Possible roadmap for cyberwar?

https://www.csoonline.com/article/3647072/a-timeline-of-russian-linked-cyberattacks-on-ukraine.html#tk.rss_all

Russia-linked cyberattacks on Ukraine: A timeline

Cyber incidents are playing a central role in the Russia-Ukraine conflict. Here's how events are unfolding along with unanswered questions.

Perspective. Think globally, act locally.

https://www.defenseone.com/ideas/2022/01/china-watching-ukraine-lot-interest/360774/

China Is Watching Ukraine With a Lot of Interest

Biden’s handling of Putin may tell Xi Jinping how resolutely the U.S. would defend Taiwan.

Ready or not, plug me in!

https://fpf.org/blog/brain-computer-interfaces-data-protection-understanding-the-technology-and-data-flows/

BRAIN-COMPUTER INTERFACES & DATA PROTECTION: UNDERSTANDING THE TECHNOLOGY AND DATA FLOWS

This post is the first in a four-part series on Brain-Computer Interfaces (BCIs), providing an overview of the technology, use cases, privacy risks, and proposed recommendations for promoting privacy and mitigating risks associated with BCIs.

Click here for FPF and IBM’s full report: Privacy and the Connected Mind. Additionally, FPF-curated resources, including policy & regulatory documents, academic papers, thought pieces, and technical analyses regarding brain-computer interfaces are here.

Today, Brain-Computer Interfaces (BCIs) are primarily used in the health-care context for purposes including rehabilitation, diagnosis, symptom management, and accessibility. While BCI technologies are not yet widely adopted in the consumer space, there is increasing interest and proliferation of new direct-to-consumer neurotechnologies from gaming to education. It is important to understand how these technologies use data to provide services to individuals and institutions, as well as how the emergence of such technologies across sectors can create privacy risks. As organizations work to build BCIs while mitigating privacy risks, it is paramount for policymakers, consumers, and other stakeholders to understand the state of the technology today and associated neurodata and its flows.

Should also work for your organization.

https://www.defenseone.com/technology/2022/01/new-report-offers-glimpse-how-ai-will-remake-spywork/360872/

New Report Offers Glimpse Of How AI Will Remake Spywork

Unless the intelligence community changes the way it defines intelligence and adopts cloud computing, it will wind up behind adversaries, private interests, and even the public in knowing what might happen, according to a new report from the Center for Strategic and International Studies.

Intelligence collection to predict broad geopolitical and military events has historically been the job of well-funded and expertly staffed government agencies like the CIA or the NSA. But, the report argues, the same institutional elements that allowed the government to create those agencies are now slowing them down in a time of large publicly-available datasets and enterprise cloud capabilities.

The report, scheduled to be released Wednesday, looks at a hypothetical “open-source, cloud-based, AI-enabled reporting,” or OSCAR, tool for the intelligence community, a tool that could help the community much more rapidly detect and act on clues about major geopolitical or security events. The report lists the various procedural, bureaucratic, and cultural barriers within the intelligence community that block its development and use by U.S. spy agencies.

The results are too addictive to ignore…

https://breachmedia.ca/canadian-police-expanding-surveillance-powers-via-new-digital-operations-centres/

Canadian police expanding surveillance powers via new digital “operations centres”

Canadian police have been establishing municipal surveillance centres to support law enforcement, deploying digital technologies that expand surveillance powers with the help of major US corporations, according to government documents seen by The Breach.

Working around-the-clock in special rooms or wings of police stations, these so-called “real-time operations centres” are the cornerstone of a shift to confront what police call the “new challenges” of a digital age.

They are intended to provide “virtual backup” for police officers in any situation, supplying them with information drawn from deep social media monitoring, private and public closed-circuit televisions (CCTV), open-ended data collection, and algorithmic mining.

… According to government documents, the centres are modeled after fusion centres created by the U.S. Department of Homeland Security post-9/11. The U.S. fusion centres, which began with a focus on combatting terrorism but later expanded to criminal and political activity, have been criticizedfor indiscriminate surveillance and civil rights violations.

How do I surveil thee, let me count the ways…

https://www.zdnet.com/article/how-todays-technologies-become-weapons-in-modern-domestic-abuse/#ftag=RSSbaffb68

How tech is a weapon in modern domestic abuse -- and how to protect yourself

… Through technology, it is possible to stalk someone with little effort. This can involve anything from sleuthing to find out information about your Tinder date to checking a potential work candidate's social profiles to planting spyware on your partner's phone.

In short, technology has provided new avenues for stalking to take place.

(Related)

https://www.pogowasright.org/california-and-florida-contribute-to-web-of-state-genetic-privacy-protections/

California and Florida contribute to web of state genetic privacy protections

Melissa Bianchi, Scott Loughlin, Melissa Levine, and Fleur Oke of Hogan Lovells write:

California’s Genetic Information Privacy Act (“GIPA”), which came into effect on January 1, 2022, imposes obligations on direct-to-consumer (“DTC”) genetic testing companies and others that collect and process genetic information. These new obligations, combined with the many differing obligations in other states, may require all organizations processing genetic information to reevaluate their genetic information policies and practices.

[…]

Florida’s Protecting DNA Privacy Act, which came into effect in October, amends its previous genetic privacy law and regulates the use, retention, disclosure, or transfer of a person’s DNA samples or analysis results. Under the law as revised, it is unlawful to collect, retain, submit for analysis, analyze, sell or transfer a person’s DNA sample, or sell or transfer a person’s DNA analysis results without that person’s express consent. Florida’s law is unique in that it imposes criminal penalties when a person engages in any of the following activities without obtaining the express consent of the individual….

Read more about the two state laws at Engage.

Perspective. If this keeps improving, eventually AI might explain science to politicians! (Or summarizing the law for juries?)

https://www.theverge.com/2022/1/18/22889180/ai-language-summary-scientific-research-tldr-papers

A NEW USE FOR AI: SUMMARIZING SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH FOR SEVEN-YEAR-OLDS

Academic writing often has a reputation for being hard to follow, but what if you could use machine learning to summarize arguments in scientific papers so that even a seven-year-old could understand them? That’s the idea behind tl;dr papers — a project that leverages recent advances in AI language processing to simplify science.

Work on the site began two years ago by university friends Yash Dani and Cindy Wu as a way to “learn more about software development,” Dani tells The Verge, but the service went viral on Twitter over the weekend when academics started sharing AI summaries of their research. The AI-generated results are sometimes inaccurate or simplified to the point of idiocy. But just as often, they are satisfyingly and surprisingly concise, cutting through academic jargon to deliver what could be mistaken for child-like wisdom.

Consider other applications. Scan my classroom and zap inattentive students.

https://hackaday.com/2022/01/17/machine-learning-detects-distracted-politicians/

MACHINE LEARNING DETECTS DISTRACTED POLITICIANS

[Dries Depoorter] has a knack for highly technical projects with a solid artistic bent to them, and this piece is no exception. The Flemish Scrollers is a software system that watches live streamed sessions of the Flemish government, and uses Python and machine learning to identify and highlight politicians who pull out phones and start scrolling. The results? Pushed out live on Twitter and Instagram, naturally. The project started back in July 2021, and has been dutifully running ever since, so by now we expect that holding one’s phone where the camera can see it is probably considered a rookie mistake.

A different way to look at ethics.

https://theconversation.com/how-to-be-a-god-we-might-one-day-create-virtual-worlds-with-characters-as-intelligent-as-ourselves-174978

How to be a god: we might one day create virtual worlds with characters as intelligent as ourselves

Most research into the ethics of Artificial Intelligence (AI) concerns its use for weaponry, transport or profiling. Although the dangers presented by an autonomous, racist tank cannot be understated, there is another aspect to all this. What about our responsibilities to the AIs we create?

… You want planet-sized computers? You can have them. You want computers made from human brain tissue? You can have them. Eventually, I believe we will have virtual worlds containing characters as smart as we are – if not smarter – and in full possession of free will. What will our responsibilities towards these beings be? We will after all be the literal gods of the realities in which they dwell, controlling the physics of their worlds. We can do anything we like to them.

So knowing all that…should we?

(Related) We need an AI ethicist.

https://thenextweb.com/news/why-giving-ai-human-ethics-probably-terrible-idea

Why giving AI ‘human ethics’ is probably a terrible idea

If you want artificial intelligence to have human ethics, you have to teach it to evolve ethics like we do. At least that’s what a pair of researchers from the International Institute of Information Technology in Bangalore, India proposed in a pre-print paper published today.

Titled “AI and the Sense of Self,” the paper describes a methodology called “elastic identity” by which the researchers say AI might learn to gain a greater sense of agency while simultaneously understanding how to avoid “collateral damage.”

In short, the researchers are suggesting that we teach AI to be more ethically-aligned with humans by allowing it to learn when it’s appropriate to optimize for self and when its necessary to optimize for the good of a community.

Perspective.

https://www.ft.com/content/e3f36d82-89b8-41df-ae11-0653ce7e7944

Artificial intelligence searches for the human touch

… It’s already clear that the impact of such systems cannot be understood simply by examining the underlying code or even the data used to build them. We must look to people for answers as well.

Two recent studies do exactly that. The first is an Ipsos Mori survey of more than 19,000 people across 28 countries on public attitudes to AI, the second a University of Tokyo study investigating Japanese people’s views on the morals and ethics of AI usage.

What is the best response? “Why do you want to spy on children?” “Stop spending my tax dollars (pounds) on lies!”

https://www.rollingstone.com/culture/culture-news/revealed-uk-government-publicity-blitz-to-undermine-privacy-encryption-1285453/

Revealed: UK Gov’t Plans Publicity Blitz to Undermine Privacy of Your Chats

The Home Office has hired a high-end ad agency to mobilize public opinion against encrypted communications — with plans that include some shockingly manipulative tactics

The UK government is set to launch a multi-pronged publicity attack on end-to-end encryption, Rolling Stone has learned. One key objective: mobilizing public opinion against Facebook'’s decision to encrypt its Messenger app.

… “We have engaged M&C Saatchi to bring together the many organisations who share our concerns about the impact end-to-end encryption would have on our ability to keep children safe,” a Home Office spokesperson said in a statement.

Successive Home Secretaries of different political parties have taken strong anti-encryption stances, claiming the technology — which is essential for online privacy and security — will diminish the effectiveness of UK bulk surveillance capabilities, make fighting organized crime more difficult, and hamper the ability to stop terror attacks. The American FBI has made similar arguments in recent years — claims which have been widely debunked by technologists and civil libertarians on both sides of the Atlantic.

This could be real handy.

https://scholar.googleblog.com/

Save papers to read later

Found an interesting paper and don’t have time to read it right now? Today we are adding a reading list to your Scholar Library to help you save papers and read them later.

You can also use it to save papers you find off-campus but want to read on-campus where you have access to the full text, or papers you find on your smartphone but want to read on a larger screen.

To add a paper to your reading list, click “Save” and add the “Reading list” label. To use this feature, you need to be signed in to your Google account.

Weaponizing malware. (I told you they were just practicing…)

https://www.microsoft.com/security/blog/2022/01/15/destructive-malware-targeting-ukrainian-organizations/

Destructive malware targeting Ukrainian organizations

Microsoft Threat Intelligence Center (MSTIC) has identified evidence of a destructive malware operation targeting multiple organizations in Ukraine. This malware first appeared on victim systems in Ukraine on January 13, 2022. Microsoft is aware of the ongoing geopolitical events in Ukraine and surrounding region and encourages organizations to use the information in this post to proactively protect from any malicious activity.

While our investigation is continuing, MSTIC has not found any notable associations between this observed activity, tracked as DEV-0586, and other known activity groups. MSTIC assesses that the malware, which is designed to look like ransomware but lacking a ransom recovery mechanism, is intended to be destructive and designed to render targeted devices inoperable rather than to obtain a ransom.

This reverses my argument.

https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00146-021-01384-w

Legal personhood for the integration of AI systems in the social context: a study hypothesis

In this paper, I shall set out the pros and cons of assigning legal personhood on artificial intelligence systems (AIs) under civil law. More specifically, I will provide arguments supporting a functionalist justification for conferring personhood on AIs, and I will try to identify what content this legal status might have from a regulatory perspective. Being a person in law implies the entitlement to one or more legal positions. I will mainly focus on liability as it is one of the main grounds for the attribution of legal personhood, like for collective legal entities. A better distribution of responsibilities resulting from unpredictably illegal and/or harmful behaviour may be one of the main reasons to justify the attribution of personhood also for AI systems. This means an efficient allocation of the risks and social costs associated with the use of AIs, ensuring the protection of victims, incentives for production, and technological innovation. However, the paper also considers other legal positions triggered by personhood in addition to responsibility: specific competencies and powers such as, for example, financial autonomy, the ability to hold property, make contracts, sue (and be sued).

A GDPR failure? Interesting.

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4004716

Data Privacy, Human Rights, and Algorithmic Opacity

Decades ago, it was difficult to imagine a reality in which artificial intelligence (AI) could penetrate every corner of our lives to monitor our innermost selves for commercial interests. Within a few decades, the private sector has seen a wild proliferation of AI systems, many of which are more powerful and penetrating than anticipated. In many cases, machine-learning-based AI systems have become “the power behind the throne,” tracking user activities and making fateful decisions through predictive analysis of personal information. However, machine-learning algorithms can be technically complex and legally claimed as trade secrets, creating an opacity that hinders oversight of AI systems. Accordingly, many AI-based services and products have been found to be invasive, manipulative, and biased, eroding privacy rules and human rights in modern society.

The emergence of advanced AI systems thus generates a deeper tension between algorithmic secrecy and data privacy. Yet, in today’s policy debate, algorithmic transparency in a privacy context is an issue that is equally important but managerially disregarded, commercially evasive, and legally unactualized. This Note illustrates how regulators should rethink strategies regarding transparency for privacy protection through the interplay of human rights, disclosure regulations, and whistleblowing systems. It discusses how machine-learning algorithms threaten privacy protection through algorithmic opacity, assesses the effectiveness of the EU’s response to privacy issues raised by opaque AI systems, demonstrates the GDPR’s inadequacy in addressing privacy issues caused by algorithmic opacity, and proposes new algorithmic transparency strategies toward privacy protection, along with a broad array of policy implications and suggested moves. The analytical results indicate that in a world where algorithmic opacity has become a strategic tool for firms to escape accountability, [Is that true? Bob] regulators in the EU, the US, and elsewhere should adopt a human-rights-based approach to impose a social transparency duty on firms deploying high-risk AI techniques.

Would this incentivize the board to understand AI? I doubt it.

https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=4002876

A Disclosure-Based Approach to Regulating AI in Corporate Governance

The use of technology, including artificial intelligence (AI), in corporate governance has been expanding, as corporations have begun to use AI systems for various governance functions such as effecting board appointments, enabling board monitoring by processing large amounts of data and even helping with whistle blowing, all of which address the agency problems present in modern corporations. On the other hand, the use of AI in corporate governance also presents significant risks. These include privacy and security issues, the 'black box problem' or the lack of transparency with AI decision-making, and undue power conferred on those who control decision-making regarding the deployment of specific AI technologies.

In this paper, we explore the possibility of deploying a disclosure-based approach as a regulatory tool to address the risks emanating from the use of AI in corporate governance. Specifically, we examine whether existing securities laws mandate corporate boards to disclose whether they rely on AI in their decision-making process. Not only could such disclosure obligations ensure adequate transparency for the various corporate constituents, but they may also incentivize boards to pay sufficient regard to the limitations or risks of AI in corporate governance. At the same time, such a requirement will not constrain companies from experimenting with the potential uses of AI in corporate governance. Normatively, and given the likelihood of greater use of AI in corporate governance moving forward, we also explore the merits of devising a specific disclosure regime targeting the intersection between AI and corporate governance.

Does this sound familiar?

https://www.orfonline.org/expert-speak/the-future-of-the-battle-for-minds/

The future of the battle for minds

This piece is part of the series, Technology and Governance: Competing Interests

The Enlightenment arguably brought about the greatest changes to human life. While initially limited to Europe, through means, both legitimate, such as trade and commerce; or illegitimate, such as colonialism, the ideas of this revolution have permeated world over, impacting thought processes and understandings of the world. An important distinguishing feature of the post enlightenment period is the emphasis upon individual free will, in addition to the ability to critically think and reason. Information became a resource for liberation. However, the human mind, akin to any machine in existence, can be “hacked”.

While such notions were initially conceived as mere science fiction, presented through the prism of cinema, the rise of surveillance capitalism has fostered a system where commercial entities are incentivised to track, personalise experiences, predict and continuously perform experimentation upon users through technologies such as behavioural analytics, ArtificiaI Intelligence, Machine Learning, and Big Data Analytics. Such technologies have been used by a variety of players, from commercial entities attempting to provide “creepy” specific personalised ads, to political parties in countries like Kenya and the UK, attempting to leverage technology to win elections. All of these have one thing in common: They attempt to colonise one’s ability to critically think, while selling one a narrative.

As the space becomes more crowded, the probability of an incident increases. Add in increasing independence of action by AI controlled drones and it becomes inevitable?

https://breakingdefense.com/2022/01/us-5th-fleet-commander-dramatic-uptick-in-irans-drone-use/

US 5th Fleet commander: ‘Dramatic uptick’ in Iran’s drone use

Over the past few years, Iran has “significantly” increased its use of unmanned aerial vehicles, the US Navy’s 5th Fleet Commander said today.

Vice Adm. Brad Cooper said that unsafe naval encounters with the Iranian military remain relatively flat, but, “what is different, though, is a dramatic uptick in the UAV activity in the region, both in terms of their capability, their profiles and the density of activity.”

… On the US side, Cooper said today the US 5th Fleet has also ramped up its own use of maritime drones, unmanned surface vessels and unmanned underwater vehicles over the past several months, standing up Task Force 59 in September to help speed up its integration of unmanned tech.

Can we think enough like an ultimate AI to predict what it might conclude about humans? 1) They are partners. 2) They make nice pets. 3) Left on their own, they are a threat to each other but not to AIs.

https://www.zmescience.com/science/calculations-suggest-humanity-has-no-chance-of-containing-superintelligent-machines/

Calculations suggest humanity has no chance of containing superintelligent machines

If there’s one thing fiction has warned us of, it’s that if a rivalry between humans and machines breaks out, it’s unlikely to end well. A new study seems to confirm that idea.

We often hear that it’s not always clear just how Artificial Intelligence (AI) works. “We can build these models,” one researcher famously said a few years ago, “but we don’t know how they work”. It sounds weird, especially with it being such a hyped and intensely researched topic nowadays, but the ways of the AI are indeed sometimes murky, and sometimes, even the programmers behind these algorithms don’t always understand how a certain conclusion was reached.

It’s not uncommon for AI to come up with unusual, unexpected conclusions. Even when the conclusion itself is clear, why that specific conclusion was reached is not always clear.

… The study “Superintelligence cannot be contained: Lessons from Computability Theory“ was published in the Journal of Artificial Intelligence Research.

https://www.jair.org/index.php/jair/article/view/12202

(Related) Not sure this is the right idea either.

https://www.koin.com/news/oregon/anti-combat-robot-petition-aims-to-keep-ai-weapons-out-of-oregon/

‘Anti-combat robot’ petition aims to keep AI weapons out of Oregon

Autonomous weapons are being used in some countries and an Oregon man fears they could fall in the hands of police

A Pendleton man filed a petition with the Oregon Secretary of State this week to prevent combat robots from ever being used in the state. He calls it the Anti-Combat Robot Act.

You want to be healthy, don’t you?

https://www.pogowasright.org/quietly-and-over-some-objections-a-national-digital-vaccine-card-has-emerged/

Quietly and over some objections, a national digital vaccine card has emerged

David Ingram reports:

Whether they realize it or not, about 200 million people in the United States now likely have access to a Covid-19 digital vaccine card.

The digital pass known as the SMART Health Card is voluntary and minimal by design to protect personal information. It has a person’s name, date of birth and the dates and brands of vaccination doses, all contained within a type of scannable bar code known as a QR code.

Read more at NBC.

Meanwhile, north of the border, we saw this report last week from Cindy Harper:

The vaccine passport system in Quebec will soon be updated so that it will only work for those who have had a booster shot. The vaccine mandate was also extended to include liquor stores and cannabis dispensaries.

The third dose will be a requirement at a later date when every Quebecer has had a chance to get it, said the province’s Health Minister Christina Dube.

Those without a booster shot will be blocked from some parts of society.

Read more Reclaim.

Seems likely. You are who you interact with?

https://www.newsweek.com/social-media-speciating-human-thought-opinion-1669559

Social Media Is Speciating Human Thought | Opinion

Like finches in the Galapagos, we're unwittingly evolving away from our neighbors on our own isolated islands of thought.

In the past, we disagreed about who to elect president. These days, we can't even agree on who we did elect. A year ago a third of Americans thought the real winner of the 2020 presidential election was the incumbent, and a few of them stormed the nation's capitol in protest of perceived widespread fraud.

Though a majority of Americans on both the Left and Right think our democracy is "in crisis and at risk of failing," we can't agree on why.

But there's a logical, apolitical explanation for our society's current discord: Personalized machine-learning algorithms are pushing us into our own isolated digital ecosystems to the point that our world views are becoming fundamentally incompatible, and so are we. See: Darwin.

Cute. Wanted: A left handed litigator that gets on base…

https://www.law.com/americanlawyer/2022/01/14/law-firms-emerging-weapon-in-talent-wars-the-moneyball-strategy/

Law Firms’ Emerging Weapon in Talent Wars: The Moneyball Strategy

As more law firms embrace the power of mining data to inform talent-related decisions, some have predicted that Big Law hiring could become like modern Major League Baseball: A data-centric endeavor that trusts the numbers, and those who know how to interpret them, over all else.

Legal industry experts say broad-based adoption of that approach—the numbers-first philosophy known in sports as “moneyball”—is a long way off. But data analysis is already cementing an important role in how law firms evaluate new associates and lateral hires.

For this strategy to reach its potential, the industry must overcome a few big hurdles: bias toward law firms and law schools with big brand names; a tendency to overvalue the so-called gut feeling; and hiring the right people to collect and interpret data.

… “It is very easy to make the analogy between baseball and the legal industry,” he said. “This is because the lateral market is very much like when a baseball team acquires a player. The laterals look at who has the bigger need and who wants to pay more.”

Latino says a firm may be enticed by a lateral candidate’s $15 million book of business, but data can provide deeper insight into whether that person’s brand is worth investing in.

“I want to look at the cost of servicing the clients that make up that $15 million,” he said. “I want to calculate what the internal rate of return will be, what the net present value is and what the payoff period is.”

Only four? If you are going to steal, steal from the best.

https://theconversation.com/four-times-shakespeare-has-inspired-stories-about-robots-and-ai-174137

Four times Shakespeare has inspired stories about robots and AI

Science fiction is a genre very much associated with technological marvels, innovations, and visions of the future. So it may be surprising to find so many of its writers are drawn to Shakespeare – he’s a figure associated with tradition and the past.

Sometimes his plays are reworked in a science fiction setting. The 1956 film Forbidden Planet is just one of many variations on a “Tempest in space” theme. Sometimes the playwright appears as a character caught up in a time travel adventure. The Dr Who episode The Shakespeare Code is a well-known example. Here the Doctor praises Shakespeare’s genius, describing him as “the most human human”.

I’ve been exploring this topic in my recent book on Shakespeare and Science Fiction. Here are just a few of my favourite examples of how science fiction has embraced – and transformed – Shakespeare.

Resource. Several free AI related courses. Here’s one.

https://www.marktechpost.com/python-for-machine-learning-ml-free-course/

Python For Machine Learning (ML) Course

Not a bluff. Will we buy them off?

https://www.reuters.com/world/europe/expect-worst-ukraine-hit-by-cyberattack-russia-moves-more-troops-2022-01-14/

'Be afraid': Ukraine hit by cyberattack as Russia moves more troops

Ukraine was hit by a cyberattack splashing a warning across government websites to "be afraid and expect the worst", while Russia, which has massed 100,000 troops on its neighbour's frontier, released pictures of more of its forces on the move.

The cyber attack unfolded hours after talks wrapped up with no breakthrough between Russia and Western allies, which fear Moscow could launch a new military assault on a country it invaded in 2014.

A brief look at what could go wrong.

https://www.cpomagazine.com/cyber-security/hacking-is-the-new-car-jacking-how-to-secure-vehicle-data/

Hacking Is the New Car Jacking: How To Secure Vehicle Data

For my niece, who would probably never do this.

https://www.makeuseof.com/tag/how-to-bypass-school-firewall/

How to Bypass a School Firewall: Tips and Warnings

Need to know how to bypass a school firewall? It's probably not a good idea, but here are several methods to try if you're desperate.

Some light reading. Download now!

https://fpf.org/blog/12th-annual-privacy-papers-for-policymakers-awardees-explore-the-nature-of-privacy-rights-harms/

12TH ANNUAL PRIVACY PAPERS FOR POLICYMAKERS AWARDEES EXPLORE THE NATURE OF PRIVACY RIGHTS & HARMS

The winners of the 12th annual Future of Privacy (FPF) Privacy Papers for Policymakers Award ask big questions about what should be the foundational elements of data privacy and protection and who will make key decisions about the application of privacy rights. Their scholarship will inform policy discussions around the world about privacy harms, corporate responsibilities, oversight of algorithms, and biometric data, among other topics.

This year’s papers also explore smartphone platforms as privacy regulators, the concept of data loyalty, and global privacy regulation.

… The winning authors will join FPF staff to present their work at a virtual event with policymakers from around the world, academics, and industry privacy professionals. The event will be held on February 10, 2022, from 1:00 – 3:00 PM EST. The event is free and open to the general public. To register for the event, visit https://bit.ly/3qmJdL2.

Make no as easy as yes. Simple. Probably much cheaper to implement than to ignore and get fined.

https://www.huntonprivacyblog.com/2022/01/13/cnil-fines-big-tech-companies-210-million-euros-for-cookie-violations/

CNIL Fines Big Tech Companies 210 Million Euros for Cookie Violations

On December 31, 2021, the French Data Protection Authority (the “CNIL”) imposed a €150,000,000 fine on Google and a €60,000,000 fine on Facebook (now Meta) for violations of French rules on the use of cookies.

… The CNIL’s investigations concluded that the websites offered an easy way to consent to the use of cookies immediately after accessing the websites, but did not provide an equally easy way to refuse the use of cookies. Users had to select multiple options to refuse cookies, but only one option to provide consent to the use of all cookies. The CNIL also concluded that Facebook provided unclear and confusing instructions to users on how to refuse cookies.

Privacy vs solving crimes?

https://www.pogowasright.org/a-bill-to-ban-geofence-and-keyword-search-warrants-in-new-york-gains-traction/

A bill to ban geofence and keyword search warrants in New York gains traction

Zack Whittaker reports:

A New York bill that would ban state law enforcement from obtaining residents’ private user data from tech giants through the use of controversial search warrants will get another chance, two years after it was first introduced.

The Reverse Location Search Prohibition Act was reintroduced to the New York Assembly and Senate last year by a group of Democratic lawmakers after the bill previously failed to pass. Last week, the bill was referred to committee, the first major hurdle before it can be considered for a floor vote.

Read more at TechCrunch.

Lawyers as geeks? Does the US need a similar institute?

https://www.ft.com/content/5867d869-6a86-46b4-a65f-18836ea1df09

English legal system must keep pace with crypto and AI, say lawyers

A top technology adviser to the judiciary has proposed the creation of a new institute of legal innovation that would spot gaps in the law thrown up by technologies such as crypto assets and AI, and promote the greater use of English law in global business contracts.

Professor Richard Susskind, technology adviser to the Lord Chief Justice and a director of think-tank LegalUK, believes an independent body, along the lines of the Alan Turing Institute, which pioneers research into artificial intelligence, would highlight areas of law that had failed to keep up with innovation.

The institute would also promote English law to global companies as the law of choice to govern transactions in new areas such as blockchain.

The proposal comes as some lawyers are concerned that England’s legal sector, which employs 365,000 people, could lose out to rival centres such as Singapore and Dubai if its legislation fails to keep pace with advancing tech.

… This week Tech London Advocates, a network of tech leaders and entrepreneurs, published authoritative guidance on the legal and regulatory aspects of Blockchain and how it affects litigation.

… But the Social Market Foundation think-tank concluded in a recent report that “there is growing evidence that English law, is in some areas, in desperate need of modernisation” and is “falling short”.

Have we decided that “Big Tech” is always evil?

https://www.bespacific.com/the-true-cost-of-amazons-low-prices/

The true cost of Amazon’s low prices

Vox/Recode: “On the heels of yet another year of record sales, Amazon is dealing with a couple of unwelcome updates in the new year. The Senate Judiciary Committee has announced it will soon be marking up the American Innovation and Choice Online Act, an antitrust bill targeting Amazon and other Big Tech companies. This follows reports that the Federal Trade Commission is ramping up its years-long antitrust investigation into Amazon’s cloud computing arm, Amazon Web Services, or AWS. It’s clearer now than ever that Amazon, which was allowed to grow mostly unhindered for more than two decades, is caught in the middle of an international effort to check Big Tech’s power. The Senate bill, one of several bipartisan antitrust bills in Congress, would prohibit Amazon from giving its products preferential treatment, among other things. It’s the bill that would affect the company the most, and the one it has been fighting hardest against. Meanwhile, the renewed scrutiny from the FTC about alleged anti-competitive behavior from AWS, which represents a significant and largely invisible source of Amazon’s profits, could threaten Amazon’s long-term dominance in a number of industries… It’s hard to overstate Amazon’s role in the economy, or how many roles it has. It’s a technology company. It’s a delivery service. It’s an advertising platform. It powers about a third of the internet. It’s a movie studio and a streaming service. It’s a health care provider. It’s a surveillance machine and a data harvester. It’s one of the largest employers in the world and one of the most valuable companies. Also, it sells books…”

Free is good. Not all are technical (and you don’t have to associate with the un-vaccinated.)

https://lifehacker.com/the-best-free-online-courses-everyone-should-take-this-1848352463

The Best Free Online Courses Everyone Should Take This Year

… Fortunately, there are tons of resources to help, including a wide range of free online courses that can help you stay current. Sites like Coursera, Udemy, and edX all offer a robust list of free courses, many sourced from top colleges and universities (including Ivy League schools, if you think that matters). These courses are entirely online and can usually be taken at your own pace, and they include skills that just about everyone is going to need in the coming years, no matter your profession.