Perhaps
they should structure these so the victims get most of the money?
Equifax
on the hot seat for running out of data breach settlement funds
Even
when making restitution to victims of its massive 2017 data breach,
Equifax still can’t seem to avoid a mess. The credit reporting
agency is now attracting a ton of scrutiny after the Federal Trade
Commission revealed in an urgent announcement to the public that the
pool of Equifax settlement funds used to pay cash claims to victims
is quickly running dry. And that victims who step up to file a claim
going forward should probably just go ahead and pick a non-cash
alternative.
… For
its part, the FTC is
stressing that it thinks
[Not likely!
Bob] the free
credit monitoring offered as part of the settlement is worth more
than the cash anyway. That’s because victims will be
able to get free monitoring of their credit report at all three
national credit reporting agencies — and the offer even includes up
to $1 million in identity theft insurance and identity restoration
services.
However,
even that is drawing criticism. Another
commenter on that FTC post noted that “my data has been compromised
numerous times and I’ve received numerous free credit monitoring
compensations.” [My
students agree. Bob]
… All
that said, Electronic Privacy Information Center president and
executive director Marc Rotenberg told The Washington Post “there’s
something a little askew” over consumers thinking $125 was a
possible offer at first, while officials “now have to race around
saying, ‘Look at the fine print.'”
Old
military technology, but who knew these states were where narcotics
came into the US?
Pentagon
testing mass surveillance balloons across the US
The
US military is conducting wide-area surveillance tests across six
midwest states using experimental high-altitude balloons, documents
filed
with the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) reveal.
Up
to 25 unmanned solar-powered balloons are being launched from rural
South Dakota and drifting 250 miles through an area spanning portions
of Minnesota, Iowa, Wisconsin and Missouri, before concluding in
central Illinois.
… “What
this new technology proposes is to watch everything at once.
Sometimes it’s referred to as ‘combat TiVo’ because when an
event happens somewhere in the surveilled area, you can potentially
rewind the tape to see exactly what occurred, and rewind even further
to see who was involved and where they came from.”
(Related)
Aerial
Surveillance Is Astonishingly Legal
In
the eyes of the law, there’s no difference between a smartphone
photo taken through an airplane window and one taken by an
ultra-powerful camera in a helicopter hovering over your backyard.
Apple
and Google have already done something. (See yesterday’s blog)
Amazon
Gives Option to Disable Human Review of Alexa Recordings
A
new policy took effect Friday that allows customers, through an
option in the settings menu of the Alexa smartphone app, to remove
their recordings from a pool that could be analyzed by Amazon
employees and contract workers, a spokeswoman for the Seattle company
said. It follows similar moves by Apple Inc. and Google.
But
will AI love me back?
Forget
AI ethics—treat technology like a new relationship instead
Not
a week passes without an ethical misstep by Big Tech. From
Facebook’s
personal data overreaches to
thousands
of e-commerce sites that
trick people into superfluous purchases to cities implementing
facial-recognition
systems without consent,
the tech industry continues to stress-test trust.
In
response, ethical guidelines have flourished.
Whether a short
checklist, visual
principles, or
lengthy
treatise, most
agree on core principles of privacy, safety and security,
transparency, fairness, and autonomy.
But despite the efforts of think tanks, tech companies, and
government agencies, the principles haven’t been so easy to put
into practice.
What
if we took a different approach? Rather than focusing solely on
generalizable standards or a prescriptive ethical code, we could
instead emphasize an ethics
of care.
And what requires more care than our own romantic relationships?
… The
phases below map to Mark Knapp’s relational development model. The
University of Texas professor outlined 10 steps in relationships,
from hello to goodbye.
Let’s
focus on the steps for coming together, and how they might apply to
our tech relationships.
Automating
teachers?
China
has started a grand experiment in AI education. It could reshape how
the world learns.
Experts agree AI will be important in 21st-century
education—but how? While academics have puzzled over best
practices, China hasn’t waited around. In the last few years, the
country’s investment in AI-enabled teaching and learning has
exploded. Tech giants, startups, and education incumbents have all
jumped in. Tens of millions of students now use some form of AI to
learn—whether through extracurricular tutoring programs like
Squirrel’s, through digital learning platforms like 17ZuoYe,
or even
in their main classrooms. It’s the world’s biggest
experiment on AI in education, and no one can predict the outcome.
Compute
smarter!
Included are cheat sheets that cover:
- Microsoft Office keyboard shortcuts for Windows & Mac
- PowerPoint keyboard shortcuts
- Word keyboard shortcuts
- Outlook keyboard shortcuts
- Excel keyboard shortcuts
- Excel Formulas
- Gmail keyboard shortcuts
- Google Drive keyboard shortcuts
- Google Search operators and commands
- Markdown elements
