has readers fretting about space debris and traffic management. Given the attention to the problem, it’s unfair to say that this will sneak up on us, but the lack of urgency around addressing space safety might leave us with a nasty surprise. The leak in the Soyuz spacecraft at the ISS, likely caused by a micrometeroid impact, may be a warning for congested space lanes to come. It’s a champagne problem, in the sense that space junk worries us because of the growing value of space activity. But as I will ruefully attest on Jan. 1, champagne problems can still hurt.

Robots are headed for the moon en masse: Attempted landings from companies including Japan’s iSpace, Intuitive Machines (two different missions!), Astrobotic, plus robots built by space agencies in Japan, India, and Russia.

China’s new space station will be complete, and western researchers have already started signing up to collaborate there. Will we see a non-Chinese astronaut visit?

Russia’s decision to invade Ukraine, for example, has been a debacle, but it put an incredible spotlight everything changing in space. One of Russia’s first acts of war was hacking satellite communications networks, while SpaceX’s Starlink network became a vital tool for Ukrainian resistance. The public, along with intelligence agencies and militaries, relied on satellite data to understand and prosecute the fighting. Drones and missiles that rely on satellite navigation and communications have become central to the conflict. AdvertisementIt’s not the first “space war”—the 1990 Gulf War typically gets that distinction—but never before have space assets been so front and center.

Musk is baiting mainstream media companies to cover a manufactured scandal about something that happened years ago and it is still not yielding returns. So far, the media largely isn’t taking the bait, showing that news coverage doesn’t just happen simply because a billionaire tries to engineer it. Silence is still the editor’s best kept weapon in the content wars.

Over at Twitter, Musk has given privileged access to some ideologically friendly journalists who must publish their findings on his platform.

But that same morning, Twitter staff assigned to evaluate tweets had quickly concluded that Trump had not violated Twitter’s policies.

multiple tweeps [Twitter employees] have quoted the Banality of Evil suggesting that people implementing our policies are like Nazis following orders.” 

“A lot of times, SI [Twitter’s Site Integrity team] has used technicality spam enforcements as a way to solve a problem created by Safety [team at Twitter] under-enforcing their policies.”In a follow-up message with a colleague, Roth said he was looking for ways to marginalize accounts that had fallen into disfavor without banning them outright.

Site Integrity Policy-Policy Escalation Support team, or SIP-PES

trategic Response Team-Global Escalation Team, or SRT-GET. It handled up to 200 cases a day.

Do Not Amplify

Search Blacklist

Trends Blacklist

a set of tools that include locking users out of searches and preventing some users’ tweets from trending—which is how countless other users discover what’s popular or being talked about on Twitter.

visibility filtering

What “shadow banning” has long meant to lay critics of Twitter was not that no one on the platform could see their posts, but that far fewer people could. They meant something fishy was happening, screens were being thrown up, the air let out of their tires, so that posts by conservative or non-woke thinkers never seemed to reach as many eyeballs as those that espoused left-approved ideas.

shadow banning.

Tweets or accounts or hashtags that offended the powers that be were not publicly shamed, but quietly throttled, meaning users frequently did not know they were being deprived of arguments or data that did not support the prevailing wisdom or the politically favored narrative.

platform to exchange best practices, guide innovators and operational end-users throughout the development phase, thereby contributing to building trust within the innovation community

develop a user-friendly Responsible AI certification standard, including quality controls and risk mitigation, that will help align new AI and data projects with NATO’s Principles of Responsible Use approved in October 2021

establish a Review Board to govern the responsible development and use of Artificial Intelligence (AI)

internationally agreed legal framework

Promoting open, secure, peacefuland cooperative ICT environment

ECOWAS Programme on the Promotion of Digital Skills and Digital Entrepreneurship for Youth

The legal framework as provided by ECOWAS to regulate electronic transactions

seven nations onboard with a moratorium on destructive tests of anti-satellite weapons

he FCC adopted new rules for defunct satellites.

Firefly gets to orbit. The company has put satellites on orbit with the first launch of its Alpha rocket.

ViaSat merges with Inmarsat

the first Russian astronaut to depart from the US since the days of the Space Shuttle

when NASA announced that it would study the feasibility of a privately led and funded mission that would use a Dragon to boost the Hubble space telescope to a higher altitude, thus extending the operational life of the flagship observatory

quantum computer infrastructure will support the development of a wide range of applications with industrial, scientific and societal relevance for Europe, adding new capabilities to the European supercomputer infrastructure.

available primarily for R&D purpose to a wide range of European users, no matter where in Europe they are located, to the scientific communities, as well as to industry and the public sector

measures taken to realize the vision set forward in this framework should be proportionate with the extent and nature of the harm, or risk of harm, to people’s rights, opportunities, and access.

blueprint to help protect the public from harm

a two-part test to determine what systems are in scope. This framework applies to (1) automated systems that (2) have the potential to meaningfully impact the American public’s rights, opportunities, or access to critical resources or services

where appropriate.

reasonable expectations

You should know how and why an outcome impacting you was determined by an automated system, including when the automated system is not the sole input determining the outcome

Continuous surveillance and monitoring should not be used in education, work, housing, or in other contexts where the use of such surveillance technologies is likely to limit rights, opportunities, or access

free from unchecked surveillance; surveillance technologies should be subject to heightened oversight that includes at least pre-deployment assessment of their potential harms and scope limits to protect privacy and civil libertie

appropriately and meaningfully given

seek your permission and respect your decisions regarding collection, use, access, transfer, and deletion of your data

pre-deployment and ongoing disparity testing and mitigation, and clear organizational oversight

ensuring accessibility for people with disabilities in design and development

roactive and continuous measures to protect individuals and communities from algorithmic discrimination and to use and design systems in an equitable way

pre-deployment testing, risk identification and mitigation, and ongoing monitoring

Independent evaluation and reporting

protected from inappropriate or irrelevant data use in the design, development, and deployment of automated systems, and from the compounded harm of its reuse

Automated systems should be developed with consultation from diverse communities, stakeholders, and domain experts to identify concerns, risks, and potential impacts of the system

this framework is accompanied by From Principles to Practice—a handbook for anyone seeking to incorporate these protections into policy and practice, including detailed steps toward actualizing these principles in the technological design process

five principles that should guide the design, use, and deployment of automated systems to protect the American public in the age of artificial intelligence. The Blueprint for an AI Bill of Rights is a guide for a society that protects all people from these threats—and uses technologies in ways that reinforce our highest values.

ICTs for the environment

option of telecommunications/ICTs and improving digital skills

Securing information and communication networks: Best practices for developing a culture of cybersecurity

e-health and e-education

Sustainable smart cities and communities

enable inclusive communication

tions/information and communication technologies for rural and remote areas

aspects of national telecommunications/ICTs1Statement

The use oftelecommunications/ICTsfor disaster risk reduction and management

tudy Group Questions

Fostering telecommunication/ICT-centric entrepreneurshipand digital innovation ecosystems for sustainable digital development

he ITU Partner2Connect Digital Coalition

Connecting every school to the Internet and every young person to information and communication technology services

ESOLUTION WGPLEN/1 (Kigali, 2022)Digitaltransformation for sustainable development

RESOLUTION 85(Rev. Kigali, 2022)Facilitating the Internet of Things and smart sustainable cities and communities for global development

RESOLUTION 76(Rev. Kigali, 2022)Promoting information and communication technologiesamong young women and men for socialand economic empowerment

RESOLUTION 67(Rev. Kigali, 2022)The role of the ITU Telecommunication Development Sector in child online protection

RESOLUTION66(Rev. Kigali, 2022)Information and communication technology, environment, climate change and circular economy

RESOLUTION 58(Rev. Kigali, 2022)Telecommunication/information and communication technology accessibility for persons with disabilities and persons with specific needs

promote efforts to enhance educational opportunities for women and girls in STEM and telecommunication/ICT skills and careers across their lifespan, with particular attention to women and girls in rural and underserved areas;11continue to assist developing countries to close the gender digital divide, including enhancing women's and girls' access to reliable connectivity, digital literacy and digital skills;12support the continuation of the Network of Women (NoW) advisory group, working on a voluntary basis, composed of two women representative coordinators per region designated in collaboration with the regional groups

promote educational programmes to protect women and girls from online forms of abuse and harassmentand to address their safety needs

evelop partnerships with other United Nations agencies to promote the use of telecommunications/ICTs in projects aimed at women and girls in line with ITU's mandate, with the aimof encouraging women and girls to connect to the Internet, increasing training for women and girls, and monitoring the telecommunication/ICT gender divide, including actively participating in and promotingEQUALS –The Global Partnership for Gender Equality in the Digital Age

mobilize resources for gender-sensitive projects, including projects to ensure that women and girlscan use ICTs for their own empowerment and in daily personaland professional activities,and create services and develop applications that contribute to the equality and empowerment of all women and girls

design, implement and support projects and programmes in developing countries and countries with economies in transition that are either specifically targeted to women and girls or are gender sensitive, for the purpose of tackling the barriers that women and girls encounter in access to and use of ICTs in terms of digital literacy and skills, training in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) fields, affordability, trustand confidence, at the international, regional and national levels, taking into account SDG target 5.b

continue to work to promote gender equality in the field of telecommunications/ICTs, recommending and supporting the implementation of actionsonpolicies and programmes at the international, regional and national level in order toimprove the socio-economic condition of women, with greater emphasis on developing countries

support gender mainstreaming in the Union's activities

shall continue to support the development of activities, projects and events aimed at closing the gender digital divide

RESOLUTION55(Rev.Kigali, 2022)Mainstreaming a gender perspective1in ITU to enhance women's empowerment through telecommunications/ICTs

RESOLUTION 46(Rev.Kigali, 2022)Assistance toindigenouspeoples and communities through information and communication technologies

RESOLUTION45(Rev. Kigali, 2022)Mechanisms for enhancing cooperation on cybersecurity, including countering and combating spam

in order to

to maintain the Group on capacity-building initiatives(GCBI),composed of competent capacity-development experts familiar with the needs of their regions, to enhance the ability of ITU Member States, Sector Members, Associates, Academia, experienced and expert professionals and organizations with relevant expertise to assist ITU-D, and to contribute to the successful implementation of its capacity andskills-developmentactivities in an integrated manner in cooperation with the two ITU-D study groups and in accordance with adopted Kigali Action Planpriorities and regional initiatives, each according to its respective field of competence

RESOLUTION 40(Rev.Kigali, 2022)Group on capacity-building initiatives

RESOLUTION 37(Rev. Kigali, 2022)Bridging the digital divide

RESOLUTION 34(Rev. Kigali, 2022)The role of telecommunications/information and communication technology in disaster preparedness, early warning, rescue, mitigation, relief and response

RESOLUTION 15(Rev. Kigali, 2022)Applied research and transfer of technolo

RESOLUTION 11(Rev.Kigali, 2022)Telecommunication/information and communication technology services in rural, isolated and poorly served areas

RESOLUTION 5(Rev. Kigali, 2022)Enhanced participation by developing countries1in the activities of the Union

Resolutions

REGIONAL INITIATIVES

Implementation of ITU-D Priorities

Affordable Connectivity

WorldTelecommunicationDevelopmentConferencecallsuponthe ITUmembership and all development-oriented stakeholders,includingthosein theUnitedNations system,tocontribute activelytowardsthesuccessfulimplementationofthis Declaration

Promoting international cooperation and partnership among ITU membership and development-oriented stakeholders for achieving sustainable development using telecommunication/ICT-centric digital technologies.

Providing support to and cooperating with developing countries, LDCs, LLDCs, and SIDS in addressingtheir constraints for accessing digital-centric new and emerging telecommunication/ICT technologies and services and for the integration thereof into different sectors, such as government services, agriculture, education, health, finance, transport, etc

implement evidence-based decision-making

Promoting sound, open, transparent, collaborative and future-proof policy and regulatory decisions with a view to facilitating digital transformation in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic and beyond. We will implement innovative strategies and policy/regulatory initiatives to bridge the widening digital divides by enabling universal, secure and affordable broadband connectivity and promoting increased digital inclusion, while enhancing confidence and security in the use of telecommunication/ICT infrastructure and services. As such, we will develop and implement policy/regulatory frameworks to help ensure infrastructure resiliency, interoperability and protection of data, as well as increase broadband uptake. Besides, we will adopt effective plans to develop and enhance digital capacities and skills that are required in the online world, without which the digital divides will continue to widen

bold and innovative national plans and recovery strategies for ensuring governance, business, education and social-life continuity. This includes providing the necessary platforms and networks for essential activities such as teleworking, e-commerce, remote learning, telemedicine and digital financial services, while paying special attention to the needs of women and girls, persons with disabilities and persons with specific needs, the elderly and children, and at the same time preparing the ground for future developments in the post-COVID-19 era

We are also fully committed to tackling environmental and climate-change issues, notably in implementing telecommunication/ICT tools to mitigate the impact of climate change and addressing the impact of telecommunications/ICTs on the environment, in collaboration with users, the private sector, policy-makers and regulators

Accelerating the expansion and use of efficient and up-to-date digital infrastructures, services and applications for building and further developing the digital economy,including mobilization of financial resources for providing universal, secure and affordable broadband connectivity to the unconnected as soon as possible. This will also include promoting investments in broadband infrastructure deployment, adoption and acces

Multistakeholder cooperation

Digital inclusionis a necessity, and insufficient digital capacity and lack of digital skills are core barriers to digital transformation and the digital economy. The demand for digitally skilled workers will increase with the accelerated move towards digital transformation. While many jobs have been and will be lost due to the COVID-19 pandemic, digital transformation and the digital economy can nurture new ICT-centric jobs. Education and capacity building for youth, and their access to digital skills and tools, are essential for youth engagement in shaping the digital future

We recognize that available, affordable, dependable and accessible ICTs when leveraged through adequate digital skills can provide powerful drivers for development and are instrumental in timely, inclusive and resilient recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic. Capacity building/development in different ICT areas, including spectrum management, remains a challenge

ualities

build confidence, trust and security in the use of telecommunications/ICTs

In the digital era, universal, secure and affordable broadband connectivity is indispensable and provides opportunities for boosting productivity and efficiency, ending poverty, improving livelihoods and ensuring that sustainable development becomes a reality for all.

Another first for WTDC-22 is the Network of Women (NoW)

The Kigali conference revised Resolution 55 on mainstreaming a gender perspective in ITU to enhance women’s empowerment through telecommunications/ICTs to encourage Member States to have gender parity in their delegations to ITU-D activities to help solve the issue of under representation of women

SeveralpledgesweremadedirectlyinsupportofITUprojects,including

Thefirst-everITUPartner2Connect (P2C) Digital DevelopmentRoundtablewas heldon7-9June2022asanintegralpartofWTDC-22.Atthetimeofthiswriting(13June2022),374pledges had been announced, representinganestimatedvalueofUSD24.5billion.Thedriveforuniversalandmeaningfulconnectivityrepresentedinthesepledgesisexpectedtobenefitbillionsofpeoplearoundtheworld,especiallyindevelopingcountries.

The digital divide continues to be a challenge, particularly for the LDCs, LLDCs, and SIDS. In response to this challenge, in September 2021 at the margins of the United Nations General Assembly, ITU launched the Partner2Connect (P2C) Digital Coalition, a multistakeholder alliance to foster meaningful connectivity and digital transformation globally. Launched in close cooperation with the Office of the Secretary-General’s Envoy on Technology, and in line withthe United Nations Secretary General’s Roadmap for Digital Cooperation, P2C provides a leadership platform to mobilize and announce new resources, partnerships and commitments around four focus areas:

Regions

common sense is not one precise thing, and therefore cannot be easily defined by rules

Common sense is different from intelligence in that it is usually something innate and natural to humans that helps them navigate daily life, and cannot really be taught.

but research seems to show that combining synthetic data with real data gives statistically sound results

Synthetic data can give smaller players the opportunity to turn the tables.

it can reduce biased outcomes

it can protect privacy and copyright

he synthetic data comes perfectly labeled

it’s easier to collect way more of it

Synthetic data, however it is produced, offers a number of very concrete advantages over using real world data.

There are a couple of ways this synthetic data generation happens

he upcoming establishment of an EU office in San Francisco

stakeholders from business, academia and civil society

countries of strategic importance or that have a high level of vulnerability

It says that economic advancement is itself a human right and that getting richer is a precondition for enjoying other human rights. It calls for “people-centred” development, by which it means a kind that focuses on people’s material needs

In support of this goal,

competing to control international data,

onceived of as agents of geopolitical influence or means to control critical, strategic resources

nor delegates to standard-setting bodies have traditionally been

with the ultimate goal of shaping the international architecture rather than simply seeking advantage within it

New Zealand, Hong Kong, Ireland, Luxembourg, and Sweden are the countries or regions with the highest growth in AI hiring from 2016 to 2021

In 2021, China continued to lead the world in the number of AI journal, conference, and repository publications

Despite rising geopolitical tensions, the United States and China had the greatest number of cross-country collaborations in AI publications from 2010 to 2021

multistakeholder deliberation u

appropriate scope of sanctions

It might be a smart gamble—a new variant, the climate crisis, or a nuclear apocalypse might force us all indoors again—but it is, to put it dramatically, a bet against humankind

The question is whether we—the intended users—will go along with it.

China has yet to grant regulatory approval for the sale of cultivated meat (so far, Singapore is the only country in the world that has), but that could soon change as pressure mounts to achieve the five-year plan. Market approval would see increased private investment in local cultivated meat start-ups, like Joes Future Food, which has already raised nearly $11 million to start lab-grown pork production. Meanwhile, the sheer size of China’s potential market could spark additional investment in global brands that are already scaling up

By promoting cultivated meat alternatives, China could reduce greenhouse gas emissions from raising livestock (or importing meat), while ensuring that it maintains food security

A graph hypernetwork starts with any architecture that needs optimizing (let’s call it the candidate). It then does its best to predict the ideal parameters for the candidate. The team then sets the parameters of an actual neural network to the predicted values and tests it on a given task.

Given a new, untrained deep neural network designed for some task, the hypernetwork predicts the parameters for the new network in fractions of a second, and in theory could make training unnecessary. Because the hypernetwork learns the extremely complex patterns in the designs of deep neural networks

Boris Knyazev of the University of Guelph in Ontario and his colleagues have designed and trained a “hypernetwork” — a kind of overlord of other neural networks — that could speed up the training process.

open standard, it is designed to be adopted by any software, device, or online platform as well as by regulatory bodies and government agencies to establish standards for digital provenance

C2PA specification will provide platforms with a method to define what information is associated with each type of asset (e.g., images, videos, audio, or documents), how that information is presented and stored, and how evidence of tampering can be identified

establishing the provenance of media is critical to ensure transparency, understanding, and trust

empowers content creators and editors worldwide to create tamper-evident media, by enabling them to selectively disclose information about who created or changed digital content and how it was altered

released version 1.0 of its technical specification for digital provenance

the Coalition for Content Provenance and Authenticity (C2PA)

concrete hope toward making these qubits compute

the MIT team’s new qubit appears to be extremely robust, able to maintain a superposition between two vibrational states, even in the midst of environmental noise, for up to 10 seconds.

many types of qubits, some of which are engineered and others that exist naturally

Where a classical bit in today’s computers carries out a series of logical operations starting from one of either two states, 0 or 1, a qubit can exist in a superposition of both states. While in this delicate in-between state, a qubit should be able to simultaneously communicate with many other qubits and process multiple streams of information at a time, to quickly solve problems that would take classical computers years to process.

such wobbly qubits could be a promising foundation for future quantum computers

when pairs of fermions are chilled and trapped in an optical lattice, the particles can exist simultaneously in two states — a weird quantum phenomenon known as superposition.

MIT physicists have discovered a new quantum bit, or “qubit,” in the form of vibrating pairs of atoms known as fermions.

Twist takes a big step towards making quantum programming easier by guaranteeing that the quantum bits in a pure piece of code cannot be altered by bits not in that cod

The scientists designed Twist to be expressive enough to write out programs for well-known quantum algorithms and identify bugs in their implementations.

understanding the meaning of a quantum program requires understanding the entanglement present in its data

Twist paves the way to languages that make the unique challenges of quantum computing more accessible to programmers

“Our language Twist allows a developer to write safer quantum programs by explicitly stating when a qubit must not be entangled with another,”

Twist can describe and verify which pieces of data are entangled in a quantum program, through a language a classical programmer can understand.

discarding one qubit without being mindful of its entanglement with another qubit can destroy the data stored in the other, jeopardizing the correctness of the program.

Twist is an MIT-developed programming language

"Entanglement forging essentially enables you to cut up a larger circuit into smaller circuits that we can execute on smaller hardware

Entanglement forging could markedly expand the computational power of quantum systems

Entanglement forging, it turns out, involves the use of a classical computer to capture quantum correlations and effectively split the problem in half, making it possible to separate the 10 spin-orbitals of the into two groups of five that could be processed separately. This doubles the size of the system that can be simulated on quantum hardware.

would speed technological innovation

bring even more vendors into the wireless industry, by allowing companies to hyperspecialize.

In its most ambitious version, Open RAN would split the RAN into smaller components beyond the radio and the baseband unit.

“Ericsson is probably in the party that's fighting back the most against Open RAN, because they will probably have the most to lose."

disaggregation

The surest way to avoid such a disaster is to stick with the same vendor from one end of the network to the other, thus avoiding any possibility of mismatched interfaces.

companies that can provide cutting-edge end-to-end networks. It's now just three: Ericsson, Nokia, and Huawei.

the tweaks primarily take the form of vendors defining radio parameters that were intentionally left blank in 3GPP standards for future development.

there is nothing preventing a vendor from “complementing" a standardized interface with additional proprietary techniques.

Unfortunately, the long and short of it is usually: the more qubits you have the more errors you get. The new research hopes to alleviate that by creating a new way to handle qubit operations, thus allowing gate-based quantum computer systems to scale.

each team was able to build a distinct, silicon-based, two-qubit quantum computing system capable of operating with greater than 99% accuracy

e are not seeing to splinter the internet

defected

defectio

incorporating diverse stakeholder views

While the initial call to action and the ultimate Alliance would consist of governments, ultimately the Alliance would also include a substantial multi-stakeholder component,

exceptions such as blocking illegal content and/or specified national security exemption

pen and interoperable access for software and apps

nondiscrimination among Alliance members in domestic regulation in the internet secto

a commitment to use only trustworthy providers for core information and communications technologies network infrastructure.

echnical and non-technical security standards

a plan to develop a charter of operational principles and commitments over the course of 2022 and 202

his year, Chinese researchers have produced more AI-related papers than any other nation, with the country having 27.68% of the global share of research papers in the field of AI and becoming the global lead in our Research in AI papers indicator, boosting its score in the Human Capital dimension.