National

Regu(AI)ting Health: Lessons for Navigating the Complex Code of AI and Healthcare Regulations

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수요일, 1월 24, 2024

Authors: Stephanie Wong, Amber Ezzell, & Felicity Slater As an increasing number of organizations utilize artificial intelligence (“AI”) in their patient-facing services, health organizations are seizing the opportunity to take advantage of the new wave of AI-powered tools. Policymakers, from United States (“U.S.”) government agencies to the White House, have taken heed of this trend, [?]

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Authors: Stephanie Wong, Amber Ezzell, & Felicity Slater As an increasing number of organizations utilize artificial intelligence (“AI”) in their patient-facing services, health organizations are seizing the opportunity to take advantage of the new wave of AI-powered tools. Policymakers, from United States (“U.S.”) government agencies to the White House, have taken heed of this trend, [?]

Piero Cipollone: One step ahead: protecting the cyber resilience of financial infrastructures

Retrieved on: 
금요일, 1월 19, 2024

Bank market power, both in the loan and deposit market, has important implications for credit provision and for financial stability.

Key Points: 
  • Bank market power, both in the loan and deposit market, has important implications for credit provision and for financial stability.
  • This article discusses these issues through the lens of a simple theoretical framework.

Congress is failing to deliver on its promise of billions more in research spending, threatening America's long-term economic competitiveness

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수요일, 1월 17, 2024

The federal government spends tens of billions of dollars every year to support fundamental scientific research that is mostly conducted at universities.

Key Points: 
  • The federal government spends tens of billions of dollars every year to support fundamental scientific research that is mostly conducted at universities.
  • For instance, the basic discoveries that made the COVID-19 vaccine possible stretch back to the early 1960s.
  • If lawmakers miss a second Feb. 2 deadline, then automatic budget cuts will hit future research hard.
  • Our data shows how endangering basic research harms communities across the U.S. and can limit innovative companies’ access to the skilled employees they need to succeed.

A promised investment

  • Congress had just passed the bipartisan CHIPS and Science Act.
  • The “science” part of the law promised one of the biggest federal investments in the National Science Foundation – America’s premier basic science research agency – in its 74-year history.
  • The CHIPS act authorized US$81 billion for the agency, promised to double its budget by 2027 and directed it to “address societal, national, and geostrategic challenges for the benefit of all Americans” by investing in research.

Research’s critical impact

  • Lagging research investment will hurt U.S. leadership in critical technologies like artificial intelligence, advanced communications, clean energy and biotechnology.
  • Less support means less new research work gets done, fewer new researchers are trained and important new discoveries are made elsewhere.
  • They employ your neighbors and friends and contribute to the economic health of your hometown and the nation.


When Congress’ problems endanger basic research, they also damage businesses like these and people you might not usually associate with academic science and engineering. Construction and manufacturing companies earn more than $2 billion each year from federally funded research done by our consortium’s members.

Jobs and innovation

  • Highly trained people are essential to corporate innovation and to U.S. leadership in key fields, like AI, where companies depend on hiring to secure research expertise.
  • Our data shows that they go on to many types of jobs, but are particularly important for leading tech companies like Google, Amazon, Apple, Facebook and Intel.
  • They also hurt private-sector innovation because even the most successful companies need to hire people with expert research skills.

High stakes

  • Temporary cuts to research funding hurt too because they reduce high-tech entrepreneurship and decrease publication of new findings.
  • This would make one of the fears that led lawmakers to pass the CHIPS and Science Act into a reality.
  • Whether the current budget deal succeeds or fails, basic research is on the table and the stakes are high.


Jason Owen-Smith's research is supported by grants from the National Science Foundation, the National Institutes of Health, the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation and Wellcome Leap. He is executive director of the Institute for Research on Innovation and Science (IRIS).

ESMA and NCAs to coordinate supervisory activities on MiFID II pre-trade controls

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일요일, 1월 14, 2024

ESMA and NCAs to coordinate supervisory activities on MiFID II pre-trade controls

Key Points: 
  • ESMA and NCAs to coordinate supervisory activities on MiFID II pre-trade controls
    The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA), the EU’s financial markets regulator and supervisor, has launched a Common Supervisory Action (CSA) with National Competent Authorities (NCAs), with the objective of assessing the implementation of pre-trade controls (PTCs) by EU investment firms using algorithmic trading techniques.
  • PTCs are used by investment firms to carry out checks at order entry to limit and prevent sending erroneous orders for execution to trading venues.
  • Following the May 2022 flash crash, ESMA and NCAs have focussed their attention on the implementation of PTCs in the EU, gathering evidence through questionnaires submitted to a sample of EU investment firms.
  • As a follow up, ESMA and NCAs have decided to launch a CSA with the goal of gathering further and more detailed insights on how firms are using PTCs across the EU.

After 3 months of devastation in the Israel-Hamas war, is anyone 'winning'?

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일요일, 1월 7, 2024

His observation might well be applied to the tragedy we are witnessing in Gaza.

Key Points: 
  • His observation might well be applied to the tragedy we are witnessing in Gaza.
  • Some 85% of Gazans have also been displaced and a quarter of the population is facing a famine, according to the United Nations.

Israel: limited success …

  • Israeli society is divided between those who want to prioritise negotiations to release the hostages and those who want to prioritise the elimination of Hamas.
  • Israel achieved an important symbolic success with the apparent targeted killing of Hamas deputy leader Saleh al-Arouri in Beirut on January 2.
  • Israel still has US support in the UN Security Council, which has managed to pass only one toothless resolution since the war began.

…and facing a ‘day after’ conundrum

  • US President Joe Biden prefers a Gaza government led by a reformed Palestinian Authority, but Netanyahu has rejected this and has not articulated an alternative plan.
  • Defence Minister Yoav Gallant this week outlined what seems to be his own plan for Gaza, involving governance by unspecified Palestinian authorities.
  • Whether or not that’s a fair judgement, it’s clear that internal divisions and indecision within his government are hindering Israel’s prosecution of the war.

Hamas – still standing

  • Hamas’ main achievement is that it is still standing.
  • To win, the militant group does not have to defeat Israel – it needs merely to survive the IDF onslaught.
  • Opinion polling also shows support for Hamas has risen from 12% to 44% in the West Bank and from 38% to 42% in Gaza in the past three months.

United States – weakness in dealing with Israel

  • Secretary of State Antony Blinken failed in his effort to persuade Israel to end the war by the start of the new year.
  • Moreover, divisions in the US may hurt Biden in the lead–up to the presidential election in November.
  • Republicans, taking their cue from Trump, are prioritising support for Israel and stopping the flow of migrants across the US-Mexico border.

United Nations – irrelevant


The UN has also failed in its mission of maintaining world peace. The only Security Council resolution on the war meant nothing, as Russia was pleased to point out. The recent UN General Assembly resolution illustrated Israel’s growing isolation, but has done nothing to change the course of the war. UN Secretary–General Antonio Guterres has been powerless to influence either Israel or Hamas.

Iran – watching for opportunities

  • But it takes its orders from Tehran, which still shows no sign of wanting to become directly involved in the war.
  • The bombings have been claimed by the Islamic State, which will likely make Iran more focused on its internal security than on assisting Hamas.


Ian Parmeter does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

The meat and dairy industry is not 'climate neutral', despite some eye-catching claims

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화요일, 1월 2, 2024

They then pour a little less gas and want credit for doing so, despite still feeding the fire.

Key Points: 
  • They then pour a little less gas and want credit for doing so, despite still feeding the fire.
  • Yet that is more or less what some influential supporters of the livestock industry have done.
  • For example, one study claims that the US dairy industry could reach climate neutrality by 2050 through reducing its annual methane emissions by just 1%-1.5%.
  • That methane is a product of the digestion processes in cattle, sheep, and other ruminants, emitted when they belch.
  • In a paper now published in the journal Environmental Research Letters, my co-author Donal Murphy-Bokern and I argue that these claims represent a distorted understanding of the science.
  • There’s a risk that they could be used for greenwashing and undermining confidence in this area of climate science.

Changing definitions and climate metrics

  • That’s why in 2018 some academics introduced a new metric called GWP* to better represent the warming impact over time.
  • This risks undermining climate science by confusing businesses, consumers and policy makers.
  • These recent climate neutral claims distract us from the urgent challenge of reducing emissions of all greenhouse gases from all sectors, including agriculture.
  • He told The Conversation: “Reaching climate neutrality is a good goal to have, but it doesn’t have to be the last goal.


Caspar Donnison does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

ESMA offers recommendations on digitalisation of retail investment services

Retrieved on: 
화요일, 1월 2, 2024

ESMA offers recommendations on digitalisation of retail investment services

Key Points: 
  • ESMA offers recommendations on digitalisation of retail investment services
    The European Securities and Markets Authority (ESMA), the EU’s financial markets regulator and supervisor, has published today a discussion paper on the digitalisation of retail investment services and related investor protection considerations.
  • ESMA is seeking stakeholders input by 14 March 2024 on recommendations regarding online disclosures, digital tools, and marketing practices.
  • In the Discussion Paper ESMA explores the evolving landscape of retail investments.
  • Based on the supervisory experience of the National Competent Authorities (NCAs) and relevant academic literature, ESMA assesses both the opportunities and the potential risks linked to digitalisation.

The world has lost a dissenting voice: Australian journalist John Pilger has died, age 84

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화요일, 1월 2, 2024

John Pilger, a giant of journalism born in Australia in 1939, has died at the age of 84, according to a statement released online by his family.

Key Points: 
  • John Pilger, a giant of journalism born in Australia in 1939, has died at the age of 84, according to a statement released online by his family.
  • His numerous books and especially his documentaries opened the world’s eyes to the failings, and worse, of governments in many countries – including his birthplace.

‘I am, by inclination, anti-authoritarian’

  • Whatever the merits of Waugh’s criticism, they are, in my view, outweighed by the breadth and depth of Pilger’s disclosures in the public interest.
  • It is my duty, surely, to tell people when they’re being conned or told lies.
  • I am, by inclination, anti-authoritarian and forever sceptical of anything the agents of power want to tell us.

Telling the stories of ordinary people

  • Like many of his generation, he moved to the UK in the early 1960s and worked for The Daily Mirror, Reuters and ITV’s investigative program World in Action.
  • He reported on conflicts in Bangladesh, Biafra, Cambodia and Vietnam and was named newspaper journalist of the year in Britain in 1967 and 1979.
  • He made more than 50 documentaries.
  • He did this by telling the stories of ordinary people he had encountered, whether miners in Durham, England, refugees from Vietnam, or American soldiers returning from the Vietnam War – not to parades, but to lives dislocated by the silence and shame surrounding the war’s end.

The world has lost a resolutely dissenting voice

  • In Welcome to Australia [Pilger’s 1999 film], he concentrated on the bad things that were happening but not the good.
  • He’s a polemicist and, if you want to arouse people’s passions and anger, the stronger the polemic, the better.
  • Whatever flaws there are in Pilger’s journalism, it feels dispiriting that on the first day of a new year clouded by wars, inaction on climate change and a presidential election in the US where democracy itself is on the ballot, the world has lost another resolutely dissenting voice in the media.


Matthew Ricketson is the Media Entertainment and Arts Alliance’s representative on the Australian Press Council.

Vivek Ramaswamy is the millionaire millennial running for US president. Is he running towards a career low?

Retrieved on: 
토요일, 12월 30, 2023

The 38-year-old political novice is one of the America’s wealthiest millennials and made his fortune as a biotech entrepreneur.

Key Points: 
  • The 38-year-old political novice is one of the America’s wealthiest millennials and made his fortune as a biotech entrepreneur.
  • The Harvard-educated son of Indian immigrants with a successful business pedigree presents himself as an anti-establishment outsider.
  • Associated Press reporter Bill Barrow says that Ramaswamy wants to be the candidate that “can return Trump’s ‘America First’ vision to the White House without the baggage”.

Trump’s biggest fan

  • Ramaswamy is a huge admirer of Donald Trump, calling him the “best president of the 21st century”.
  • But in a clear attempt to differentiate himself from the former president, he has sought to put forward policies that are more extreme than Trump’s agenda.

No more support for Ukraine

  • Writing on the American Conservative website he proclaimed a desire to follow the foreign policy path of Richard Nixon’s “cold and sober realism”.
  • Ramaswamy provided an illustration of how this would manifest itself under his presidency.
  • Citing the war in Ukraine and how his administration would negotiate a deal to end the conflict he wrote: “A good deal requires all parties to get something out of it.

Republican supporters?

  • His nationalistic populist foreign policy agenda and deeply conservative positions are now the hallmarks of the modern Republican party.
  • Yet polling ahead of the Iowa Republican presidential caucuses on January 15 2024 is not positive for Ramaswamy.
  • He is struggling to resonate with Republican voters and has been languishing in the polls, far behind Trump and other challengers.

Following in Trump’s shadow

  • Some observers have stressed Ramaswamy’s difficulties rest with his inability to consistently embody the outsider image that he wants to project.
  • So it looks like he is heading out of the race, with egg on his face.


Richard Hargy does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organization that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.

Assessing data protection practices of UK tracing agents

Retrieved on: 
금요일, 12월 29, 2023

Earlier this year a women’s charity raised concerns with us about the alleged actions of a tracing agent – an investigator using various methods to find a person’s current address details.

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Earlier this year a women’s charity raised concerns with us about the alleged actions of a tracing agent – an investigator using various methods to find a person’s current address details.