### Issue 1794 - Monday 27th February, 2023

## In Today's Issue

- Home Affairs setting up a national officer for cyber security & reviewing cybersecurity strategy (again)
- Meta's new "foundational large language model" LLaMA is like GPT-3 but designed to run on a single GPU
- Signal says it'll just quit the UK if encryption busting Online Safety Bill gets passed
- Probably not a coincidence that all this AI hype picked up after the cryptocurrency industry took a downward turn
- Cheap refurb Sony headphones, TP-Link gigabit switches, Lenovo Z16 Thinkpad, dual monitor desk mount, Kingston 1TB HSSD

## The News

### Home Affairs setting up a national officer for cyber security & reviewing cybersecurity strategy (again)

Watch out hackers and internet bad guys, Australia is setting up national office for cyber security within Home Affairs and will kick off yet another review of our cyber security strategy. The Minister for Home Affairs said on the radio that the office will be led by "a new senior official with the title of coordinator for cyber security" that they're already recruiting for, with the plan for them to start "as soon as next month". The Coordinator for Cyber Security's job will be "to help manage cyber incidents in a proper, seamless, strategic way across the Australian government". Good luck to everyone involved, I'm sure it will achieve everything it sets out to do.

### Meta's new "foundational large language model" LLaMA is like GPT-3 but designed to run on a single GPU

Not wanting to be left out of the AI party, Meta has taken the wraps off its own "state-of-the-art foundational large language model", called LLaMA. Zuck said LLaMA is "designed to help researchers advance their work" and investigate "risks of bias, toxic comments, and hallucinations in large language models". Unlike OpenAI and Google's attempts, LLaMA is capable of running on a single GPU but can apparently outperform GPT-3. It's dataset is also publicly available. Meta plans to build consumer facing products (like how ChatGPT is based off GPT-3) off LLaMA eventually. If you wanna give LLaMA a whirl you gotta get Meta's permission as it's not open to the public, only researchers.

### Signal says it'll just quit the UK if encryption busting Online Safety Bill gets passed

The UK is forging ahead with its Online Safety Bill, which if you don't know, is the UK's attempt break end-to-end encryption under the auspices of scanning messages for kiddie porn or terrorism chatter. When asked by the Register what secure messaging app Signal would do if the law is passed, Signal's President, Meredith Whittaker said "If we were given a choice between kneecapping our privacy guarantees by implementing such mass surveillance, or ceasing operations in the UK, we would cease operations". Meredith also told the BBC that "there's no-one who doesn't want to protect children", but "the idea that complex social problems are amenable to cheap technical solutions is the siren song of the software salesman".

## Something I Saw On The Internet

### Probably not a coincidence that all this AI hype picked up after the cryptocurrency industry took a downward turn

Is it a coincidence that all the current hype for AI-related stuff like ChatGPT, Stable Diffusion and so on has come into the mainstream at the same time cryptocurrency shit itself and people started wising up that the bulk of cryptocurrency is a scam? Charlie Stross reckons it isn't a coincidence at all and those involved are "hucksters and grifters" who are "now chasing the sweet VC/private equity money that has been flushed out of the cryptocurrency market". I kinda get the same feeling, but there's also some actual use attached to AI that cryptocurrency didn't seem to have beyond moving "real" money around (sometimes legally, often illegally).

## Bargains

- Refurb Sony WH-1000XM5B wireless headphones - $398.05 from Sony's eBay store
- TP-Link 8-port LS1008G or 5-port LS1005G gigabit ethernet switch - $26.50/$16.50 from Amazon
- Lenovo ThinkPad Z16 (Ryzen 5 Pro 6650H, 16GB DDR5 RAM, 512GB PCIe 4.0 SSD, RX6500M GPU, 1920x1200 16" display) - $1,799 from Lenovo
- NB H180 Dual Monitor Desk Mount - $59.95 from Amazon
- Kingston 1TB NV2 M.2 PCIe Gen4 SSD - $79 + delivery from JW Computers

## Image Of The Day

A Yahoo! branded guitar. I have no other information about this image. I wish I knew more. (hankbenis / Tumblr)

## The End

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The Sizzle is created on Wathaurong land and acknowledges the traditional owners of country throughout Australia, recognising their continuing connection to land, water and community. I pay my respect to them and their cultures and to elders both past and present.