikiLeaks, while that website was disseminating emails and documents that had been stolen from Democrats by Russian hackers as part of a Kremlin operation to help Trump win the White House. But the extent of Stones shenanigansand Trumps personal and possibly criminal involvementnever became a central component of the Trump-Russia scandal narrative, and Eisen blames Mueller for not fully pursuing this matter. Moreover, Eisen reports that he and his fellow staffers developed important evidence on this front.

Heres the background: When Muellers report was publicly released, key portions of its section related to Stone were redacted. But a close readingwhich later would be backed up by evidence submitted at trialindicated that during the 2016 campaign, Trump and top campaign officials, most notably, then-campaign chief Paul Manafort, tried to use Stone as a conduit to WikiLeaks to obtain inside information on what dirt Julian Assanges site had on Hillary Clinton. The Mueller report alluded to a call Trump received at some point from Stone, in which the two discussed WikiLeaks plans. But it was unclear when this happened, and Stones name was redacted when the report was first released.

This topic was damning for Trump because it showed that he and his campaign had sought to get information from WikiLeaks through Stone while WikiLeaks was part of a Russian operation targeting a US presidential election. Stones lies to congressional investigators were designed to hide his efforts on behalf of Trump to make contact with WikiLeaks. And when Trump replied to written questions from Muellerhe refused to submit to an in-person interview with the special counselhe claimed that he could remember no conversations with Stone about WikiLeaks. So neither Stone nor Trump would acknowledge Trumps attempt to use Stone as a channel to or from WikiLeaks. The two were mounting a cover-up.

The joint Trump-Stone stonewalling was partially undone by Rick Gates, Trumps deputy campaign manager, who cooperated with Muellers investigation and who was sentenced to 45 days in prison and a $20,000 fine for his part in a series of financial crimes and for lying to federal investigators. Gates told Mueller about Stones communications with Trump and the Trump campaign about WikiLeaks. (These were the bare-bones details in Muellers final report that were redacted at first.) Gates information did emerge during Stones trial, and these portions of the Mueller report were unredacted several weeks ago. One newly unredacted passage described Trump instructing Manafort to stay in touch with Stone about WikiLeaks and to keep Trump updated on this. But the cover-up mainly worked. Stone publicly declared, I will never roll on Donald Trump. And Trump saved Stone from prison.

Eisens book adds to whats known about this skullduggery. Staffers for the House Judiciary Committee interviewed Gates last year, and Gates detailed one instance of Trump and Stone discussing WikiLeaks:

Gates told us he was with Trump in the summer of 2016 when longtime Trump friend Roger Stone called Trump and apparently told him that WikiLeaks would be releasing additional hacked emailsWith the help of our Judiciary colleague Charlie Gayle, a smart, affable former prosecutor, we were able to establish the likely date of the call: July 25, 2016, just three days after the first WikiLeaks release of hacked DNC documents. Russias role [in the hacking] was already known. Gates described how in the mid-afternoon or early evening, he was riding with Trump in a Chevy Suburban from Trump Tower to LaGuardia Airport to board the campaign plane. They were still in Manhattan when Stone called Trump. Trump held the cellphone far enough away from his ear that Gates could see Rogers number on the screen. Trump listened to Roger, got off the phone, and told Gates, More information is comingclearly a reference to WikiLeaks. Just two days later, Trump would publicly holler, Russia, if you are listening

This is a more specific recounting than what Mueller included in his report. The House staffers had established the date of Trumps conversation with Stone. (It was previously reported that this call occurred on July 31, 2016.) And it is significant that the call occurred days after WikiLeaks dumped material stolen by Russian cyber-ops. With the hack already publicly linked to Moscow, Trump was privately trying to get inside information from WikiLeaks about the operation, as he was publicly encouraging Russian hackers to do more. This is what Trump and Stone wanted to hidethe appearance that Trump might have been attempting to collude with or take advantage of the Russia-WikiLeaks operation.

Mueller did ask Trump about this in a set of written questions. But in a written reply, Trump said, I have no recollection of the specifics of any conversations I had with Mr. Stone between June 1, 2016 and November 8, 2016. I do not recall discussing WikiLeaks with him.

Eisen believes that Trump lied to Mueller. He faults Mueller for not aggressively chasing Trump on this point:

Trumps written answers to Mueller dealing with WikiLeaks are littered with do not recalls fourteen of them. Maybe Trump had forgotten the Stone call, as implausible as that might seemEither way, Muellers willingness to accept those answers instead of insisting on an in-person cross-examination was unconscionable.

If Trump had lied to Mueller, that would have been a crime. And commuting a prison sentence to reward a witness who would not cooperate with a federal investigation is another possible act of obstruction of justice. (Trump claims he commuted the sentence because he believed Stone had been treated unfairly.)

The Trump-Stone cover-up occurred in plain sight, and it worked. Trump and Stone never disclosed Trumps attempt to use Stone as a link to WikiLeaks. And Stone, who lied to investigators and kept silent about the truth, escaped punishment. Yet Mueller did not clearly spell all this out for the public. As Eisen observes generally about the special counsel in his book, Mueller brought us so close, and yet left us miles away.

Read more:
New Book Provides More Evidence of the Trump-Stone Russia Coverup - Mother Jones

Julian Assange charged with conspiring with ‘Anonymous’

WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange was hit with a new federal indictment on Wednesday accusing him of conspiring with hackers, including the group Anonymous.

The superseding indictment doesnt add new charges beyond the 18 counts the Department of Justice unsealed last year but broadens the scope of the conspiracy that Assange is accused in, prosecutors said.

Assange and others at WikiLeaks recruited and agreed with hackers to commit computer intrusions to benefit WikiLeaks, the DOJ said in a press release.

Prosecutors said that Assange and a WikiLeaks did their recruiting during conferences in the Netherlands and Malaysia in 2009.

Since the early days of WikiLeaks, Assange has spoken at hacking conferences to tout his own history as a famous teenage hacker in Australia and to encourage others to hack to obtain information for WikiLeaks, the DOJ said.

In 2010, Assange allegedly gained access to a NATO countrys government computer system, prosecutors said.

Two years later, he allegedly communicated directly with the leader of the hacking group LulzSec who was by the cooperating with the FBI and provided a list of targets for LulzSec to hack.

In another communication, Assange told the LulzSec leader that the most impactful release of hacked materials would be from the CIA, NSA, or The New York Times, the DOJ said.

WikiLeaks allegedly obtained and published information it got as part of a hack into an American intelligence consulting company by an Anonymous and LulzSec-affiliated hacker, prosecutors said.

Assange was charged last year with allegedly violating the Espionage Act by conspiring with former Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning to illegally obtain and disclose classified information.

He was arrested after being booted from the Ecuadorian Embassy in London and is now at the center of an ongoing extradition battle over whether he should be sent to the United States. He is currently locked up in a UK jail on other charges.

His alleged publication of hundreds of thousands of classified documents could see him sentenced to 175 years in prison, his legal team has said.

Assanges lawyers claim he was acting as a journalist entitled to First Amendment protections and that the US charges against him are politically motivated.

With Post wires

Originally posted here:

Julian Assange charged with conspiring with 'Anonymous'

Florida man to be charged with vandalism of 2 synagogues – Forward

Image by Sarasota County Sheriffs...

Vincent Martinez will be charged with vandalizing two synagogues.

(JTA) A Florida man is being charged in connection with the vandalism of two Reform synagogues in Sarasota.

Victor Martinez, 21, was named by the Sarasota Country Sheriffs Office as the previously unidentified man who spray-painted swastikas and hate messages on Temple Sinai and Temple Emanu-El earlier this month. He also has been implicated in a vandalism attack on Temple Emanu-El in April, the Sheriffs Office said in a statement.

All of the incidents were captured on security footage and by security cameras at a nearby ATM.

Warrants for Martinezs arrest were issued Wednesday, according to the statement.

Martinez, who was placed at the scenes of the incidents using cellphone records, faces three counts of criminal mischief by defacing and damaging a synagogue, all classified as felony hate crimes. He is at a secure medical facility pending his arrest, according to the statement.

The Temple Sinai campus was extensively vandalized in the July 15 attack, including many walls made of porous Jerusalem stone, making the removal of the messages difficult. In April, swastikas were spray-paintedon the doors of Temple Emanu El, which was again vandalized on July 15.

The post Florida man will be charged with vandalism of 2 Reform synagogues in Sarasota appeared first on Jewish Telegraphic Agency.

Read the original post:

Florida man to be charged with vandalism of 2 synagogues - Forward

AP Explains: What is shadow banning?

NEW YORK (AP) The sinister-sounding term shadow banning has been in play recently, mostly thanks to conservatives including President Donald Trump accusing Twitter and other technology companies of political bias.

Twitter SHADOW BANNING prominent Republicans. Not good. We will look into this discriminatory and illegal practice at once! Many complaints, the president tweeted on July 26. (His tweet was not accurate.)

Heres a look at shadow banning and why its now a political issue.

HISTORY OF SHADOW BANNING

Shadow bans started in the early days of online discussion groups and the tools used to police disruptive participants. Moderators could always just disable the accounts of spammers, harassers or those who were just too argumentative. But sometimes banned users came back with new accounts, prolonging the turmoil and creating a lengthy round of whack-a-mole.

So forums came up with an alternative punishment: the shadow ban. Instead of disabling the targets account entirely, shadow banning just seals the offending account in a hermetic bubble. The shadow-banned user can still post freely but no one else sees their messages.

At Reddit, shadow banning was long the only tool available to moderators. It shuts down spam and, in theory, lets internet trolls stew in their own juices until they get bored and drift away.

DOES TWITTER SHADOW BAN USERS?

Twitter says no, although some political conservatives remain unconvinced of that.

In May, Twitter outlined a new approach intended to reduce the impact of disruptive users, or trolls, by reading behavioral signals that tend to indicate when users are more interested in blowing up conversations than in contributing. For instance, Twitter will take note if users sign up for multiple accounts at the same time, or if they repeatedly tweet at or mention accounts that dont follow them.

While accounts flagged this way dont technically violate Twitter policy, the company now wants to protect the health of users online conversations. (That word is now a staple in the companys lexicon; CEO Jack Dorsey used health, healthy or unhealthy 31 times in prepared congressional testimony Tuesday.) So Twitter will reduce their visibility in certain ways, by displaying them less prominently in search results or conversation threads.

Thats not actually shadow banning, since these users and their tweets are still visible on Twitter in other ways. Dorsey said in his testimony that we do not shadowban anyone based on political ideology.

WHY PEOPLE ARE TALKING ABOUT SHADOW BANS

Largely because Trump tweeted about them. And for that, we have Vice News to thank.

On July 25, Vice News published a story claiming that Twitter was limiting the visibility of prominent Republicans in search results. In particular, it wrote, Twitter wasnt autosuggesting some names such as Ronna McDaniels, head of the Republican National Committee if you searched for them. Similarly prominent Democrats reportedly werent affected the same way.

Typing Bugs Bu in the Twitter search box, for instance, wouldnt autosuggest the account of a prominent cartoon rabbit. But you could still search for Bugs Bunnys tweets by typing in his full name. They would also turn up in your feed if you followed him. So the wascally wabbit would not be shadow banned.

But when Trump declared the issue an example of shadow banning, many followed along. Later that day, Twitters head of product, Kayvon Beykpour, acknowledged that the companys behavioral signal analysis was at fault , and said the company had fixed the issue.

In a blog post co-authored by Beykpour, Twitter said we do not shadowban. It said hundreds of thousands of accounts were affected, and that the problem wasnt limited to political accounts or specific geographies.

THE FUROR CONTINUES

Conservative complaints of shadow banning have been in play for a few years.

In a 2016 Breitbart article, right-wing provocateur Milo Yiannopoulos wrote that Twitter was blacklisting politically inconvenient users, citing an unnamed individual inside the company. Project Veritas, a conservative group that produces sting videos intended to embarrass liberal organizations and media outfits, released a heavily edited video that purported to show Twitter engineers and officials describing shadow banning.

Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas cited the Project Veritas video in a January 17 hearing in which he grilled Twitter policy director Carlos Monje over the question of shadow banning.

Similar questions are likely to arise in a Wednesday congressional hearing at which Dorsey will be the sole witness.

Dorsey argued in his prepared testimony that it would make no sense to mute users based on politics. From a simple business perspective and to serve the public conversation, Twitter is incentivized to keep all voices on the platform, he said.

Twitters most prominent user, after all, happens to be a Republican.

More:

AP Explains: What is shadow banning?

WISeKey to Showcase its Cybersecurity Solutions for Artificial Intelligence Used in Drones and Robots at SIDO 2020 – GlobeNewswire

WISeKey to Showcase its Cybersecurity Solutions for Artificial Intelligence Used in Drones and Robots at SIDO 2020

Drones and robotics sensitive applications are growing thus generating valuable data that has become a target for hackers. WISeKey has developed a comprehensive set of digital security solutions to protect Artificial Intelligence when in use to analyze our environment.

Geneva, Switzerland July 27, 2020: WISeKey International Holding Ltd. (WISeKey) (SIX: WIHN, NASDAQ: WKEY), a leading global cybersecurity and IoT company, announced today that it will be demonstrating its disruptive set of technologies to secure new Artificial Intelligence data acquisition devices, including drones and robots, at the 6th edition of the SIDO leading IoT, AI, Robotics and XR event (Lyon, France September 3-4, 2020).

Big Data is at the heart of our future society construction and management. Connected sensors are invading our environment to acquire a huge amount of data that are analyzed by Artificial Intelligence to predict and make decisions. According to Grand View Research, Inc., estimated the global Artificial Intelligence market reached at US$40B in 2019. The same study forecasts this market to explode to US$733.7B in 2027. Drones and robots are becoming central in this Internet of Things (IoT) revolution. They are therefore exposed to new cyberattacks that steal sensitive data or compromise their firmware and behavior.

Through decades of expertise in cybersecurity, WISeKey has designed complete end-to-end protection solutions for these systems, that could for instance be combined with the IBM Watson IoT offering. IBMs Watson IoT Platform is a cognitive system that learns from and infuses intelligence into the physical world. Device manufacturers and businesses can use the power of Watson IoT Platform to build specialized, integrated solutions to solve their business challenges. Watson IoT Platform implements a messaging broker that allows the exchange of information between devices and business applications, using a secure Public Key Infrastructure (PKI) technology to bring authentication and data encryption. This implies a seamless integration with the WISeKey concept of Root of Trust (RoT) that delivers a digital identity that can be leveraged later in the Watson IoT platform together with WISeKeys solutions such as:

After the recent announcement of our partnership with Parrot, the leading European drone group, to integrate our advanced digital security solutions into the Companys growing range of ANAFI drones, this participation in the SIDO 2020 event will be a new opportunity for WISeKey to explain how our certified digital security can help leading IoT device makers protect their customers assets, stressed Carlos Moreira, Founder and CEO of WISeKey. Our Company has become a key player in the cybersecurity arena, uniquely bringing its Swissness to the protection of Artificial Intelligence.

Want to know more? Come and meet with our experts at SIDO 2020 - Booth E213 Lyon, France September 3-4, 2020 (more information on http://www.sido-event.com and http://www.wisekey.com ). Immediately book your meeting slot at sales@wisekey.com.

About WISeKey

WISeKey (NASDAQ: WKEY; SIX Swiss Exchange: WIHN) is a leading global cybersecurity company currently deploying large scale digital identity ecosystems for people and objects using Blockchain, AI and IoT respecting the Human as the Fulcrum of the Internet. WISeKey microprocessors secure the pervasive computing shaping todays Internet of Everything. WISeKey IoT has an install base of over 1.5 billion microchips in virtually all IoT sectors (connected cars, smart cities, drones, agricultural sensors, anti-counterfeiting, smart lighting, servers, computers, mobile phones, crypto tokens etc.). WISeKey is uniquely positioned to be at the edge of IoT as our semiconductors produce a huge amount of Big Data that, when analyzed with Artificial Intelligence (AI), can help industrial applications to predict the failure of their equipment before it happens.

Our technology is Trusted by the OISTE/WISeKeys Swiss based cryptographic Root of Trust (RoT) provides secure authentication and identification, in both physical and virtual environments, for the Internet of Things, Blockchain and Artificial Intelligence. The WISeKey RoT serves as a common trust anchor to ensure the integrity of online transactions among objects and between objects and people. For more information, visitwww.wisekey.com.

Press and investor contacts:

Disclaimer:This communication expressly or implicitly contains certain forward-looking statements concerning WISeKey International Holding Ltd and its business. Such statements involve certain known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors, which could cause the actual results, financial condition, performance or achievements of WISeKey International Holding Ltd to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. WISeKey International Holding Ltd is providing this communication as of this date and does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements contained herein as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.This press release does not constitute an offer to sell, or a solicitation of an offer to buy, any securities, and it does not constitute an offering prospectus within the meaning of article 652a or article 1156 of the Swiss Code of Obligations or a listing prospectus within the meaning of the listing rules of the SIX Swiss Exchange. Investors must rely on their own evaluation of WISeKey and its securities, including the merits and risks involved. Nothing contained herein is, or shall be relied on as, a promise or representation as to the future performance of WISeKey.

Continue reading here:
WISeKey to Showcase its Cybersecurity Solutions for Artificial Intelligence Used in Drones and Robots at SIDO 2020 - GlobeNewswire

Cerevel Therapeutics and Cyclica Announce Research Collaboration to Use Artificial Intelligence to Accelerate Discovery of Novel Medicines in…

BOSTON & TORONTO--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Cerevel Therapeutics, a company dedicated to unraveling the mysteries of the brain to treat neuroscience diseases, and Cyclica, whose AI-augmented, integrated platform enables multi-objective, polypharmacology-informed design of drug molecules, today announced a research collaboration aimed at accelerating the discovery of novel medicines for neuroscience diseases. Through this collaboration, Cerevel will use Cyclicas Ligand Express and Ligand Design proprietary AI platforms to screen, identify, design and evaluate compounds directed at pre-specified targets for neuroscience diseases.

Cerevel aims to be the premier neuroscience company by applying state-of-the-art technology and a differentiated approach to developing novel medicines, said John Renger, Ph.D., chief scientific officer at Cerevel Therapeutics. We are using Cyclicas world-class AI platform for high throughput screening in compound identification and optimizationwhich we believe can more efficiently identify new therapeutic molecules with symptomatic or disease-modifying potential. Utilizing cutting-edge tools like Cyclicas is one of the many ways we are creating a leading neuroscience drug discovery and development platform for the future.

Leveraging Cyclicas multi-targeted, proteome-wide approach, combined with Cerevels novel and relentless pursuit of advancing neuroscience, has the potential to bring medicines to patients suffering from neurological diseases faster, said Vern De Biasi, vice president and global head of strategic partnerships at Cyclica.

In addition to its pipeline of five clinical assets and seven pre-clinical programs, Cerevel is pursuing undisclosed targets for numerous neurological indications, including those with disease-modifying potential. Cerevel is supporting these efforts through the use of AI, as well as human genetic analyses and DNA-encoded chemical libraries, to better understand the therapeutic potential of numerous chemical lead series.

AI-based in silico drug design has made dramatic progress over the past five years and can significantly enhance our approach to designing potent and selective small molecules based upon predicted three-dimensional structure of protein targets, said David Stone, head of genetics and biomarkers at Cerevel Therapeutics. We will use Cyclicas AI platforms to rapidly generate unique chemical matter for synthesis and testing, with the goal of faster development of new medicines for patients living with neuroscience diseases.

Cyclicas drug discovery platform accelerates pre-clinical drug development by considering the polypharmacological profiles and medicinal properties of drug candidates simultaneously during the design process, said Vijay Shahani, director of applied science at Cyclica. We are excited by the opportunity to combine our technological approach with Cerevels strong expertise in neuroscience to drive the development of meaningful therapeutics.

Terms of the collaboration with Cyclica are not disclosed.

About Cerevel Therapeutics

Cerevel Therapeutics is dedicated to unraveling the mysteries of the brain to treat neuroscience diseases. The company seeks to unlock the science surrounding new treatment opportunities through understanding the neurocircuitry of neuroscience diseases and associated symptoms. Cerevel Therapeutics has a diversified pipeline comprising five clinical-stage investigational therapies and several preclinical compounds with the potential to treat a range of neuroscience diseases, including Parkinsons disease, epilepsy, schizophrenia and substance use disorder. Headquartered in Boston, Cerevel Therapeutics is advancing its current research and development programs while exploring new modalities through internal research efforts, external collaborations or potential acquisitions. For more information, visit http://www.cerevel.com.

About Cyclica

Cyclica is the first company to approach polypharmacology with a structure-based, AI-augmented in silico discovery platform, centered on Ligand Design and Ligand Express. Powered by MatchMaker, a proprietary deep learning proteome screening technology, and POEM, an innovative supervised learning technology for predicting molecular properties, Cyclicas platform is suited uniquely to the design of novel, chemical matter by simultaneously prioritizing compounds based on their on- and off-target polypharmacological profiles as well as their developmental properties. With a world-class team that has deep roots in the industry, a first-in-class platform, and an innovative decentralized partnership model, Cyclica is creating medicines with greater precision for unmet patient needs.

Special Note Regarding Forward-Looking Statements

This press release contains forward-looking statements that are based on managements beliefs and assumptions and on information currently available to management. In some cases, you can identify forward-looking statements by the following words: may, will, could, would, should, expect, intend, plan, anticipate, believe, estimate, predict, project, potential, continue, ongoing or the negative of these terms or other comparable terminology, although not all forward-looking statements contain these words. These statements involve risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results, levels of activity, performance or achievements to be materially different from the information expressed or implied by these forward-looking statements. Although we believe that we have a reasonable basis for each forward-looking statement contained in this press release, we caution you that these statements are based on a combination of facts and factors currently known by us and our projections of the future, about which we cannot be certain. Forward-looking statements in this press release include, but are not limited to, statements about the potential of artificial intelligence platforms to accelerate the discovery and development of novel medicines for neuroscience diseases. We cannot assure you that the forward-looking statements in this press release will prove to be accurate. Furthermore, if the forward-looking statements prove to be inaccurate, the inaccuracy may be material. In light of the significant uncertainties in these forward-looking statements, you should not regard these statements as a representation or warranty by us or any other person that we will achieve our objectives and plans in any specified time frame, or at all. The forward-looking statements in this press release represent our views as of the date of this press release. We anticipate that subsequent events and developments will cause our views to change. However, while we may elect to update these forward-looking statements at some point in the future, we have no current intention of doing so except to the extent required by applicable law. You should, therefore, not rely on these forward-looking statements as representing our views as of any date subsequent to the date of this press release.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200727005180/en/

Read more:
Cerevel Therapeutics and Cyclica Announce Research Collaboration to Use Artificial Intelligence to Accelerate Discovery of Novel Medicines in...

Four university experts use Artificial Intelligence to discover that children don’t like going to school on Mondays in Milton Keynes – Milton Keynes…

The researchers at De Montfort University Leicester studied attendance data using AI models.

And they say artificial intelligence is the way forward to improve pupil attendance at all schools.

The experts found Monday morning was the most common time for absenteeism at the school, with potential reasons including separation anxiety, taking extended weekend breaks and a lack of motivation to attend school after time off.

To improve attendance, the researchers developed a two-pronged approach.

Firstly, they increased the frequency and value of rewards given for full attendance, holding monthly raffles with prizes for those children who had not missed a day of school during that month.

Secondly, they introduced a Monday Matters initiative, giving pupils fun activities to look forward to on their first day back after the weekend.

Thanks to these measures, Willen Primary achieved the required national average attendance of 96 per cent for the first time in four years. They also saw a huge improvement in persistent absenteeism, which improved by more than 55 per cent compared with a year ago.

Dr Raymond Moodley, a visiting researcher at De Montfort's Institute of AI, was leading the project along with his colleagues Professor Francisco Chiclana, Dr Fabio Caraffini, and Dr Mario Gongora.

Dr Moodley said: By using AI, we were able to pinpoint the problem areas for attendance at Willen Primary School, which in this case was Monday mornings.

One of the key changes we wanted to make was to increase the incentives on offer for pupils who have a 100 per cent attendance record over a shorter time frame. Schools typically tend to reward children on an all or nothing basis by only recognising pupils who have full attendance for the entire year.

However, our approach sets shorter-term goals for the children which makes it more achievable, and if they fail to achieve full attendance in one month, then they can always try again the following month.

Pupils that are persistently absent are typically shown to have the weakest performance at school. Persistent absenteeism is also higher for those children that receive free school meals.

Carrie Matthews, headteacher at Willen Primary School, said: The novel approach provided by the team at the Institute of AI allowed us to improve our understanding of our attendance and put impactful plans in place to reduce absenteeism. The results of our collaboration have been fantastic!

Dr Moodley and his fellow researchers are now developing an easy-to-use AI-enabled absenteeism diagnostic tool that will eventually be available for schools across the UK to download.

Schools will be able to upload their own attendance data from their attendance recording systems and gain insights into their attendance using the AI models.

Attendance is just one parameter measured by Ofsted when it comes to a schools overall performance, said Dr Moodley.

We also want to look at other factors that impact pupil performance and outcomes in later life. These include motivations for choosing subjects particularly girls in STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics) as well as behavioural management, and optimising the learning environment (classroom layout, timetable design etc.)

AI is tremendously powerful, and we want to harness this power to maximise the overall performance of every child in every school.

Dr Moodley and his colleagues, who are members of a research interest group called RiSE (Research in Societal Enhancement), are currently engaged in a number of AI-led projects in areas including crime prevention, agricultural sustainability, alternative solutions to managing pandemics, and medicine.

For more information about the Institute of AI at De Montfort University visit here

See the original post:
Four university experts use Artificial Intelligence to discover that children don't like going to school on Mondays in Milton Keynes - Milton Keynes...