Newsletter Volume 31 Issue 2, Feb 2019

From The Editor

From food safety to cybersecurity, blockchain is being hailed as the biggest thing since the internet. A January 2, 2019 MIT Technology Review, In 2019, blockchains will start to become boring, suggested that “In 2017, blockchain technology was a revolution that was supposed to disrupt the global financial system. In 2018, it was a disappointment. In 2019, it will start to become mundane.” In fact, there is already evidence to support the MIT Technology Review forecast, i.e.:

Walmart’s two-year pilot project had already demonstrated that a distributed ledger can keep tabs on food products from farm to shelf.

The value of blockchain in the financial sector reached $1.9 billion in 2017 and revenues are projected to reach $462 billion by 2030.

A September 2018 report in the Australian Cybersecurity Magazine describes How blockchain could redefine cybersecurity.

See below, Blockchain Comes Out of the Closet. (Also note the 25% Early Bird Discount Until 28th of February  for our QESP BLOCKCHAIN WORKSHOP in Partnership with the Australian Computer Society, see Events below.) 

 “A new partnership between the federal government’s peak cyber security team and a professional association promises to improve cross-sector collaboration, and might also lead to more consideration of independent expertise in the development of public policy..” This quote is from a 01/02/2019 article in The Mandarin, which describes the deal between the Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC) and the Australian Information Security Association (AISA). See below, Infosec professionals join ACSC to improve national cyber resilience and, hopefully, policy.

“A team of researchers has discovered that decentralized systems work better when the individual parts are less capable.” This finding comes in a February 6, 2019 ScienceDaily article from George Washington University, which explored “a common theory that decentralized systems, those without a central brain, would be more resilient against damage or errors… This research has the potential to inform everything from how to effectively structure a company, build a better autonomous vehicle, optimize next-generation artificial intelligence algorithms — and could even transform our understanding of evolution.” The surprising finding was that as the research team made individual pieces better, the entire system performed worse. “As the parts get cleverer, they collectively make more significant errors and repeat mistakes from the past.” See below,  Simpler parts make for a more efficient system.

“The Australian political digital infrastructure is a target in an ongoing nation state cyber competition which falls just below the threshold of open conflict… But cyber measures targeting Australian government infrastructure are the “new normal”. It’s the government response which is the most unique thing about this recent attack.” This quote is from a February 18, 2019 article in The Conversation, which gives details of how “The Australian Signals Directorate (ASD) – which incorporates the Australian Cyber Security Centre (ACSC) – analyses and responds to cyber security threats.”  See below, A state actor has targeted Australian political parties – but that shouldn’t surprise us.

Current Issue

Articles in the current Issue cover:

Blockchain Comes Out of the Closet

“The Securities and Exchange Commission in the United States, the Financial Conduct Authority in the UK, the Hong Kong Monetary Authority and other regulatory bodies are reacting positively towards blockchain technology within the financial sector” 

Infosec professionals join ACSC to improve national cyber resilience and, hopefully, policy

“We have people who are academics in the cyber security space, we have people that are in the risk management space, people in the project management space, senior executives at large organisations, small business owners, and people from different government agencies that deal with cyber security and risk management.”..

Simpler parts make for a more efficient system

“ When an overly capable system component is working on a task, it will start to self-correct when mistakes happen in order to accomplish the goal. This leads to over corrections which take the system further away from its end point, ‘the worse thing it could do’.”

A state actor has targeted Australian political parties – but that shouldn’t surprise us.

“In January ASD identified in a report that across the three financial years (2015-16 to 2017-18) there were 1,097 cyber incidents affecting unclassified and classified government networks which were “considered serious enough to warrant an operational response.”.”

QESP Blog

How Machine Learning Creates Big Bad Data

By Ted Smillie

21 February 2019

Machine learning mistakes range from serious to ridiculous. Here are some examples:

How Machine Learning Creates Big Bad Data

Events

QESP BLOCKCHAIN WORKSHOP in Partnership with the Australian Computer Society

Date: Thursday 14th March 2019 – 6:00pm – 9:00pm (Networking & Registration start at 5:30 pm)

Location: Swissôtel, 68 Market Street Sydney 2000

Blockchain expertise captured the No. 1 position on the latest skills index by Upwork for being the hottest in the U.S. job market (Forbes). In Australia, Blockchain was one of the factors whereby ACS became the first professional association in the ICT sector to be admitted as a member of the World Economic Forum  (WEF) in September 2018, and multiple incubators and accelerators developed and grew massively.

Everyone interested in this new exciting area is welcome to participate, senior decision-makers from the public and private sectors, experts, students, academics and stakeholders in general.

25% Early Bird Discount Until 28th of February

Non Members:  $40

QESP and ACS members: $20 – ACS Members can earn 2 CP Hours

Students or seniors: $20.

25% Early Bird Discount Until 28th of February

YOU CAN REGISTER FOR THIS EVENT NOW: Tickets are purchased through Eventbrite.

Please follow this link to purchase your ticket Purchase Ticket

For more information see the BLOCKCHAIN WORKSHOP SERIES – ABSTRACT

Quotes 

Quote of the Day

You’re going to start seeing open-source, self-executing contracts gradually improve over time. What the Internet did to publishing, blockchain will do to about 160 different industries. It’s crazy. Patrick M. Byrne

Quote from Yesteryear

“Almost all of the many predictions now being made about 1996 hinge on the Internet’s continuing exponential growth. But I predict the Internet will soon go spectacularly supernova and in 1996 catastrophically collapse.” – Robert Metcalfe, founder of 3Com, 1995

Ted Smillie

QESP Chair