Im mike embley. Our top stories it is about 3 30am. Joe biden says hes on course to win the us presidency now on bbc news click. But the vote halloween is here and this week, we have robotic tricks. Counting continues. Sailing treats. Im not here to declare that weve won, but im. Eerie earbuds. Here to report that. And. When the count is finished, we believe we will be. A president ial election the winners. The Trump Campaign launches legal action to try to stop the counting in michigan, pennsylvania and georgia and wants a recount in wisconsin. And we visit one so called swing state where the Record Number of postal votes mean theyve got a lot on their plates. Welcome to click. I hope youre 0k. Listen, halloween might not be happening outdoors this year, but i tell you what its certainly happening indoors here, at least. Lets cross to laras Haunted House and see what horrors await. Wow, youve got lots of halloween there yeah. Turns out i do. Do you think ive overdone it slightly . Oh, no, i love it you have gone stylishly minimalist as always, i see. Yeah, all i could find was this skeleton in my closet. I dont really have anything else to decorate the house with. Do you know, ive never been trick or treating. Have you not . Well, look, many of us wont be trick or treating this year, but there are some people who try to make it as safe as possible for the kids who do pass by. Trick or treat this is luke key from austin, texas, and hes out to save halloween. Hes been finding ways to dispense sweets from a distance. Hes experimented with dropping them from a drone and even firing them from an air cannon. But i think his star creation is this, artie the robot. After eight years of tinkering, its latest skill is distributing socially d ista nt sweets. It runs on arduino microcomputers, weighs in at about iliokg, and has been shrunk down to avoid scaring the kids. Goodbye, guys. Bye just readjusting the lighting to something more sensible, because straight after halloween, there is another American Horror story. Never mind who wins, the run up to the us president ial elections has been a political nightmare for many. Two candidates yelling at each other, misinformation completely clouding the very real issues that the country is having to deal with, and of course the debate over whether masks are too scary to wear. Now, for a long time there have been attempts to try and engage Younger Voters and also to make voting more accessible for people with disabilities. In the us, a few states have been running small trials to see whether technology can play a part, and James Clayton has been to one of those states to see it in action. America is about to hold an election that feels like a crossroads for the country, and already tens of millions of people have already voted either by postal voting or voting early in places like this. But is there a simpler, more technologically advanced way of voting . You can do your banking, even your tax returns online. So why cant you vote digitally . Well, you might not know this, but in some states, you actually can. This is terra from west virginia. Shes been disabled since the age of two. It was very simple. I mean, literally in less than 15 minutes, i had gone online, entered the information, got my ballot, voted, signed it, and sent it off. Several companies are trialling mobile voting in this president ial election in a very limited way. Those who are eligible are members of the armed forces and people with disabilities. One called voatz does it by mobile. Another called democracy live uses a web browser. So how does it work . When finished filling out your ballot, select continue at the bottom of the page to move on to the final step, where you will sign your ballot and review your ballot packet. Well, every state is different, but all of the pilots need some kind of verification that its actually you. That could be facial id or a photo of your id or a signature. Then it acts very much like a postal vote. Thats until you send it off. Voatz uses blockchain to store your vote. Democracy live keeps the data in amazons cloud. A copy of your ballot is also printed out. The voatz app is being trialled in a county in utah, democracy live in west virginia, and jurisdictions in oregon and south carolina. Its not a huge trial. At most, a few thousand will vote this way. The pilots are all being funded by this man, bradley tusk. An early investor in uber, hes got deep pockets and big ambitions. You know, im not doing this just because i want to make it easier for military to vote or people with disabilities to vote, but because i want to radically increase turnout overall, so that we move things into the centre, right . And so that everybody votes, and that means having technology that can handle millions of votes. So why arent we all e voting . Why arent we all voting on our mobile phones . Well, its because there are a lot of people who are very sceptical of the technology, and some believe there are some serious security flaws with some of these apps. I caught up with michael hes reverse engineered these two electronic Voting Systems and says hes found security flaws in both. Im definitely surprised that it was as easy as it was. I think theres a lot of things they could have done to make it much harder, but overall, those sorts of problems are not necessarily solvable in using the current technology, which is one of the reasons why we wanted to take a look at this system in the first place. Heres the example he gives. Remember the Online Banking comparison . Well, this is why he thinks thats not a fair parallel. When you bank online, you can actually see a transcript of how you, you know, spent your money, and you can say, hey, this transaction says that i spent 500 in the uk, but i live in boston and have never been to the uk, therefore this is obviously fraudulent, right . You cant really do the same thing with voting, because if you can prove the way that you voted, if you can have this transcript, someone else can get a hold of it. I put some of these criticisms to both of these companies. First, democracy live. At some point, we cant hold back the tide, right . Next generation voters are going to demand next generation voting technologies. Were going to learn lessons, right . Thats why were starting small and responsibly with voters that would be otherwise disenfranchised. We dont have all the answers right now. The Academic Community and the Security Community dont have all the answers. Thats why you do smaller responsible testing, learn the lessons, and then build from there. And thats what were trying to do right now, and were starting with groups that today would be otherwise disenfranchised. I put those same questions to the founder of voatz. Obviously, its new, so there will be criticisms. So we welcome the scrutiny, but at the same time, a lot of that is hypothetical. Just by looking at one piece of the system without actually transacting with the system in any meaningful way often would lead you to incorrect or incomplete assumptions. So what did terra think of her experience of voting online . I like it for people with disabilities, because it gives us options, and we need options because some of us just cant get out. Some of us require special tools in order to write or speak, and i think that its a good option for people like that, but i am not necessarily an advocate of electronic voting without a lot more security around. Both types of voting have been used before in local elections, and both Companies Say theyve never been successfully hacked. Is e voting the future . Are voting stations like this the past . Not so fast because even the advocates of this Technology Say that technology is not quite there yet, which does rather beg the question, why is it being tried in a us election . But perhaps these small trials may help to one day offer another safe and secure form of voting in america. Just maybe not quite yet. James clayton there. Of course, this isntjust a debate limited just to the us. The pandemic has played havoc with elections around the world, and the arguments for and against online Voting Systems have been given new life. But in one country, it has been a reality now for well over a decade. Way back in 2005, digitally savvy estonia became the first country to allow online voting in elections. Skip forward to their 2019 general election, and 44 of voters filled out their ballots online. And there have been other examples of positive engagement with internet voting across the world. Back in april, the labour party elected their new leader in an online ballot in which a 70 of its 550,000 members voted. This way of voting makes a lot of sense its less expensive than the traditional in person system, and for many it isjust easier. And could online voting be the way to engage a Younger Generation . As time goes on, online voting will become more and more important for young people. Because society will become increasingly digital, increasingly online, whilst at the same time our Voting System will look exactly the same as those that existed in the 1800s. Therefore you are going to have a big divide between democracy and the way that people live their lives. We can have elections, but there are still thousands of people who cant physically vote, and therefore we have elections but were not a full democracy. However, many claim that online voting is still too vulnerable to Cyber Attacks and security breaches. Malware could tamper with votes before they reach government servers, and hackers could create mirror versions of an election portal, steal voter credentials, or even attack the computers that count the ballots. But in estonia, there have been no serious security issues. However, crucially, online voting is linked to the countrys state of the art electronic id cards, which estonians use for everything from paying taxes to accessing health records, and not every country has such a Solid Digital infrastructure in place. And some countries just dont want to take the risk. After years of testing, for example, switzerland was hoping to push forward with online voting but in 2019 decided to end trials after flaws were uncovered in the proposed system. Regardless of whether youre for or against internet voting, all would agree that the stakes could not be higher than in major elections where there can be zero doubt cast on the outcome. So we may have to settle for waiting in line at the ballot box for a little while yet. Hello, and welcome to the week in tech. It was the week that Harley Davidson revealed its electric bicycle, the serial will go on sale next march. The ceos of google, facebook and twitter, face hours of questions from us senators on censorship and misinformation on their founders, and alibaba founder jack mas new Online Payment Group detailed his plans for a stock market debut next month. It is said to be the Worlds Largest ever. It was also the week that Spacex Satellite Internet Service started recruiting beta testers with low expectations to test its broadband. For a fairly steep 1199 a tester will get a router and terminal to connect to the satellites, giving access to what an e mail describes as better than nothing internet service. The release of the highly anticipated game cyberpunk 2077 has been delayed again until december 10th. A letter from the Developers Cd Projekt red apologised for further delays and said they knew the announcement would raise emotions and questions. Spot, the boston dynamics robot dog, was sent to chernobyl to help sniff out radiation. 3a years on from the disaster, 200 tonnes of radioactive fuel is estimated to still be in the area. And finally, we met another robot named spot whos also learning to behave like a dog. A team from Johns Hopkins university are training this robot using dog training techniques of positive reinforcement. When it performs a task well, the robot gets a treat. Researchers say it can achieve in two days what would usually take a month of training. The headphone market is seriously overcrowded, so companies are having to get a little bit more creative these days. Take a look at this, for example it looks like one speaker, and it is in this form, you call this party mode, but you can also separate them into two and place them up to 22 feet apart to create stereo sound. Plus, take a look inside, and youve got a pair of True Wireless earbuds. Each part of the duolink go speakerbuds has six hours battery life, and the buds can be recharged when theyre sitting in the speaker. Ive had a bit of a problem with getting earbuds to fit and stay in my ears. Now, as ive often said before, this may be because i have strange ears, but these ones actually fit very well, so theyre great for strange ears. This isnt the most amazing audio ive ever heard but for something so versatile at this price point, i dont think i complain. And now something for a quieter life. Cocoon relax are claimed to be the worlds first sleep aiding headphones, so they hope to help you get a better nights sleep but they could also give you a little bit of relaxation during the day. Hm, i cant really do it here, can i . Yep, i got a rest on thejob again. They use cognitive behaviour therapy methods to provide relaxation as well as being full of biometric sensors. The devices eeg sensor aims to track brave waves along with monitoring motion and heartrate, combining them with info on the users environment. This allows them to personalise the programme for example, change the audio when youve fallen asleep, or if theres some background sound, then add some white noise. You do, of course, have to buy into the idea that you would want to sleep in a pair of headphones. Admittedly, they are extremely comfortable, its just that if you try to move away from your back, it is quite hard to keep them in place. Also, i do sleep pretty well and, to be honest, i dont really have much desire to relax which maybe means i actually need to so im not sure im really their target market, but the thing i can see them being very useful for would be on an aeroplane, not that im actually travelling anywhere right now. An earbud version is coming soon too, and there are plenty of other wearable sleep devices out there, including other earbuds aiming to help you get the best out of your slumber. Here, i have the ouieton sleep earbuds. One of the things they can do is use noise cancelling to get rid of any snoring. Hopefully they can do that for my own. I tried them at ces a little while ago on the show floor, but now i can test a pair to go to bed. With ten hours battery life, theres plenty of time for good nights sleep. The noise cancelling and flattening did a greatjob of dampening down low frequency sound and they were surprisingly and comfortable, but the one on the side i was sleeping on kept falling out by the morning, which is clearly a problem. Although maybe my strange eears are to blame again yes, they do a better job than foam earplugs, but they do so with a pretty hefty price tag. But if you simply want a bit of silence, or at least some of the time, then these prototype earplugs are an interesting proposition. The idea is you place them deep inside your ears as absurd as it sounds, i actually had to watch the video to find out exactly how to do it because its not at all instinctive but once you place them inside, further than i thought anything could actually fit in my ear, byjust using this dial at the side, you can reduce the volume around you by between five and 38 decibels. To put that into context, the Company Claims thats losing around 80 of household sound at its highest. And if you keep it on its lowest it barely makes a difference and the reason that would be useful is the companys premise is that you would wear them all day. You simply adjust them as to whether you want to turn up or down the volume of actual life. These are just the prototype, and i wasnt really sold on the idea that i would want to keep them in all day, but if you, do with no battery and having been sitting in the depths of your ear canal, then you may be pleased to know that they can be washed in soapy water. Wow, they look like they go right in did they touch your brain . Yes, i think so it felt like it 0k now, you may remember a few weeks ago we took a look at the americas cup, a sailing race at the cutting edge of design tech. This week, were going back to sea this time for the start of a round the world race with a twist. All of the sailors have to do it completely alone. Travelling 27,000 miles, it takes competitors 80 days of constant sailing. They can only pause for 30 minute bursts of sleep. So, naturally, this can impact their Mental Health. And one competitor is taking on some tech that she hopes could come to the rescue. Zoe kleinmans been to the south coast of england to find out more. This is pip hare. Shes taking part in this years vendee globe race. I dont think there is another sporting event on the planet that asks so much of human beings. Pips trying to beat the world record set 15 years ago by dame ellen macarthur. The challenge is physically tough both on the sailor and on the boat. But something that can be overlooked is the Mental Health strain of being completely alone at sea for weeks on end. It is why pips team is going to keep a eye on her wellbeing. Pips boat is kitted out with every gadget youd expect on a 21st century craft. Autopilot, gps, led flares, but what sets it apart is that Mental Health tech is also part of the package. Im really interested in how youre going to cope with being completely on your own for such a long period of time. So it is a long time at sea, but im really not alone, im well connected. I have two satellite systems, i can upload video, i can whatsapp chat. And this connection to shore is where this 20 year old yacht truly becomes cutting edge. Pips team plans to use Artificial Intelligence to understand how shes really feeling from the videos she shares during her voyage. Its looking at the text thats been transcribed from anything anybody says, and its giving us a sentiment about positive, neutral or negative, about whats being said. And then its also looking at your facial expressions as you are talking to identify emotions. Anything from joy to effortful thought to emphasis, as well as things like contempt and disgust. So when pip uploads a video, Say Something like this. Its my last day in poole today. It ends up in a system that looks a little like this, which picks up all of the different emotions that shes experiencing. This then allows her team to work out how they might be able to help her. Its really do. We sense that pip isnt asjoyful as she has been over the past week and do we want to have another phone call that really tries to lift her spirits . But to give it a fair trial, i thought id have a go too. And i dont think ill be needing a pep talk any time soon i seem pretty chipper. Back on land, this technology is used to do market research, analysing video uploads from customers. It basically replaces the focus group, and medallia claims that lets companies monitor emotional responses to their products. But when it comes to this race, ill be interested to see just how useful it is. The team is Still Limited in what support it can provide remotely. Looking after pips Mental Health includes helping her make good decisions especially when she is tired. She plans to survive on just 30 minute bursts of sleep. It is not always easy to understand how well my cognitive function, how it might be impaired or how well it is functioning. So i am working with a company who specialises in monitoring Rare Health Conditions for patient management. And they have written me an app that will help me assess my own cognitive ability while i am out there. For me, if i am about to make a big decision, maybe i might decide to have a bit of a sleep before i make the decision. This app called oxygen gives her regular prompts to complete basic maths challenges, a bit like brain training, and the speed and accuracy of her answers indicates how good she is. I get a notification through my wearable, so there is a forward memory task where i recall the numbers in a list going forwards. There is a backwards memory task, same again, just a little bit harder. Without the app i would just do it through mental arithmetic tasks, but the app gives a bit of regularity to what i am doing, and then were also collecting the data so that we can learn from it when i get back. It is crazy to think that, the next time i come back, i will have sailed around the world. That was zoe kleinman with pip hare. We wish pip all the very best of luck for the race. Thats it for click this week at halloween. Lara, what on earth . well, you clearly didnt think i was making enough effort, so im now mixing you up something in my cauldron. Anyway, you can keep up with the team throughout the week wont that be fun . Were on youtube, instagram, facebook and twitter bbcclick. Thanks for watching, and well see you soon. Echoing bye hello there. Its pretty cold out there at the moment across more southern parts of the uk. Wednesday started with some frost quite widely in england and wales. What followed was a generally dry and sunny autumn day. But, for scotland and northern ireland, we saw more cloud moving in during the afternoon and the evening. You can see that clearly on the satellite picture from earlier on. That cloud moving very slowly southwards. We actually have weakening weather front bringing some damp and drizzly weather and lowering the cloud onto the hills. But weve got High Pressure across the south, this is where weve got the clearer skies and weve got those lower temperatures as well. Milder in the north, but colder in the south. Maybe some frost around for mid wales, midlands and southwards. Notjust some frost, some mist and fog too. Thats going to be dense in places in the morning. Gradually through the morning that will tend to lift and break. May take a while in the home counties, mind you. Then we get sunshine coming through. But, for north wales, Northern England it looks quite cloudy, damp and misty over the hills. Further north, weve got more of a breeze from the atlantic. Thats significant. Its blowing in a lot of cloud but the cloud breaks to the east of the high ground in a bit of scotland. And a bit of warm, 15 or 16 degrees. Elsewhere ten to 12. Similar to what we had on wednesday. This time in the morning weve got much more mist and fog around. And into friday morning, again there will be dense patches of fog. Again its more likely for the midlands southwards. This time on friday that fog will tend to lift more readily. The breeze will pick up a little bit more and we should see sunshine developing. Further north, some low cloud around, misty over the hills. Cloud tending to thin, some sunshine coming through away from the northwest. The temperatures ten to 12 degrees again. A little bit milder perhaps towards the south east, but the winds are picking up in the far southwest. The wind direction is changing just in time for the weekend. Thats going to be quite significant because thats going to draw up some milder air and push it very slowly northwards. Instead of the High Pressure thats keeping it quiet at the moment, itll be quite cold. Thats moving away towards continental europe. And lowering pressure from iberia means weve got the threat of some rain coming up from the south. Maybe the odd shower around on saturday rain across northern and Western Areas on sunday. Temperatures gradually rising. Higher temperatures towards the south possibly up to 16 or 17 degrees celsius. 00 28 01,673 4294966103 13 29,430 airand