The first digits of numbers in a data set aren’t distributed equally. And now you know more than a lot of fraudsters do – and should – when they’re making up their phony numbers.
Big data is about processing large amounts of data. It is often associated with multiplicities of data. But the ability to generate data outpaces the ability to store it.
Virtually every researcher relies on computers to collect or analyze data. But when computers are opaque black boxes that manipulate data, it’s impossible to replicate studies – a core value for science.
A new real-time measuring buoy can change the way the maritime industry operates.
Supplied
For millions of South Africans, access to data for the internet is a luxury.
Somali university students celebrate their graduation. Universities that fare well on national measures may be ignored by international ranking systems.
Feisal Omar/Reuters
The news that African universities will soon be ranked has generated a great deal of hype. But the initiative seems likely to be doomed from the start.
Quantum key distribution technology can be implemented with single photons using an optical channel to encrypt any data transmission.
Supplied
Active ageing isn’t just about the ability to be physically active or a part of the labour force, but continuing participation in social, economic and cultural life.
A Facebook server farm in Sweden: the energy you don’t see.
EPA
Smartphones may have been around for a while but demand for digital traffic is still growing fast. During the new year celebrations, mobile providers in the UK and Australia reported a 50% increase in…
The consent policies of popular websites would take a month to read. Perhaps including a sign like this would be a simpler solution.
Shutterstock
We live in a world increasingly dominated by our personal data. Some of those data we choose to reveal, for example, through social media, email and the billions – yes, billions – of messages, photos and…
What it takes to get to the top.
Rugby by Shutterstock
With a “win-at-all-costs” culture firmly embedded in elite sport, coaches are increasingly turning to technology in attempts to zoom in on the slightest deficiencies perceived to be thwarting the performance…
How do we make sense of numbers without stats?
Jeffrey/Flickr
Terry Speed, WEHI (Walter and Eliza Hall Institute of Medical Research)
AUSTRALIA 2025: How will science address the challenges of the future? In collaboration with Australia’s chief scientist Ian Chubb, we’re asking how each science discipline will contribute to Australia…
Carsten Holz, Hong Kong University of Science and Technology
The world’s second-largest economy has become the second-most watched and yet investors, politicians and economists are never quite clear what it is they’re looking at. China’s premier, Li Keqiang, is…
2CB, 2CE? Let’s call the whole thing off.
Psychonaught
The number of deaths caused by a group of mind altering drugs, including mephedrone, has increased over the past three years. And while toxicology reports also link the use of these substances to deaths…
Instant access to health data is becoming the norm so we are wise to the implications.
IntelFreePress
In the run up to the introduction of the NHS care.data programme, there is an urgent need for a debate about what we, and our healthcare providers, mean by the term “consent”. So far, the plans for care.data…
Honorary Enterprise Professor, School of Population and Global Health, and Department of General Practice and Primary Care, The University of Melbourne
Former postdoctoral researcher on machine learning applied to chemical engineering and currently science communicator for the National Museum of Emerging Science and Innovation (Miraikan), University of Tokyo