2021年经济学人 人工智能"投身"情报界,让你无处遁形(1)

Spies and technology

间谍和技术

Machine intelligence

机器智能

Intelligence agencies are grappling with the promise—and pitfalls—of AI

情报机构正在努力应对人工智能带来的希望和困难

When it comes to using artificial intelligence (AI), intelligence agencies have been at it longer than most. In the coldwarAmerica's National Security Agency (NSA) and Britain's Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) explored early AI to help transcribe¹ and translate the enormous volumes of Soviet² phone-intercepts they began hoovering up in the 1960s and 1970s.

说到使用人工智能(AI)，情报机构比大多数其他机构使用的时间都要长。在冷战时期，美国国家安全局(NSA)和英国政府通信总部(GCHQ)探索了早期人工智能技术，以帮助转录和翻译他们在20世纪60年代和70年代开始收集的大量苏联的窃听电话。

Yet the technology was immature³. One former European intelligence officer says his service did not use automatic transcription or translation in Afghanistan in the 2000s, relying on native speakers instead. Now the spooks are hoping to do better. The trends that have made AI attractive for business in recent years—more data, better algorithms, and more processing power to make it all hum—are giving spy agencies big ideas, too.

然而，这项技术还不成熟。一名前欧洲情报官员表示，本世纪头十年，他的部门在阿富汗没有使用自动转录或翻译，而是依赖母语人士。现在，间谍们希望能做得更好。近年来，使人工智能对商业具有吸引力的趋势——更多的数据、更好的算法和更强大的处理能力，让一切都变得活跃起来——也给了间谍机构一些大胆的想法。

On February 24th GCHQ published a paper on how AI might change its work. "Machine-assisted fact-checking" could help spot faked images, check disinformation against trusted sources and identify social-media bots that spread it. AI might block cyber-attacks by "analysing patterns of activity on networks and devices", and fight organised crime by spotting suspicious chains of financial transactions.

2月24日，国家通信情报局(GCHQ)发表了一篇关于人工智能可能如何改变其工作的论文。“机器辅助的事实核查”可以帮助识别虚假图像，检查不可信来源的虚假信息，并识别传播这些信息的社交媒体机器人。人工智能可能通过“分析网络和设备上的活动模式”来阻止网络攻击，也可能通过发现可疑的金融交易链来打击有组织犯罪。

Other, less well-resourced organisations have already shown what is possible. The Nuclear Threat Initiative, an American ngo, recently showed that applying machine learning to publicly available trade data could spot previously⁴ unknown companies and organisations suspected of involvement in the illicit⁵ trade in materials for nuclear weapons. But spy agencies are not restricted to publicly available data.

其他资源不那么丰富的组织已经证明了什么是可能的。美国非政府组织“核威胁倡议”最近表示，将机器学习应用于公开的贸易数据，可以发现以前不为人知的公司和组织，这些公司和组织涉嫌参与用于核武器的材料的非法贸易。但间谍机构并不局限于公开的数据。

Some hope that, aided by their ability to snoop on private information, such modest applications could pave the way to an AI-fuelled juggernaut. "AI will revolutionise the practice of intelligence," gushed⁶ a report published on March 1st by America's National Security Commission on Artificial Intelligence, a high-powered study group co-chaired by Eric Schmidt, a former executive chairman of Alphabet, Google's parent company, and Bob Work, a former deputy defence secretary.

一些人希望，在它们窥探私人信息的能力的帮助下，这种不起眼的应用程序可能会为由人工智能驱动的巨大力量铺平道路。3月1日，美国国家安全委员会发布了一份关于人工智能的报告，报告称：“人工智能将给情报界带来一场革命。”美国国家安全委员会是一个强大的研究小组，由谷歌母公司Alphabet前执行董事长埃里克·施密特和前国防部副部长鲍勃·沃克共同担任其董事长。

The report does not lack ambition. It says that by 2030 America's 17 or so spy agencies ought to have built a "federated architecture of continually learning analytic⁷ engines" capable of crunching⁸ everything from human intelligence to satellite imagery in order to to foresee looming⁹ threats. The commission points approvingly to the Pentagon's response to covid-19, which integrated dozens of data sets to identify covid-19 hotspots and manage demand for supplies.

这份报告并不缺乏雄心壮志。报告称，到2030年，美国的大概17家间谍机构应该已经建立起了一个“持续学习分析引擎的联合架构”，能够分析从人类情报到卫星图像的一切，以便预测逐渐逼近的威胁。该委员会赞同五角大楼(美国政府)应对新冠的方式，它整合了数十组数据以确定新冠热点地区和管理供应需求。

1 transcribe   

v.抄写，誉写；改编(乐曲)；复制，转录

参考例句：

• We need volunteers to transcribe this manuscript.我们需要自愿者来抄写这个文稿。
• I am able to take dictation in English and transcribe them rapidly into Chinese.我会英文记录，还能立即将其改写成中文。

2 Soviet   

adj.苏联的，苏维埃的；n.苏维埃

参考例句：

• Zhukov was a marshal of the former Soviet Union.朱可夫是前苏联的一位元帅。
• Germany began to attack the Soviet Union in 1941.德国在1941年开始进攻苏联。

3 immature   

adj.未成熟的，发育未全的，未充分发展的

参考例句：

• Tony seemed very shallow and immature.托尼看起来好像很肤浅，不夠成熟。
• The birds were in immature plumage.这些鸟儿羽翅未全。

4 previously   

adv.以前，先前（地）

参考例句：

• The bicycle tyre blew out at a previously damaged point.自行车胎在以前损坏过的地方又爆开了。
• Let me digress for a moment and explain what had happened previously.让我岔开一会儿，解释原先发生了什么。

5 illicit   

adj.非法的，禁止的，不正当的

参考例句：

• He had an illicit association with Jane.他和简曾有过不正当关系。
• Seizures of illicit drugs have increased by 30% this year.今年违禁药品的扣押增长了30%。

6 gushed   

v.喷，涌( gush的过去式和过去分词 )；滔滔不绝地说话

参考例句：

• Oil gushed from the well. 石油从井口喷了出来。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》
• Clear water gushed into the irrigational channel. 清澈的水涌进了灌溉渠道。 来自《现代汉英综合大词典》

7 analytic   

adj.分析的，用分析方法的

参考例句：

• The boy has an analytic mind. 这男孩有分析的头脑。
• Latin is a synthetic language,while English is analytic.拉丁文是一种综合性语言，而英语是一种分析性语言。

8 crunching   

v.嘎吱嘎吱地咬嚼( crunch的现在分词 )；嘎吱作响；（快速大量地）处理信息；数字捣弄

参考例句：

• The horses were crunching their straw at their manger. 这些马在嘎吱嘎吱地吃槽里的草。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• The dog was crunching a bone. 狗正嘎吱嘎吱地嚼骨头。 来自《简明英汉词典》

9 looming   

n.上现蜃景（光通过低层大气发生异常折射形成的一种海市蜃楼）v.隐约出现，阴森地逼近( loom的现在分词 )；隐约出现，阴森地逼近

参考例句：

• The foothills were looming ahead through the haze. 丘陵地带透过薄雾朦胧地出现在眼前。 来自《简明英汉词典》
• Then they looked up. Looming above them was Mount Proteome. 接着他们往上看，在其上隐约看到的是蛋白质组山。 来自英汉非文学 - 生命科学 - 回顾与展望