60minutes

The looming big business of facial recognition

The odds are you are not just a face in the crowd any longer. Even if your picture isn't plastered all over social-networking and photo-sharing sites, facial recognition technology in public places is making it harder if not impossible to remain anonymous.

Lesley Stahl reports on the new ways this technology is being used that even has one of its inventors calling it too intrusive. Her "60 Minutes" report will be broadcast Sunday, May 19 at 7 p.m. ET/PT.

Professor Alessandro Acquisti of Carnegie Mellon, who researches how technology impacts privacy, stunned Stahl with an … Read more

Bill Gates and learning from Leonardo da Vinci

What inspires a billionaire? In the case of Bill Gates, it's a 500-year-old manuscript penned by Italian genius Leonardo da Vinci.

And at $30.8 million, it was probably a bargain to the Microsoft founder, who considers it a priceless symbol of knowledge. Charlie Rose talks to Gates about the historic document -- the world's most valuable -- for a 60 Minutes story to be broadcast Sunday, May 12, at 7 p.m. ET/PT.

Gates won't entertain comparisons of his life to that of da Vinci, who conceived of airplanes and helicopters hundreds of years before … Read more

Jack Dorsey tells '60 Minutes' Twitter, Square creation stories

It might be hard to believe that emergency dispatchers in St. Louis were the inspiration for Twitter, but that's exactly the case, Jack Dorsey told "60 Minutes" recently.

This Sunday, Dorsey -- who co-founded Twitter and later co-founded Square, the mobile payments company -- will appear on "60 Minutes," recalling how listening in on radio calls between emergency dispatchers fueled his interest in the idea of very short-form communications (see video below).

During the episode, which will air Sunday evening on CBS (CNET's parent company), Dorsey will talk about growing up in St. Louis … Read more

Ideo's David Kelley talks design, Steve Jobs

Meet one of the most innovative thinkers of our time. He is a man who has had an enormous impact on our everyday lives.

David Kelley is the founder of the Silicon Valley global design firm Ideo. His company has created thousands of breakthrough inventions, including the first computer mouse for Apple, the standup toothpaste tube, and a better Pringle for Procter & Gamble. Ideo may be the most influential product design company in the world.

Kelley was a longtime friend and colleague of Steve Jobs -- "He made Ideo," Kelley tells Rose -- and he is a … Read more

Thiel's college dropout plan scrutinized by '60 Minutes'

Peter Thiel's plan to pay college students to develop their promising concepts instead of attending school is attracting students as well as critics.

Best known as a co-founder of PayPal, the Silicon Valley investor and entrepreneur has also made early-stage investments in companies such as Facebook, LinkedIn, and Yelp. Now he's investing in college students, awarding fellowships of $100,000 each to youth under 20 years old, essentially encouraging them to drop out of college to become entrepreneurs.

In an interview for tonight's "60 Minutes," Thiel tells Morley Safer that his program is a viable … Read more

Tech giants back effort to revolutionize teaching

Sal Khan teaches math, science, and history to millions of students, but none has ever seen his face.

Khan is the voice and brains behind the Khan Academy--a free online tutoring site that was born out of a young cousin's struggles with algebra in 1994. His classroom has grown from a few hundred pupils to more than 4 million a month.

Khan, 35, believes he can transform education worldwide, and his approach is now being tested in American schools. Along the way, the former hedge fund analyst has won the support of Google Chairman Eric Schmidt and Microsoft co-founder … Read more

Ex-CIA chief: Stuxnet a good idea

Former CIA chief Gen. Mike Hayden says the Stuxnet virus that sabotaged the Iranian nuclear program was a "good idea."

"This was a good idea, all right? But I also admit this was a big idea too," Hayden said in an interview to be broadcast Sunday night on the CBS program "60 Minutes." "The rest of the world is looking at this and saying, 'Clearly, someone has legitimated this kind of activity as acceptable.'"

The computer worm was fingered as a culprit in the mass failure of centrifuges at Iran's nuclear … Read more

Groupon founder admits to 'bush-league mistake' before IPO

Groupon CEO Andrew Mason admits that his team made mistakes before the daily deals site went public late last year, but he defended his performance in guiding the startup's meteoric rise.

In an interview with Lesley Stahl aired tonight on the CBS news magazine "60 Minutes," Mason conceded that his team made a "bush-league mistake" when it misstated its revenues before going public. The Securities and Exchange Commission forced the daily deals provider to revise its filing papers after the company reported that it generated $713.4 million in revenue in 2010, while the SEC … Read more

Tasers--an officer's weapon of choice, '60 Minutes' reports

The Taser sounds like the perfect law enforcement tool. Simple, effective and generally safe, it allows officers to subdue a suspect using electricity rather than resorting to blunt or deadly force.

But a recent study found that some officers may be too quick to use the popular stun guns when conventional procedures would suffice. As CBS News' David Martin reports for "60 Minutes," there's growing concern that Tasers may be inflicting unnecessary pain and, in rare cases, lead to death.

Bio reveals the real Steve Jobs

MacBook Pro notebooks get a boost, Sprint ends unlimited 4G for non-smartphone devices, and we learn more about the man behind Apple with the release of the official biography of Steve Jobs.

Links from Monday's episode of Loaded: