Tag: Ethics

An app is inspiring children to read books. But as a non-profit organisation in the US has shown, books are also highly valuable in prisons. The organisation’s founder, a former prison resident himself for nine years, discovered how stories and books could provide perspective during his long stay in solitary confinement. In the meantime, the registered lawyer has been...

Some test animals do get a happy ending after all. Better still, a US research team wants to ensure animal testing can be bypassed in sustainable and cost-effective ways with the help of marine red seaweed, known as Pacific dulse. Following cleaning and drying of the seaweed the US team used an anionic surfactant to remove all its cells,...

Modern plasters leave no trace when treating chronic wounds. Unlike medication used to alleviate severe pain, which often contains addictive opioids. Which is why a biotechnology startup in France is focusing on developing painkillers without the addictive potential. The blueprint for future non-opioid drugs: the body’s own TAFA4 protein, which is secreted in response to touch, and normalises the...

A tattoo can help protect people from sexual assault. Whereas a non-profit organisation in Berlin is focusing on how to combat gender-based violence within relationships. The group’s app allows those affected to keep an incident log, which serves as proof in court proceedings. Additionally, information is available on different types of violence. For security reasons, details of the app,...

Placeholders can protect personal data from AI chatbots. So-called large language models provide the basis for established AI systems. Many of these were trained using all available online data - only some respect copyright laws. Now, a Swiss-based research team is focusing on only mining data that is publicly accessible and legally usable. 15 billion data units from 1,000+...

A simple system could protect cars from unauthorised entry. Log-ins, passwords and, most recently, passkeys, do the same job for email or other online accounts. Service provider logs record access, also recognising devices and IP-addresses. But experienced hackers with knowledge of this private information can use this to mask their own details during login to falsify records. Staying undetected...

It’s important to safeguard children against improper content online. Students in Indonesia, meanwhile, have focused on how people with Down’s Syndrome or Fragile X Syndrome can learn about protecting their sphere of privacy. The team developed a simple system using three different colours of soap. Allowing parents or carers to impart crucial information on intimate areas during bathtime using...

Smart home devices needn’t reveal users’ data. A ring could perform a similar function in public. Navigation and weather apps (along with many others) store users’ location data. Now, a university team from Munich has developed a new method to prevent such data being used to infer private information. The basis for the method is a digital grid system...