Rumor-Detection Software IDs Disputed Claims on Twitter

After the seven days of Boston marathon bombing, a group of hackers release a bogus tweet from the official account of Associated Press which was containing a message that “Breaking News: Two Explosions in the White House and it if found that Barack Obama is injured”. Before some organizations such as; Associated Press or White House could clarify the false statement, the stock market of NYSE responds very fast and within minute it record the drop of 140 pints, where millions of people lose billions of dollars.

Stock market recovered very fast, but analyst stated that there was a chance of long time frame which was enough for hackers to make a good some of money through trading. We all knew that rumors and the negative effects of rumors spread very fast in hyper-connected times as per the statement of Qiaozhu Mei, who is Associate professor in Information and Department of Electrical Engineering and Computer Science at the University of Michigan School. To deal with these kinds of situations Prof. Mei and team of researchers have developed software which will help the society by identifying the rumors and correcting the erroneous claims on Twitter.

This software was introduced at the International World Wide Web Conference, Italy. But in the summers of 2015 they tested it live on the website which they are developing and named it as the Rumor Lens. Sometimes we found there are few posts on the social media which are spreading beyond the control of anyone and due to that our goal is to detect the emerging rumors in very less time, said Mei, who is an expert on text mining process and the processing of natural language.

The whole team demonstrated the capacity of software and for that they had done the analysis of two sets of tweets: First; a random sample of more than 1.2 billion tweets of November 2013 and Second; 30 million tweets related to the Boston Marathon bombing. In the sample testing they collected the second set from Twitter's Gardenhose with 10 per cent of its real time stream however; data was representing the unpredictable as well as high-profile events which was the rumors with less span of time.

In the whole process software correctly detected more than 110 rumors and about the Boston Marathon bombing, so after the testing software find more than 50 per cent accuracy on an average. The percentage of accuracy in both sample testing was higher than the 10 per cent accuracy of hastag and trending topic tracking rumor detection process. Researchers pointed out that there software are so fast in identifying the fishy statements. Prof Mei, stated that our method can detect the rumors 3.5 hours earlier than other methods which use hastag tracking and trending topics.

Rumor Lens is the sites of researches and it is expected that site will be available in the couple of months. In the statement researchers define the rumors as a controversial statement.

How Wearable Will Shape the Future of Mobile Payments

Mobile – Banking & Finance – A Necessity 

The adoption of mobile for the purpose of banking and finance section is no more an option to the users and stats indicate that most of the time is spend in mobile apps than in web with estimates that by 2020, around 80% users in the world would be in possession of smartphone. As per Visa, Australia has been leading the world in adopting contactless payments while Apple Pay will be hurrying over it.

Mobile now, no longer seems to be an option but a necessity and a key channel for delivery of financial services. This seems to be a good opportunity for banking and finance sector and with Apple Pay together with introduction of wearable, developments in mobile technology had given way to various opportunities for financial services businesses in redefining on how consumers could interact with banking as well as financial services. We tend to live in the age of entitled consumer where consumers expect more, trust their peers, have options, a voice, are informed and feel that they are entitled to –

• Access to their financial information whenever they intend to
• Real time and 24/7 banking services
• Real time, secure and convenient transactions
• Intuitive, simple and seamless user experiences

Wearable Technology – Important Part of Companies Game Plans

Executives from Capital One, MasterCard and PayPal participated in an animated discussion on the future of mobile payments at the Wearable World Congress in San Francisco and explained on why wearable technology is an important part of the companies’ game plans. MasterCard’s Vice President of start-up engagement and acceleration, Stephane Wyper commented that MasterCard is aimed on leveraging the latest as well as the greatest gadget which includes wearable, in creating loyal customers.

He added that looking at the future; consumers are interacting with updated devices which extend beyond plastics or the devices in their pocket. The question for MasterCard is that `how to enable all of those connected devices to be payment devices’. Wearable in the market is on the rise and Capital One is of the opinion that it could be used in drawing and retaining customers. Capital One’s Vice President, Angie Moody, of new product innovation, comments that the company is looking to wearable to `reinvent the way consumers interact with finance on daily business’.

Wearable Provide Connectivity when Mobile Apps Unable To Do So 

Capital One intends to extend the experience of payment in order to help consumers with more informed, responsible payment options by using the data that is collected by wearable which include location as well as data it collects as per Moody. It states that wearable would offer new ways in learning who you are, when you are and where you go.

Varun Krishna, of PayPal, Sr. director of its consumer wallet division envisages wearable computing as an opportunity for the company which could give rise tomore connect as well as a personal experience. He states that wearable could provide connectivity when mobile apps are unable to do and by nature they are more connected to the user than a phone.

Progress in data analytics tends to also play an important part in the evolution of wearable based or wearable assisted, mobile payment since they tend to help the financial institutes to make better use of consumer data. Presently, payment companies tend to request data regarding customers and enter information as they wish, in sharing into mobile apps or websites. Future wearable and other devices will tend to automatically collect data when users opt in, delivering relevant and contextual information which will be less of a pull and more of a push according to Moody.

Improve & Extend Process of Payment

He adds further that `wearable could improve and extend the process of payment though there could be balance between ease of use of friction removal with a need in providing all necessary information in making informed financial decisions.

One needs to balance reduction of friction with the need in making people comprehend the process where they tend to spend money without a thought. By eliminating friction one could take the customer away from the tangibility of cash’. Moody quotes the recent decision of Uber in making the customers confirm that they are willing to pay for `surge pricing’ prior to their request of a driver.

This confirmation was added since Uber had removed too much friction making it easy for individuals in requesting a ride in peak hours thereby getting stuck with high charges as per Moody. Moody is also of the opinion that a balance between ease of use as well as providing relevant information defends consumers as well as helps in building trust between them and the service providers and if one tend to break that trust, it does gets difficult to get it back.

The application ecosystem for wearable as well as mobile payments is progressing and providers will learn from their initial mistakes. Capital One is also keenly attempting in establishing itself as a player in mobile payment section through promotional offers and discounts in popular mobile apps which includes Uber.

Google’s Security News: Malware’s Down, and You’re Heeding More of Its Warnings

According to the Google’s security product manager, the company defines their success in simple term- invisibility. As per Stephan Somogyi they are targeting as the main outcome when we encountered a blank browser window appearing in front of him. He was able to give some insight on the status of the online security, during the Google’s I/O conference at the half-hour presentation called the Second annual Google Security update at I/O.

Phishing and Malware Sites: 

He gave some more details on the Safe Browsing service of the company. He calls them as a collection of systems that have the ability to hunt down the badness all across the net. It has the ability to protect the visitors who are searching the web using the Google search site or even Chrome, Safari as well as Firefox. This indicates the total reach to the audience amounting to 1.1 billion people.

According to the reports released by the company, they have located that the Malware is becoming is not a huge problem anymore. But they have also found that phishing sites that are able to fool the customers into entering their details like password and more financial details are increasing in numbers.

During the last week of Mat, they were able to detect nearly 14,977 malware sites and nearly 33,571 phishing sites using the safe browsing. The Malware has shown a big drop and Phishing has shown a bigger increase. Somogyi has given all the credit to the enhanced security in all their operating system in every device. Due to this the Malware authors are now more concentrating on the phishing sites and targeting the software’s.

The much needed push for encryption: 

Google has been among the first companies who were advocating the use of encryption to avoid people from snooping on users online. The acceleration to this push came in the form of the revelations made by Edward Snowden, who confirmed that NSA has been eavesdropping on their traffic from quite some time. He further expressed his anger pertaining to the effort that is being put forth by Google to get other emails providers to try and adapt the TLS, which is the Transport Layer security encryption. Through this all the third party companies care unable to reading the messages when they are transit.

The company is hoping to reach to larger companies that work in sending email and find out the reasons why they are unable to implement TLS. But from the perspective of the company, they do not want to resort to public shaming.

They are not ready to disclose the names of the company who have still not followed or implemented TLS. Compared to TLS, Google has been able to attain much more success in terms of encouraging different websites to implement HTTPS encryption to completely secure the user visit to websites. The company is making all effort to ensure that the users feel completely safe when spending their time online.

Google: Your Hands May Be the Only Interface You’ll Ever Need

Project Soli – Hands Only User Interface

Wearable devices tend to get smaller and smaller and our hands and fingers find it difficult in keeping up with them. Hence gearheads at Google’s Advanced Technology and Projects group – ATAP have been working on ways in controlling devices with simple hand gestures. Google ATAP is aware that the hand is the best method for interaction with devices though not everything seems to be a device. Project Soli the latest wearable is not a wearable one would think, neither a watch but ‘you’.

Project Soli intends to make the hands and fingers the only user interface that would be needed. It is actually radar which is adequately small to be fitted into a wearable like a smart watch where the small radar tends to pick up on the movements on real time, utilising the movements made to modify its signal. While the hand rests, it is actually moving slightly which tends to end as a baseline response on the radar and moving the hand away or from side to side with regards to the radar could change the signal and amplitude. Crossing the fingers or making a fist could also change the signal.

ATAP to have APIs

In order to make sense of the signal to a service or app, ATAP would be having APIs which could tap in the deep machine learning of Project Soli. However, it is still early for the new entry though it has got the people at Google I/O eager and instead of going hands-free, Project Soli would make the hands the UI which could be a better option than voice control could be. Ivan Poupyrev, technical program lead for Google ATAP comments that `should Project Soli become a reality someday, users would be able to control smart watches, fitness trackers as well as other devices with the use of gestures in utilising their smartphone, only without the phone’.

 He informed the audience at Google I/O that their hands tend to be always with them and are ergonomic and could be the only interface ever needed in controlling wearable devices. Nevertheless, gesture based interfaces tend to already exist and several of them such as the Kinect or PlayStation Move utilise camera in detecting the hand movements. Thus they work only when there happens to be clear lines of sight which are worthless in the dark.

Flares out Radar Signals – Numerous Antennae

The Soli chip is said to flare out radar signals from numerous antennae, thousands of time each seconds creating an arena that could measure the minute movements of the fingers, detecting when the fingers are crossed or record signals at once from both hands. It is a kind of software developers generating a vocabulary in interpreting each gesture, translating it into action similar to deleting a message or taking a call on the smartwatch.

The latest radar chip has the capabilities of a range of 5 feet or more, enabling it to be integrated to all types of devices which include the walls of the home. Probably there may be a time in the near future that one may be capable of turning on the lights on snapping the fingers or turn up the volume on Sonos by turning an imaginary dial in the air. Presently Project Soli is just a research project.            

Google's 'Smart' Food Diary Is Actually Kind Of Dumb

Google – Automated Food Diary to Estimate Calorie Count

Google has been building an automated food dairy which could help to estimate calorie counts from the images taken of our meal according to a report in Popular Science. Named Im2Calories, the project is said to utilise technology from DeepMind, which is an AI start-up Google acquired in 2014. Google has filed a patent for Im2Calories, however there is no mention yet on when the service is likely to be made available.

Meanwhile, several other companies are making similar attempts on the projects like Im2Calories which are being supported by equally questionable science. Im2Calorie is said to measure the size of the food, in absolute terms as well as relative to what is on the plate and could also identify the condiments. According to the report, it does not even matter if the picture tends to be high resolution or not. Presently, the technology is still imprecise in estimating calorie counts.

According to Kevin Murphy, a researcher at Google acknowledges as much to Popular Science stating that `it’s okay fine, maybe we get the calories off by 20%. It does not matter’. The focus for Google is in minimizing those inaccuracies over a period of time, claims Murphy. There does not seem to be any doubt in Google’s ability in collecting and processing data from large section of users though the company would still have to solve a big problem for the function of Im2Calories – calorie counting could be unreliable.

Counting Calories – Look at Kinds of Calories Eaten

A main study published in The New England Journal of Medicine in 2011 observed that the quality of food is a main contributing factor than quantity. Dr Dariush Mozaffarian, lead author of the study informed the New York Times - `Conventional wisdom – to eat everything in moderation eat fewer calories and avoid fatty foods, isn’t the best approach.

Just counting calories won’t matter much unless you look at the kinds of calories you’re eating’. However if calories seems to a good measure for health, food labels, - the basis of Google’s date, has also considered to be inaccurate. In 2010, there has been much uncertainty with regards to calorie counting where David Kirchoff, the CEO then of the Weight Watchers acknowledged that `calorie-counting has become unhelpful’ for those intending to lose weight. Since then the company is said to have abandoned its calorie first approach.

Im2Calories – A Potential Tool

Im2Calories, which is the potential tool, had been announced at the Rework Deep Learning Summit, recently. Murphy had unveiled a project that utilises `sophisticated deep learning algorithms to analyse a still image of food, estimating how many calories could be on the plate. In one instance, the system viewed an image and counted `two eggs, two pancakes and three strips of bacon.

Although the food stuff does not seem to be a universal unit of measurement, the system could scale the size of each piece of foot with regards to the plate together with the condiments. Murphy has no intention of shaming users with this new system but wants to have the `process of keeping a food diary and awareness of foods and this seems to be much easier than feeding information manually to a food app which could include portions of food items, types of food and much more.

It is assumed that the latest tool Im2Calories could be popular especially in the US since obesity tends to be a crisis. However, even if Im2Calories does not seem to be accurate, Murphy is of the opinion that the new system will tend to have an impact on the users.