Social Media Bans Aren’t Enough to Make Children Safe

<img src="https://spectrum.ieee.org/media-library/phone-showing-social-apps-with-a-childs-shadow-using-a-smartphone-in-background.jpg?id=67777766&width=1245&height=700&coordinates=0%2C62%2C0%2C63"/><br/><br/><p>Even before France approved legislation banning social media for children under 15 last January, 13-year-old Benjamin was already wondering what life without social media would look like. “If we want to play football, we won’t be able to organize it. What will we do? Send letters instead?” he joked in <a href="https://www.lemonde.fr/en/pixels/article/2026/02/18/teens-on-france-s-social-media-ban-for-under-15s-we-re-going-back-to-the-stone-age_6750597_13.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">an interview for <em>Le Monde</em>.</a> </p><p>His reaction captured the central challenge behind the growing wave of youth social media bans: Removing access is one thing; understanding what those platforms mean in children’s lives is another. </p><p>Within weeks of Australia’s similar <a href="https://www.legislation.gov.au/C2024A00127/asmade/details" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">ban</a>, the country’s <a href="https://www.esafety.gov.au/newsroom/media-releases/platforms-restrict-access-to-47-million-under-16-accounts-across-australia" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">eSafety Commissioner reported</a> that platforms had restricted access to 4.7 million under-16 accounts. Two months later, though, <a href="https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/world/589514/one-fifth-of-australian-teens-still-use-tiktok-snapchat-after-social-media-ban" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">one in five Australian teenagers</a> under 16 was still using TikTok and Snapchat, according to a parental-control data company. But even if all children’s social media accounts were to disappear, do such bans actually make children safer online?</p><p><a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/countries-seek-to-curb-social-media-addiction-for-kids" target="_blank">Governments are moving ahead</a> without answering that question as they follow Australia’s lead. <a href="https://www.scmp.com/news/asia/southeast-asia/article/3348232/indonesia-begins-social-media-ban-children-under-16" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Indonesia’s child-safety framework, which took effect in March,</a> bars children under 16 from holding accounts on “high-risk” platforms. The U.K. government has announced <a href="https://www.hngn.com/articles/272094/20260715/uk-proposes-midnight-social-media-curfew-16-17-year-olds-ahead-under-16-ban-rollout.htm" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">plans</a> to ban social media for under-16s, add default overnight social media curfews for 16- and 17-year-olds, and extend child-safety rules to cover risky AI features. And on 17 September, the European Commission <a href="https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/news/eu-kids-act-restrict-social-media-platforms-access-children-eu">proposed the EU KIDS Act</a>, which would bar children under 13 from social media, set 15 as the EU-wide minimum age for opening an account independently, and require platforms to show that their services are age appropriate and safe by design.</p><p>But based on my experience working on <a href="https://www.itu.int/en/ITU-D/Cybersecurity/Pages/COP/COP.aspx" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Child Online Protection initiatives</a> with the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) across Southeast Asia and the Pacific, I know the bans don’t address the real problems. Instead, we should be paying more attention to <a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/social-media-trial">the systems that generate harm</a> in the first place—namely, recommender algorithms, engagement-maximizing design, opaque moderation, and extractive data practices.</p><h2>Account removals are not the same as online child safety</h2><p>My experience working on protecting children’s online safety has taught me three main lessons: </p><p>First, the public institutions responsible for child online protection often lack the staff, budget, or technical capacity to enforce complex online safety policies. </p><p>Indonesia is illustrative. A<a href="https://www.unicef.org/indonesia/child-protection/reports/evaluation-programme-prevent-respond-online-child-sexual-exploitation-abuse-ocsea" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"> 2026 UNICEF evaluation</a> found capacity constraints among service providers, long-term funding uncertainty, and a need for specialized personnel. At the local level, some staff lacked digital skills, while budget constraints left some areas reliant on external support. </p><p>Second, many children, and often their parents, lack the digital literacy and critical thinking skills needed to navigate online risks safely. My policy research on child online protection in Indonesia, <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s44206-025-00244-0" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">published earlier this year in <em>Digital Society</em></a>, found substantial gaps that account removals cannot repair: Many children lacked guidance on navigating the internet safely, and large numbers did not know how to report harmful experiences. </p><p>And third, the platforms have limited independent oversight as they identify underage users, design age-verification systems, and report their own compliance. In Indonesia, platforms themselves are responsible for carrying out age verification, while the Ministry of Communication and Digital Affairs <a href="https://www.komdigi.go.id/berita/siaran-pers/detail/lindungi-anak-di-era-digital-kemkomdigi-wajibkan-verifikasi-usia-di-platform-digital" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">oversees compliance</a>. TikTok’s appeals process for users flagged as underage, for instance, can require a <a href="https://www.tiktok.com/support/faq_detail?id=7611808266502560268&category=web_account" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">government-issued ID and selfies</a>, which is a problem because it involves collecting the additional personal data on an ID card, beyond that needed to confirm age. Will government regulators ensure that TikTok handles that data responsibly? </p><h2>The privacy paradox of proving age</h2><p>Every age-based ban creates an engineering problem: How can a platform reliably determine that a user is old enough, without intruding on other information? Governments and companies may use identity documents, parental authorization, app-store checks, or facial age estimation. Each approach has trade-offs among accuracy, privacy, accessibility, and resistance to circumvention. </p><p>There are also technical issues. One tool, <a href="https://www.identt.pl/en/blog/age-verification-vs-age-estimation-key-differences-and-best-use-cases/">facial age estimation</a>, draws on enormous databases but it is probabilistic, not exact, because people vary so much. It’s also been shown to misclassify both children and adults.</p><p> The challenge should not merely be to “verify age.” It should be to prove that someone is above a threshold, without disclosing their identity, birth date, or other information third parties might use to create a marketing profile. <a href="https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/factpages/blueprint-age-verification-solution-help-protect-minors-online" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">The European Commission’s age-verification blueprint</a> challenges companies to verify ages without collecting all that additional information.</p><p>Privacy-preserving technologies offer promising ways to achieve this. <a href="https://standards.ieee.org/beyond-standards/trends-in-online-age-verification-for-2026/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Zero-Knowledge Proofs (ZKPs)</a> can confirm that someone meets an age threshold without revealing their identity or exact date of birth. <a href="https://www.w3.org/TR/vc-data-model-2.0/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">W3C Verifiable Credentials</a> are cryptographically verifiable digital claims that can disclose only the information needed, such as “over 16.” And <a href="https://www.technologyreview.com/2026/03/09/1132352/the-usability-imperative-for-securing-digital-asset-devices/">device-based age signals</a> can allow a phone or app store to share an age range without revealing a user’s exact birth date. But these methods still require rigorous security testing, common standards, independent oversight, and clear limits on data retention. Otherwise, poorly designed <a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/age-verification">child-safety policies</a> risk creating permanent identity infrastructures in which businesses, not people, control personal data.</p><h2>Where connection goes when a platform closes</h2><p>Blocking access to a platform redirects some young people, but not always where expected. Early anecdotal reports in Australia pointed to teenagers migrating to smaller, less-regulated platforms like Yope, a pattern the <a href="https://www.cato.org/blog/australias-under-16-social-media-ban-warning-online-speech-security-around-world" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Cato Institute</a> flagged as a “whack-a-mole” problem for regulators. But industry data collected two months later found <a href="https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/world/589514/one-fifth-of-australian-teens-still-use-tiktok-snapchat-after-social-media-ban" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">no broad-based shift</a> of that kind, aside from a small uptick in WhatsApp use. Many teens simply found a way to stay on the banned platforms.</p><p>This points to a deeper gap in current society:<a href="https://www.newporthealthcare.com/resources/industry-articles/third-places-mental-health/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"> the erosion</a> of youth “<a href="https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC6934089/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">third places</a>“ physical spaces where young people have room to socialize and build identity outside home and school. As those spaces have diminished, commercial communications platforms have absorbed that role. </p><p>For many teenagers, social media workarounds are merely inconvenient. But for isolated, marginalized, disabled, or LGBTQ+ youth who depend on online communities for support that’s otherwise unavailable, displacement can mean losing certain kinds of belonging, or having to move to a platform with even weaker oversight. </p><h2>How to design safer online systems for children</h2><p>If blanket social media bans don’t work, then what will? The platforms have created many of the conditions that governments are now trying to contain: engagement-optimized recommenders, intrusive data practices, weak safeguards against unwanted contact, and features such as infinite scroll, autoplay, streaks, and persistent notifications. </p><p>These design patterns increasingly face regulatory scrutiny, including what’s required under the <a href="https://www.techtimes.com/articles/320180/20260711/eu-charges-meta-addictive-design-infinite-scroll-violates-dsa-health-rules.htm" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">European Union’s Digital Services Act</a>. A <a href="https://5rightsfoundation.com/infinite-scroll-groundbreaking-study-reveals-tiktokisation-of-children-online/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">2026 study from the 5Rights Foundation</a> that tracked children’s device use minute by minute found that the user interfaces shape children’s attention, sleep, and well-being in real time. </p><p>A more durable response would regulate those interfaces directly, <a href="https://www.ohchr.org/en/documents/general-comments-and-recommendations/general-comment-no-25-2021-childrens-rights-relation" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">treating children as legitimate users</a> whose privacy, agency, and well-being are required protections, not afterthoughts. That means designing for safety from the outset. One example would be for children’s apps to have <a href="https://ico.org.uk/for-organisations/uk-gdpr-guidance-and-resources/childrens-information/childrens-code-guidance-and-resources/age-appropriate-design-a-code-of-practice-for-online-services/code-standards/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">high-privacy defaults</a>, such as private accounts and location sharing switched off for minors. They could also have recommender systems that explain the main factors shaping a feed and give young users more control over personalization. The European Commission has published <a href="https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/library/commission-publishes-guidelines-protection-minors" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">age-appropriate interaction guidelines </a>that limit unsolicited contact and prevent minors from being added to groups without consent. Rules could also prohibit <a href="https://digital-strategy.ec.europa.eu/en/library/commission-publishes-guidelines-protection-minors" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">engagement-maximizing features that demand users’ attention,</a> such as autoplay, infinite scroll, <a href="https://medium.com/design-bootcamp/designing-for-user-retention-the-psychology-behind-streaks-cf0fd84b8ff9" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">usage streaks</a>, read receipts, and push notifications, by disabling or limiting them by default.</p><p>Governments should define measurable outcomes and fund independent evaluation, platforms should give researchers meaningful data access, and engineers should audit age-assurance systems for bias and data leakage. Schools, parents, and children themselves need a seat in designing the technology that’s designed to protect children. </p><p>If policymakers still decide to remove an infrastructure for youth connection, they should offer something better in return. Social media bans may reduce some forms of exposure to harmful content and may be justified for particular ages, services, or risks. But they are just one tool, not a comprehensive substitute for safer design, accountable platforms, digital literacy, institutional capacity, and <a href="https://digitalserendipities.substack.com/p/if-we-ban-social-media-for-children" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">noncommercial digital “third places”—</a>moderated communities, creative spaces, and public-interest platforms designed for youth participation rather than profit.</p><p>The first wave of social media restrictions isn’t enough to keep children safe. Governments are still measuring what’s easiest to count, <span>while neglecting harder-to-measure outcomes such as children’s access to safe third places and <a href="https://www.oecd.org/en/data/dashboards/oecd-child-well-being-dashboard.html" target="_blank">meaningful social connection, both online and offline</a></span>. Until governments can show evidence that harm has actually declined, they will keep mistaking account removal for safety.</p> Reference: https://ift.tt/2Kaw6ZJ

Mexican EPICS in IEEE Team Builds Portable Educational Platform

<img src="https://spectrum.ieee.org/media-library/four-young-adult-students-laugh-together-while-one-of-them-holds-a-robot-shaped-like-a-hexagonal-cylinder.jpg?id=67845427&width=1245&height=700&coordinates=0%2C156%2C0%2C157"/><br/><br/><p>In Guadalajara, Mexico, many high schools have motivated teachers and talented students with an interest in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics, but they lack access to advanced tools such as robotics laboratories. The resources shortfall limits the students’ opportunities for hands-on learning on cutting-edge applications.</p><p>A team from <a href="https://apps.iteso.mx/web/iteso/inicio" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">ITESO, Universidad Jesuita de Guadalajara</a>, is working to change that. Through the <a href="https://epics.ieee.org" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">EPICS in IEEE</a> initiative, a multidisciplinary group of 15 engineering students, faculty advisors, and <a href="https://www.ieeegdl.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">IEEE Guadalajara Section</a> volunteers developed RoboMeshA. The portable, self-contained educational platform brings robotics and AI experiences into classrooms.</p><p><a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/epics-in-ieee-15th-anniversary" target="_self">EPICS</a> is administered by <a href="https://ea.ieee.org" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">IEEE Educational Activities</a> and funded by the <a href="https://www.ieee-ras.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">IEEE Robotics and Automation Society</a>.</p><h2>A mobile laboratory</h2><p>Rather than requiring a school to build a dedicated computer lab or install complex software, RoboMeshA<em> </em>operates as an all-in-one mobile learning network.</p><p>“RoboMeshA brings robotics and AI to students who don’t have access to specialized facilities or preinstalled software,” says team member Fernando Vidal Luna, an IEEE student member and a mechatronics engineering major at ITESO.</p><p>Students connect directly to the platform from a user-friendly web browser. They can interact with the robot manually or use its control modes to watch it move and detect and avoid obstacles.</p><p>“The project combines mechanical design, embedded systems, control engineering, computer vision, and AI into a single robotic system that functions as a mobile learning laboratory,” says faculty advisor <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/jorgealizarraga/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Jorge A. Lizarraga</a>.</p><p>The team says young students are interested in technology, programming, and robotics but don’t have an opportunity to work with systems that combine mechanics, electronics, software, and control.</p><p>“RoboMeshA allows students to see how all these disciplines work together in a tangible and understandable way,” says team member José S. González, who also is studying mechatronics engineering.</p><p>The team has built two units and is developing a modular coupling framework to expand the system’s capabilities for research and classroom demonstrations. The structured system design approach connects independent software components while minimizing internal dependencies, enabling four RobotMeshA robots to operate together.</p><h2>Overcoming design challenges</h2><p>The team faced significant hurdles while designing the project.</p><p>“One key challenge involved the robot’s structural design,” Luna says. “It wasn’t only about making a chassis where all the components fit and the design had sufficient stability, rigidity, and weight distribution. It was also about ensuring that the electronics were protected while still being accessible for maintenance, testing, and modifications.”</p><p>“It was also challenging to design a platform that could be used by students with different levels of experience,” González adds.</p><p class="pull-quote">“When students realize the technology they develop can inspire others and improve lives, engineering becomes far more meaningful.” <strong>—Luis Fernando Luque-Vega</strong></p><p>The team partnered with the <a href="https://www.colomos.ceti.mx/" target="_blank">CETI Colomos</a> and <a href="https://prepa.iteso.mx/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Prepa ITESO</a> high schools to validate the platform in classroom settings.</p><p>“We wanted the first interactions with the robot to be simple and intuitive,” González says, “such that students could simply power the robot, connect to its network, and begin interacting with it, rather than having to deal with software installation, extensive configuration, or troubleshooting.”</p><h2>Engineering with social impact</h2><p>Many of the students who participated were from ITESO’s applied professional projects program. The experience offered them <a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/hands-on-projects-career-advice" target="_self">practical training</a> in project management, system integration, and user-centered design.</p><p>The team also presented a research paper and a project poster in May at the <a href="https://congresossuj.mx/congresos/3er-congreso-de-ingenierias-suj/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Engineering Congress of the Jesuit University System</a>.</p><p>“Seeing a design move from a digital model to a physical system was invaluable,” González says. “Working with students from different backgrounds taught us to listen to end users and design for their actual needs.”</p><p>Project lead <a href="https://www.linkedin.com/in/luis-fernando-luque-vega-289aa348/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Luis Fernando Luque-Vega</a>, an IEEE member, says he’d like the venture to serve as a blueprint for engineering education.</p><p>“I hope RoboMeshA<em> </em>is adopted by schools, universities, and IEEE student branches across Mexico and internationally as a model for integrating technical innovation with community engagement,” Luque-Vega says.</p><p>By pairing engineering talent with community service, initiatives such as EPICS in IEEE demonstrate how targeted support can turn academic concepts into real-world solutions.</p><p>“When students realize the technology they develop can inspire others and improve lives, engineering becomes far more meaningful,” Luque-Vega says.</p><p>For more information on service-learning opportunities, visit the <a href="https://epics.ieee.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">EPICS website</a>.</p> Reference: https://ift.tt/s4lYBCr

Measure Distant Asteroids With a DIY Rig

<img src="https://spectrum.ieee.org/media-library/a-telescope-on-tripod-with-laptop-and-power-boxes-for-a-portable-astronomy-setup.png?id=67788039&width=1245&height=700&coordinates=0%2C73%2C0%2C74"/><br/><br/><p>I’ve seen two<a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/solar-eclipse-spain-2026-smartwatches" target="_blank"> total solar eclipses</a> and have been duly impressed by what happens as the moon casts its shadow on Earth. But recently I’ve become even more intrigued by a similar phenomenon that doesn’t involve the sun or the moon—something called an asteroid occultation.</p><p>That’s what happens when an asteroid orbits around the solar system and blocks the light of a distant star you’re viewing from Earth. Like the moon during a solar eclipse, the asteroid casts a predictable moving shadow on a swath of Earth’s surface—a small silhouette in the dim light bathing us from that one star.</p><p>When such a fortuitous alignment occurs, amateur astronomers can discern things about the asteroid that professionals can’t readily measure, even with their <a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/vera-rubin-observatory-first-images" target="_self">giant telescopes on high mountains</a>. That’s because amateurs are nimble: They can be in just the right place at just the right time to measure an asteroid’s fleeting shadow, which could be just a few hundred meters wide and traveling at tens of kilometers per second. With enough observers, they can collectively map that shadow, revealing the asteroid’s shape.</p><p>Even folks on a limited budget can do this, because the size of an asteroid you can measure doesn’t scale with the size of your telescope. If the occulted star is relatively bright, you don’t need much of a telescope at all.</p><h2>How Do You Catch an Asteroid Occultation?</h2><p>My own efforts along these lines have been with a modest 5.1-inch-aperture (130-millimeter) Newtonian telescope that <a href="https://www.firstlightoptics.com/telescopes-in-stock/skywatcher-explorer-130p-ds-ota.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">sells for about US $300</a>. I attach it to a <a href="https://www.highpointscientific.com/explore-scientific-firstlight-exos-nano-equatorial-mount-w-steel-st1-tripod-fl-exosnanot1-00" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">small equatorial mount</a> ($150) that can track the stars by virtue of some added stepper motors driven by an open-source telescope controller called <a href="https://onstep.groups.io/g/main" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">OnStep</a>. (You could save yourself the time, trouble, and expense of all that DIY hacking by purchasing a motorized mount for <a href="https://explorescientific.com/products/iexos-100-2-pmc-eight-equatorial-tracker-system" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">as little as $300</a>.)</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image rm-float-left rm-resized-container rm-resized-container-25" data-rm-resized-container="25%" style="float: left;"> <img alt="Key components of the flasher. " class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="f8033e7173d1fe7383b224c668e4f0cc" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" id="0641e" loading="lazy" src="https://spectrum.ieee.org/media-library/key-components-of-the-flasher.png?id=67788040&width=980"/> <small class="image-media media-caption" placeholder="Add Photo Caption...">A flasher provides a calibrated time base for light-curve measurements. It relies on a GPS module [top] to provide a high-accuracy pulse once per second, is gated by an Arduino nano [middle] to prevent flashes occurring at the moment of occultation, and is then passed to a LED [bottom].</small><small class="image-media media-photo-credit" placeholder="Add Photo Credit...">James Provost</small></p><p>I bought an inexpensive astronomy color camera <a href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0BJK69Y4F" target="_blank">on Amazon for $260</a> to take images at the video rates required to capture the rapid changes during an occultation. I chose this camera because it has a relatively large sensor, Sony’s IMX585, which provides a large field of view. A monochrome camera would be better for asteroid occultations, but the monochrome version of this camera is harder to come by and more expensive. If you’re looking for a cheaper option, the monochrome <a href="https://www.touptekastro.com/products/g3m662m?srsltid=AfmBOoor0CVEfFTzEmsPr098rFobo0qQ11-bw3rYkCK5IBS5QIn3CT-K" target="_blank">ToupTek G3M662M</a> (about $200) would be a good choice, although its sensor is smaller.</p><p>Knowing where and when to catch an occultation in your area is of course critical and can be calculated using free PC software found on the <a href="https://occultations.org/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">International Occultation Timing Association</a> (IOTA) website. If you plan to contribute your observations to IOTA to increase the body of scientific knowledge about asteroids, you will need to calibrate the timing of your images. You can’t just depend on the time stamps your computer adds to the video frames, which can be way off.</p><p>For time calibration, many practitioners use a flasher: a red LED driven from the pulse-per-second signal from a GPS receiver. Asteroid observers use such a pulsing LED positioned in front of their telescopes to <a href="https://www.occultations.org.nz/meetings/TTSO18/Camilleri%20-%20Flash%20Timing.pdf" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">calibrate the timing of the images</a> they take. With some effort, it’s possible to reduce the uncertainty to just a handful of milliseconds.</p><p>The flasher I built uses <a href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/B01D1D0F5M" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">a GPS module</a> that I had on hand. But I’d recommend you purchase a different one that accepts an external active antenna. HiLetgo’s NEO-7M <a href="https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07X5GVW6Q" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">$12 module</a> might be a good choice—but don’t forget to remove its antenna-coupling capacitor (marked as C2 on the circuit board) if you do attach an active external antenna to it.</p><h2>How Do You Make a Telescope Flasher?</h2><p>You can’t let the flasher just blink away every second, though, because its light might stomp on the very signal you’re trying to detect. So alongside the GPS module, my flasher also contains an Arduino Nano, plus two transistors, three resistors, and a switch. I wired these components together so as to drive the LED directly from the pulse-per-second signal coming from the GPS. The signal passes through a transistor controlled by the Arduino so that the flashes can be started and stopped at prescribed times. I can then program the flasher to produce calibrating pulses near the start and end of each recording session, while suppressing the flashing around the occultation itself.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image"> <img alt="Line graph of fluctuating data values with a low dip highlighted around 06:07:59." class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="26a57e1d0a02d2ae913de9ead50e4c2e" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" id="fddcb" loading="lazy" src="https://spectrum.ieee.org/media-library/line-graph-of-fluctuating-data-values-with-a-low-dip-highlighted-around-06-07-59.png?id=67793121&width=980"/> <small class="image-media media-caption" placeholder="Add Photo Caption...">Over time, an asteroid such as Duccio will pass in front of multiple stars [below]. Each time it does, it will block the light from a star [above] for a time that depends on its width along the line of transit. By combining multiple light curves, it is possible to map the shape of the asteroid.</small><small class="image-media media-photo-credit" placeholder="Add Photo Credit...">James Provost</small></p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image rm-float-left rm-resized-container rm-resized-container-25" data-rm-resized-container="25%" style="float: left;"> <img alt="Dashed gray blob over diagonal colored lines on a white background." class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="012914498c0ef020e5643b82e3c807a6" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" id="966c8" loading="lazy" src="https://spectrum.ieee.org/media-library/dashed-gray-blob-over-diagonal-colored-lines-on-a-white-background.png?id=67793120&width=980"/> </p><p>So far, I’ve managed to record four occultations that have occurred within easy driving distance of my home in North Carolina. The first was quite short, by an asteroid a mere 4 kilometers wide. The star involved was rather dim, so I really had to squint at my laptop screen to see the star momentarily blink out. The star in my second occultation was brighter, and the dimming much longer, so no squinting was required. My third observation tested the limits of my little telescope with a very dim target star, requiring quite long exposures per video frame (about a third of a second). Thankfully, the asteroid was a big one (120 km wide), so the occultation lasted a few seconds, and I could discern it.</p><p>The asteroid I targeted last, named <a href="https://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/tools/sbdb_lookup.html#/?sstr=11621" target="_blank">Duccio</a>, is about a dozen kilometers wide and orbits in the main asteroid belt between Mars and Jupiter. Its shadow, moving at a clip of some 24 km per second, took about a half second to pass over me. The star this asteroid blocked was bright enough for me to record the event very distinctly at 24 frames per second, providing excellent time resolution.</p><p>Asteroid occultations offer a wonderful natural experiment. And unlike a solar eclipse, observable events probably take place near you multiple times each month. So with <a href="https://occultations.org/documents/OccultationObservingPrimer.pdf" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">a little knowledge and the right gear</a>, you can observe them. You just have to wait for the stars—and the asteroids—to align.</p> Reference: https://ift.tt/9tx6Qbc

Engineering the Substation Exit for Reliability, Capacity, and Expansion

<img src="https://spectrum.ieee.org/media-library/hendrix-by-marmon-utility-logo-with-lightning-bolt-icon.png?id=67812895&width=980"/><br/><br/><p>This white paper gives distribution engineers and utility teams a practical overview of the substation exit, the short and high-consequence section where station capacity divides into individual feeders. It explains how covered, spacer-supported overhead construction can reduce common contact-driven faults while leaving room for future circuits.</p><p><strong>What you will learn about:</strong></p><ul><li>Why a fault near the substation exposes more customers than one farther along the feeder, and why the first spans out of the station carry so much reliability weight.</li><li>How covered conductors and spacer-cable systems differ from bare overhead conductors, and why covered conductor is not treated as touch-safe insulation.</li><li>Which engineering factors shape a sound exit design, including conductor rating, protection coordination, grounding, and structural loading.</li><li><span>How overhead spacer cable compares with conventional bare overhead and underground shielded cable across footprint, reliability, and lifecycle cost.</span></li><li>How to move a project from concept to commissioning using staged design gates and a clear performance specification.</li></ul><div><a href="https://content.knowledgehub.wiley.com/aerial-cable-systems-for-substation-exit-construction/" target="_blank">Download this free whitepaper now!</a></div> Reference: https://ift.tt/j0bFNDx

3 Skills That Will Matter More in the Age of AI

<img src="https://spectrum.ieee.org/media-library/an-illustration-of-stylized-people-wearing-business-casual-clothing.webp?id=65257424&width=1200&height=600&coordinates=0%2C150%2C0%2C150"/><br/><br/><p><em>This article is crossposted from </em>IEEE Spectrum<em>’s careers newsletter. <a href="https://engage.ieee.org/Career-Alert-Sign-Up.html" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank"><em>Sign up now</em></a><em> to get insider tips, expert advice, and practical strategies, <em><em>written i<em>n partnership with tech career development company <a href="https://www.parsity.io/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Parsity</a> and </em></em></em>delivered to your inbox for free!</em></em></p><p><em><em></em></em><span>If you have kids, they’re probably back in school right now after the summer break. Mine are too.</span></p><p>My kids range from 9 to 20 years old, and lately I’ve been thinking a lot about what their future careers are going to look like.</p><p>Some schools are embracing <a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/ai-in-the-classroom" target="_self">AI in the classroom</a>. Others are banning it completely. I’m not sure either side has figured out the right answer yet—<a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/ai-engineer-skills" target="_self">I’m not sure any of us have</a>.</p><p>What I do know is that <a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/ai-code-review-software-engineers" target="_self">AI is already changing how engineers, and nearly every other knowledge worker, does their job</a>. So I’ve been thinking: What skills do I actually want my kids to develop for an AI-augmented workforce?</p><h3>1. Learn to write</h3><p>The more I use AI, the more convinced I am that it’s a multiplier, not a substitute.</p><p>Give a great researcher AI tools and they can accelerate their research. Give an experienced software engineer the same tools and they can build at an incredible rate. But put those tools in the hands of someone <em><em>without</em></em> foundational knowledge and you often get something else you’re used to seeing way too much of: slop.</p><p>We’ve all seen the vibe-coded applications that barely work. Our inboxes are filled with emails that sound suspiciously identical. Teachers are reading papers that sound like they were all written by the same person. That “person” has the last name GPT.</p><p>When everyone has access to the same tools, having an actual voice becomes a differentiator.</p><p>Ironically, <a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/ieee-course-technical-writing" target="_self">strong writing skills</a> might be MORE important because of AI, not less. Text is still the primary way we communicate with these models, so being able to clearly articulate what you want improves what you get back.</p><p>But more importantly, writing teaches you to develop ideas of your own.</p><p>AI can help you express your opinion. It shouldn’t manufacture one for you.</p><h3>2. Learn to speak</h3><p>Like written communication, speaking skills are now at a premium—but for a different reason. </p><p>We live in a strange moment. We’re more digitally connected than ever, while often feeling increasingly isolated from one another. At the same time, we’re seeing renewed interest in conferences, meetups, communities, and in-person experiences.</p><p>When human interaction feels scarce, communication becomes more valuable.</p><p>So <a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/improve-public-speaking-skills" target="_self">learn how to explain an idea in front of a room</a>. Learn how to disagree without being disagreeable. Learn how to tell a story. Learn how to listen. Learn how to persuade someone.</p><p>There’s a timeless book, originally published 90 years ago, that teaches these interpersonal skills, and it’s probably more valuable for engineers than another white paper on how neural networks work: <a href="https://icrrd.com/public/media/31-10-2020-083612How%20to%20Win%20Friends%20and%20Influence%20People%20-%20Dale%20Carnegie.pdf" target="_blank"><em><em>How to Win Friends and Influence People</em></em></a><em><em>.</em></em></p><p>An AI can generate a presentation for you, but it can’t convincingly deliver it to a skeptical audience. That takes emotional intelligence.</p><h3>3. Learn to be bored</h3><p>This might be the hardest one.</p><p>We have engineered <a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/tips-for-bored-engineers" target="_self">boredom</a> almost completely out of our lives. There’s always a podcast to listen to, a notification to check, a video to watch, a feed to scroll, or now an AI to talk to.</p><p>Go for a walk without headphones. Eat without looking at a phone. Sit in the car without immediately reaching for something to fill the silence, and let your mind wander.</p><p>Because boredom isn’t wasted time. It’s a breeding ground for original ideas.</p><p>The danger I worry about isn’t that AI becomes too intelligent, but that we become too willing to outsource the uncomfortable parts of thinking.</p><p>The students going back to school today will enter a workforce filled with technology that I couldn’t have imagined when I was their age. I have no idea what the dominant AI model will be by then or even what interacting with a computer will look like.</p><p>That’s exactly why I don’t want to optimize their education around today’s tools. I want them to learn the skills that will outlive the tools.</p><p>Write clearly. Speak confidently. Think independently.</p><p>And every once in a while, embrace boredom.</p><p>—Brian</p><h2><a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/ai-code-review-software-engineers" target="_self">AI Slop Is Changing How Engineers Review Code</a></h2><p>Software engineers have entered a new era of code review. The strategies they’re now testing will determine whether AI can actually provide code that’s faster and more reliable when you factor in the review process. If it can, what does that mean for the entry-level engineers who are still learning to code on their own? </p><p>Read more <a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/ai-code-review-software-engineers" target="_self">here</a>. </p><h2><a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/h-1b-visa-us-government" target="_self">U.S. Tech Firms Change Strategies to Hire International Talent</a></h2><p>In response to a barrage of actions by the U.S. federal government to limit legal immigration, tech companies are adapting their search for top talent. <em><em>IEEE Spectrum</em></em> looked into the responses to proposed changes, like higher fees for H-1B visa applications. </p><p>Read more <a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/h-1b-visa-us-government" target="_self">here</a>. </p><h2><a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/adaptable-engineer-core-skills" target="_self">What It Takes to Be an Adaptable Engineer</a></h2><p>As AI changes the job market and day-to-day work of engineers, young professionals are often told they need to be adaptable. But what does adaptability actually look like in practice? The skill has different definitions depending on who you ask, but with the right mindset and support from leadership, adaptability can help keep you afloat. </p><p>Read more <a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/adaptable-engineer-core-skills" target="_self">here</a>. </p><em><em></em></em> Reference: https://ift.tt/2iuCn5f

IT mistake erases 11 years of viewing history for hospitals’ maternity records

<p>A “human error” in the IT department led to Nottingham University Hospitals <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/NHS_trust">NHS Trust</a> (NUH) losing data from maternity records over an 11-year span.</p> <p>The data loss occurred on August 18, the English hospitals announced in a <a href="https://www.nuh.nhs.uk/news/statement-nuh-data-loss-11205">blog post</a> on Monday spotted by <a href="https://www.theregister.com/databases/2026/09/22/nhs-trust-it-blunder-overwrites-11-years-of-maternity-records/5298130">The Register</a>. The blog said the problem is “the result of human error” during routine technical work while “creating a copy of a radiotherapy database for reporting purposes.”</p> <p>The post reads:</p><p><a href="https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2026/09/it-mistake-erases-11-years-of-viewing-history-for-hospitals-maternity-records/">Read full article</a></p> <p><a href="https://arstechnica.com/information-technology/2026/09/it-mistake-erases-11-years-of-viewing-history-for-hospitals-maternity-records/#comments">Comments</a></p> Reference : https://ift.tt/W8MVhEG

Barbara Mazzolai Wants to Build a New Field of Robotics

<img src="https://spectrum.ieee.org/media-library/photo-of-a-woman-standing-in-front-of-greenery-holding-a-device-shaped-like-a-small-octopus-arm.png?id=67787635&width=1245&height=700&coordinates=0%2C0%2C0%2C0"/><br/><br/><p>Throughout her career, roboticist <a href="https://www.iit.it/people-details/-/people/barbara-mazzolai" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Barbara Mazzolai</a> has turned to nature for inspiration. Now she wants to ensure the technology she builds gives back to the environment, too.</p><p>After starting her career as a biologist, a chance opportunity saw Mazzolai switch streams to engineering and become an early pioneer of <a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/tag/bioinspired-robots" target="_blank">bioinspired robotics</a>. Building on her knowledge of biology’s ability to solve a diverse set of problems, she has developed robots based on octopuses, plant roots, <a href="https://opentalk.iit.it/en/iit-the-first-biodegradable-seed-robot-able-to-change-shape-in-response-to-humidity/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">and even seeds</a>. “I’ve always been fascinated by living organisms, [and] by the extraordinary variety of solutions in nature, selected by the evolutionary process,” she says.</p><h3>Barbara Mazzolai</h3><br/><p><strong></strong><strong>Employer:</strong></p><p> Italian Institute of Technology</p><p><strong>Occupation: </strong></p><p>Associate director for robotics; director of the Bioinspired Soft Robotics Laboratory</p><p><strong>Education: </strong></p><p>Master’s degree in biology, University of Pisa; master’s degree in eco-management and audit schemes, Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna; Ph.D. in microsystems engineering, University of Rome Tor Vergata</p><p>But Mazzolai, now the associate director for robotics at the <a href="https://www.iit.it/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Italian Institute of Technology, in Genoa</a>, also believes engineering needs to <a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/robotics-climate-change" target="_blank">reckon with its own impact</a> on the natural world. That’s why she is advocating for a new field of research she calls “sustainability robotics.”</p><p>In a manifesto <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s42256-026-01260-6" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">published in<em><em> Nature Machine Intelligence</em></em></a> in July, she and her collaborators outline a vision for a new approach to designing robots that’s meant to improve the relationship between nature, humanity, and technology.</p><p>“We need to reduce the footprint of our technology,” she says. “It’s really about thinking in a different way to open new possibilities for robotics [and] for society.” In this new mode of thinking, Mazzolai considers sustainability a core component of the design.</p><h2>A child of nature</h2><p>Mazzolai traces her fascination with the living world back to her childhood growing up on Italy’s Tuscan coast, close to the port city Livorno. Her father was a public-health inspector and a professional mycologist, and the family spent a lot of time exploring forests and learning about the local fungi and plants.</p><p>After toying with the prospect of pursuing art, her other major passion, Mazzolai ultimately decided to enroll at the <a href="https://www.unipi.it/en/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">University of Pisa</a> in 1987 to study biology. She was particularly drawn to marine biology, but shortly before graduating with a master’s degree in 1995, she secured a research position at the <a href="https://www.cnr.it/en/institute/008/institute-of-biophysics-ibf" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Italian National Research Council’s Institute of Biophysics</a> studying the cycles of heavy metals like mercury through both living and nonliving parts of the environment.</p><p>This involved collecting and analyzing samples from water, soil, vegetables, and even humans to understand the impact these metals have on health and the environment. She balanced this work with studying environmental management at the <a href="https://www.santannapisa.it/it" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Scuola Superiore Sant’Anna</a>, in Pisa, graduating with a master’s degree in 1998.</p><p>During that time, however, she learned that the university was recruiting biologists to help design new devices for environmental monitoring. She applied for and got the job in 1999 and began working as a research assistant under renowned bioroboticist <a href="https://www.embs.org/tbme/past-editorial-board-members/paolo-dario/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Paolo Dario</a>, first developing sensors and then robots meant to monitor air, water, and soil.</p><p>Even before entering a doctoral program, Mazzolai was promoted to assistant professor in 2004 and shortly afterward made her first foray into bioinspired robotics. In collaboration with colleagues at Sant’Anna, she helped design a soft robot inspired by the octopus. “We proposed it as a paradigm for launching this idea of soft robotics: demonstrating that [robots] can be soft, but at the same time apply strong force to the environment, like the animal does,” she says.</p><h2>Back to school</h2><p>In 2007 Mazzolai enrolled in a Ph.D. in microsystems engineering at <a href="https://web.uniroma2.it/" rel="noopener noreferrer" target="_blank">Tor Vergata University of Rome</a>, which she balanced with her role at Sant’Anna. She was already relying heavily on microfabrication techniques to develop sensors for her robots, and she was keen to push that part of the field forward.</p><p>While robots frequently feature sensors designed for perception, such as tactile or proprioceptive sensors, these systems typically focus on understanding the robot’s position in its environment, she says. “But there are few robots that integrate physical or chemical sensors to really understand the environment they move in,” she adds.</p><p class="pull-quote"><span>“I’ve always been fascinated by living organisms, [and] by the extraordinary variety of solutions in nature.”</span></p><p>Mazzolai was appointed as a team leader at the Center for Micro-BioRobotics of the Italian Institute of Technology in 2009, where she continued her work on the emerging field of bioinspired robotics. Two years later, she completed her Ph.D. and was promoted to director of the center.</p><h2>Planting the seeds</h2><p>Around this time Mazzolai says she became interested in using plants as a model for new kinds of robots, expanding bioinspiration beyond just animals. In particular, she was captivated by the ability of roots to efficiently explore the underground environment, and she imagined machines with the same deftness could have applications in both environmental modeling and <a href="https://spectrum.ieee.org/fertilizer-shortage-precision-agricultur" target="_blank">precision agriculture</a>.</p><p class="shortcode-media shortcode-media-rebelmouse-image"> <img alt="photo of silver metallic coil wrapped around a green plant vine" class="rm-shortcode" data-rm-shortcode-id="de76a2caa4c0c991fc2540f7dfa4b498" data-rm-shortcode-name="rebelmouse-image" id="305e3" loading="lazy" src="https://spectrum.ieee.org/media-library/photo-of-silver-metallic-coil-wrapped-around-a-green-plant-vine.jpg?id=67787644&width=980"/> <small class="image-media media-caption" placeholder="Add Photo Caption...">While many bioinspired robots mimic animals, plants also serve as a muse for Mazzolai. This tendril-like bot can coil around other structures like a vine. </small><small class="image-media media-photo-credit" placeholder="Add Photo Credit...">Italian Institute of Technology</small></p><p>When she first proposed the idea, colleagues were somewhat skeptical of robots based on seemingly static organisms. But in reality, she says, plants move nonstop through a process known as indeterminate growth. “They really grow for their entire life,” she says. “They adapt their morphology, their behavior to the external environment; they repair, they sense, they communicate.”</p><p>Trying to mimic a system that operates on such different principles to conventional robotics required some serious thinking, however. Mazzolai says that working in bioinspired robotics sometimes requires you to have “two separate brains”—one of a biologist and one of an engineer.</p><p>The process often involves deep study of the target organism to learn the underlying principles that shape how it operates before trying to engineer a robot capable of mimicking them. “It’s not a copy of natural organisms,” says Mazzolai, because a living organism is both difficult to replicate and has different goals.</p><p>In the case of plant roots, what makes them so efficient at exploring the soil is that they reduce friction by growing only at the very fine tip of the structure, while the thicker base of the root remains static. This significantly reduces the amount of energy required to push through the earth compared to that of a more conventional drill, which must push the entire structure from above.</p><p>To realize this principle in a robot, her team developed a miniaturized 3D printer that sits at the machine’s tip and feeds thermoplastic filament through a heated nozzle to build a snakelike body behind it. This allows the robot to push through the soil efficiently. The tip also contains sensors that allow it to avoid obstacles and detect nearby nutrients or water.</p><h2>Making robotics sustainable</h2><p>After spending so much of her career borrowing from nature, Mazzolai is now eager to return the favor. Many modern technologies, including plastics and car batteries, have been developed with little thought about how they will affect the environment at the end of their life cycles, she says.</p><p>She wants to ensure that robotics doesn’t follow the same path. This is the inspiration for what she and collaborators now call sustainability robotics. The approach has three central pillars: ensuring that robots have minimal impact on the environment; that they’re available to people from across the world and all socioeconomic backgrounds; and that they’re “symbiotic,” providing benefits to both humans and nature.</p><p>More concretely, Mazzolai would like to incorporate the concept of a life cycle into the design of robots, so that at the end of their useful life these machines can be reused, recycled, or even biodegraded.</p><p>While that might sound ambitious, she’s confident that all the ingredients to make it a reality are in place. And it’s a vision that she is certain will inspire future roboticists. “There are younger people who want to really work in this field because this is the future, their future,” she says. Facing the threat of ongoing environmental damage, “they want to develop something that can help.”</p> Reference: https://ift.tt/FmGb8xa