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CSIRO breakthrough could block sexualised AI deepfakes

CSIRO breakthrough could block sexualised AI deepfakes

CSIRO researchers say they've developed a new algorithm that can block images from being used to create deepfakes, as Australian state governments scramble to criminalise sexually explicit AI-generated content.
The use of generative AI deepfakes to create non-consensual sexualised deepfake images has soared in popularity among high school students and the broader public. Victoria banned image-based sexual abuse in 2022, and the NSW and South Australian state governments are following suit.
CSIRO researchers say they've developed a new algorithm that can block images from being used to create deepfakes. Credit: Bloomberg
Now, a scientific breakthrough developed by Australian researchers could stop a user's photos from being used to create deepfakes altogether.
The technique, developed by CSIRO in partnership with the Cyber Security Cooperative Research Centre and the University of Chicago, subtly alters content to make it unreadable to AI models while remaining unchanged to the human eye.
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Bright idea for businesses to power household bill cuts
Bright idea for businesses to power household bill cuts

The Advertiser

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Bright idea for businesses to power household bill cuts

Big buildings with empty rooftops could be the key to lowering power bills for Australian households and cutting greenhouse gas emissions, according to a trial proposed by a major energy firm. Ausgrid's proposal, announced on Tuesday, would tap into solar panels on commercial and industrial properties and deliver cheaper, renewable power to their residential neighbours. If successful, the company estimates it could cut consumer power bills in trial areas by up to $200 a year, delivering savings for apartment residents and renters who might otherwise be unable to access the technology. The proposal comes amid pressure for energy companies and the government to ramp up renewable power projects to meet the nation's 2050 net-zero target and as a record number of households install solar batteries. Ausgrid's five-year solar power trial, called Community Power Network, is proposed for 32,000 households in the Botany and Mascot areas within Sydney and in the NSW Central Coast suburb of Charmhaven. The power plan was designed to address two major issues: underused commercial and industrial rooftops and inequitable access to solar power, Ausgrid market development and strategy group executive Tim Jarratt said. "Australia has had phenomenal success with rooftop solar - over a third of households have it ... but it's important to remember that if one third of customers have it, two thirds don't," he told AAP. "The reasons that people don't have (solar) and aren't able to benefit from really cheap power off their own roofs is they're in apartments, they're renting or they don't have the capital to spare." The plan would involve Ausgrid installing $84 million worth of batteries to its network, and encourage a $76 million investment in rooftop solar panels from third parties, such as property owners, by offering generous feed-in tariffs. Solar power generated in the trial would be stored and delivered to customers during peak periods at lower rates in a move the company estimated could save $22.9 million across five years or between $150 and $200 on annual household power bills. "People have often described this glut of solar slashing around the network in the day as a problem and we've tried to look at it in a different way," Mr Jarratt said. "Electricity generated from your rooftop or a neighbouring rooftop that's consumed locally is by far the cheapest power source that Australian consumers have." The proposal, under review by the Australian Energy Regulator, would be underwritten by Ausgrid, with no charges to customers if it failed to produce profits. The energy regulator will hold three public workshops on the proposal in late August before deciding whether to approve the plan. Solar power accounted for eight per cent of energy in Australia's market in the past year, according to the Australian Energy Market Operator, overtaking gas at seven per cent. The country's climate targets include a goal to generate 82 per cent of electricity from renewable sources by 2030. Big buildings with empty rooftops could be the key to lowering power bills for Australian households and cutting greenhouse gas emissions, according to a trial proposed by a major energy firm. Ausgrid's proposal, announced on Tuesday, would tap into solar panels on commercial and industrial properties and deliver cheaper, renewable power to their residential neighbours. If successful, the company estimates it could cut consumer power bills in trial areas by up to $200 a year, delivering savings for apartment residents and renters who might otherwise be unable to access the technology. The proposal comes amid pressure for energy companies and the government to ramp up renewable power projects to meet the nation's 2050 net-zero target and as a record number of households install solar batteries. Ausgrid's five-year solar power trial, called Community Power Network, is proposed for 32,000 households in the Botany and Mascot areas within Sydney and in the NSW Central Coast suburb of Charmhaven. The power plan was designed to address two major issues: underused commercial and industrial rooftops and inequitable access to solar power, Ausgrid market development and strategy group executive Tim Jarratt said. "Australia has had phenomenal success with rooftop solar - over a third of households have it ... but it's important to remember that if one third of customers have it, two thirds don't," he told AAP. "The reasons that people don't have (solar) and aren't able to benefit from really cheap power off their own roofs is they're in apartments, they're renting or they don't have the capital to spare." The plan would involve Ausgrid installing $84 million worth of batteries to its network, and encourage a $76 million investment in rooftop solar panels from third parties, such as property owners, by offering generous feed-in tariffs. Solar power generated in the trial would be stored and delivered to customers during peak periods at lower rates in a move the company estimated could save $22.9 million across five years or between $150 and $200 on annual household power bills. "People have often described this glut of solar slashing around the network in the day as a problem and we've tried to look at it in a different way," Mr Jarratt said. "Electricity generated from your rooftop or a neighbouring rooftop that's consumed locally is by far the cheapest power source that Australian consumers have." The proposal, under review by the Australian Energy Regulator, would be underwritten by Ausgrid, with no charges to customers if it failed to produce profits. The energy regulator will hold three public workshops on the proposal in late August before deciding whether to approve the plan. Solar power accounted for eight per cent of energy in Australia's market in the past year, according to the Australian Energy Market Operator, overtaking gas at seven per cent. The country's climate targets include a goal to generate 82 per cent of electricity from renewable sources by 2030. 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Ausgrid's five-year solar power trial, called Community Power Network, is proposed for 32,000 households in the Botany and Mascot areas within Sydney and in the NSW Central Coast suburb of Charmhaven. The power plan was designed to address two major issues: underused commercial and industrial rooftops and inequitable access to solar power, Ausgrid market development and strategy group executive Tim Jarratt said. "Australia has had phenomenal success with rooftop solar - over a third of households have it ... but it's important to remember that if one third of customers have it, two thirds don't," he told AAP. "The reasons that people don't have (solar) and aren't able to benefit from really cheap power off their own roofs is they're in apartments, they're renting or they don't have the capital to spare." The plan would involve Ausgrid installing $84 million worth of batteries to its network, and encourage a $76 million investment in rooftop solar panels from third parties, such as property owners, by offering generous feed-in tariffs. Solar power generated in the trial would be stored and delivered to customers during peak periods at lower rates in a move the company estimated could save $22.9 million across five years or between $150 and $200 on annual household power bills. "People have often described this glut of solar slashing around the network in the day as a problem and we've tried to look at it in a different way," Mr Jarratt said. "Electricity generated from your rooftop or a neighbouring rooftop that's consumed locally is by far the cheapest power source that Australian consumers have." The proposal, under review by the Australian Energy Regulator, would be underwritten by Ausgrid, with no charges to customers if it failed to produce profits. 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"Australia has had phenomenal success with rooftop solar - over a third of households have it ... but it's important to remember that if one third of customers have it, two thirds don't," he told AAP. "The reasons that people don't have (solar) and aren't able to benefit from really cheap power off their own roofs is they're in apartments, they're renting or they don't have the capital to spare." The plan would involve Ausgrid installing $84 million worth of batteries to its network, and encourage a $76 million investment in rooftop solar panels from third parties, such as property owners, by offering generous feed-in tariffs. Solar power generated in the trial would be stored and delivered to customers during peak periods at lower rates in a move the company estimated could save $22.9 million across five years or between $150 and $200 on annual household power bills. 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Revealed: How playful whales and dolphins socialise with each other
Revealed: How playful whales and dolphins socialise with each other

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  • The Age

Revealed: How playful whales and dolphins socialise with each other

Rolling from side to side, presenting their bellies, and even lifting their dolphin playmate into the air are some of the ways that whales socialise with their smaller cousins, a new study finds. The Australian research looking at images and video from 17 locations around the world challenges previous scientific assumptions that dolphins 'harassed' whales, finding instead that the play was often mutual. Griffith University whales and climate program lead Dr Olaf Meynecke and co-author Olivia Crawley analysed nearly 200 separate and unrelated interactions between 425 baleen whales and 1570 dolphins. Their findings were published in the journal, Discover Animals, on Tuesday. 'When we go out and do our whale surveys or tagging whales, we always joke that we can find the whales by looking for the dolphins,' Meynecke said. 'Whales that show a lot of active behaviours seem to get the most interest from the dolphins.' Meynecke said the dolphins, being faster swimmers, usually initiated the encounters, but the whales responded either positively or neutrally most of the time. Across all whale species, at least a quarter of the interactions were mutual, and for humpback whales it was at least a third. It was rare that the whale would try to avoid the dolphin or become aggressive. Most of the documented interactions were between adult animals, but a whale calf was present in 44 events and a dolphin calf in 53 events. Both whale and dolphin calves were present on 21 occasions. There were six different whale species in the dataset – more than two-thirds were humpbacks, followed by grey whales (16 per cent) and fin whales (7 per cent). More than half the dolphins were bottlenose, followed by common dolphins (17 per cent) and Pacific wide-sided dolphins (15 per cent).

Revealed: How playful whales and dolphins socialise with each other
Revealed: How playful whales and dolphins socialise with each other

Sydney Morning Herald

time8 hours ago

  • Sydney Morning Herald

Revealed: How playful whales and dolphins socialise with each other

Rolling from side to side, presenting their bellies, and even lifting their dolphin playmate into the air are some of the ways that whales socialise with their smaller cousins, a new study finds. The Australian research looking at images and video from 17 locations around the world challenges previous scientific assumptions that dolphins 'harassed' whales, finding instead that the play was often mutual. Griffith University whales and climate program lead Dr Olaf Meynecke and co-author Olivia Crawley analysed nearly 200 separate and unrelated interactions between 425 baleen whales and 1570 dolphins. Their findings were published in the journal, Discover Animals, on Tuesday. 'When we go out and do our whale surveys or tagging whales, we always joke that we can find the whales by looking for the dolphins,' Meynecke said. 'Whales that show a lot of active behaviours seem to get the most interest from the dolphins.' Meynecke said the dolphins, being faster swimmers, usually initiated the encounters, but the whales responded either positively or neutrally most of the time. Across all whale species, at least a quarter of the interactions were mutual, and for humpback whales it was at least a third. It was rare that the whale would try to avoid the dolphin or become aggressive. Most of the documented interactions were between adult animals, but a whale calf was present in 44 events and a dolphin calf in 53 events. Both whale and dolphin calves were present on 21 occasions. There were six different whale species in the dataset – more than two-thirds were humpbacks, followed by grey whales (16 per cent) and fin whales (7 per cent). More than half the dolphins were bottlenose, followed by common dolphins (17 per cent) and Pacific wide-sided dolphins (15 per cent).

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