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In today’s digital world, scams come in many forms—some so convincing that even the savviest among us can fall victim. Scammers now use staged approaches, impersonating tech support agents, bank officials, and even loved ones to gain your trust. Understanding how these scams work and staying vigilant can save you from financial loss and emotional distress.” The information below is based on material compiled by the American Bankers Association and the Bank of America. It provides suggested examples that can be useful to help prevent us from being victims and is being shared as a service to all readers:

A word of caution: Don’t download software or provide remote access to anyone you don’t know. 

Imposter

Following the introduction of Chat GPT3.5 to the public on November 30, 2022, there have been growing concerns about how the emerging AI revolution can be utilized to reimagine and , if necessary, reinvent new technologies capable of preserving our democracy– as we enter another technological, economic, and political crossroads in our society. Sharing these concerns, I have been  searching the literature hoping to discover institutionally backed efforts dedicated to addressing them. Recently, I learned about the publishing by the Stanford Digital Lab of The Digital Papers: Artificial Intelligence in America, Volume 1 of a projected ongoing series. Learning of this publication, I immediately went to Amazon and ordered my own copy. The following is my Overview of this first volume:

In the late 18th century, the Federalist Papers emerged as a groundbreaking series of essays advocating for the ratification of the U.S. Constitution.  Alexander Hamilton, James Madison, and John Jay—under the pseudonym “Publius”—articulated a vision for governance that reflected the challenges of their time: an unstable political landscape, shifting economic forces, and burgeoning democratic ideals. Fast forward to the 21st century, the world again finds itself at the intersection of disruptive change where the political, economic, and technological forces at play call for a similar intellectual effort to chart a way forward.

The Digitalist Papers: Artificial Intelligence and Democracy in America takes inspiration from the spirit of the Federalist Papers, yet it aims to address an even more complex landscape. The technological revolution now driven by artificial intelligence (AI) offers immense potential to reshape every aspect of human life—from how we communicate to how we govern ourselves. As Hamilton, Madison, and Jay once grappled with how to mold governance to fit the emerging United States, today’s thought leaders must confront the challenge of integrating AI into existing democratic institutions. This is the goal of the Digitalist Papers series: to explore the possibilities of AI’s impact on democracy and to consider how governance structures must evolve to preserve and enhance democratic values in this era of unprecedented technological change.

“On Friday, October 4, the Supreme Court agreed to hear arguments in Gutierrez v. Saenz, a case regarding death-sentenced Texas prisoner Ruben Gutierrez’s ability to sue the state for DNA testing in support of his innocence claim. The Court had issued a stay to Mr. Gutierrez on July 16, just twenty minutes before his scheduled execution. Mr. Gutierrez was convicted and sentenced to death in 1999 for the murder and robbery of an 85-year-old woman but has long maintained his innocence. Forensic evidence from inside the trailer where the killing occurred has never been tested for DNA, but the state has refused Mr. Gutierrez’s testing requests. The Court will now decide whether the Fifth Circuit was correct when it ruled that Mr. Gutierrez did not have standing to sue Texas over its refusal to give him access to DNA testing. The Court will likely hear Mr. Gutierrez’s case next spring.”  Leah Roemer. Death Penalty Information Center October 9, 2024.

In his October 7, 2024 posting in VERDICT. Amherst professor Austin Sarat argues that the Gutierrez case could expand the use of DNA evidence in criminal cases and the Court “should allow Gutierrez to challenge Texas’s restrictions on post-conviction DNA testing, asserting that such limitations in death penalty cases across the country hinder the pursuit of justice and should be reconsidered”.

Click here to read Professor Sarat’s complete posting in VERDTCT: Legal Analysis and Commentary from Justia.

 

Surgeon and bioethicist Charles E. Brinkley is a contributor to VERDICT a service of Justia. In his August14, 2024 VERDICT posting , Does Informed Consent Alone Mitigate Responsibility: Considering Patient Harm Related to Artificial Intelligence, Dr. Brinkley “discusses the ethical implications and potential harms of using artificial intelligence (AI) in healthcare decision-making, particularly focusing on informed consent and physician responsibility. Dr. Binkley argues that patients should be informed when AI is used in their care, and that healthcare providers have a duty not only to inform patients of potential risks but also to mitigate those risks, emphasizing that the use of AI does not absolve physicians of their responsibilities to patients.”

Constitution Day is one of our most important holidays because it commemorates the signing of the U.S. Constitution, our most foundational document, on September 17, 1787 by the delegates of the Constitutional Convention in Philadelphia. It is perplexing to note that the commemoration of such an important event in our history is not observed more broadly as one of our national holidays.

As Kathleen Hal Jameson writes in her article, What Constitution Day Means and Why it Matters: “For almost three quarters of a century, advocates have worked to give comparable federal stature to September 17, the day on which we celebrate the anniversary of the 1787 signing of the U.S. Constitution by the nation’s founders. As President John F. Kennedy noted in his 1961 Constitution Day proclamation, it is a day for ‘ceremonies’ set up to ‘inspire all our citizens to keep the faith of our Founding Fathers and to carry out the ideals of United States citizenship’

I celebrated by leading a discussion about Constitution Day, centered on the question: Is now the moment for a new Constitutional Convention? The following links provide the materials used during the session, along with a Concluding Statement capturing the unanimous agreement of the group

In August 2023, Mary Smith, President of the American Bar Association (ABA), announced the creation of the ABA  Presidential Taskforce on Law and Artificial Intelligence to “bring together lawyers and judges from across the ABA to address the impact of AI on the legal profession and the practice of law.” From it’s beginning, the Taskforce has been concentrating it’s efforts on a broad array of critical AI issues of concern to ABA, including AI’s impact on the legal profession, the courts, legal education, access to justice, governance, risk management, and challenges with generative AI. During the past year, the Task Force has been active on a number of fronts, addressing these issues from various perspectives, including the preparation of it’s Task Force Report on the Impact of AI on the Practice of Law: Year 1 On the Impact of AI on the Practice of Law, released August 2024.

Quoting from the Report: “This Report addresses the critical AI issues that impact lawyers and judges in the practice of law, and provides insights and resources that will equip the legal community to effectively address and leverage these developments. Given the rapid pace of change in the AI landscape (the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) released new guidance documents as this Report was being finalized), and the  need to give the AI developments the attention they deserve, the AI Task Force will continue its work in the new bar year (2024-25).

Highlights of the AI Task Force’s year [as mentioned in the Report] include:

The 2024 NY Metro Joint Cyber Security Conference will be held on September 26 from 8:30AM -5:30PM EDT,  celebrating its 11th year featuring keynotes, panels and sessions aimed at educating everyone on the various aspects of information security and technology.

Workshops featuring in-depth extended classroom-style educational courses to expand your knowledge and foster security discussions will take place virtually post-conference.  It is a collaborative event cooperatively developed, organized and sponsored by a consortium consisting of leading information security industry organizations and chapters (The New York Cyber Security Coalition).

For additional information, including conference location and conference and workshop registrations, click here

The AI Elections Accord is a voluntary agreement among leading technology companies to combat the deceptive use of AI in the 2024 elections. Recognizing the potential for AI to generate highly realistic but false content, known as deepfakes, the accord aims to protect the integrity of elections worldwide. The signatories have agreed to the following voluntary framework of principles and actions to advance seven principal goals:

  1. Prevention: Researching, investing in, and/or deploying reasonable precautions to limit risks of deliberately Deceptive AI Election Content being generated.
  2. Provenance: Attaching provenance signals to identify the origin of content where appropriate and technically feasible.

Recently, we were asked to conduct an information search regarding Nvidia Corporation, a prominent American technology company known for its contributions to the fields of graphics processing units (GPUs) and artificial intelligence (AI). Here’s an outline of our search results:

Overview

Founded: 1993

On July 17, 2024, we noticed a posting from Wisblawg which stated in part that “In recent months web developers and SEO experts have noted significant changes in Google’s Indexing practices observing a shift toward more selective indexing of web content…” Having already received other indications over the past year of impending changes in indexing practices by Google, we decided it was time to take a deeper dive into the subject.

The following is a compilation of our findings, ending with statistical information derived from an AI search using ChatGPt:

 Introduction

Contact Information