http://www.phiprivacy.net/?p=2420
UK: Organs removed without consent after IT blunder
By Dissent, April 11, 2010 7:43 am
Patrick Hennessy and Laura Donnelly report:
The records of 800,000 people were affected by an error that meant their wishes about the use of their organs after death were wrongly recorded.
An investigation has found that 45 of those for whom wrong records were stored have since died – and in approximately 20 cases organs were taken where consent had not been given.
[...]
After detecting the fault last year, NHS Blood and Transplant, which holds the organ donation register, was able to correct 400,000 of the flawed records. But 400,000 more people will shortly be contacted to be told that the wrong information may be held about them, and asked to provide consent again.
Until fresh consent is obtained, organs will not be taken from any of those people in the event of death.
The error occurred in 1999, when data held by the Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency, which includes a request for consent in applications for a driving licence, was transferred to the organ registry.
The mistake came to light when NHS Blood and Transplant (NHSBT) wrote letters to new donors thanking them for joining the register, and outlining what they had agreed to donate. Respondents wrote back to say the information was wrong.
A spokesman for NHS Blood and Transplant, said: “We are taking it very seriously and are urgently investigating the situation.”
Read more in the Telegraph.
These types of mistakes make it very difficult for the public to trust the government with databases of sensitive information.
Just in case you thought this “legal stuff” was simple...
http://www.pogowasright.org/?p=8850
Bringing US Surveillance Laws Into the 21st Century
April 10, 2010 by Dissent
Scott M. Fulton, III writes:
You may think that your communications with other individuals over the Internet may be protected from unreasonable use by U.S. law enforcement without subpoena and due process. The truth is, judges have been loosening the interpretation of a 1986 wiretapping law, almost pretending that it did apply to present circumstances. But perhaps the greatest problem with the current Electronic Communications Privacy Act (ECPA) lay with its definitions, which at one point appear to be applicable (after several stretches of logic) to the Internet… and then, upon further review, do not.
Read more on TechNewsWorld.
This will happen as soon as Al Gore invents Global Cooling...
http://www.pogowasright.org/?p=8861
Fulfilling Government 2.0’s Promise with Robust Privacy Protections
April 10, 2010 by Dissent
Danielle Keats Citron has an article in the March issue of the George Washington Law Review, “Fulfilling Government 2.0’s Promise with Robust Privacy Protections.” The abstract:
The public can now friend the White House and scores of agencies on social networks, virtual worlds, and video-sharing sites. The Obama Administration sees this trend as crucial to enhancing governmental transparency, public participation, and collaboration. As the President has underscored, government needs to tap into the public’s expertise because it does not have all of the answers.
To be sure, Government 2.0 might improve civic engagement. But it also might produce privacy vulnerabilities because agencies often gain access to individuals’ social-network profiles, photographs, videos, and contact lists when interacting with them online. Little would prevent agencies from using and sharing individuals’ social-media data for more than policymaking, including law-enforcement, immigration, tax, and benefits matters. Although people may be prepared to share their views on health care and the environment with agencies and executive departments, they may be dismayed to learn that such policy collaborations carry a risk of government surveillance.
This Essay argues that government should refrain from accessing individuals’ social-media data on Government 2.0 sites. Agencies should treat these sites as one-way mirrors, where individuals can see government’s activities and engage in policy discussions but where government cannot use, collect, or distribute individuals’ social-media information. [Sounds like a Business Model to me Bob] A one-way mirror policy would facilitate democratic discourse, enhance government accountability, and protect privacy.
You can download the entire article here.
(Related) Do any of these people use the Internet as a mirror?
http://hothardware.com/News/Study-Says-Almost-Half-Of-Americans-Use-Social-Networks/
Study Says Almost Half Of Americans Use Social Networks
Friday, April 09, 2010 - by Jennifer Johnson
According to a recent survey from Arbitron and Edison Research, nearly half of Americans age 12 and older have a profile on one or more social networking Web sites. The study also revealed that the use of social networking sites is not limited to youth: Approximately 78% of teens and 77% of 18 to 24-year-olds have personal profile pages. Nearly two-thirds of Americans between the ages of 25 and 34 have personal profile pages.
A new term to me, but the cost cutting strategy shouldn't be news to anyone.
Will AOL and Demand Media’s Content Farm Strategy Prevail?
by Guest Author on Apr 10, 2010
Are content farms the future of online media? Demand Media is now providing travel tips to USA Today, and AOL is supplementing its thousands of paid journalists with an even larger army of citizen freelancers.
… In The Collapse of Complex Business Models, Clay Shirky argues that the inertia facing TV executives stems from their desire to see “online video generate enough money to cover their current costs”.
… Most media companies are trying hard to increase those numbers, to boost the value of their online content until it matches the amount of money it costs to produce. But Rosenblatt thinks they have it exactly backward. Instead of trying to raise the market value of online content to match the cost of producing it — perhaps an impossible proposition — the secret is to cut costs until they match the market value.”
Interesting. Spending money on the kids rather than the teachers or technology.
Should Kids Be Bribed To Do Well In School?
Posted by timothy on Saturday April 10, @04:50PM
theodp writes
"Harvard economist Roland Fryer Jr. did something education researchers almost never do: he ran a randomized experiment in hundreds of classrooms in Chicago, Dallas, Washington and New York to help answer a controversial question: Should Kids Be Bribed to Do Well in School? He used mostly private money to pay 18,000 kids a total of $6.3 million and brought in a team of researchers to help him analyze the effects. He got death threats, but he carried on. His findings? If incentives are designed wisely, it appears, payments can indeed boost kids' performance as much as or more than many other reforms you've heard about before — and for a fraction of the cost."
For my Statistics class. Perhaps we should conduct an experiment?
http://news.cnet.com/8301-17852_3-20002210-71.html?part=rss&subj=news&tag=2547-1_3-0-20
Why every math wiz should challenge red light cameras
by Chris Matyszczyk April 10, 2010 7:12 PM PDT
… According to NBC2, when his wife received a ticket, Mogil listened carefully to her explanation that she felt the yellow light was too short. A rare husband, Mogil respected his wife's feelings. In fact, such was his respect that he took a stopwatch to the intersection in question. The speed limit was 45 mph, which meant that, according to the guidelines set by the county, the yellow light ought to be illuminated for 4.5 seconds.
There has been some nationwide consternation as to whether the dark pressures of finance have been brought to bear upon counties to such a degree that light durations have been sneakily curtailed. So Mogil tested this light 15 times in order to achieve statistically significant proof of the potential cause of his wife's anguish.
What he found was that the yellow lights, on average, were on for a mere 3.8 seconds. Some math tutors might have decided the proof was enough. But not Mogil. He went to court, where a special magistrate picked up his wife's ticket, ripped it into many pieces and tossed it out of the courtroom window--metaphorically speaking, that is.
Dilbert captures the strategy behind warranties and guarantees issued only “because the other guy did it.”
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