But several US senators are looking to get something more official on the books. Called the Block Nuclear Launch by Autonomous Artificial Intelligence Act, the new legal framework would… well, block any nuclear launches by an autonomous AI.

AI goes nuclear?

Specifically, the bill intends to “…safeguard the nuclear command and control process from any future change in policy that allows artificial intelligence…to make nuclear launch decisions”. Involved in the bill are Senator Edward J. Markey, as well as Representatives Ted W. Lieu, Don Beyer, and Ken Buck.

“While U.S. military use of AI can be appropriate for enhancing national security purposes, use of AI for deploying nuclear weapons without a human chain of command and control is reckless, dangerous, and should be prohibited,” said Buck.

While well-intentioned, the bill faces more challenges from the technology than just being in control of launches. We live in an age where Drake and Kanye have been cloned, where the Pope dresses in Balenciaga, and where the line between real and fake is more blurred than ever. It’s entirely possible that an advanced AI system, if it somehow got hold of nuclear launch codes, could impersonate an American president convincingly enough to launch a missile or seventeen. Sure, it’s a plot worthy of a Tom Clancy novel, but it’s within the realm of possibility.

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The (cyberattack) steaks are high

The largest meat supplier in the world, JBS, confirmed the attack in a press release, saying that some of the servers at its North American and Australian facilities were compromised. This has led to the closure of the company’s facilities in cities in Iowa, Minnesota, Texas, Colorado and Alberta, Canada, as well as locations across Australia.

The company said that its “…backup servers were not affected, and it is actively working with an Incident Response firm to restore its systems as soon as possible.” It added, “The company is not aware of any evidence at this time that any customer, supplier or employee data has been compromised or misused as a result of the situation.”

JBS handles around 23% of all meat processing in the United States and about 20% of Australia’s meat production. This sort of attack could conceivably mess with the global food supply chain, which is probably the point. Ransomware expert Brett Callow, of Emsisoft, speaking to the Associated Press, explains, “They play a critical role in the food supply chain and threat actors likely believe this increases their chances of getting a speedy payout.”

Source: Bloomberg

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The first, the United Arab Emirates’ Hope Probe, should have made it to the red planet this week. It will stay in orbit and study its atmosphere for one complete Martian year (687 Earth days).

China’s Taiwen-1 mission also enters orbit this month and will begin scouting the potential landing site for its Mars rover, due to be deployed in May.

If successful, China will become the second country to land a rover on Mars.

These two missions will join six orbiting spacecraft actively studying the red planet from above:

• NASA’s Mars Odyssey, Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) and MAVEN Orbiter
• Europe’s Mars Express
• India’s Mars Orbiter Mission (MOM)
• the European and Russian partnership ExoMars Trace Gas Orbiter.

The oldest active probe – Mars Odyssey – has been orbiting the planet for 20 years.

The third spacecraft to reach Mars this month is NASA’s Perseverance rover, scheduled to land on February 18. It will search for signs of ancient microbial life but its mission also looks ahead, testing new technologies that may support humans visiting Mars one day.

Laboratories on wheels

NASA has an impressive track record for landing on Mars. It has operated all eight successful missions to the Martian surface.

What began with the two Viking landers in the 1970s continues today with the InSight lander, which has studied the daily weather on Mars and detected Marsquakes for the past two years.

Perseverance will be the fifth rover to arrive on Mars that’s capable of venturing across the surface of another planet.

These amazing laboratories on wheels have extended our knowledge of a faraway world. Here’s what they’ve told us so far.

The first rover – Sojourner

Twenty years after Viking 1 & 2 landed stationary probes on Mars, a third spacecraft finally reached the planet, but this one could move.

On July 4, 1997, NASA’s Pathfinder literally bounced onto the Martian surface, safely enclosed in a giant set of airbags. Once stable, the lander released the Sojourner rover.

The first rover on Mars could move at a maximum speed of 1cm a second and was about as long (63cm) as a skateboard — smaller than some of the boulders it encountered.

Sojourner explored 16 locations near the Pathfinder lander, including the volcanic rock “Yogi”. Pictures of its landing site, Ares Vallis, showed it was littered with rounded pebbles and conglomerate rocks, evidence of ancient flood plains.

The geologists – Spirit and Opportunity

A pair of upsized rovers arrived on Mars in early 2004. Spirit and Opportunity were geologists, searching for minerals within the rocks and soil, hidden clues that dry, cold Mars may once have been wet and warm.

Spirit landed in Gusev Crater, a 150km-wide crater created billions of years ago when an asteroid crashed into Mars.

Spirit discovered evidence of an ancient volcanic explosion, caused by hot lava meeting water. Small rocks had been thrown skyward but then fell back to Mars. Examination of the impact or “bomb sag” showed the rock had landed on wet soil.

Even when things went wrong, Spirit made new discoveries. While dragging a broken front wheel, Spirit churned up a track of soil revealing a patch of white silica.

This mineral usually exists in hot springs or steam vents, ideal environments where life on Earth tends to flourish.

The rover that kept on going

Opportunity arrived on Mars three weeks after Spirit. Its original three-month mission was extended to 14 years as it travelled almost 50km across the Martian terrain.

Landing in the small Eagle Crater, Opportunity went on to visit more than 100 impact craters. It also found a handful of meteorites, the first to be studied on another planet.

The rover was descending into Endeavour Crater when a dust storm ended its mission. But it was along the crater’s edge that Opportunity made its biggest discoveries.

It found signs of ancient water flows and discovered the crater walls are made of clays that can only form where freshwater is available — more evidence that Mars could well have been a place for life.

The chemist – Curiosity

Curiosity landed in Gale Crater on August 6, 2012, and continues to explore the region today. During the coronavirus pandemic, scientists and engineers have been commanding the rover from their homes.

In a first for space exploration, NASA’s Curiosity was lowered to the Martian surface using a “sky crane”. After a successful soft landing, the crane’s cables were cut and the spacecraft’s descent stage flew away to crash elsewhere.

Curiosity is a fully equipped chemical laboratory. It can shoot lasers at rocks and also drill into the soil to collect samples. It’s confirmed ancient Mars once had the right chemistry to support microbial life.

Curiosity also found evidence of ancient freshwater rivers and lakes. It seems that water once flowed towards a basin at Mount Sharp, a central peak that rises 5.5km from within Gale Crater.

From being on the surface of Mars, we’ve learned it was once very different to the dry, dusty planet it is today.

With flowing water, possible oceans, volcanic activity and an abundance of key ingredients necessary for life, the red planet was once much more Earth-like. What happened to make it change so dramatically?

It’s exciting to consider what the Perseverance and Taiwen-1 rovers may discover as they explore their own patch of Mars. They might even lead us to the day when humans are exploring the red planet for ourselves.

• Tanya Hill is Honorary Fellow of the University of Melbourne and Senior Curator (Astronomy), Museums Victoria
• This article first appeared on The Conversation

Header image: NASA/JPL-Caltech/Cornell University/Arizona State University

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Which is the first time this has happened. Previously, Trump was left alone no matter what inflammatory content was posted to his accounts. Then, around the time of the November 2020 election, both Twitter and Facebook were fact-checking Trump’s social media posts. And now, claiming that Trumps posts were inciting or inflaming protest tensions, Facebook and Twitter have issued a ban on Trump’s social media accounts.

Donald Trump’s ban

This means that the account of @realDonaldTrump will be locked for 12 hours following the removal of these Tweets. If the Tweets are not removed, the account will remain locked.

— Safety (@Safety) January 7, 2021

Trump tweeted support for the mob that swarmed the Washington Capitol, a move that saw Twitter issuing a twelve-hour ban on the president’s Twitter account. The ban would be lifted after Trump deletes the offending tweets, but he also faces a permanent ban if the tweets in question aren’t deleted.

We've assessed two policy violations against President Trump's Page which will result in a 24-hour feature block, meaning he will lose the ability to post on the platform during that time.

— Meta Newsroom (@MetaNewsroom) January 7, 2021

Facebook took similar steps, blocking Trump from posting to either Facebook or Instagram for a period of 24 hours, based on “two policy violations”. This follows concerns from Facebook around the violence, when the company “…removed from Facebook and Instagram the recent video of President Trump speaking about the protests and his subsequent post about the election results. We made the decision that on balance these posts contribute to, rather than diminish, the risk of ongoing violence.”

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