Good morning, and a happy new week to all of you. Let’s get into the tech news.
1. Melanoma treatment added to the PBS
Kicking things off with The Guardian, which is reporting that Australians living with melanoma now have access to subsidised treatment options offered under the Pharmaceutical Benefits Scheme (PBS). Australians are at a much larger risk of developing this type of skin cancer, and from February 1, treating it will become much more affordable for many people. “With cheaper medicines, we are supporting millions of Australians with chronic, ongoing conditions so they don’t have to choose between health care and paying the bills,” Federal Minister for Health and Aged Care Mark Butler said.
2. NSW to trial AI to protect out-of-care young people
Moving over to itNews, which is reporting that New South Wales is testing AI to predict risks to young people in out-of-care homes (as in, young people who live in foster homes, with trusted relatives, or with community members). The state government has partnered with Monash University for the program. “This research project is in its early phase and does not involve AI/machine learning replacing specialist caseworker decision-making,” a spokesperson for The Department of Communities and Justice told itNews. The program will remain in its proof of concept phase for 12 months.
3. Microsoft discloses a hack
The Verge reports that Microsoft suffered a hack from a Russian state-sponsored group of hackers beginning in late November 2023. The tech giant claims that senior leadership emails were accessed by the hackers, along with employees in cybersecurity and legal teams. “The attack was not the result of a vulnerability in Microsoft products or services. To date, there is no evidence that the threat actor had any access to customer environments, production systems, source code, or AI systems,” Microsoft said.
4. Apple Vision Pro app development suffering
Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman reports that Apple’s new VR headset, the Vision Pro, will lack apps when it debuts in the U.S. in February. Netflix, YouTube, and Spotify have also said that they won’t be launching anything on the headset, or enabling iPad apps to run on it, when it launches. Additionally, Google and Meta appear to be dodging the platform entirely. Gurman guesses that 99 per cent of apps that will likely run on the headset at launch will be iPad app ports. The low-volume nature of the Vision Pro, along with its high costs, also appear to be making it a questionable piece of tech for developers.
5. Meta joins AI arms race
The Australian reports (via AFP) that Meta is moving to create artificial intelligence, putting it alongside Microsoft’s OpenAI and Google to develop sophisticated large language models and chatbots. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg said that the goal is to create AI than can solve problems and rationalise similarly to humans. “We’ve come to this view that, in order to build the products that we want to build, we need to build for general intelligence,” Zuckerberg told The Verge. I guess he’s bored of the metaverse.
BONUS ITEM: Gosh, I love space. This asteroid, Sar2736, crashed into Germany over the weekend.
First videos of the atmospheric entry of asteroid #Sar2736 now coming in.
— Nahel Belgherze (@WxNB_) January 21, 2024
Augustusplatz Live Cam, Leipzig, Germany. pic.twitter.com/bg12YiJbtY
Have a lovely week.