South Korean Prisons Will Be Run By Robots Next Year
We all know that robots make everything better. Somehow, though, I'm not sure the inmates of a South Korean prison will agree when robot guards start appearing next year.
These new robotic guards, that measure 150cm in height, are to be introduced to a prison in the city of Pohang, South Korea, from March next year. The prison plans to introduce them properly if the month-long trial is a success.
The scientists behind the robot have spent $850,000 on the new robots, with the intention of allowing human guards to spend more time rehabilitating offenders as opposed to working on more menial tasks, like night patrols. A host of sensors on the robots let them keep an eye on the behavior of criminals, and even the conditions in cells.
Last week the news blogs were filled with information about a second attack on a computer-based supervisory control system (SCADA) at the Curran-Gardner Township Public Water District based near Springfield Ill. The first was the Stuxnet malware targeted at an Iranian nuclear facility that was extensively covered. We wrote about how the Symantec anti-virus researchers decompiled the malware and demonstrated it to us here earlier this summer, and how variants on Stuxnet called Duqu were also found last month floating around European networks.