Great CACM article about UK's Horizon Post Office scandal #Software #QA #Validation #Verification #Society https://cacm.acm.org/news/how-software-bugs-led-to-one-of-the-greatest-miscarriages-of-justice-in-british-history/

List of fact-checking websites

Dozens of services for checking news information (both political and non-political) for different countries and regions.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_fact-checking_websites

A *gentle* reminder that, I have a funded #PhD position for UK students, available with myself and @bentnib

This project will be looking at developing new methods for asserting the resilience of existing communicating systems by developing new static analysis methods derived from advanced programming language research.

Deadline for getting in contact is: Thursday 20th March 2025

You will belong to @StrathCyber and @mspstrath, as well as gaining access to @spli

https://www.strath.ac.uk/studywithus/postgraduateresearchphdopportunities/science/computerinformationsciences/towardstype-drivenassuranceofcommunicatingsystems/

Call for Papers
16th International Conference on Interactive Theorem Proving — ITP'25

Reykjavik, Iceland
27 September – 3 October 2025

https://icetcs.github.io/frocos-itp-tableaux25/itp/

ITP is concerned with all aspects of interactive theorem proving, ranging from theoretical foundations to implementation aspects and applications in program verification, security, and the formalization of mathematics.

- Abstract submission deadline: 12 March 2025
- Paper submission deadline: 19 March 2025
- Author notification: 23 May 2025
- Camera-ready copy due: 27 June 2025

#Google plans to stop using insecure #SMS #verification in #Gmail

SMS messages are delivered by mobile carriers without #encryption, and they often go through intermediaries that can be compromised without your knowledge. Even if the line is secure, phone numbers have very little in the way of #security.
#2fa #privacy

https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2025/02/google-plans-to-stop-using-insecure-sms-verification-in-gmail/

Essential reading: Paul M. Barrett's meta article on fact-checking for the Tech Policy Blog.

After providing a short history of the discipline, he goes on to debunk three myths, namely that

...fact-checking censors free speech...
...is biased against conservatives...
...and just doesn't work.

https://www.techpolicy.press/some-facts-about-fact-checking-defending-the-imperfect-search-for-truth-in-an-era-of-institutionalized-lying/

Is U Doin' Bui'ness?

According to #Google
Set up #BIMI

You can use the #BrandIndicatorsForMessageIdentification (BIMI) #standard to add your #organization’s logo to #outgoing email messages sent from your organization. Email clients that support BIMI display the #logo along with your organization’s #messages in the recipient's #mailbox. #Logos used with BIMI are #verified by a #thirdparty so #recipients can be sure logos in their inbox are #legitimate.
BIMI requires third-party certification for your domain and logo. The third-party #certification must be a #VerifiedMarkCertificate (#VMC) or a #CommonMarkCertificate (#CMC)."

https://support.google.com/a/answer/10911320

Okay. So, who is the "Verified Third Party"?
@jloc0@sdf.org @zombiewarrior @OutOnTheMoors

Interesting story from @tedium about an extortion scheme targeting prominent personalities on Bluesky who don't own their own domain.

"Cybersquatting is not a new issue, of course, but Bluesky’s decision to tie verification to domains as social proof shows the limitations of the strategy."

https://tedium.co/2024/12/17/bluesky-impersonation-risks/

I wonder how this would play out in the fediverse.

Sorry, but I don't believe in for-profit social media companies... Ultimately, this has all elements to end badly for the users.

"When I spoke this week to Bluesky CEO Jay Graber, she was gratified by the new users. “It’s been a wild week,” she says. But she noted that this spike was one of several over the past few months. Bluesky, she says, is in it for the long haul. The idea is not to recreate classic Twitter, she says, but to reshape social media on the principle of openness and user control. Remember the cool way that the internet worked before those fluffy companies got all proprietary and evil? That’s the Bluesky vision, a digital version of the hippie dream. Graber’s word cloud is full of stuff like radical transparency, and she gushes about the AT Protocol, the open-source framework that Bluesky is built on. Without getting into the weeds on this, the bottom line is that by opening everything up, communities—instead of corporate control freaks—can shape Bluesky to allow for delightful customized experiences.

Take content moderation. To purge the service of illegalities and harassers, Bluesky has brought on contractors to assist the mere 20 or so people currently employed. But the bulk of the feed-policing is expected to be crowdsourced—because of Bluesky’s open design, committed outsiders can build systems to implement their own standards. Once this system flowers, users will be able to pick the regimen that suits their comfort level."

https://www.wired.com/story/plaintext-bluesky-says-it-wont-screw-things-up/

hax - A #Rust #verification tool

https://github.com/hacspec/hax

hax is a tool for high assurance translations that translates a large subset of Rust into formal languages such as F* or #Coq.

1/2

#Webinar note: On October 29th at 11:00 (CET), members of the veraAI project will discuss their work on AI-based audio verification tools – which are about to play an important role in the fight against disinformation and unlabeled synthetic media.

EBU people and associates (and basically all media professionals) are welcome to join (after registration with a company email address, that is).

Details over here:

https://tech.ebu.ch/events/2024/veraai-audio-tools-to-counter-disinformation

#Worldcoin rebrands as ‘World,’ unveils next generation #Orb

The #blockchain #identity #verification project also announced new verification methods.
#privacy #biometrics

https://cointelegraph.com/news/worldcoin-rebrands-world-unveils-next-generation-orb

WikiProject AI Cleanup is all about fighting low-quality GenAI content and misinfo on Wikipedia.

@404mediaco has published a portrait of the group of editors trying to protect the free content online encyclopedia:

https://www.404media.co/the-editors-protecting-wikipedia-from-ai-hoaxes

What are some other popular sites, like GitHub, that let you verify your account on your fediverse profile page?

https://til.simonwillison.net/mastodon/verifying-github-on-mastodon

I'm having no luck with getting link #verification working on my profile. I've got a rel="me" link on my website bengleason.net. The site is https, and the rel link is visible in plain old html. And I've edited and reedited my profile to try to trigger verification. All without any #checkmark on my #profile.

This all worked fine on other instances, so it's a mystery why it won't work on Mastodon.online.

Does anyone have any advice?

"A platform that used to downgrade hoaxes, conspiracy theories and false claims has become one where even the boss now spreads the stuff. That change didn’t happen immediately, but the shift of X from a useful information source to a locus of misinformation has alarmed fact-checkers worldwide."

(via @Poynter)

https://www.poynter.org/fact-checking/2024/how-elon-musk-twitter-takeover-accelerated-misinformation/

More information to help me feel safe about the rando in my car.

Uber's rider ID program is available everywhere in the US as of tomorrow

https://www.engadget.com/transportation/ubers-rider-id-program-is-now-available-everywhere-in-the-us-143037313.html?src=rss&guccounter=1

Here's a new #tool to help fight #disinfo and facilitate #verification:

SPOT is an #AI-driven natural language interface for geospatial searches in #OpenStreetMap.

Fetch an image you need to check.

Identify an info pattern.

Provide instructions: "Show me a parking space within 200 meters of a communications tower and a power pole in Legnago, Italy".

Receive a really good result on an interactive map.

Details & a call for beta testers in this post: https://innovation.dw.com/articles/geolocation-verification-with-ai-our-solution

→ L'IA au service de l'État de #droit pour le #développement
https://aoc.media/analyse/2024/09/08/lia-au-service-de-letat-de-droit-pour-le-developpement/

Si tout processus décisionnel #critique doit être exempt de toute forme d'#automatisation, qu'elle soit issue d'une #IA ou non, cela n'exclut pas nécessairement l'usage prudent et limité de ces #technologies pour des tâches annexes telles que l'#information, le #tri et la #vérification. À condition que cet usage soit #public, #ouvert et que l'#État conserve une #souveraineté totale.