The Fourth Industrial Revolution represents a fundamental change in the way we live, work and relate to one another. It is a new chapter in human development, enabled by extraordinary technology advances commensurate with those of the first, second and third industrial revolutions. These advances are merging the physical, digital and biological worlds in ways that create both huge promise and potential peril. The speed, breadth and depth of this revolution is forcing us to rethink how countries develop, how organisations create value and even what it means to be human. The Fourth Industrial Revolution is about more than just technology-driven change; it is an opportunity to help everyone, including leaders, policy-makers and people from all income groups and nations, to harness converging technologies in order to create an inclusive, human-centred future. The real opportunity is to look beyond technology, and find ways to give the greatest number of people the ability to positively impact their families, organisations and communities.
Fourth Industrial Revolution
Space submarines are being developed to explore Saturn's and Jupiter's moons
NASA has committed funding to submarines for exploring oceans and lakes in space.
Fourth Industrial Revolution
Millions of internet users have taken a digital detox – do you need one?
We're spending increasing amounts of time online, and it’s affecting our personal and professional lives, a survey finds.
Cybersecurity
Chess, card fraud and what we need to do about it
Contactless cards present a significant fraud risk, and this is what we can do about it, writes Steven J. Murdoch.
Fourth Industrial Revolution
NASA is getting ready to send a spacecraft closer to the sun than ever before
NASA's Solar Probe Plus mission is set to launch in 2018, and will travel to within 4 million miles of the sun. That's 7 times closer than ever before.
Health and Healthcare Systems
These tiny robots could transform modern medicine
Researchers have developed nanoscale soft micromachines that could help treat disease.
Emerging Technologies
2016 might seem like the year of AI, but we could be getting ahead of ourselves
AI is still highly dependent on humans and our expectations around the technology have become inflated, argues PV Kannan.
Industries in Depth
Youth's digital divide, why states fail and other must-read stories of the week
A weekly round up of some of the top stories from the past seven days.
Education and Skills
Rich and poor teenagers use the web differently – here's what this is doing to inequality
Poorer teenagers spend roughly the same time online as their wealthier classmates. But they're using this time differently, and it's counting against them.
Jobs and the Future of Work
Tech diversity, Twitter trolls and other must-read gender stories of the week
A weekly digest of stories about how the gender gap plays out around the world – in business, health, education and politics.
Fourth Industrial Revolution
The 'Platform Economy' has arrived. Here's what you need to know about it
We should expect the Platform phenomenon to disrupt all, or certainly, most existing industrial sectors while stimulating the birth of many new ones.
Fourth Industrial Revolution
You might never have heard of augmented reality, but if you've played Pokémon Go you've experienced it
Pokémon Go has taken augmented reality (AR) from a niche technology to mainstream.
Industries in Depth
This solar-powered plane just flew 40,000km around the world with no fuel
Solar Impulse 2 has completed its 16-month, round-the-world journey.