Thanks, Cardinal readers, for clicking into the latest edition of Tech Briefs. This weekly batch of items covering the digital and life sciences landscapes goes live every Wednesday in Cardinal News.
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The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers is seeking public comments on the Google data center campus proposed for Botetourt County.
In an announcement last week, the corps said that Google had sent its Norfolk District an application for a permit pursuant to the Clean Water Act’s section 404, regarding disposal of dredged or fill material.
According to the Corps of Engineers’ notice, Google wants to construct a “mission-critical data center campus,” called Project Raspberry — three data center buildings, each about 300,000 square feet, along with three substations, an office building about 28,000 square feet, access roads, utilities, parking areas and stormwater management facilities.
The work on 343.6 acres that Google purchased in the Greenfield Industrial Park in Daleville would impact “unnamed tributaries” to Tinker Creek and Rulman Branch, according to the notice.
“The proposed action would result in permanent impacts to approximately 3.24 acres of non-tidal wetlands and 6,715 linear feet of stream channel associated with site grading and infrastructure construction,” according to the notice.
The corps identified the Indiana bat as a species that could be affected, though not “adversely” affected, by Google’s proposal to remove about 120 acres of forested habitat within the mouse-eared flyer’s range. There is no known hibernation in the vicinity, the corps noted.
“To avoid impacts to maternity colonies, the applicant has committed to a time-of-year restriction limiting all tree clearing to October 15 through March 31,” the notice read. “Standard erosion and sediment control Best Management Practices (BMPs) will be implemented to minimize indirect effects to aquatic foraging habitat.”
No essential fish habitat lies in the proposed construction zone, the corps determined.
The Norfolk District will receive written comments until April 9. Submit them electronically to the Regulatory Request System, https://rrs.usace.army.mil/rrs. The corps point of contact is Brittany Kopitsky, brittany.d.kopitsky@usace.army.mil.
Anyone seeking a public hearing on the matter may submit that request, particularly stating the reasons. “Requests for a public hearing will be granted, unless the District Engineer determines that the issues raised are insubstantial or there is otherwise no valid interest to be served by a hearing,” according to the notice.
Read the entire notice at nao.usace.army.mil.
Sen. Warner introduces legislation on AI and the economy
A new bill, co-sponsored by Sen. Mark Warner, D-Va., is intended to create solutions for Americans adapting to artificial intelligence-driven economic and workforce changes.
The legislation, called the Economy of the Future Commission Act, would put policymakers and experts from industry and higher education to work with a bipartisan group from Congress and government agencies. They would develop recommendations focused on education, labor, commerce and economic policy, according to a news release from Warner’s office.
Ultimately, the commission would identify steps for Congress to strengthen training, support workers and ensure global competitiveness.
Warner teamed with Sen. Mike Rounds, R-S.D., to introduce the measure.
“AI is going to transform nearly every sector of our economy,” Warner said in the news release. “The question isn’t whether these changes are coming — it’s whether we are prepared.”
The announcement comes on the heels of Warner leading another bipartisan effort, a recent letter pushing government agencies to expand data collection and public reporting on what impact AI is having on the country’s workforce.
The bill has been referred to the Senate Committee on Commerce, Science and Transportation.
Virginia Tech professor discusses drone attacks on data centers
Back in the early desktop computer days, the mantra was “save often.” Everything was stored on your machine or saved onto disks.
These days, it’s easy to take saving for granted when so much of our data is on the cloud, stored in data centers.
Saving our own stuff in our own space is one among many potential takeaways from the early days of the United States and Israel’s war on Iran. Iran is targeting data centers in the Persian Gulf. At least three were targeted in the region on March 8, including an Amazon Web Services building in the United Arab Emirates, according to multiple news reports.
The Guardian.com reported that millions of people in Abu Dhabi and Dubai were unable to access apps for such everyday tasks as checking bank balances or placing food orders.
These seem like minor inconveniences, thousands of miles away, but likely are a harbinger of future wars, with drones deployed for multiple destructive purposes, not least disrupting communications and other aspects which most of us have entrusted to remote locations.
“Data centers are becoming an essential part of modern infrastructure, and many digital services depend on them,” said Virginia Tech cybersecurity expert Murat Kantarcioglu in a news release from the university. “Just as people plan for power outages after a storm, users and consumers may increasingly need to prepare for scenarios in which a digital service is unavailable for an extended period.”
Kantarcioglu, a computer science professor at Virginia Tech’s College of Engineering, said that data centers are designed with backups in case of routine hardware failures. Destruction of an entire facility could destroy all the data permanently, unless copies exist elsewhere. A drone attack could impact health care, cybersecurity, defense and other critical areas.
Such institutions might consider building programs on their own infrastructure, to provide protection, he said.
The risks of disruptions and data losses are low for everyday users of cloud-based services, Kantarcioglu said. But other issues, including cyberattacks, could destroy their data.
“As a precaution, I recommend backing up sensitive and critical cloud-stored data to locally kept, encrypted external hard drives,” he said. “Encryption is especially important, as you do not want unauthorized parties to gain easy access to the data.”