<p>In simple words, technology is the implementation of scientific knowledge to yield practical outcomes. Often it is used to alter, control, or manipulate the human environment. The chief intent of technology is to enhance the quality of living. Despite the step by step authorization of technology in the healthcare sector, not all of it is yet used to reduce healthcare costs and reach good margins as technology is not enforced to its maximum potential.</p><p>Even though our expectation of life has improved over the last centuries, our comparatively inactive lifestyle has led to the rise of chronic diseases like arthritis, asthma, diabetes, cystic fibrosis, COPD, mental health disorders and many more. These diseases, being long-term and degenerative, add budgetary difficulties on both the patient and the healthcare system.</p><p>?In the United States alone, <a href="https://www.cms.gov/Research-Statistics-Data-and-Systems/Statistics-Trends-and-Reports/NationalHealthExpendData/NationalHealthAccountsHistorical">$3.8 trillion or $11,582 per person</a> is spent on the healthcare departments each year. The accepted technologies that are already used by the healthcare system have uplifted the operational efficiency of the hospitals. With more smart technologies, the healthcare sector can cut expenses to a greater extent. With the increase in workforce fees, demographic transition, undetermined regulatory climate, it is time for the healthcare sector to bring forth the application of smart technology to decrease healthcare costs without compromising the quality of care.</p><p>?Here are six reasons why technology should be used to bring down clinical burdens:</p><h3 id="lessened-staffing-cost">Lessened Staffing Cost</h3><p>In any firm, be it healthcare, the workforce accounts for a huge section of the operating expenses. Staffing issues have always been expensive and necessary. Staff are either expected to work overtime or new employees are hired to resist the unanticipated patient magnitude to fill the gaps of shift coverage. A hospital cannot run without its staff, but with smart and efficient staffing strategies, the cost of employing staff members can be reduced.</p><p>Smart scheduling applications can be used to schedule new meetings and appointments of the patients. The work shift of the staff members can also be scheduled by merging the past shifts, current patient volumes, the expertise of the existing staff and workforce requirements. These smart applications can carry out analysis to predict the number of incoming patients that might arrive shortly, and give out solutions based on the number of beds, rooms and equipment status. In addition to that, this one option is significantly less costly than hiring employees to carry out the same operations in a more time consuming and prone to errors method.</p><p>Technology can not only restrain healthcare expenses but also leave positive impacts on the patients as well.</p><h3 id="lessened-administrative-expenditure">Lessened Administrative Expenditure</h3><p>Doctors spend a large amount of time, up to <a href="https://www.ama-assn.org/practice-management/digital/clicks-and-keyboards-stealing-face-time-patients">one-third</a> of their time, in administrative work instead of treating their patients. This administrative work includes inputting a patient?s notes into the Electronic Health Records (EHRs). The patient?s clinical history, tests, medications and more are all typed manually by the doctors themselves. There are no separate employees to carry out this process. This leads to <a href="https://ehrintelligence.com/news/ehr-technology-a-key-contributor-to-physician-burnout">physician burnout</a>.</p><p>But with the help of Artificial Intelligence and smart software, technology can take care of administrative responsibilities. For example, instead of manually entering the test results of a patient, the software can automatically import and save the results. This also saves a lot of time that is consumed by the process of filling out forms every time a patient visits the hospital. Once the information of any patient is entered into the software, it will save to be used and renewed for the next time. Simple administrative tasks like appointment booking, meeting scheduling and setting reminders can be digitized with the help of technology.</p><p>Automating the administrative responsibilities can lessen the burden carried by the physicians and staff, demolish physician burnout, save a lot of paperwork and allow doctors to spend more time towards the treatment of their patients.</p><h3 id="optimised-supply-chain">Optimised Supply Chain</h3><p>Placing orders for new supplies can be a hectic job. Not only is a professional supposed to order the new supplies but also is supposed to keep track of the existing supplies. Tracking the inventory, checking for expired products, changing brands etc are all the responsibilities o a single employee. And with so many responsibilities to carry out, the cost of employing the professional is also high.</p><p>Data analytics and Artificial Intelligence (AI) can be used to reduce stress. Automated ordering software can be used to place orders at the right time, i.e. only when the product is required. Not placing orders only when needed or ordering too many products can lead to huge losses. Radiofrequency tags can be used by healthcare professionals to track expensive types of equipment throughout their entire lifetime and also point out befitting to order replacements. Modern technological solutions like smart cabinets and barcode scans can be used to reduce the wastage of expired or recalled products.</p><h3 id="targeted-digital-marketing">Targeted Digital Marketing</h3><p>Healthcare providers need to meet new patients in the easiest way possible. People these days spend a lot of time being online. Digital marketing can enable targeted ads to be shown to the people searching for a particular disease, problem, condition or within a particular speciality. Since it has become easier to reach people online, targeted digital marketing can cost less per new patient compared to the traditional method of marketing.</p><p>Targeted digital marketing is a must marketing strategy, as it will help the organization to invest in their marketing budget as effectively as possible.</p><h3 id="simplified-sharing-and-saving-of-patient-data">Simplified Sharing and Saving of Patient Data</h3><p>Any patient with more than one disease will need to visit more than one doctor. All doctors must be able to share their patient?s data in a simplified manner. With smart software, a physician can share all the tests results and conditions of a patient with the other doctors. It can also give access to the tracks of a patient?s health records and archive a patient?s history. This will make the collaboration between the doctors of the same patients much easier.</p><h3 id="reduced-need-for-specialists">Reduced Need For Specialists</h3><p>It has become to keep track of one?s health by themselves with the help of healthcare wearables and their connected apps. One can easily see their pulse rate, sugar level, blood pressure and much more without having to visit a physician now and then.</p><p>Also with the help of telemedicine, not every patient is required to be admitted to the hospital. Doctor and patient interaction can be held out easily with the video calling applications. This does not only help the patient to save money but also eliminate hospital room expenses.</p><h3 id="conclusion">Conclusion</h3><p>This epidemic of diseases requires stopping and regular evaluation that will bring changes on a huge scale. Research-based technological solutions are needed to treat these diseases efficiently and at a low cost. Organizations that are looking for a thriving workforce at a minimized healthcare cost should consider digitized therapeutics as a major part of the solution.</p>

Sarah Shams

Premium reporting on technology, startups, VC funding, and software from Techfastly tagged with Healthcare. Read about trends and strategies for Healthcare.

Healthcare

How Health-care Technologies Can Reduce Clinical Burden

<h2 id="what-exactly-is-big-data">What exactly is Big Data?</h2><p>Before knowing about Internet Crimes, let?s get some good idea about Big Data:</p><p>In the simplest way possible, Big Data can be defined as large volumes of data growing exponentially with time. This data is so huge that it becomes hard to manage and, sometimes the traditional data management tools cannot process it or store it efficiently. </p><p>The <a href="https://www.forbes.com/sites/gartnergroup/2013/03/27/gartners-big-data-definition-consists-of-three-parts-not-to-be-confused-with-three-vs/?sh=2464e77542f6">Gartner</a> definition of Big Data is ?</p><blockquote>?Big data? is high-volume, velocity, and variety information assets that demand cost-effective, innovative forms of information processing for enhanced insight and decision making.</blockquote><h2 id="how-%E2%80%9Cbig%E2%80%9D-is-big-data">How ?big? is Big Data?</h2><p>To give you an idea about how ?BIG? Big Data is, take a look at the numbers below: Data is generated per minute on the internet -</p><p><em>2.1Million</em> snaps are sent on Snapchat,</p><p><em>3.8Million</em> searches are made on google,</p><p><em>4.5Million</em> videos are watched on Youtube, and</p><p><em>188Million</em> emails are sent.</p><p>That is a huge amount of data! But that is not all the data generated per minute. There is a lot more than that.  </p><p>The New York Stock Exchange generates <em>one terabyte</em> of new trade per day. </p><p>Facebook generates<em> 500+ terabytes</em> of new data every day. This huge amount of data is generated mainly in terms of photos and videos uploaded, comments made and messages sent. </p><p>The jet engine can generate about <em>10+terabytres</em> of data every 30 minutes of flight time. Roughly around 100,000 flights are taking off and landing per day, the amount of data generated reaches up to Petabytes.  </p><p>By now, you must have a good deal of understanding of how ?big? big data is. It is <em>gigantic</em>.</p><h2 id="types-of-big-data">Types of Big Data:</h2><p>Big Data can be classified into three types ? 1) Structured data, 2) Unstructured Data and 3) Semi-structured data.</p><p><strong>Structured Data: </strong>Structured data is any data that can be accessed, processed and stored in the form of a fixed format. Structured Data is the most uncomplicated form of Big Data to work with.</p><p>Example of Structured Data: The employee table is a good example of structured data.</p><p><strong>Unstructured data: </strong>Unstructured data is any data with an unknown form or classified structure. Apart from the size being huge, unstructured data produces different difficulties in terms of its processing for obtaining value out of it.</p><p>Example of Unstructured Data: |The output returned by ?Google Search?</p><p><strong>Semi-structured data: </strong>Semi-structured data is any form of data that can combine both Structured and Unstructured data. To be precise, it implies to the data that even by not being directed under a specific database, it contains essential information that can identify singular components inside the data.</p><p>Example of Semi-structured data: Personal data stored in an XML file.</p><h2 id="why-is-big-data-so-important">Why is Big Data so important?</h2><p>The analytics of Big Data is used by numerous organizations make use of their data to identify new windows of opportunity. Companies use Big Data to achieve growth and defeat their competitors.</p><p>Companies need to collect and analyse Big Data mainly because it is ? 1. Cost-effective, 2. Time-saving, 3. Helps in the understanding of the market in the best way possible, 4. Get feedback about their company, 5. Improve customer acquisition and retention, 6. Innovate and redevelop their products and 7. Ensures influential marketing campaigns by solving advertisers problems and offers marketing insights.</p><p>Every company uses the data collected by them in their own way. The more constructively a company uses its data, the more promptly it expands.</p><p><em>The amount of data a company collects is not important but how the company chooses to utilize it is important.</em></p><h2 id="relation-of-internet-crimes-with-big-data">Relation of Internet crimes with Big Data.</h2><p>In a single sentence, cybercrime is any form of criminal activity that requires the use of a computer, networked device and a network.</p><p>Cybercriminals carry out these forms of criminal activities for a few reasons. Some want to generate profit, some do it to damage or disable computers and connected devices, some spread illegal information, images, videos and other materials.</p><p>The past years have seen several cyber attacks like the Telegram Hijack, Sopra Steria Ransomware Attack, Seyfarth Shaw Malware Attack, Carnival Corporation Data Breach and many more. The Cambridge Analytica scandal has proved that data violations do not require hacking.</p><p>This brings our attention to a new viewpoint on data security. Many multinational companies have access to an enormous amount of information. They can be personal information too, information that people would like to be kept hidden. After the Facebook Scandal, we have learned that no data that we share is unexploitable. Big data plays an important part here as it is the main data analytics tool. The misuse of big data for more cybercrimes can become an infamous issue. Publishing data through apparently legal ways can cause several complications and drawbacks. The damage will be worse if the data is used by criminals with greater threats.</p><p>It is an obvious fact that a company cannot run without collecting data. With cybercriminals wanting to misuse the data, constant analysis of potential threats and breaches has become a necessity. This is not an easy task and requires more big data-based technologies, which is not a positive point.</p><h2 id="use-of-big-data-in-cybersecurity">Use of Big Data in cybersecurity.</h2><p>According to a Bowie University study, 84% of businesses that used big data managed to stop cyber attacks. How did they do it? By using Big Data Analytics.</p><p>The process of analyzing large volumes of data that is unutilized by the usual analytics programs is referred to as Big Data Analytics.</p><p>Big Data Analytics, in collaboration with Machine Learning, can perform an in-depth analysis of all the collected data, past and existing, and distinguish between what is ?normal? and what is not. Based on the results, companies can then use machine learning to build up their cybersecurity guidelines so they can be cautioned whenever there is an irregularity in the normal course of things and hence can block cybersecurity threats.</p><p>Big data is a brilliant method to detect potential threats that come from employee devices. It identifies anomalies in the employee as well as the contractor devices.</p><p>Big data also allows companies to respond to threats detected automatically and ensures the accuracy of the data.</p><h2 id="wrapping-up">Wrapping up:</h2><p>With so many benefits, it is no wonder why companies are now investing in costly and advanced frameworks to enhance cybersecurity. It is widely believed that big data will solve various issues of artificial intelligence. Apart from that, the truth, however, is that with the increasing advancements of cyber attacks, the cybersecurity established to avoid them is also increasing. It is important for companies to identify the risks of cybercrimes and take responsibility to block them.</p>

Big Data And The Rise Of Internet Crimes.

<p>If on a scale of 1-10, your knowledge of cloud computing lies somewhere between 1-5, here is an easy explanation of cloud computing. </p><p>Let?s imagine that you?ve started your own business or a start-up. Whatever business it is, you will have to manage and keep track of a huge amount of data. In the beginning, when you have three to four people working in your company, the in-built storage system of three to four computers will be enough to store all the necessary data. But with time and good fortune, your business or start-up idea will grow bigger and you will need to hire more and more employees to work for you. The bigger your business grows, the more employees you will require and the more data you will have to manage and store. By following the old, traditional method of data storage, you will buy external storage like SSDs and HDDs. The problems with these external storage systems are that ? a)hardware will cost you money, b) you will have to arrange for a tech team only to manage all those hardware and c) you will have to pay for their maintenance. On top of that, half of the storage system might not be used and your company will have to face the loss.</p><p>Now imagine if you had a service to do all the management, maintenance and security of your data. All you had to do was pay a certain amount of nominal fee, and use the service only when you need it. That will be an efficacious game changer. That is what cloud computing is. That is where the cloud computing service providers jump in. </p><p>In simple words, anything that involves the delivery of hosted services over the internet is called cloud computing. The main goal of cloud computing is to provide uncomplicated, scalable access to computing resources and IT services.</p><h2 id="how-does-cloud-computing-work">How Does Cloud Computing Work?</h2><p>Cloud computing services allow their clients to access data over the internet, from remote servers, databases and other computers.</p><p>To properly understand the functioning of cloud computing, divide it into the front-end and back-end.</p><p>The front-end authorizes its users to access data stored in the cloud using cloud computing software or via an internet browser. The back-end, however, is responsible for storing data and information safely? i.e. the principal integrant of cloud computing. The front-end and back-end transmissions are supervised by a central server.</p><p>There are a certain set of rules, known as protocols, that helps the central server in facilitating necessary operations. It uses software like middleware to guarantee faultless connectivity between the computers and devices that are connected with cloud computing.  </p><h2 id="examples-of-cloud-computing">Examples of Cloud Computing</h2><p>The best and well-known example of cloud computing is Google Cloud. A lot of people with computer devices use this cloud computing service to store their data. People use Google Docs, Google Drive, Google Photos on a regular basis these days.</p><p>Another good example of cloud computing is Office 365 by Microsoft. They provide subscription-based services such as Excel, Powerpoint and Outlook.</p><p>Other examples of cloud computing services include Slack, Creatio, Salesforce, Amazon Web Services (AWS), iCloud, IBM Cloud and many more. </p><h2 id="advantages-of-cloud-computing">Advantages of Cloud Computing</h2><p>By now, one must already have a good idea about the advantages of cloud computing. But one can still be unsure about the benefits or want to know deeply about the topic. Here are a few advantages of cloud computing.</p><p><strong>Less costly:</strong> The pay-as-you-go option allows you to pay for exactly the amount of space required. Unlike the traditional way of buying hard drives, there is no need to pay for anything extra except for the storage space.</p><p><strong>Security: </strong>According to RapidScale,<a href="https://www.slideshare.net/rapidscale/cloud-computing-stats-security-and-recovery"> 94% of businesses</a> recognized an improvement in security after implementing cloud computing services.</p><p><strong>Scalability: </strong>The cloud computing service provider can handle the scaling up and down of their clients by providing storage needs quickly to suit the situation.</p><p><strong>Business continuity: </strong>A business continuity plan requires the protection of data and systems. Businesses, even after facing unpredictable crises need to get back on track and having their data stored in the cloud ensures the backup and protection of their data in a secure location.</p><p><strong>Flexibility: </strong>Cloud computing offers flexibility to the employees of the company using cloud computing services. They can have the ability to access the data from their home or while using other computers. </p><h2 id="compute-layers">Compute Layers</h2><p>Compute layer outlines the status of cloud computing services and virtual machines. It brings attention to the logs and logs tables that store information related to several events activated on the cloud. Compute layers also helps in finding out the websites that over-utilize the resources that have been administered to them.</p><h2 id="benefits-of-separating-storage-and-compute-layers">Benefits of Separating Storage and Compute Layers</h2><p>With cloud adoption and separation of storage and compute, businesses can achieve cost savings and greater flexibility.</p><p>Any large retailer wanting to enhance the overall customer experience by checking the insights of purchase transactions, service history, social data, customer demographics etc will require the real-time processing and transformation of a huge amount of data. </p><p>Separating compute and storage has some additional benefits:</p><h3 id="scalability">Scalability:</h3><p> If data is stored in locally attached disks and the requirement of a bunch of database nodes arises to meet performance specifications, databases usually partition the data in such a way that each node owns some portion of the data. This ownership of data makes the scaling of the database inconvenient. On the other hand, when all the storage network is attached, scaling of the system shows significant convenience. With the increase in computes capacity, a new node can be joined and the data can be remastered. In this process, the data node ownership is modified without the movement of any data.</p><h3 id="cost-effective">Cost-effective: </h3><p>Cloud computing has shown significant changes in the pricing dynamics. Using cloud computing, remote storage is a lot cheaper than buying object storage or buying block storage. Cloud data service providers have strong networking infrastructures which help in remote storage.</p><h3 id="availability">Availability: </h3><p>When all the data is stored remotely, the failure of any compute node will not cause the loss of the data. It will not even be temporarily unavailable. Also, the recovery of node failure can be carried out promptly using the surviving compute nodes.</p><h2 id="in-closing">In Closing</h2><p>Several database dealers have come up with novel architectures over the recent years which support separated storage and compute in cloud computing. In the next few years, the separation of storage and compute, and the relocation of the existing database systems to this prototype will become common.</p>

Premium reporting on technology, startups, VC funding, and software from Techfastly tagged with Business. Read about trends and strategies for Business.

Business

Benefits of Separating Storage And Compute Layers In Cloud Computing

<p>The mental process of receiving, storing, transforming, developing and recovering information is known as Cognition.</p><p>Machines have proved to remember information but can they perform the other functions mentioned above? Yes!</p><p>Technology keeps surprising us every day!</p><p>Let?s see some more new technological advancements that might blow your mind.</p><h2 id="what-is-cognitive-computing">What is cognitive computing?</h2><p>Cognitive computing mimics the functioning of the human brain by utilizing machine learning that incorporates self-learning systems.</p><p>In the fullness of time, this kind of technology will ease the formation of automated IT models which will not require human assistance for solving complex problems. In cognitive computing, computerized models are used to make human thought process simulations in complex situations requiring cryptic and uncertain solutions. This concept of cognitive computing is supposed to have life-changing impacts on both the private lives of individual users as well as industries and businesses.</p><p><a href="https://money.cnn.com/2016/04/13/technology/watson-david-kenny/index.html">David Kenny</a>, the General Manager at IBM Watson says, ?AI can only be as smart as the people teaching it.? This is not the case for cognitive technology.</p><p>Cognitive computing is the unification of several technologies like Artificial Intelligence, sentiment analysis, machine learning, natural language processing, neural networks and contextual analysis. All these combined together is used to solve day-to-day problems in the way of humans. This new technology will reason and scale with motive and interact with humans by being just like them. Basically, cognitive computing mimics humans in their natural habitat. In addition to that, cognitive computing helps to improve human decision making. Some cognitive system features may show adaptive, interactive stateful and contextual indications.</p><h2 id="a-little-history-of-cognitive-computing">A Little History of Cognitive Computing:</h2><p>IBM Watson is the <a href="https://historyofinformation.com/detail.php?id=2830">first cognitive computer</a> manufactured by IBM. David Ferrucci, along with his team started the development of Watson.</p><p>The growth of Watson: In February 2011, Watson competed on a TV quiz show- <em>Jeopardy! </em>and defeated two of the all-time champions. That got Watson a large media coverage and after a couple of years, in January 2014 a business unit was created. IBM launched the IBM Watson Group that is a business dedicated to the commercialization and development of the technology. In the same year, its global headquarters is opened in New York City?s ?Silicon Alley.? After two years, in May 2016, Watson had learned English, French, Italian&lt; Spanish&lt; Brazilian Portuguese, Japanese and Arabic. It had started to learn Korean which brought the total number of its conversational language to eight. Watson can even help to tackle cybercrime now, after collaborating with eight top universities.<br></p><h2 id="how-does-cognitive-computing-work">How does cognitive computing work?</h2><p>According to <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cognitive_computing">Wikipedia</a>, ?the term cognitive computing has been used to refer to new hardware and/or software that mimics the functioning of the human brain and helps to improve human decision making.?</p><p>Unlike Artificial Intelligence, cognitive computing serves as assistance instead of accomplishing the task by itself. Faster and more accurate data analysis is the main objective of cognitive computing. Humans can retain the upper hand, without having to worry about the mistakes and errors made by the machine learning system.</p><p>Cognitive computing generates solutions to a wide range of problems by using self-learning algorithms based on data mining and pattern recognition.</p><p>To reach this accomplishment, the cognitive computing system must be i) adaptive, ii) interactive, iii) iterative and stateful and iv) contextual.</p><h2 id="what-can-this-smart-technology-do">What can this smart technology do?</h2><p>Cognitive computing can be used in various fields, from retail to healthcare, from banking and finance to education.</p><ol><li>Retail: Cognitive computing helps the marketing team to collect more data about the market which can be then analysed to make retailers more adaptive and efficient. This leads to more sales and finer customer care service.</li><li>Healthcare: Cognitive computing helps medical professionals in taking the best decisions for the treatment of their patients. Taking errorless decisions will empower doctors to better diagnose and treat their patients. This also helps them to customize treatment modules based on the needs of the patients. Example: Genome Medicine.</li><li>Banking and Finance: Cognitive computing will help the banking industry to operate efficiently, simplify customer engagement and grow revenues. Cognitive banking also customizes a customer support system. This helps in making clever investment decisions, based on facts like is the customer a risk-taker or risk-averse. If the authorization is given, the technology will be able to understand the personality of the customers based on their content posted online.</li><li>Education: Cognitive computing will reshape the education industry. It can already search journals, books and research papers from the digital library within seconds and provide you with the required materials. It can also provide the students with personal tutorials, guidance and also explain critical concepts at their own pace.</li></ol><p>The other fields that use cognitive computing for the betterment of their industry include cybersecurity, the logistics industry and many more.</p><h2 id="quantum-computing">Quantum Computing.</h2><p>Quantum computing focuses on the development of computer technology based on Quantum theory Principles. Quantum Theory explains the behaviour of energy and material down to the atomic and subatomic levels.</p><p>These supercomputers are based on the two features of quantum physics, i.e., Superposition and entanglement.</p><p>Quantum computers handle operations with higher speed and lesser energy consumption when compared with conventional computers.</p><p>The contribution of Quantum computing in the fields of finance, medicine, polymer design, machine learning, artificial intelligence, big data, nuclear science, aerospace designing and military affairs can be huge.</p><p>Quantum Computing differs from classical computing as it processes information in a different way. Transistors which are either 1 or 0 are used by classical computers while quantum computers use qubits which can be 1 and 0 at the same time. More the linking together of transistors, more the linear power.</p><p>Building a quantum computer requires a long time and a huge amount of money. Google has spent billions of dollars trying to build a quantum computer for several years and they are hoping to get it ready by 2029.</p><h2 id="uses-of-quantum-computing">Uses of Quantum computing:</h2><p>Once the Quantum Computers are built, there will be no industry where the applications of Quantum computing cannot be used. Some of the top, real-world applications are listed below:</p><ol><li>Chemistry: The existence of both the transistors 1 and 0 at the same time can give power to a machine to locate molecules which will bring new opportunities in the pharmaceutical industry.</li><li>Cybersecurity: along with machine learning, quantum computing can develop innumerous techniques to bring down the increasing rate of cybersecurity threats. Quantum cryptography can also help in creating new encryption methods.</li><li>Finance: With the application of quantum technology, complex and massive calculations can be performed to improve the quality of the solution at a reduced development time.</li><li>Weather Forecast: Quantum computers will help meteorologists in the analysis of more detailed climate models which can give better insight into the climate change crisis. Accurate predictions of the changing weather patterns can even save the lives of thousands.</li></ol><h2 id="in-conclusion">In Conclusion:</h2><p>Cognitive computing will be the next-generation computing system that can communicate in human languages. And quantum computers will prove themselves to be much more efficient in big data analysis and simulations. There will be limitless applications of these new technologies.</p>

Computers that can think like Humans

<p>All of us are familiar with the word auto-correct, right? It is the feature on our tech devices that mainly detects our spelling errors and corrects them automatically.</p><p>Another great feature is the text prediction feature that is known to most of us as keyboard suggestions. This feature analyses the sentence that you are typing and suggests, more like predicts, what your next word should be. This prediction takes place due to the functioning of Machine Learning. Text prediction is the input technology that helps typing on a mobile device by recommending words the user may wish to use in that particular sentence. Those suggestions, rather predictions, are based on the context of the preceding words used in the sentence and the first letters typed. Since the user has to merely tap on the suggested word instead of typing the whole word out, this feature speeds up the input process.</p><p>Even though text prediction technology is becoming exponentially complex, the software is still spectacularly errorless.</p><h2 id="next-word-prediction-models">Next-word prediction models.</h2><p>In recent years, the language models of artificial intelligence have become very good at these tasks. And text prediction is the most notable out of them. This new feature has helped search engines and texting apps predict the next word the user wants to type. Every time we try to search for something on Google, the suggestion bar suggests us several various types of ?related searches?. </p><p>The latest generation of language prediction models can also learn new facts about the underlying meaning of the language. These features can predict the upcoming words moreover undergo tasks that need a genuine understanding of the language used. These tasks include answering questions, summarizing any document, completing an incomplete story etc. </p><p>These models were designed to optimize text predicting function without having to mimic the functioning of the human brain for completing the mentioned task. However, the neuroscientists at MIT imply that the fundamental operation of these models matches the function of language-processing centres in the human brain. </p><p>Nancy Kanwisher, the author of this new study as well as the Walter A. Rosenblith Professor of Cognitive Neuroscience, a member of MIT?s McGovern Institute for Brain Research and Center for Brains, Minds, and Machines (CBMM), has stated that ?The better the model is at predicting the next word, the more closely it fits the human brain. It?s amazing that the models fit so well, and it very indirectly suggests that maybe what the human language system is doing is predicting what?s going to happen next.?</p><p>The latest and most effective text prediction models are a part of a class of models known as Deep Neural Networks.</p><h2 id="understanding-deep-neural-networks">Understanding deep neural networks.</h2><p>A deep neural network is a type of neural network with more than two layers and a specified level of complexity. It uses advanced mathematical modelling to process data in intricate ways. The technology built to copy human brain activities (especially pattern identification) and the crossing of input through several layers of simulated neural connections is known as a neural network.</p><p>A deep neural network, as defined by some experts, is a network with an input layer, an output layer and one or more hidden layers in between them. Every layer in a deep neural network executes a specific kind of ordering and sorting in a process that is referred to as ?feature hierarchy.?</p><h2 id="how-does-artificial-intelligence-work">How does Artificial Intelligence work?</h2><p>Artificial Intelligence combines a huge amount of data with fast, repetitive processing and smart algorithms. This allows the software to automatically learn from patterns and features present in the data. Artificial Intelligence aims to come up with software that can reason on input and describe on output. Artificial Intelligence will serve human-like interconnection with software and support in decision making for certain tasks while not replacing humans altogether,</p><h2 id="back-to-text-prediction">Back to text prediction.</h2><p>These deep neural networks contain algorithmic ?nodes? that establish connections of differing power that make way for information to be exchanged between them in authorized ways.</p><p>Over the last ten years, deep neural networks have been used by scientists to form models of vision that can identify objects the same way the human brain does. Despite the computer models are not designed to mimic the human brain, the primary function of visual object identification models matches the organization of the human visual cortex. </p><p>The new research was held by the MIT team where the researchers analyzed 43 different language models. This research included several languages that were next-word prediction optimized. GPT-3 ( Generative Pre-trained Transformer 3) model was also included in this research. GPT-3, when given a prompt can generate texts similar to what a human brain would come up with. The other models were designed to fill in the blanks in a sentence and other different language-related tasks.</p><p>In this research, each model was given a string of words. The researchers calculated the activity of the nodes when the models were presented with those words. Then, the researchers compared the patterns with the activities of the human brain. The calculations were based on three tasks? 1) listening to stories, 2) reading a whole sentence at a time, 3) reading sentences with only one word revealed at a time. The human datasets were fMRI data and intracranial electrocorticographic measurements which were taken in people while undergoing brain surgery for epilepsy.</p><p>It was found that the next-word predicting models which performed in the best way had activity patterns that bore a very close resemblance to the ones seen in the human brain. The speed at which people were able to read those texts were also highly coordinated with those models. </p><p><br></p><p><strong>Everything being said</strong>,  after this research, the researchers now aim to set up variations of these language processing models to find out how the small changes in their construction can act on their operation and their aptitude to fit in with the human neural data.</p><p>The researchers also want to combine the well functioning language models with a few computer models that can carry out other types of tasks like the construction of the intuitive portrayal of the real world.</p>

Smart Tech Predicting your next words.

Edge computing is generally seen as a secure computing paradigm as long as adequate cybersecurity procedures are implemented across the network.

Do You Need To Worry About Your Edge Computing System?

<h3 id="what-is-edge-computing-and-how-does-it-work">What Is Edge Computing, And How Does It Work?</h3><p>Edge computing refers to computing that brings intelligence, data processing, analytics, and communication capabilities down to endpoints or where data is gathered and provided to end-users, such as network gateways. By providing highly efficient networks and operations, improved user experiences, and service delivery, latency is reduced. Network performance and uptime determine whether a company succeeds or fails. Year after year, a company's reliance on performance and reliability will only grow. Cloud workloads will continue to migrate to the edge for this reason.</p><p>By 2027, the global market for edge computing is estimated to reach USD 43.4 billion. With new traffic demands and traffic patterns, 5G technology will help the edge computing business flourish. The edge is seen as a threat by cloud leaders, who have responded by spending substantially in the edge ecosystem alongside telecom providers. Individuals or companies who refuse to go to the cloud and instead stick to their on-premises computer servers are known as server huggers. So, if you're clinging to the cloud today, you might be tomorrow's cloud hugger, i.e., rejecting the move to edge computing and all of its capabilities and benefits, including cost savings.</p><p>Edge computing is a brand-new way of doing business. It's a decommissioned data centre that's physically closer to IoT devices, lowering costs and latency. Edge computing is a potent instrument that will usher in the future of autonomous vehicles, augmented reality, smart cities, and more. This data processing and analysis methodology will evolve in the future years. It's nearly inescapable because of the potential and lower cost.</p><p>Millions of IoT devices are distributed over the world, gathering and transmitting petabytes of telemetry and audio/video to servers for analysis. In the consumer sector, the internet of things is referred to as the smart home,' which includes internet-connected equipment such as lighting fixtures, thermostats, home security systems, cameras, and so on. The IoT brings together traditional domains such as embedded systems, wireless sensor networks, control systems, automation, transportation systems, vehicular communication systems, medical devices, elder care, and others. The bandwidth required to transport the data costs millions of dollars, and the distance involved causes latency problems. The data analytics computers were physically brought closer together to minimize expenses and increase quality, with only relevant and important data being transmitted through the cloud. This is what Edge Computing is all about.</p><p>Every new widely used computing technology comes with a learning curve for businesses and organizations. Edge computing, in which cloud computing is decentralized and deployed at or near data-generating devices, poses similar issues, not least of which is edge security, or the practice of understanding edge computing's cybersecurity vulnerabilities and countermeasures.</p><h3 id="advantages-of-edge-computing">Advantages of Edge Computing</h3><p>The following are the key advantages of edge computing over cloud computing:</p><blockquote>Data handling that is better</blockquote><blockquote>Lower connectivity costs and improved security</blockquote><blockquote>Uninterruptible, dependable connection</blockquote><p>Instead of sending sensitive data to a central data centre, edge computing allows you to filter it at the source. Less sensitive data is sent between devices and the cloud, which means greater security for you and your customers. Most IoT projects can also be completed at a lower cost by decreasing data transit and storage requirements using traditional methods.</p><h3></h3><h2 id="hacking-and-physical-manipulation">Hacking and Physical Manipulation</h2><p>In an edge-computing architecture, physical tampering of devices is a possible possibility, depending on their location and level of physical protection from adversaries.</p><p>By bringing processing resources closer to data sources, edge computing by its very nature increases the attack surface. Physical attackers aiming to breach entire edge networks have more territory to cover with an enlarged attack surface, but the fact that there are more devices in more places makes physical attacks that much easier to carry out.</p><p>After gaining physical access, attackers can:</p><ul><li>Extract valuable and confidential cryptographic data</li><li>Node circuits can be tampered with.</li><li>Node software and operating systems can be changed or modified.</li></ul><p>There's also the chance that an attacker will physically harm or destroy edge nodes, jeopardizing the network's effectiveness.</p><h2 id="injections-of-harmful-hardware-or-software">Injections of Harmful Hardware or Software</h2><p>Cybercriminals can use a variety of hardware and software-based tools to corrupt, steal, alter, or erase data travelling within edge networks, especially when it comes to infecting and manipulating edge nodes, or servers and devices located at the edge.</p><p>Cyber attackers can inject unauthorized software and hardware components into the edge network, wreaking havoc on the efficacy of existing edge servers and devices and even allowing service provider exploitation, in which entities that provide the software and hardware solutions that enable edge computing to begin unwittingly executing hacking processes on behalf of the attacker.</p><p>Node replication, which involves adversaries inserting a malicious node into the edge network and assigning it an ID number that is identical to that of an existing node, is one such terrifying behaviour identified by IEEE researchers. Assailants can then take data from within the network, much like a covert spy stealing valuable intelligence from the opponent. They can even use node-revocation protocols to delegitimize other nodes in the network.</p><p>There's also camouflaging, in which attackers inject a fake edge computing node that looks and acts like any other - sharing, receiving, storing, processing, redirecting, and transmitting data packets - as well as hardware trojan injection, which gives attackers control over a node's integrated circuits, and thus its data and software.</p><h3 id="threats-against-data-routing">Threats against Data Routing</h3><p>A "routing information attack," or simply "routing attack," occurs at the communication level of an edge network and is another edge computing security concern to be aware of. Routing attacks influence throughput, latency, and data pathways by interfering with the way data is transported within a network.</p><p>In their work, the IEEE researchers discuss four different types of routing information attacks:</p><p><strong>Black holds: </strong>Incoming and outgoing network data packets are simply erased during a black hole attack, guaranteeing that they never reach their intended destination. If the data needs to be retransmitted, this reduces throughput and can increase latency. The worse the network performs, the lower the throughput and the higher the delay.</p><p><strong>Grey holes: </strong>A grey hole attack is similar to a black hole attack, except instead of removing data packets in a network all at once, it deletes them gradually and selectively. This is a more sophisticated attack than the black hole attack, and as a result, it can be more difficult to detect.</p><p><strong>Wormholes: </strong>During a wormhole attack, packets are recorded at one network site, tunnelled to another, and then replayed. Research conducted at the University of British Columbia found that strategically placing a wormhole can disrupt 32% of all conversations across an ad hoc network.</p><p><strong>Hello Flood: </strong>Finally, there's the Hello Flood attack, which involves a malicious node broadcasting hello packets to nodes pretending to be their neighbours, causing network routing confusion.</p><h3 id="ddos-distributed-denial-of-service-attacks">DDoS (Distributed Denial-of-Service) Attacks</h3><p>Another edge computing security concern to be aware of is distributed denial of service (DDoS) attacks, in which an existing network resource is overwhelmed with traffic from other compromised systems inside the network. Outage attacks, sleep deprivation assaults, and battery draining attacks are three well-known DDoS attacks carried out on edge computing devices, according to IEEE researchers.</p><p>When a DDoS attack forces nodes to stop operating completely, it is called an outage attack. A sleep deprivation assault occurs when attackers flood nodes with legitimate requests, preventing them from entering a power-saving mode, resulting in a significant increase in power consumption. A battery-draining assault, also known as a barrage attack, can trigger an outage by depleting the battery life of certain nodes or sensors by repeatedly running energy-intensive programmes or applications. Researchers also point out the possibility of jamming attacks, which can be continuous or intermittent. The network is swamped with counterfeit messages and disturbances during a jammer assault, which can exhaust resources at all levels: communication, computing, and storage.</p><h3 id="final-thoughts">Final Thoughts</h3><p>The four edge computing security issues discussed in this article are just a few of the many that can affect an edge network and compromise sensitive data. It's critical to stay up to date on the current dangers to your edge computing setup so that you can be ready in the event of a disaster. Edge computing is generally seen as a secure computing paradigm as long as adequate cybersecurity procedures are implemented across the network. It's always a good idea to put your faith in manufacturers who have rules and practices in place to ensure that their edge servers and other edge computing solutions are secure.</p><p>Manufacturers who have obtained or are working toward obtaining their Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification (CMMC), are DFARS/NIST SP 800-71-compliant and have partnered with leading cybersecurity companies to offer operating system (OS) hardening and data-at-rest encryption key management for self-encrypting drives fall into this category (SEDs). To assist ward off hardware-based assaults, purchasing an edge server from a manufacturer with a Counterfeit Protection Program (CPP) and other stringent quality inspection systems in place is strongly advised.</p>

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