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AVATAR Security Kiosk Can Spot Dodgy People

In the future you may have to convince a computer that you are telling the truth at airport security checkpoints. A robotic kiosk will ask travellers a series of questions and report those who pose a potential security risk to human authorities for further investigation. The virtual border agent can detect changes in physiology and behaviour during interviews with travellers. The system is called AVATAR and is currently being tested in U.S. and Canada. An SDSU professor is developing a robotic kiosk that could help detect travelers with sinister intentions.

The Smartphone Menace

In Charlottesville, I found myself having a lunch conversation one day with some folks who are involved in Christian education at the elementary and secondary level. They were talking about the challenges they face today. One of the biggest is the ubiquity of smartphones in the hands of kids. Parents think nothing of giving them to their children, the educators said, and many kids have virtually unlimited access to the Internet. There’s the “older brother porn problem” in which younger kids get turned on to porn by watching it on an older sibling’s smartphone.