- Back to school and back to work! Tech lifestyle expert Carley Knobloch joins us to share some great Fall tech pics for the entire family
- Should teachers allow genAI in the classroom? Tony Anscombe, Chief Security Evangelist with ESET, says “yes” -- and explains why
- Life-saving communications tech during natural disasters and other emergencies – we’ll learn all about Verizon Frontline with its VP, Cory Davis
- I’ll share some thoughts on the Apple AirPods Pro 3. In a word? Wow.
- Thank you to Visa and Sandisk for your support!
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Do you ever feel overwhelmed by the ever changing world
of technology? Check it Out can help make some sense
of it all, breaking down GeekSpeak into street speak. Technology columnist, author,
and TV personality Mark Saltzman covers consumer technology each week
for every listener, Mark tackles the latest news, reviews, and
how toos to help you understand what's hot, what's not
(00:22):
and why.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Hey, everyone, welcome to teck it Out. This is episode
four twelve. I hope you're all doing great today and
thank you for making teck it Out a small part
of your day. Thrilled to have you along, whether you
tune in on your favorite local talk radio station or
perhaps you subscribe to check it Out in podcast form.
(00:44):
Either way, thanks for your support. We have a great
show planned for you this hour with three different guests
and topics. We're going to kick things off in a
moment with Carly Noblock. She's a tech lifestyle expert who
no doubt you've seen on TV several times over the
years and really knows her stuff, and much like what
I try to do on this program, she's really good
(01:05):
at breaking down geek speak into street speak. So we're
going to talk about getting back to school getting back
to work. It is September, so there are some changes
in the home. Things can get a little hairy, and
so she's going to share some recommended gadgets, everything from
new routers to keep everyone connected at high speeds, to
the latest in e readers and digital notepads that let
(01:28):
students or moms and dads take notes on something that
looks like a regular tablet, but it will transcribe your
handwriting into text with weeks, not hours of battery life.
I think she's also going to talk about an affordable
video doorbell, as we are spending less time at home
this month compared to the summer. So if you shop online,
whether it's packages or food delivery services and all that,
(01:49):
and you want to know when it's at your front
door even if you're not at home, we'll talk about
a very affordable video doorbell. Then after that, not a
day goes by that we don't hear about AI AI
AI that it really is changing the game for virtually
everyone that has ever used it. It's pretty wild, as
you likely know. And so we're going to have Tony
(02:10):
anscom on the show. He usually joins us from a
cybersecurity company called e set to talk about protecting your
devices and all that, and password management and how to
avoid getting scammed. But today we're going to talk more
about AI and students are they using or abusing AI?
Are they using it as a tool to help them
(02:30):
write essays and book reports and all that, or are
they having AI like Chat, GPT or Google, Gemini or
Copilot do all the work for them. It's a fine line, right, Well,
Tony is going to argue that schools, be at high
school or college university, that they shouldn't be banning AI,
but rather perhaps should be encouraging students to use AI.
(02:51):
And he'll explain why. Possibly a controversial take on it,
since students, like many of us, will no doubt just
rather have work done for them. Right. We're going to
get to that with Tony Enscomb from E Set in
about twelve minutes from now, and then also on this show,
Verizon Frontline will join us. Not someone who's going to
talk to us about why you should use Verizon if
(03:11):
you're looking to change mobile carriers and all that. This
is all about Frontline, which is technology for public safety,
so for first responders and the like during natural disasters,
how to keep them connected so they can help us
in the event of an emergency, again, whether it's a
natural one like hurricanes and floods and forest fires or earthquakes,
(03:32):
but also man made catastrophes, things like trained derailment and
chemical spills and mass shootings. What can they do in
the event that they need people on the ground to
efficiently coordinate with one another and communicate. We're going to
learn all about technology these special trucks and flying drones
and robotic dogs that can access areas that are safer
(03:52):
than humans doing it. And it's not just tied to
Verizon customers, by the way, so that's called Verizon Frontline.
So a very diverse tech out for you this hour,
and if we have time, and I think we will,
maybe after the interview with Carly Noblock, which we're going
to kick off with now, I'm also going to share
some thoughts on the AirPods Pro three. I've been having
a lot of fun reviewing this product among others from Apple.
(04:14):
Very fortunate to come home to all the devices that
I got a chance to play around with at Apple
Park in Cupertino, California, Apples headquarters. As you likely heard
from last week's show, Waiting for me when I got
home were the new iPhone seventeen family of devices, the
super thin iPhone Air, Apple AirPods three, and then a
couple days later, I got the Apple Watch family of products.
(04:37):
So lots to talk about over the next couple of weeks,
as you may be considering an upgrade. I'll share my
very positive experience working with Apple AirPods Pro three, probably
in the first half of this show, so without further ado,
you are listening to teck it out powered by Visa
safeguarding your payments whether it's online or at retail. I'll
(04:58):
tell you more about Visa shortly, but let's sufficiently kick
off a brand new show with our first interview. Now
that the kids are back in school, the chaos at
home has likely begun, am I. Right Between homework, reading,
and after school activities, it could be a lot for
families to juggle. Fortunately, we have tech lifestyle expert Carly
Noblock here with us to share some smart solutions to
(05:20):
help you handle it all. Hi, Carly, so great to
chat with you again.
Speaker 3 (05:23):
It's always great to be on your show, Mark, thanks
for having me back. I partnered with a couple of
great brands here that will help families stay organized and
as stress free as possible this fall.
Speaker 2 (05:34):
If that is possible, Yeah, sure, we'll try. And being
the geek that I am, I am a believer that
tech can help play a role there. And so I'm
excited to chat with you. I know you're doing a
bunch of TV interviews today and showing these products on camera.
For our purposes, I'll have you explain some of the
highlights for us, but we'll also plug a website where
our listeners can check it out or check it out
(05:56):
as I like to say, to see you demonstrate some
of these in action. Yeah, let's just kick things off. So, Carly,
what are some of your favorite devices this school season.
Speaker 3 (06:05):
Well, I've got two devices here from Amazon from Kindle
for the first one is really for busy parents. They're
going to love this new note taking companion that feels
like writing on real paper. It's the Kindle Scribe. So
imagine a Kindle an e ink reading device that everyone's
familiar with, but now you can write on it. So
it's a digital notebook that lets you take notes, create
(06:26):
to do lists, and plan your week all in one place.
You can also convert handwritten notes to text and summarize
your notes with AI, so that's pretty cool. And you
can also write in the margins of books that you're reading,
or on documents or PDFs that you're reading, So now
you can really take notes wherever inspiration strikes. And then
every year I feel like the backpacks for our kids
(06:48):
get heavier and heavier, so these Kindle Kids devices that
I have here can also help. They're a light, portable
way to carry thousands of books in one Every device
comes with a subscribe into Amazon Kids Plus for access
to all the books that kids love, like Harry Potter,
Pursy Jackson, or Diary of a Wimpy Kid. Plus you
get a kid friendly case built in, parental controls, weeks
(07:12):
of battery life so you don't have to always be
harping on them to charge their devices, and it's got
a glare free screen that's really easy on little eyes.
Speaker 2 (07:21):
Awesome, all right, So that's the larger Kindles scribe great
for note taking, whether it's for students or for moms
or dads in the workplace. I've played around that AI
and it's amazing when not only will it transcribe your
handwriting into text, but will summarize your meeting for you,
like you were saying, and then yeah, Kindle for Kids.
I've been playing around with the Kindle Colorsoft for kids,
so adding color into the mix on some of the models,
(07:43):
which is really cool. You can even use your fingertip
like a yellow highlighter like we used to highlight our textbooks,
but now not ruining the books. So there's a lot
of applications for these devices. Love it all, right, kicking
off with Kindle, Now, let's pivot and talk about families
who are again both working and studying under the same
roof Internet speed is always a challenge. What solutions are
(08:04):
out there to keep everyone connected?
Speaker 3 (08:06):
Yeah, I mean between the fact that many parents are
working from home these days and kids are doing their
homework on devices these days, so it's really critical to
have a home network with the speed that everybody needs.
So the Eero seven gives you fast, reliable internet for
streaming and studying and working in apartments or homes, and
the Eero Pro seven is designed for busier households or
(08:29):
small to medium businesses that need to support basically lots
of devices at once. Both of them feature true Mesh technology,
which allows you to eliminate all the dead spots in
your home and finds you the fastest connection no matter
what corner of your home that you are in.
Speaker 2 (08:44):
Awesome. So Eero, of course is eer. Yeah. They have
a family of routers and extenders and all that good
stuff to keep everyone connected, even in larger homes or
in older homes where you may have like concrete walls
and that can impede the signal. It's not just for work,
Let's face it, it's all so far after school fun,
when the kids want a game online or stream on
(09:05):
Amazon Prime Video or Netflix or Disney or what have you.
Back to school for the kids and back to work
for parents, September can be a tough transition month, and
so thankfully we've got tech lifestyle expert Carly Noblock with us.
She's joining us to share some top tech ideas to
help ease into the new season. Peace of mind, I
would argue, is priceless. Any tech to help us with that.
Speaker 3 (09:26):
Yeah, whether you're keeping an eye out for school supply
deliveries or you just want to say hi to your
kids when they get home from school, the blank video
doorbell really has you covered the school season. It's super
easy to set up it gives you a full view
of your porch and with two way talk, you can
chat with whoever's at the door, whether it's a delivery
guy or your child who's coming home from school for
(09:47):
just sixty nine to ninety nine. It also runs on
battery for up to two years, gives you that peace
of mind, gives you eyes on your house when you
maybe can't be there.
Speaker 2 (09:55):
That's the blank video doorbell. Yeah, I just chose that
as the quote unquote bang for your bock video doorbell
for Reviewed dot com. I just had some hands on
time with that product, and for sixty nine dollars, Yeah,
it rival some of the more expensive video doorbells out there,
all the same features that you know and love, but
in a price point that's a little easier on your wallet. So, Carly,
(10:15):
for everything we've chatted about today, where can we go
for more info?
Speaker 3 (10:19):
Yeah, for more information on everything I covered today, you
can head over to inthnews dot tv.
Speaker 2 (10:24):
Again, that's Inthnews dot Tv. You'll see Carly noblock with
these items as well, plus links and prices and all that.
All the best for the fall season. Thanks Carly, thanks
so much for having me. Mark all right, my take
on AirPods Pro three. These are the most comfortable, great
sounding air pods you've ever tried. Twice the active noise cancelation,
(10:46):
new foam infused silicone tips so a more comfortable fit,
and more tip sizes to choose from now six of them.
Longer battery life. We're talking eight hours of active noise
cancelation or up to ten hours of transparency mode. And
you want to hear the side and live translation, which
we talked about last week, where you're conversing with someone
and if they're speaking another language, you will hear English
(11:07):
in your ears in real time. Craziness two forty nine
for the Apple AirPods Pro three or for our friends
north of the border three twenty nine in Canada. When
we return on tech it Out, we're going to talk
AI in the classroom. Does it belong there? Stick with us,
We'll be right back.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
Listen to check it Out whenever you want to find
the check it Out podcast, Did I Do? Or wherever
you get your podcasts.
Speaker 2 (11:40):
Welcome back to tech it Out. We cover cybersecurity a
lot on this program and how you can best protect
yourself in the digital age, even if you're not super
tech savvy. One part of the solution is securely shopping online,
and so I'm thrilled about my partnership with Visa on
tech it out, as they've made some significant investments in
fraud prevent over the past five years, as much as
(12:02):
ten billion dollars Yes that's billion with a B, to
support Visa's brand promise to protect the financial information of
individuals and businesses. Zero liability means peace of mind when
you shop online using your Visa card. There can be
no half measures when it comes to cybersecurity. Read more
about Visa and how securing the world's payments is priority
(12:23):
one at Visa dot com slash Security. That's Visa dot
Com slash Security. I'll go out on a limb here
and suggest most students today, well at least in high
school and university college age kids, most students are using
AI to help with their studies. I'd suspect, but our
AI tools like Chat, GPT and Google Gemini doing the
(12:46):
work for the students. To discuss, we're joined by Tony Anscom,
chief security evangelists with est, a leading cybersecurity company and
friend to this program. Hey Tony, good to chat with
you again. Thanks for your time.
Speaker 4 (12:58):
Hey, Hallo Mak Just to be clear, is actually me.
I haven't been replaced.
Speaker 2 (13:02):
By AI yet. Well, it sounds like you. It looks
like you because we're doing this over a zoom and
always a pleasure chatting with you, and you do such
a great job in breaking down geek speak into street speak.
Before we talk about AI, please tell us a bit
about your work with e set and what's new with you, Tony.
Speaker 4 (13:17):
Oh, well, nothing ever stands still in the world of cybersecurity.
As you know, Mark, things continually change. Well, as you know,
my role with an e set is actually going out
and talking at a lot of conferences and talking about
new threats and what's happening in the threat landscape. And
in fact, one of the most interesting ones I've seen recently, Mark,
(13:38):
is the use of captures where cybercronells are taking a
capture and then turning around and saying there's part two
of this capture and asking somebody to press certain keystrokes
that infects their machine. So there's never lack of innovation
on both sides, which is kind of interesting.
Speaker 2 (13:58):
Yeah, it's a cat and mouse thing. So a capture
is when you're asked to prove you're a human when
you're on a website where you're asked to move some
designs around or click the boxes that show you bicycles
or a crosswalk or something. So the cyber criminals are
finding ways to fool you even in this respect.
Speaker 4 (14:16):
Well, the issue is something like that, is you trust
it because it's trying to validate that you are real.
So therefore you trust it because you think it's there
to do the right thing and do the Yeah, so
you trust it and when it asks you to do
the next step. But of course you continue to trust
unless you're a complete cynical person like me and trust
(14:37):
nothing nothing.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
Well, I suspect that's the way to go, right, is
trust no one. Thanks for that, Tony. So look, AI
has so much promise. Right, it's already being used by
hundreds of millions of people, but there are concerns about misuse,
especially by students. What would you say the key issue
is here? Is it plagiarism?
Speaker 4 (14:56):
Well, I think there's a fear that students will just
go home with their homework prep and sit there and say,
you know how, mister Ai, could you write me an
essay for two thousand words on this topic? Please oh great,
thank you for my two thousand words. I can now
go go and hang out with my mates and two
minutes later they've done all their homework. And yeah, while
(15:19):
I think that is a concern, I think there's other
elements around that concern we should have. And there are
tools appearing on the market now that allow teachers to
understand whether something was AI created, or at least try
and identify it. But of course that's a cat and
mouse game too, isn't it is somebody builds the tool
to identify AI, AI improves and then you've got to
(15:42):
improve the tool to identify AI.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
You can even ask the AI to dumb it down
or make three percent mistakes or something like that. I mean,
it's that good where you can say, not only write
me a two thousand word essay on the history of
I don't know whatever, France, but you could say write
it like I'm in the twelfth grade instead of university
(16:04):
level to fool the professors. But yeah, there used to
be software called turn it in where professors and teachers
can compare swaths of text with anything that any other
student have submitted or a website. But this is a
bit different with AI because it's called GENAI for a reason.
It's generating new content, but there are still ways to
kind of see if the student is cheating.
Speaker 4 (16:23):
Well, yeah, absolutely. Now, of course, if you've got the
ingenious student that turns around and takes their own model
and feeds in everything they've submitted in the last five years,
the AI will come back and write it in their
language potentially, So I'm just saying, but if the student's
clever enough to do that, By the way, I don't
think we need to be concerned about them plagiarizing.
Speaker 2 (16:46):
And there's other concerns right aside from not using our brains,
which you know atrophy, but like accuracy bias, there are
other issues with using AI.
Speaker 4 (16:55):
There are. But you know, I think I maybe have
a slightly differ view on some people on this is
I think we should actually be teaching people to use AI.
We shouldn't be asking them to avoid it. Because if
somebody came to you R I, Mark and and said, hey,
you know, could you talk to us for fifteen minutes
on this topic. Now, maybe you know something about the topic,
(17:17):
but you don't know enough, so you go off and
do your research. You or I would probably use AI
or anybody in the workplace would probably use AI to
help them gather information on that topic and put together
what they're going to talk about. So my point here
is in the workplace, AI is becoming a tool of
(17:38):
the worker. To me, we need to be teaching students
how to responsibly use AI as a workplace tool, not
instead of doing everything. I don't please create all of
my homework, but can you give me some assistance. I've
been given this assignment. You know, what are the key
points that I should be thinking about for the essay.
Speaker 2 (17:59):
I like that, and that's optimistic, but many of us
will take the path at least resistance. I'll have to
get Tony's response to that when we return. Tony Anscomb
from Set is our guest. Stick with us more check
it out coming right up after this short break.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
I want to follow Mark Google Mark with a C
and Saltzman with a Z breaking down geeks peak into
street speak. This is check it out to check it
out with technology columnist, author, and TV personality Mark Saltzman.
Speaker 2 (18:39):
Welcome back to check it out. We're chatting with Tony
Anscomb from Set about using AI in the classroom. Tony
suggested before the break that kids should be encouraged to
use it as a tool. And I politely pushed back
and said, well, wait a second, they're probably just going
to have it do the whole thing. I heard that
professors are now trying to find different ways to test
the students to prove that they've learned what they've been teaching,
(19:03):
like an oral essay or other ways instead of a
paper essay.
Speaker 1 (19:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (19:07):
I mean this kind of goes back to it depends
what you're writing and who you're writing it for, isn't it.
But if you're writing an academic paper, typically you'd have
to reference everything you put in it anyway. Yeah, although
AI can do that for you, the sources of the
reference are likely to be different. You know, maybe somebody
could actually turn and say you can only reference materials
or such like. So I think there are ways of
(19:29):
ways of telling. And of course, if you've suddenly got
a student yesterday was a sea level student and suddenly
they're a and everything they turn in A, I don't
think I need something to tell me they're plagiarizing.
Speaker 2 (19:40):
But just to play Devil's advocate, Tony can of students
say only include sources from the UK or from you know,
whatever New York state or whatever, just to localize the sources.
If that is prerequisite, I'm sure you could.
Speaker 4 (19:55):
I'm sure you could go back and then turn around
and say can you can you remove everything that was
from this source or can you rewrite this from these sources.
I'm sure you could. But I mean the other side
of this is not only students, is it, that are
benefiting from AI. I mean, you know, if you step
into a classroom, a lecture hall, different students may require
different lesson plans or may be asked to create different
(20:19):
have different assignments based on their understanding or a topic,
or their level, or and the teachers may well be
using AI tooling to create individualized lesson plans for different students.
So now we see a benefit of instead of one
lesson plan that fits all students, you may see different
lesson plans for different students at different levels. But does
(20:41):
the teacher come to the class and turn and say, hey, students,
you know I've used AI to do this, and this
is how I've used AI to create this lesson for you,
and different people are going to get slightly different assignments
because you know, I want to make sure it's all individualized.
I'm a teacher or a lecturer actually admitting that they
(21:04):
used AI to do that, but would probably take the
credit in the same way the student would take the
credit for writing something they asked.
Speaker 2 (21:13):
So what's the answer, then, Tony, we are chatting with
Tony Anskilm, chief security evangelists with e Set, a renowned
cybersecurity software company, and Tony does a lot of outreach
and educational work. How can schools set these ethical standards
for AI use in learning?
Speaker 4 (21:29):
Well, I think Mark, we've talked about things like mobile
phone usage before, about kids and parents. Yeah, I think
to a certain degree, some of the ethics around this
is not dissimilar. You know, if you want your students
to behave in a certain way, then actually you have
to lead by example. So I think showing responsible usage
(21:50):
as as a lecturer or teacher, however, we want to
turn them and showing how you're using AI responsibly, and
I think will help the student understand how actually AI
is a tool in their in their toolbox for learning,
as opposed to it being I can do this without
(22:11):
actually learning anything, which would be really scary at medical school,
wouldn't it. But you get my point is you know
there are there are I think the boundaries should be
set in both directions.
Speaker 2 (22:21):
Yes, lead by example. And again, I do think that
there are some skills that students are using when they're
using AI. Again, whether it's to tweak the language to
sound like their own, I mean that in and of itself.
I'm not encouraging plagiarism. I think that there is a
way to finesse the words into your own voice and
use it as a tool. Just like we are Generation Tony.
(22:43):
We used the calculator as a tool, but we had
to show our work that there is a way to
work that text. So it is more from your voice,
a happy medium.
Speaker 4 (22:51):
Yeah, absolutely, and we we need to encourage that critical
thinking and the creative thinking. So you know, it's not
only an essay or a piece of work about a topic.
My opinion needs to come out in it. AI is
going to struggle to have my.
Speaker 2 (23:07):
Opinion unless you ask it to take a stance one
way or another. Right, even mildly, you could say, write
a somewhat positive take on the environmental efforts by research scientists,
you know, like that kind of thing. It is crazily customizable.
But I hear where you're going, and then Tony would
be remiss to have you on the program and not
(23:28):
ask about cybersecurity threats tied to AI. Is there anything
that we need to know.
Speaker 4 (23:33):
Well, Sertnly. An interesting piece of research we publish is
about something we've called promptlog. Now we've seen cyber criminals
using AI as a tool in their toolbox. I so
you get a great phishing email landing your inbox today
and it's grammatically perfect. It's tough to actually see any
more about bad language, back grammar, etc. Or badly placed
(23:57):
logo or whatever it might be. You've really got to
look hard to see that something is a phishing email.
So we know they're using AI tools to improve elements
of the attack process. But what we hadn't seen is
actually AI being used within the attack. And we recently
saw a piece of malware and we found it actually
(24:20):
on a public source which I believe may have been
a proof of We believe may have been a proof
of concept. And what it does is based on the
environment it finds itself in. It may dynamically create different scripts,
a different code to attack what it's trying to attack,
So it does it on the fly. So AI is
(24:40):
being used to build code on the fly to attack something.
That's the first time we believe anywhere in the world
that anybody's actually seen AI being used in that way.
I mean, you could argue that's kind of exciting in
the cybersecurity industry because we've seen that evolution. Now, it's
also kind of concerning that if we start seeing that
actually in the wild attacking people, that could be pretty bad.
Speaker 2 (25:03):
Anything we can do to safeguard ourselves from that.
Speaker 4 (25:05):
Yeah, the most important thing is is to have If
you look at cybersecurity, there's cybersecurity that's using AI and
advanced technologies that will detect something like that, and then
there are older style technology. So if you're still sitting
there with what I define only anti virus as a business,
then you're probably you need to be thinking about taking
(25:27):
advanced endpoint detection response systems that look at your entire environment,
the connections from it, the log files on your machine,
the process is running, et cetera. Et cetera is no
longer about looking just for a piece of malware.
Speaker 2 (25:41):
And as he said, do that your endpoint security.
Speaker 4 (25:43):
Yeah, we have endpoint detection response and we also do it.
If you're a smaller business. I'd actually use a managed
service and that tends to be termed MDR Managed Detectional Response,
and I'd outsource it to a letter security analyst expert.
Speaker 2 (25:57):
Thank you, Tony. It's at eset dot com. Your work,
a lot of the blog posts your research. It's at
welivesecurity dot com.
Speaker 4 (26:04):
It is and you'll find a whole host of technical
research papers there, but also help consumers as well.
Speaker 2 (26:10):
Tony. Always great to chat with you. Thanks again.
Speaker 4 (26:13):
All right, thank you. Up.
Speaker 2 (26:14):
We talk about first responders and Verizon Frontline when we
return on tech it.
Speaker 1 (26:19):
Out, breaking down geek speak into street speak, Check it out.
Holosted by Mark Saltzman.
Speaker 2 (26:36):
Welcome back everyone. You're listening to check it out. It's
not your imagination. Natural disasters are becoming more frequent and
more intense. And while there are scientists studying this disturbing
trend and discussing what, if anything, can be done about it,
necessities like communication also needs to be as unaffected as possible,
(26:57):
especially as it's critical for emergency responders to be able
to do their jobs, especially during these times. To learn
about Verizon Frontline and their role in all of this,
we're joined on the Line by Corey Davis, vice president
of Verizon Frontline. Welcome to the program, Corey, good to
chat with you.
Speaker 5 (27:12):
Hey, Mark, it's a pleasure to be here. Thanks for
having us.
Speaker 2 (27:14):
Yeah, of course, So why don't we just start at
a high level. What is Verizon Frontline.
Speaker 5 (27:19):
Yeah, For over thirty years, Verizon has been committed to
delivering reliable, secure, and resilient mission critical communication solutions to
the public safety community. So we support our nation's first
responders with a purpose built a ward wearing network where
communications are always prioritized. We have a dedicated Christ's Response team,
(27:40):
we got best in class twenty four to seven support,
and then we also have a very robust partner program
and a Verizon Frontline Innovation program. And truly, you know,
our tagline here at Verizon Frontline is your mission, is
our purpose. And we have a lot of folks on
our team that are made up of former first responders.
So I have folks from law enforcement, fire ems, nine
(28:02):
to one one call centers, dispatchers, and then I have
almost every branch of the military also covered across my team.
Speaker 2 (28:10):
Awesome, So I kind of framed this off the top
like it's something for consumers so we can still communicate
during natural disasters or other emergency situations. So is it
fair then that Verizon Frontline is also or primarily for
emergency responders rather than regular Verizon customers.
Speaker 5 (28:28):
That is correct, So Verizon Frontline is exclusively for the
public safety community.
Speaker 2 (28:34):
Got it.
Speaker 5 (28:34):
Now, We do offer priority services and a discount if
they are a consumer and have a personal line, but
the main services are all around agency paid, So the
public safety the true state, local and federal responders.
Speaker 2 (28:49):
Thanks for that, Appreciate the clarification. Why, Corey, do you
think this is important for a carrier to have a
division like Frontline and implement something as ambitious as this.
Speaker 5 (29:00):
Yeah, I think you know, as we live in this
ever changing world of unpredictability, and as we've become more
reliant on not only in our cell phones but wireless communications,
you know, having that robust infrastructure, having always on priority
preemption quality of service, you know, essentially giving first responders
(29:21):
first in line to our network resources. I've been deployed
to many hurricanes, wildfires, multiple crisis situations, and I can
tell you in these situations, literally every second counts, So
being able to communicate back literally can mean saving lives
or you know, if you look at it from another perspective,
(29:41):
even just being able to make a phone call to
a loved one to say hey, I'm okay. You know,
very very critical, not only for first responders, but for
society and the communities as a whole.
Speaker 2 (29:52):
And what's going on there in Philly today. Is it
a media event where you're showing journalists behind the scenes
of Verizon Frontline.
Speaker 5 (30:00):
Yeah, actually it's more than that. So this is our
our So we do what are called the Verizon Frontline
Road Shows. We do these across the country and what
it is, it's an opportunity for public safety agencies, state, local,
and federal in the area to come out and see
live demonstrations of our capabilities, of our technology and some
of the mobile assets that we built over the years
(30:21):
through our Verizon Frontline Innovation program. And what's very unique too,
is all of these assets and all of these solutions
that are on display. These aren't prototypes like these are
actual assets and solutions and technology that we are putting
out in the field. And our team is responding with daily.
Speaker 2 (30:40):
Let's say, local law enforcement or emergency response personnel there
with another carrier just toy have a contract with another
carrier by chance, could they also adopt Verizon Frontline if
their phones are tied to another carrier or is it
separate from the kinds of lines that we would buy
as consumers.
Speaker 1 (30:58):
No.
Speaker 5 (30:58):
Absolutely, so we are aer agnostic. Our support is across
the nation for all public safety agencies, whether you are
a Verizon customer or not a Verizon customer, because we
know in time a crisis that you know, kind of
going back to our previous question there, communications is so
critical and if there is another so home carrier that
is down and we are able to help them with
(31:20):
their communications for twenty four hours, for a week, for
a month, we're able to provide those services through our program. Yeah,
and I want to make it very clear too, those
services are also free of charge. And I'm referring to
our Verizon Frontline Crisis Response Team.
Speaker 2 (31:36):
All right, thanks for that. I understand there's a demo
that showcases some of your technologies there today, and that
includes an acronym that I like, called THOR. I've heard
this before while interviewing one of your colleagues about a
year ago. That stands for tactical Humanitarian Operations response. Can
you tell us about it.
Speaker 5 (31:52):
Yeah, so think of Thor as really our Swiss Army
Knife of Verizon frontline innovation. It really has everything in
our box from four G to five G our millimeter
wave spectrum. We can do microwave, we can do private networks,
and it's also a mobile command vehicle that can seat
upwards of six people. So not only can we deploy
(32:13):
our latest and greatest technology to support any mission, but
it also can function as a mobile command unit. So
then these public safety agencies can run their full command
out of Thor while Thor is also broadcasting a very
robust and strong five G ultra wideband single awesome.
Speaker 2 (32:31):
Yeah, it looks like a long truck that has all
kinds of satellites and antenna coming out of it in
the signature Verizon Red. It's very cool looking and that's
something that would be deployed during a natural disaster.
Speaker 5 (32:43):
You know what we're trying to do here, Mark is
Thor is you know, like I said, the Swiss Army Knives.
Really big truck can go into austere environments.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
It looks like a giant Swiss Army knife because it's
red and it's got all the silver things coming out
of it like the antenna was talking about. Yeah, funny actually,
and it.
Speaker 5 (32:58):
Has been deployed. We've deployed it a mini We actually
had it right on the beach at Fort Myers Beach
during Hurricane Ian.
Speaker 2 (33:04):
Yeah, that's a great example. More with Verizon Frontline and
Corey when we return on Tech it out and stay
with us.
Speaker 1 (33:11):
Follow Mark Saltzman on Facebook, on Twitter, on Instagram. Listen
to check it out whenever you want.
Speaker 2 (33:27):
We are chatting with Corey Davis, VP of Verizon Frontline.
He's in Philadelphia at an event where they're showcasing their
technologies that are deployed during an emergency situation like a
natural disaster. Before the break, Corey, you were starting to
tell us about four tactical humanitarian operations response platform A
(33:47):
giant truck if you will. Super cool. We had to
take a short break, but please continue your thought.
Speaker 5 (33:53):
Absolutely, ye, because as you said, it's a big truck.
You know, it sits on a six point fifty chassis.
So what we're really doing and how we're idading through
the Verizon Frontline Innovation program is working with a robust
partner ecosystem to shrink that footprint, make those assets smaller
but still be able to deliver the same punch and
the same experience as store, but in a smaller package.
Speaker 2 (34:16):
Before I let you go, I understand Verizon Frontline recently
commissioned a survey and found some findings tied to public
safety technology. And speaking of tech, it would be remiss
to have you want a show like this and not
ask you about some technologies like robotic dogs that are
used or drones in these kinds of situations. Can you
tell us a bit about that?
Speaker 5 (34:36):
Yeah, and that's a really good question. And we did
put out this survey. This is a communications survey that
we've been doing with the public safety community now for
five years. We survey just a little over one thousand
responders that are in the law enforcement, the fire field,
and also the EMS space. Really this robotics AI drones,
(34:56):
we are starting to see a massive uptick of not
only interest but adoption throughout the country. I've met with
multiple customers over the last few months, and especially on
the law enforcement side. They are standing up what's called
drone as the first responder programs where they're sending out
these drones for situational awareness to gain intel around you know,
(35:18):
specific situations, crimes, et cetera. And then for the robot dogs,
we have one that's called Red that is our robot
emergency dog, and we've really seen that come to fruition
and really the benefits I think like building collapses or
trained derailments where there's has matt material because we're able
to put not only cameras we have cameras on the dog,
(35:40):
but we're also to put as MATT sniffers that can
sniff out, you know, all the bad chemicals that are
in the air. So these robotics and these tools are
really not only helping give public safety better situational awareness,
it's helping keeping them safer as well. Because prior right
you had to send a human being into these really
really bad, dangerous situations. Now you can send a robot
(36:03):
into these situations, gather that intel, and make very very
smart and safe decisions on how you want to execute
the mission.
Speaker 2 (36:12):
That's great, And you know, I've been talking mostly about
natural disasters, but you just gave an example of an
unnatural one, like a chemical spill, and I'm assuming there
are other emergency situations as well, like mass shootings or
other things that can happen where communication is critical for
first responders and other personnel, So that's great. And then
just quickly, I know there's a phrase called network slicing
(36:33):
that I think our listeners would be interested about. And
then I would love to ask you where we can
learn more if there's some literature on all this.
Speaker 5 (36:39):
Yeah, absolutely, Mark, that's a great segue all of these
man made event or natural event or even a plan event,
because what happens is is you get a large influx
of call volume or a lot of a lot of
people trying to use their devices on our network, which
you know in the past could cause some issues with congestion, right,
(37:00):
but luckily we have party and premps on our network.
But what we've enabled now is we're actually dedicating and
partitioning a slice of our network specifically for public safety
and first responders, giving them dedicated capacity. So no matter
if the if the cell tower is at one hundred
percent load, there is still a percentage that is reserved
(37:22):
at all times for public safety. And then what we've
also done is we've also created an ultra reliable, tailored
experience around application persistency. So think reducing jitter, you have
to be thinking like video, thinking of frame to frame rates,
we're able to significantly improve the performance KPIs and essentially
(37:44):
provide an experience that is above and beyond what can
be provided on our normal network because this is a
dedicated bandwidth, dedicated sliice just for first responders.
Speaker 2 (37:54):
Great. And then is there a website for frontline specifically?
Speaker 5 (37:58):
Absolutely? Yes, you can just go to verizond forward slash
Frontline and then you'll find out everything you need to
know about our Verizon Frontline christ response team, our Verizon
Frontline Innovation team for network slicing, and pretty much everything
that we talked about today.
Speaker 2 (38:12):
All Right, Corey, thank you so much for carving out
some time to chat about this really important side of
your business. This is great. Thanks again, Yeah, my pleasure.
Speaker 5 (38:19):
Thank you, Stay safe, Mark.
Speaker 2 (38:20):
And thank you for tuning into tech it Out. Hope
you enjoyed this weekend's show. Also wanted to thank Visa
for your support on tech it Out and sand Disc.
Speaking of Visa and securing your payments, you also want
to secure your data, your files. I always trust sand
Disk's external storage like solid state drives, USB thumb drives,
(38:41):
micro SD cards for fast, reliable, durable and high capacity
storage solutions that are not just great for backing up
for long term storage, but also for transferring files between devices.
Sanddisk dot com has more. Have a fantastic rest of
your day, everyone, and I look forward to catching up
with you next week for another brand new episode of
(39:02):
Tack It Out. Bye bye for now, Chop.
Do you ever feel overwhelmed by the ever changing world
of technology? Check it Out can help make some sense
of it all, breaking down GeekSpeak into street speak. Technology columnist, author,
and TV personality Mark Saltzman covers consumer technology each week
for every listener, Mark tackles the latest news, reviews, and
how toos to help you understand what's hot, what's not
(00:22):
and why.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Hey, everyone, welcome to teck it Out. This is episode
four twelve. I hope you're all doing great today and
thank you for making teck it Out a small part
of your day. Thrilled to have you along, whether you
tune in on your favorite local talk radio station or
perhaps you subscribe to check it Out in podcast form.
(00:44):
Either way, thanks for your support. We have a great
show planned for you this hour with three different guests
and topics. We're going to kick things off in a
moment with Carly Noblock. She's a tech lifestyle expert who
no doubt you've seen on TV several times over the
years and really knows her stuff, and much like what
I try to do on this program, she's really good
(01:05):
at breaking down geek speak into street speak. So we're
going to talk about getting back to school getting back
to work. It is September, so there are some changes
in the home. Things can get a little hairy, and
so she's going to share some recommended gadgets, everything from
new routers to keep everyone connected at high speeds, to
the latest in e readers and digital notepads that let
(01:28):
students or moms and dads take notes on something that
looks like a regular tablet, but it will transcribe your
handwriting into text with weeks, not hours of battery life.
I think she's also going to talk about an affordable
video doorbell, as we are spending less time at home
this month compared to the summer. So if you shop online,
whether it's packages or food delivery services and all that,
(01:49):
and you want to know when it's at your front
door even if you're not at home, we'll talk about
a very affordable video doorbell. Then after that, not a
day goes by that we don't hear about AI AI
AI that it really is changing the game for virtually
everyone that has ever used it. It's pretty wild, as
you likely know. And so we're going to have Tony
(02:10):
anscom on the show. He usually joins us from a
cybersecurity company called e set to talk about protecting your
devices and all that, and password management and how to
avoid getting scammed. But today we're going to talk more
about AI and students are they using or abusing AI?
Are they using it as a tool to help them
(02:30):
write essays and book reports and all that, or are
they having AI like Chat, GPT or Google, Gemini or
Copilot do all the work for them. It's a fine line, right, Well,
Tony is going to argue that schools, be at high
school or college university, that they shouldn't be banning AI,
but rather perhaps should be encouraging students to use AI.
(02:51):
And he'll explain why. Possibly a controversial take on it,
since students, like many of us, will no doubt just
rather have work done for them. Right. We're going to
get to that with Tony Enscomb from E Set in
about twelve minutes from now, and then also on this show,
Verizon Frontline will join us. Not someone who's going to
talk to us about why you should use Verizon if
(03:11):
you're looking to change mobile carriers and all that. This
is all about Frontline, which is technology for public safety,
so for first responders and the like during natural disasters,
how to keep them connected so they can help us
in the event of an emergency, again, whether it's a
natural one like hurricanes and floods and forest fires or earthquakes,
(03:32):
but also man made catastrophes, things like trained derailment and
chemical spills and mass shootings. What can they do in
the event that they need people on the ground to
efficiently coordinate with one another and communicate. We're going to
learn all about technology these special trucks and flying drones
and robotic dogs that can access areas that are safer
(03:52):
than humans doing it. And it's not just tied to
Verizon customers, by the way, so that's called Verizon Frontline.
So a very diverse tech out for you this hour,
and if we have time, and I think we will,
maybe after the interview with Carly Noblock, which we're going
to kick off with now, I'm also going to share
some thoughts on the AirPods Pro three. I've been having
a lot of fun reviewing this product among others from Apple.
(04:14):
Very fortunate to come home to all the devices that
I got a chance to play around with at Apple
Park in Cupertino, California, Apples headquarters. As you likely heard
from last week's show, Waiting for me when I got
home were the new iPhone seventeen family of devices, the
super thin iPhone Air, Apple AirPods three, and then a
couple days later, I got the Apple Watch family of products.
(04:37):
So lots to talk about over the next couple of weeks,
as you may be considering an upgrade. I'll share my
very positive experience working with Apple AirPods Pro three, probably
in the first half of this show, so without further ado,
you are listening to teck it out powered by Visa
safeguarding your payments whether it's online or at retail. I'll
(04:58):
tell you more about Visa shortly, but let's sufficiently kick
off a brand new show with our first interview. Now
that the kids are back in school, the chaos at
home has likely begun, am I. Right Between homework, reading,
and after school activities, it could be a lot for
families to juggle. Fortunately, we have tech lifestyle expert Carly
Noblock here with us to share some smart solutions to
(05:20):
help you handle it all. Hi, Carly, so great to
chat with you again.
Speaker 3 (05:23):
It's always great to be on your show, Mark, thanks
for having me back. I partnered with a couple of
great brands here that will help families stay organized and
as stress free as possible this fall.
Speaker 2 (05:34):
If that is possible, Yeah, sure, we'll try. And being
the geek that I am, I am a believer that
tech can help play a role there. And so I'm
excited to chat with you. I know you're doing a
bunch of TV interviews today and showing these products on camera.
For our purposes, I'll have you explain some of the
highlights for us, but we'll also plug a website where
our listeners can check it out or check it out
(05:56):
as I like to say, to see you demonstrate some
of these in action. Yeah, let's just kick things off. So, Carly,
what are some of your favorite devices this school season.
Speaker 3 (06:05):
Well, I've got two devices here from Amazon from Kindle
for the first one is really for busy parents. They're
going to love this new note taking companion that feels
like writing on real paper. It's the Kindle Scribe. So
imagine a Kindle an e ink reading device that everyone's
familiar with, but now you can write on it. So
it's a digital notebook that lets you take notes, create
(06:26):
to do lists, and plan your week all in one place.
You can also convert handwritten notes to text and summarize
your notes with AI, so that's pretty cool. And you
can also write in the margins of books that you're reading,
or on documents or PDFs that you're reading, So now
you can really take notes wherever inspiration strikes. And then
every year I feel like the backpacks for our kids
(06:48):
get heavier and heavier, so these Kindle Kids devices that
I have here can also help. They're a light, portable
way to carry thousands of books in one Every device
comes with a subscribe into Amazon Kids Plus for access
to all the books that kids love, like Harry Potter,
Pursy Jackson, or Diary of a Wimpy Kid. Plus you
get a kid friendly case built in, parental controls, weeks
(07:12):
of battery life so you don't have to always be
harping on them to charge their devices, and it's got
a glare free screen that's really easy on little eyes.
Speaker 2 (07:21):
Awesome, all right, So that's the larger Kindles scribe great
for note taking, whether it's for students or for moms
or dads in the workplace. I've played around that AI
and it's amazing when not only will it transcribe your
handwriting into text, but will summarize your meeting for you,
like you were saying, and then yeah, Kindle for Kids.
I've been playing around with the Kindle Colorsoft for kids,
so adding color into the mix on some of the models,
(07:43):
which is really cool. You can even use your fingertip
like a yellow highlighter like we used to highlight our textbooks,
but now not ruining the books. So there's a lot
of applications for these devices. Love it all, right, kicking
off with Kindle, Now, let's pivot and talk about families
who are again both working and studying under the same
roof Internet speed is always a challenge. What solutions are
(08:04):
out there to keep everyone connected?
Speaker 3 (08:06):
Yeah, I mean between the fact that many parents are
working from home these days and kids are doing their
homework on devices these days, so it's really critical to
have a home network with the speed that everybody needs.
So the Eero seven gives you fast, reliable internet for
streaming and studying and working in apartments or homes, and
the Eero Pro seven is designed for busier households or
(08:29):
small to medium businesses that need to support basically lots
of devices at once. Both of them feature true Mesh technology,
which allows you to eliminate all the dead spots in
your home and finds you the fastest connection no matter
what corner of your home that you are in.
Speaker 2 (08:44):
Awesome. So Eero, of course is eer. Yeah. They have
a family of routers and extenders and all that good
stuff to keep everyone connected, even in larger homes or
in older homes where you may have like concrete walls
and that can impede the signal. It's not just for work,
Let's face it, it's all so far after school fun,
when the kids want a game online or stream on
(09:05):
Amazon Prime Video or Netflix or Disney or what have you.
Back to school for the kids and back to work
for parents, September can be a tough transition month, and
so thankfully we've got tech lifestyle expert Carly Noblock with us.
She's joining us to share some top tech ideas to
help ease into the new season. Peace of mind, I
would argue, is priceless. Any tech to help us with that.
Speaker 3 (09:26):
Yeah, whether you're keeping an eye out for school supply
deliveries or you just want to say hi to your
kids when they get home from school, the blank video
doorbell really has you covered the school season. It's super
easy to set up it gives you a full view
of your porch and with two way talk, you can
chat with whoever's at the door, whether it's a delivery
guy or your child who's coming home from school for
(09:47):
just sixty nine to ninety nine. It also runs on
battery for up to two years, gives you that peace
of mind, gives you eyes on your house when you
maybe can't be there.
Speaker 2 (09:55):
That's the blank video doorbell. Yeah, I just chose that
as the quote unquote bang for your bock video doorbell
for Reviewed dot com. I just had some hands on
time with that product, and for sixty nine dollars, Yeah,
it rival some of the more expensive video doorbells out there,
all the same features that you know and love, but
in a price point that's a little easier on your wallet. So, Carly,
(10:15):
for everything we've chatted about today, where can we go
for more info?
Speaker 3 (10:19):
Yeah, for more information on everything I covered today, you
can head over to inthnews dot tv.
Speaker 2 (10:24):
Again, that's Inthnews dot Tv. You'll see Carly noblock with
these items as well, plus links and prices and all that.
All the best for the fall season. Thanks Carly, thanks
so much for having me. Mark all right, my take
on AirPods Pro three. These are the most comfortable, great
sounding air pods you've ever tried. Twice the active noise cancelation,
(10:46):
new foam infused silicone tips so a more comfortable fit,
and more tip sizes to choose from now six of them.
Longer battery life. We're talking eight hours of active noise
cancelation or up to ten hours of transparency mode. And
you want to hear the side and live translation, which
we talked about last week, where you're conversing with someone
and if they're speaking another language, you will hear English
(11:07):
in your ears in real time. Craziness two forty nine
for the Apple AirPods Pro three or for our friends
north of the border three twenty nine in Canada. When
we return on tech it Out, we're going to talk
AI in the classroom. Does it belong there? Stick with us,
We'll be right back.
Speaker 1 (11:24):
Listen to check it Out whenever you want to find
the check it Out podcast, Did I Do? Or wherever
you get your podcasts.
Speaker 2 (11:40):
Welcome back to tech it Out. We cover cybersecurity a
lot on this program and how you can best protect
yourself in the digital age, even if you're not super
tech savvy. One part of the solution is securely shopping online,
and so I'm thrilled about my partnership with Visa on
tech it out, as they've made some significant investments in
fraud prevent over the past five years, as much as
(12:02):
ten billion dollars Yes that's billion with a B, to
support Visa's brand promise to protect the financial information of
individuals and businesses. Zero liability means peace of mind when
you shop online using your Visa card. There can be
no half measures when it comes to cybersecurity. Read more
about Visa and how securing the world's payments is priority
(12:23):
one at Visa dot com slash Security. That's Visa dot
Com slash Security. I'll go out on a limb here
and suggest most students today, well at least in high
school and university college age kids, most students are using
AI to help with their studies. I'd suspect, but our
AI tools like Chat, GPT and Google Gemini doing the
(12:46):
work for the students. To discuss, we're joined by Tony Anscom,
chief security evangelists with est, a leading cybersecurity company and
friend to this program. Hey Tony, good to chat with
you again. Thanks for your time.
Speaker 4 (12:58):
Hey, Hallo Mak Just to be clear, is actually me.
I haven't been replaced.
Speaker 2 (13:02):
By AI yet. Well, it sounds like you. It looks
like you because we're doing this over a zoom and
always a pleasure chatting with you, and you do such
a great job in breaking down geek speak into street speak.
Before we talk about AI, please tell us a bit
about your work with e set and what's new with you, Tony.
Speaker 4 (13:17):
Oh, well, nothing ever stands still in the world of cybersecurity.
As you know, Mark, things continually change. Well, as you know,
my role with an e set is actually going out
and talking at a lot of conferences and talking about
new threats and what's happening in the threat landscape. And
in fact, one of the most interesting ones I've seen recently, Mark,
(13:38):
is the use of captures where cybercronells are taking a
capture and then turning around and saying there's part two
of this capture and asking somebody to press certain keystrokes
that infects their machine. So there's never lack of innovation
on both sides, which is kind of interesting.
Speaker 2 (13:58):
Yeah, it's a cat and mouse thing. So a capture
is when you're asked to prove you're a human when
you're on a website where you're asked to move some
designs around or click the boxes that show you bicycles
or a crosswalk or something. So the cyber criminals are
finding ways to fool you even in this respect.
Speaker 4 (14:16):
Well, the issue is something like that, is you trust
it because it's trying to validate that you are real.
So therefore you trust it because you think it's there
to do the right thing and do the Yeah, so
you trust it and when it asks you to do
the next step. But of course you continue to trust
unless you're a complete cynical person like me and trust
(14:37):
nothing nothing.
Speaker 2 (14:38):
Well, I suspect that's the way to go, right, is
trust no one. Thanks for that, Tony. So look, AI
has so much promise. Right, it's already being used by
hundreds of millions of people, but there are concerns about misuse,
especially by students. What would you say the key issue
is here? Is it plagiarism?
Speaker 4 (14:56):
Well, I think there's a fear that students will just
go home with their homework prep and sit there and say,
you know how, mister Ai, could you write me an
essay for two thousand words on this topic? Please oh great,
thank you for my two thousand words. I can now
go go and hang out with my mates and two
minutes later they've done all their homework. And yeah, while
(15:19):
I think that is a concern, I think there's other
elements around that concern we should have. And there are
tools appearing on the market now that allow teachers to
understand whether something was AI created, or at least try
and identify it. But of course that's a cat and
mouse game too, isn't it is somebody builds the tool
to identify AI, AI improves and then you've got to
(15:42):
improve the tool to identify AI.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
You can even ask the AI to dumb it down
or make three percent mistakes or something like that. I mean,
it's that good where you can say, not only write
me a two thousand word essay on the history of
I don't know whatever, France, but you could say write
it like I'm in the twelfth grade instead of university
(16:04):
level to fool the professors. But yeah, there used to
be software called turn it in where professors and teachers
can compare swaths of text with anything that any other
student have submitted or a website. But this is a
bit different with AI because it's called GENAI for a reason.
It's generating new content, but there are still ways to
kind of see if the student is cheating.
Speaker 4 (16:23):
Well, yeah, absolutely. Now, of course, if you've got the
ingenious student that turns around and takes their own model
and feeds in everything they've submitted in the last five years,
the AI will come back and write it in their
language potentially, So I'm just saying, but if the student's
clever enough to do that, By the way, I don't
think we need to be concerned about them plagiarizing.
Speaker 2 (16:46):
And there's other concerns right aside from not using our brains,
which you know atrophy, but like accuracy bias, there are
other issues with using AI.
Speaker 4 (16:55):
There are. But you know, I think I maybe have
a slightly differ view on some people on this is
I think we should actually be teaching people to use AI.
We shouldn't be asking them to avoid it. Because if
somebody came to you R I, Mark and and said, hey,
you know, could you talk to us for fifteen minutes
on this topic. Now, maybe you know something about the topic,
(17:17):
but you don't know enough, so you go off and
do your research. You or I would probably use AI
or anybody in the workplace would probably use AI to
help them gather information on that topic and put together
what they're going to talk about. So my point here
is in the workplace, AI is becoming a tool of
(17:38):
the worker. To me, we need to be teaching students
how to responsibly use AI as a workplace tool, not
instead of doing everything. I don't please create all of
my homework, but can you give me some assistance. I've
been given this assignment. You know, what are the key
points that I should be thinking about for the essay.
Speaker 2 (17:59):
I like that, and that's optimistic, but many of us
will take the path at least resistance. I'll have to
get Tony's response to that when we return. Tony Anscomb
from Set is our guest. Stick with us more check
it out coming right up after this short break.
Speaker 1 (18:15):
I want to follow Mark Google Mark with a C
and Saltzman with a Z breaking down geeks peak into
street speak. This is check it out to check it
out with technology columnist, author, and TV personality Mark Saltzman.
Speaker 2 (18:39):
Welcome back to check it out. We're chatting with Tony
Anscomb from Set about using AI in the classroom. Tony
suggested before the break that kids should be encouraged to
use it as a tool. And I politely pushed back
and said, well, wait a second, they're probably just going
to have it do the whole thing. I heard that
professors are now trying to find different ways to test
the students to prove that they've learned what they've been teaching,
(19:03):
like an oral essay or other ways instead of a
paper essay.
Speaker 1 (19:07):
Yeah.
Speaker 4 (19:07):
I mean this kind of goes back to it depends
what you're writing and who you're writing it for, isn't it.
But if you're writing an academic paper, typically you'd have
to reference everything you put in it anyway. Yeah, although
AI can do that for you, the sources of the
reference are likely to be different. You know, maybe somebody
could actually turn and say you can only reference materials
or such like. So I think there are ways of
(19:29):
ways of telling. And of course, if you've suddenly got
a student yesterday was a sea level student and suddenly
they're a and everything they turn in A, I don't
think I need something to tell me they're plagiarizing.
Speaker 2 (19:40):
But just to play Devil's advocate, Tony can of students
say only include sources from the UK or from you know,
whatever New York state or whatever, just to localize the sources.
If that is prerequisite, I'm sure you could.
Speaker 4 (19:55):
I'm sure you could go back and then turn around
and say can you can you remove everything that was
from this source or can you rewrite this from these sources.
I'm sure you could. But I mean the other side
of this is not only students, is it, that are
benefiting from AI. I mean, you know, if you step
into a classroom, a lecture hall, different students may require
different lesson plans or may be asked to create different
(20:19):
have different assignments based on their understanding or a topic,
or their level, or and the teachers may well be
using AI tooling to create individualized lesson plans for different students.
So now we see a benefit of instead of one
lesson plan that fits all students, you may see different
lesson plans for different students at different levels. But does
(20:41):
the teacher come to the class and turn and say, hey, students,
you know I've used AI to do this, and this
is how I've used AI to create this lesson for you,
and different people are going to get slightly different assignments
because you know, I want to make sure it's all individualized.
I'm a teacher or a lecturer actually admitting that they
(21:04):
used AI to do that, but would probably take the
credit in the same way the student would take the
credit for writing something they asked.
Speaker 2 (21:13):
So what's the answer, then, Tony, we are chatting with
Tony Anskilm, chief security evangelists with e Set, a renowned
cybersecurity software company, and Tony does a lot of outreach
and educational work. How can schools set these ethical standards
for AI use in learning?
Speaker 4 (21:29):
Well, I think Mark, we've talked about things like mobile
phone usage before, about kids and parents. Yeah, I think
to a certain degree, some of the ethics around this
is not dissimilar. You know, if you want your students
to behave in a certain way, then actually you have
to lead by example. So I think showing responsible usage
(21:50):
as as a lecturer or teacher, however, we want to
turn them and showing how you're using AI responsibly, and
I think will help the student understand how actually AI
is a tool in their in their toolbox for learning,
as opposed to it being I can do this without
(22:11):
actually learning anything, which would be really scary at medical school,
wouldn't it. But you get my point is you know
there are there are I think the boundaries should be
set in both directions.
Speaker 2 (22:21):
Yes, lead by example. And again, I do think that
there are some skills that students are using when they're
using AI. Again, whether it's to tweak the language to
sound like their own, I mean that in and of itself.
I'm not encouraging plagiarism. I think that there is a
way to finesse the words into your own voice and
use it as a tool. Just like we are Generation Tony.
(22:43):
We used the calculator as a tool, but we had
to show our work that there is a way to
work that text. So it is more from your voice,
a happy medium.
Speaker 4 (22:51):
Yeah, absolutely, and we we need to encourage that critical
thinking and the creative thinking. So you know, it's not
only an essay or a piece of work about a topic.
My opinion needs to come out in it. AI is
going to struggle to have my.
Speaker 2 (23:07):
Opinion unless you ask it to take a stance one
way or another. Right, even mildly, you could say, write
a somewhat positive take on the environmental efforts by research scientists,
you know, like that kind of thing. It is crazily customizable.
But I hear where you're going, and then Tony would
be remiss to have you on the program and not
(23:28):
ask about cybersecurity threats tied to AI. Is there anything
that we need to know.
Speaker 4 (23:33):
Well, Sertnly. An interesting piece of research we publish is
about something we've called promptlog. Now we've seen cyber criminals
using AI as a tool in their toolbox. I so
you get a great phishing email landing your inbox today
and it's grammatically perfect. It's tough to actually see any
more about bad language, back grammar, etc. Or badly placed
(23:57):
logo or whatever it might be. You've really got to
look hard to see that something is a phishing email.
So we know they're using AI tools to improve elements
of the attack process. But what we hadn't seen is
actually AI being used within the attack. And we recently
saw a piece of malware and we found it actually
(24:20):
on a public source which I believe may have been
a proof of We believe may have been a proof
of concept. And what it does is based on the
environment it finds itself in. It may dynamically create different scripts,
a different code to attack what it's trying to attack,
So it does it on the fly. So AI is
(24:40):
being used to build code on the fly to attack something.
That's the first time we believe anywhere in the world
that anybody's actually seen AI being used in that way.
I mean, you could argue that's kind of exciting in
the cybersecurity industry because we've seen that evolution. Now, it's
also kind of concerning that if we start seeing that
actually in the wild attacking people, that could be pretty bad.
Speaker 2 (25:03):
Anything we can do to safeguard ourselves from that.
Speaker 4 (25:05):
Yeah, the most important thing is is to have If
you look at cybersecurity, there's cybersecurity that's using AI and
advanced technologies that will detect something like that, and then
there are older style technology. So if you're still sitting
there with what I define only anti virus as a business,
then you're probably you need to be thinking about taking
(25:27):
advanced endpoint detection response systems that look at your entire environment,
the connections from it, the log files on your machine,
the process is running, et cetera. Et cetera is no
longer about looking just for a piece of malware.
Speaker 2 (25:41):
And as he said, do that your endpoint security.
Speaker 4 (25:43):
Yeah, we have endpoint detection response and we also do it.
If you're a smaller business. I'd actually use a managed
service and that tends to be termed MDR Managed Detectional Response,
and I'd outsource it to a letter security analyst expert.
Speaker 2 (25:57):
Thank you, Tony. It's at eset dot com. Your work,
a lot of the blog posts your research. It's at
welivesecurity dot com.
Speaker 4 (26:04):
It is and you'll find a whole host of technical
research papers there, but also help consumers as well.
Speaker 2 (26:10):
Tony. Always great to chat with you. Thanks again.
Speaker 4 (26:13):
All right, thank you. Up.
Speaker 2 (26:14):
We talk about first responders and Verizon Frontline when we
return on tech it.
Speaker 1 (26:19):
Out, breaking down geek speak into street speak, Check it out.
Holosted by Mark Saltzman.
Speaker 2 (26:36):
Welcome back everyone. You're listening to check it out. It's
not your imagination. Natural disasters are becoming more frequent and
more intense. And while there are scientists studying this disturbing
trend and discussing what, if anything, can be done about it,
necessities like communication also needs to be as unaffected as possible,
(26:57):
especially as it's critical for emergency responders to be able
to do their jobs, especially during these times. To learn
about Verizon Frontline and their role in all of this,
we're joined on the Line by Corey Davis, vice president
of Verizon Frontline. Welcome to the program, Corey, good to
chat with you.
Speaker 5 (27:12):
Hey, Mark, it's a pleasure to be here. Thanks for
having us.
Speaker 2 (27:14):
Yeah, of course, So why don't we just start at
a high level. What is Verizon Frontline.
Speaker 5 (27:19):
Yeah, For over thirty years, Verizon has been committed to
delivering reliable, secure, and resilient mission critical communication solutions to
the public safety community. So we support our nation's first
responders with a purpose built a ward wearing network where
communications are always prioritized. We have a dedicated Christ's Response team,
(27:40):
we got best in class twenty four to seven support,
and then we also have a very robust partner program
and a Verizon Frontline Innovation program. And truly, you know,
our tagline here at Verizon Frontline is your mission, is
our purpose. And we have a lot of folks on
our team that are made up of former first responders.
So I have folks from law enforcement, fire ems, nine
(28:02):
to one one call centers, dispatchers, and then I have
almost every branch of the military also covered across my team.
Speaker 2 (28:10):
Awesome, So I kind of framed this off the top
like it's something for consumers so we can still communicate
during natural disasters or other emergency situations. So is it
fair then that Verizon Frontline is also or primarily for
emergency responders rather than regular Verizon customers.
Speaker 5 (28:28):
That is correct, So Verizon Frontline is exclusively for the
public safety community.
Speaker 2 (28:34):
Got it.
Speaker 5 (28:34):
Now, We do offer priority services and a discount if
they are a consumer and have a personal line, but
the main services are all around agency paid, So the
public safety the true state, local and federal responders.
Speaker 2 (28:49):
Thanks for that, Appreciate the clarification. Why, Corey, do you
think this is important for a carrier to have a
division like Frontline and implement something as ambitious as this.
Speaker 5 (29:00):
Yeah, I think you know, as we live in this
ever changing world of unpredictability, and as we've become more
reliant on not only in our cell phones but wireless communications,
you know, having that robust infrastructure, having always on priority
preemption quality of service, you know, essentially giving first responders
(29:21):
first in line to our network resources. I've been deployed
to many hurricanes, wildfires, multiple crisis situations, and I can
tell you in these situations, literally every second counts, So
being able to communicate back literally can mean saving lives
or you know, if you look at it from another perspective,
(29:41):
even just being able to make a phone call to
a loved one to say hey, I'm okay. You know,
very very critical, not only for first responders, but for
society and the communities as a whole.
Speaker 2 (29:52):
And what's going on there in Philly today. Is it
a media event where you're showing journalists behind the scenes
of Verizon Frontline.
Speaker 5 (30:00):
Yeah, actually it's more than that. So this is our
our So we do what are called the Verizon Frontline
Road Shows. We do these across the country and what
it is, it's an opportunity for public safety agencies, state, local,
and federal in the area to come out and see
live demonstrations of our capabilities, of our technology and some
of the mobile assets that we built over the years
(30:21):
through our Verizon Frontline Innovation program. And what's very unique too,
is all of these assets and all of these solutions
that are on display. These aren't prototypes like these are
actual assets and solutions and technology that we are putting
out in the field. And our team is responding with daily.
Speaker 2 (30:40):
Let's say, local law enforcement or emergency response personnel there
with another carrier just toy have a contract with another
carrier by chance, could they also adopt Verizon Frontline if
their phones are tied to another carrier or is it
separate from the kinds of lines that we would buy
as consumers.
Speaker 1 (30:58):
No.
Speaker 5 (30:58):
Absolutely, so we are aer agnostic. Our support is across
the nation for all public safety agencies, whether you are
a Verizon customer or not a Verizon customer, because we
know in time a crisis that you know, kind of
going back to our previous question there, communications is so
critical and if there is another so home carrier that
is down and we are able to help them with
(31:20):
their communications for twenty four hours, for a week, for
a month, we're able to provide those services through our program. Yeah,
and I want to make it very clear too, those
services are also free of charge. And I'm referring to
our Verizon Frontline Crisis Response Team.
Speaker 2 (31:36):
All right, thanks for that. I understand there's a demo
that showcases some of your technologies there today, and that
includes an acronym that I like, called THOR. I've heard
this before while interviewing one of your colleagues about a
year ago. That stands for tactical Humanitarian Operations response. Can
you tell us about it.
Speaker 5 (31:52):
Yeah, so think of Thor as really our Swiss Army
Knife of Verizon frontline innovation. It really has everything in
our box from four G to five G our millimeter
wave spectrum. We can do microwave, we can do private networks,
and it's also a mobile command vehicle that can seat
upwards of six people. So not only can we deploy
(32:13):
our latest and greatest technology to support any mission, but
it also can function as a mobile command unit. So
then these public safety agencies can run their full command
out of Thor while Thor is also broadcasting a very
robust and strong five G ultra wideband single awesome.
Speaker 2 (32:31):
Yeah, it looks like a long truck that has all
kinds of satellites and antenna coming out of it in
the signature Verizon Red. It's very cool looking and that's
something that would be deployed during a natural disaster.
Speaker 5 (32:43):
You know what we're trying to do here, Mark is
Thor is you know, like I said, the Swiss Army Knives.
Really big truck can go into austere environments.
Speaker 2 (32:50):
It looks like a giant Swiss Army knife because it's
red and it's got all the silver things coming out
of it like the antenna was talking about. Yeah, funny actually,
and it.
Speaker 5 (32:58):
Has been deployed. We've deployed it a mini We actually
had it right on the beach at Fort Myers Beach
during Hurricane Ian.
Speaker 2 (33:04):
Yeah, that's a great example. More with Verizon Frontline and
Corey when we return on Tech it out and stay
with us.
Speaker 1 (33:11):
Follow Mark Saltzman on Facebook, on Twitter, on Instagram. Listen
to check it out whenever you want.
Speaker 2 (33:27):
We are chatting with Corey Davis, VP of Verizon Frontline.
He's in Philadelphia at an event where they're showcasing their
technologies that are deployed during an emergency situation like a
natural disaster. Before the break, Corey, you were starting to
tell us about four tactical humanitarian operations response platform A
(33:47):
giant truck if you will. Super cool. We had to
take a short break, but please continue your thought.
Speaker 5 (33:53):
Absolutely, ye, because as you said, it's a big truck.
You know, it sits on a six point fifty chassis.
So what we're really doing and how we're idading through
the Verizon Frontline Innovation program is working with a robust
partner ecosystem to shrink that footprint, make those assets smaller
but still be able to deliver the same punch and
the same experience as store, but in a smaller package.
Speaker 2 (34:16):
Before I let you go, I understand Verizon Frontline recently
commissioned a survey and found some findings tied to public
safety technology. And speaking of tech, it would be remiss
to have you want a show like this and not
ask you about some technologies like robotic dogs that are
used or drones in these kinds of situations. Can you
tell us a bit about that?
Speaker 5 (34:36):
Yeah, and that's a really good question. And we did
put out this survey. This is a communications survey that
we've been doing with the public safety community now for
five years. We survey just a little over one thousand
responders that are in the law enforcement, the fire field,
and also the EMS space. Really this robotics AI drones,
(34:56):
we are starting to see a massive uptick of not
only interest but adoption throughout the country. I've met with
multiple customers over the last few months, and especially on
the law enforcement side. They are standing up what's called
drone as the first responder programs where they're sending out
these drones for situational awareness to gain intel around you know,
(35:18):
specific situations, crimes, et cetera. And then for the robot dogs,
we have one that's called Red that is our robot
emergency dog, and we've really seen that come to fruition
and really the benefits I think like building collapses or
trained derailments where there's has matt material because we're able
to put not only cameras we have cameras on the dog,
(35:40):
but we're also to put as MATT sniffers that can
sniff out, you know, all the bad chemicals that are
in the air. So these robotics and these tools are
really not only helping give public safety better situational awareness,
it's helping keeping them safer as well. Because prior right
you had to send a human being into these really
really bad, dangerous situations. Now you can send a robot
(36:03):
into these situations, gather that intel, and make very very
smart and safe decisions on how you want to execute
the mission.
Speaker 2 (36:12):
That's great, And you know, I've been talking mostly about
natural disasters, but you just gave an example of an
unnatural one, like a chemical spill, and I'm assuming there
are other emergency situations as well, like mass shootings or
other things that can happen where communication is critical for
first responders and other personnel, So that's great. And then
just quickly, I know there's a phrase called network slicing
(36:33):
that I think our listeners would be interested about. And
then I would love to ask you where we can
learn more if there's some literature on all this.
Speaker 5 (36:39):
Yeah, absolutely, Mark, that's a great segue all of these
man made event or natural event or even a plan event,
because what happens is is you get a large influx
of call volume or a lot of a lot of
people trying to use their devices on our network, which
you know in the past could cause some issues with congestion, right,
(37:00):
but luckily we have party and premps on our network.
But what we've enabled now is we're actually dedicating and
partitioning a slice of our network specifically for public safety
and first responders, giving them dedicated capacity. So no matter
if the if the cell tower is at one hundred
percent load, there is still a percentage that is reserved
(37:22):
at all times for public safety. And then what we've
also done is we've also created an ultra reliable, tailored
experience around application persistency. So think reducing jitter, you have
to be thinking like video, thinking of frame to frame rates,
we're able to significantly improve the performance KPIs and essentially
(37:44):
provide an experience that is above and beyond what can
be provided on our normal network because this is a
dedicated bandwidth, dedicated sliice just for first responders.
Speaker 2 (37:54):
Great. And then is there a website for frontline specifically?
Speaker 5 (37:58):
Absolutely? Yes, you can just go to verizond forward slash
Frontline and then you'll find out everything you need to
know about our Verizon Frontline christ response team, our Verizon
Frontline Innovation team for network slicing, and pretty much everything
that we talked about today.
Speaker 2 (38:12):
All Right, Corey, thank you so much for carving out
some time to chat about this really important side of
your business. This is great. Thanks again, Yeah, my pleasure.
Speaker 5 (38:19):
Thank you, Stay safe, Mark.
Speaker 2 (38:20):
And thank you for tuning into tech it Out. Hope
you enjoyed this weekend's show. Also wanted to thank Visa
for your support on tech it Out and sand Disc.
Speaking of Visa and securing your payments, you also want
to secure your data, your files. I always trust sand
Disk's external storage like solid state drives, USB thumb drives,
(38:41):
micro SD cards for fast, reliable, durable and high capacity
storage solutions that are not just great for backing up
for long term storage, but also for transferring files between devices.
Sanddisk dot com has more. Have a fantastic rest of
your day, everyone, and I look forward to catching up
with you next week for another brand new episode of
(39:02):
Tack It Out. Bye bye for now, Chop.
Popular Podcasts
Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang
Ding dong! Join your culture consultants, Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang, on an unforgettable journey into the beating heart of CULTURE. Alongside sizzling special guests, they GET INTO the hottest pop-culture moments of the day and the formative cultural experiences that turned them into Culturistas. Produced by the Big Money Players Network and iHeartRadio.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com
The Charlie Kirk Show
Charlie is America's hardest working grassroots activist who has your inside scoop on the biggest news of the day and what's really going on behind the headlines. The founder of Turning Point USA and one of social media's most engaged personalities, Charlie is on the front lines of America’s culture war, mobilizing hundreds of thousands of students on over 3,500 college and high school campuses across the country, bringing you your daily dose of clarity in a sea of chaos all from his signature no-holds-barred, unapologetically conservative, freedom-loving point of view. You can also watch Charlie Kirk on Salem News Channel