Tuesday, February 22, 2022

Getting the attention of your Board of Directors keeps getting easier.

https://www.cpomagazine.com/cyber-security/potential-board-liability-for-cybersecurity-failures-under-caremark-law/

Potential Board Liability for Cybersecurity Failures Under Caremark Law

Cybersecurity is now among the most critical risk-areas for companies across industries, and boards of directors must be vigilant in overseeing their companies’ cybersecurity efforts. Failing to do so not only increases risks for the company, but may also expose board members to personal liability. Developments in Delaware’s Caremark doctrine for breaches of fiduciary duty have paved a narrow path for plaintiffs to hold directors liable for failing to adequately address and oversee their company’s cybersecurity and data privacy risks.

The Court’s 1996 landmark decision in Caremark established a legal framework for holding directors personally liable for breaching the duty of loyalty when the directors fail to “appropriately monitor and supervise the enterprise.” Under Caremark, directors may be liable in two distinct contexts: (1) “a board decision that results in a loss because that decision was ill advised or ‘negligent,’” or (2) “an unconsidered failure of the board to act in circumstances in which due attention would, arguably, have prevented the loss.” For liability to attach under the Caremark theory, the board must have entirely failed to provide any reasonable oversight in a “sustained and systematic fashion,” or the information reporting system on which the board relied must be deemed an “utter failure.”

In 2019, the Delaware Supreme Court issued a noteworthy decision concerning the Caremark standard. Marchand v. Barnhill involved a board’s alleged failure to oversee the company’s food manufacturing and safety procedures. The company, an American ice cream manufacturer regulated by the Food and Drug Administration, conducted a product recall after a listeria outbreak connected to its products resulted in three deaths. The product recall and related plant shutdowns translated into a monetary loss for investors. Plaintiffs brought a Caremark action against the company’s directors, alleging that the board failed to oversee the company’s food safety procedures. On appeal, the Court reversed the Chancery Court’s dismissal of the Caremark claim and allowed the case to proceed against the directors. The key allegations that the Court focused on in its decision to allow the claim to proceed included: (1) the non-existence of a board committee that addressed food safety; (2) the lack of reports and/or procedures requiring management to keep the board apprised of food safety compliance practices; (3) lack of evidence that “red” or “yellow” flags related to the outbreak and contained in management reports were disclosed to the board; (4) the fact that the board was presented with favorable information about food safety but not advised of negative reports that existed; and (5) board meetings lacked any regular discussions of food safety issues.



A step toward autonomous weapons? Armed drones can find threats autonomously, but require humans to release the weapons.

https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2022/2/21/us-navy-plans-launch-of-middle-east-drone-force-with-allies

US Navy plans launch of Middle East drone force with allies

The United States Navy has announced the launch of a new joint fleet of unmanned drones in the Middle East with allied nations to patrol vast swaths of volatile waters as tensions simmer with Iran.

Vice Admiral Brad Cooper, who leads the 5th Fleet, said 100 unmanned drones, both sailing and submersible, would dramatically multiply the surveillance capacities of the US Navy, allowing it to keep a close eye on waters critical to the flow of global oil and shipping. Trade at sea has been targeted in recent years as Tehran’s nuclear deal with world powers collapsed.

As Yemen’s seven-year-old civil war grinds on, the Iran-backed Houthi rebels have dispatched bomb-laden drone boats towards Saudi waters that have damaged vessels and oil facilities.

What the Houthis are doing, it is an entirely completely different operation that’s offensively oriented,” Cooper said. “What we are doing is inherently defensively oriented.”



Why you really need an upgrade strategy.

https://www.axios.com/att-3g-sunset-wireless-disrupt-devices-728228cf-e15e-48b4-9896-d32dfd93e0ce.html

Ending 3G service sparks fears of an "alarmaggedon"

AT&T's planned shutdown of its 3G network Tuesday has sparked fears that home security systems, medical alert monitors and a range of other devices will stop working.

AT&T says phone coverage will not be affected, but it's not just phones that use the company's 3G network.

  • 3G-connected cars — including some that are only a few years old — may require software or hardware upgrades, or could lose automatic crash notifications and other features entirely.

  • As much as 10% of all public school buses across the country will lose GPS and communications services, according to a filing from AASA, The School Superintendents Association.

  • San Francisco warned bus riders that more than 650 prediction display systems at bus shelters that rely on AT&T's 3G service will stop displaying real-time information.



Someone is unsure of their own gender? Who is liable if the school gets it wrong?

https://www.pogowasright.org/amendment-to-floridas-dont-say-gay-bill-would-force-schools-to-out-students-in-6-weeks/

Amendment to Florida’s ‘Don’t Say Gay’ bill would force schools to out students in 6 weeks

This will get some children beat up, killed, or driven to suicide.

Sam Sachs reports:

A new amendment to Florida’s so-called “Don’t Say Gay” bill would explicitly require schools to inform parents of their child’s sexual orientation, and put a deadline on how soon they must tell the family.
The amendment filed by bill sponsor Rep. Joe Harding, R-Williston, on Feb. 18 changes the bill to instead not only require disclosure, but requires schools to tell parents within six weeks of learning the student is any sexual orientation other than straight.

Read more at WFLA.



Will AI eventually be able to copyright? My AI says yes. If we have a “first encounter” with beings from another planet, can I steal their technology because they (as non-humans) can’t patent or copyright their tech?

https://www.engadget.com/us-copyright-office-art-ai-creativity-machine-190722809.html

You can’t copyright AI-created art, according to US officials

The US Copyright Office has once again denied an effort to copyright a work of art that was created by an artificial intelligence system. Dr. Stephen Thaler attempted to copyright a piece of art titled A Recent Entrance to Paradise, claiming in a second request for reconsideration of a 2019 ruling that the USCO's “human authorship” requirement was unconstitutional.

In its latest ruling, which was spotted by The Verge, the agency accepted that the work was created by an AI, which Thaler calls the Creativity Machine. Thaler applied to register the work as "as a work-for-hire to the owner of the Creativity Machine.”

However, the office said that current copyright law only offers protections to "the fruits of intellectual labor” that “are founded in the creative powers of the [human] mind.” As such, a copyrighted work "must be created by a human being” and the office says it won't register works “produced by a machine or mere mechanical process” that lack intervention or creative input from a human author.

The agency said Thaler failed to provide evidence that A Recent Entrance to Paradise is the result of human authorship. It also stated he was unable to convince the USCO's "to depart from a century of copyright jurisprudence" — in other words, to change the rules.


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