LET’S BE FWENDS ISSUE #70:

HOW NORMAL ARE YOU (ACCORDING TO THIS ALGORITHM)?

“Sometimes I wonder how normal normal people are, and I wonder that most in the grocery store.”

~ Elizabeth Moon

How normal am I?

I’m an old, white, not-laughing dude. That makes me pretty normal.Much to my dismay, I seem to be pretty normal. According to the algorithms powering the “How normal am I”-website. The project is an illustration of what is possible with facial recognition technology, and what is also already done on a wide scale. This kind of technology is not only used in police work, but also in commercial contexts. Give it a try, it is highly entertaining and educational.

How to negotiate with Ransomware gangs

Ransomware is any type of malicious computer program that encrypts your data so that it is only accessible to someone who has the right decryption key. The term comes from the criminal practice to encrypting your data, and then extorting you for the decryption key (the attackers take your data hostage, demanding ransom for it).

This kind of attack is shockingly common, and affects both private persons and cooperations. The unavailability of Garmin services this summer was due to a large (and apparently successful) ransomware attack. And there is at least one case where a person died because of a ransomware attack on a hospital.

Bruce Schneier published a link to an interesting conversation about how it is to negotiate with ransomware gangs, and wrote a great summary of the pros and cons of dealing with those criminals.

Detecting Deepfakes with a heartbeat

Deepfakes are so good nowadays that it’s virtually impossible to detect them all by yourself. A couple of months ago I read something about how you could measure a persons heart rate by counting the subtle changes in their face complexion when the heart pumps blood through the body. Researchers now found out that deepfake algorithms are incapable of reproducing these color shifts convincingly, allowing other algorithms to detect and mark them as fake. Until, of course, the deepfake algorithms get upgraded and add consistent and credible shifts in facial cover to their output …

Agile for Creatives? Agile for Creatives!

I had a very inspiring an lively interactive talk at the Forward Festival in Vienna on 08.10.2020 with a great audience. It was planned to be a workshop, but due to Covid-restrictions we settled for a mix between a talk and some interactive exercises. Which was actually great, because nearly all of our work is remote at the moment, circumstances we simulated nicely in one room.

The topic was “Agile for Creatives”, and the workshop had a focus on what Agile means for the processes in the creative industries, and also the roles of creatives in projects, but the things we talked about can be applied to practically any task in practically any industry.

Here’s the slide deck for you to download.

Upcoming talk: “Who’s my boss (anyway)?”

Speaking of speaking - last time my talk at Scrum Club Dornbirn got cancelled because of the ‘Rona. We’ll try again today. So if you’re really spontaneous and in the area, let’s hang out this evening!

Whenever your imposter syndrome gets the better of you and you think you’re just a fake - remember that your heartbeat shows on your face in a credible and predictable pattern, and therefore, you’re not a fake. 💓