Interesting summary, but I’d like (need) clearer guidelines.

https://www.eff.org/deeplinks/2024/09/you-really-do-have-some-expectation-privacy-public

You Really Do Have Some Expectation of Privacy in Public

Being out in the world advocating for privacy often means having to face a chorus of naysayers and nihilists. When we spend time fighting the expansion of Automated License Plate Readers capable of tracking cars as they move, or the growing ubiquity of both public and private surveillance cameras, we often hear a familiar refrain: “you don’t have an expectation of privacy in public.” This is not true. In the United States, you do have some expectation of privacy—even in public—and it’s important to stand up and protect that right.

(Related)

https://pogowasright.org/perspective-how-to-use-geofence-warrants-in-a-constitutional-manner/

Perspective: How To Use Geofence Warrants In A Constitutional Manner

Robert Frommer, a senior attorney at The Institute for Justice, writes:

Geofence warrants are powerful tools that let law enforcement identify devices located at a specific location and time based on data users send to Google LLC and other tech companies. But left unchecked, they threaten to empower police to invade the security of millions of Americans. Thankfully, there is a way that geofence warrants can be used in a constitutional manner, if only courts would take it.

[…]

That refinement begins with the courts. Recall that, after issuing a geofence warrant, courts check themselves out from the process, leaving Google to fend for itself. But courts, not corporations, should safeguard our rights. That means geofence warrants require an iterative process that ensures judicial oversight at each step.

Under that iterative process, courts would still issue geofence warrants. But after Step 1, things would change. Rather than go to Google, the police would return to court. They would identify what devices from the Step 1 list they want expanded location data for. And they would have to justify that further intrusion to the court, which would then evaluate the request and denote the subset of devices for which police could constitutionally get expanded data.

Read more at Law360.

Oh joy. Could I be offered immunity in exchange for my car’s video? (I might have been going a little too fast on my way to this parking spot.)

https://www.sfchronicle.com/crime/article/tesla-sentry-mode-police-evidence-19731000.php

Did your car witness a crime? Bay Area police may be coming for your Tesla — and they might tow it

A Canadian tourist was visiting Oakland recently when he had to talk someone out of taking his Tesla from a hotel parking lot.

This was no thief. It was the Oakland Police Department. Turns out, the Tesla may have witnessed a homicide.

In Oakland and beyond, police called to crime scenes are increasingly looking for more than shell casings and fingerprints. They’re scanning for Teslas parked nearby, hoping their unique outward-facing cameras captured key evidence. And, the Chronicle has found, they’re even resorting to obtaining warrants to tow the cars to ensure they don’t lose the video.

If it sounds good, quote it? Building “backup” for disinformation.

https://www.bespacific.com/gpt-fabricated-scientific-papers-on-google-scholar/

GPT-fabricated scientific papers on Google Scholar

GPT-fabricated scientific papers on Google Scholar: Key features, spread, and implications for preempting evidence manipulation: “Academic journals, archives, and repositories are seeing an increasing number of questionable research papers clearly produced using generative AI. They are often created with widely available, general-purpose AI applications, most likely ChatGPT, and mimic scientific writing. Google Scholar easily locates and lists these questionable papers alongside reputable, quality-controlled research. Our analysis of a selection of questionable GPT-fabricated scientific papers found in Google Scholar shows that many are about applied, often controversial topics susceptible to disinformation: the environment, health, and computing. The resulting enhanced potential for malicious manipulation of society’s evidence base, particularly in politically divisive domains, is a growing concern.”

Does an image of the outside of your house suggest access to cameras inside?

https://krebsonsecurity.com/2024/09/sextortion-scams-now-include-photos-of-your-home/

Sextortion Scams Now Include Photos of Your Home

An old but persistent email scam known as “sextortion” has a new personalized touch: The missives, which claim that malware has captured webcam footage of recipients pleasuring themselves, now include a photo of the target’s home in a bid to make threats about publishing the videos more frightening and convincing.

This week, several readers reported receiving sextortion emails that addressed them by name and included images of their street or front yard that were apparently lifted from an online mapping application such as Google Maps.

The message purports to have been sent from a hacker who’s compromised your computer and used your webcam to record a video of you while you were watching porn. The missive threatens to release the video to all of your contacts unless you pay a Bitcoin ransom. In this case, the demand is just shy of $2,000, payable by scanning a QR code embedded in the email.

Following a salutation that includes the recipient’s full name, the start of the message reads, “Is visiting [recipient’s street address] a more convenient way to contact if you don’t take action. Nice location btw.” Below that is the photo of the recipient’s street address.

Nothing to indicate fact or fiction? When all (most?) of the ads are flagged as using AI, no one will pay any attention to the “Warning.”

https://www.bespacific.com/disclosure-and-transparency-of-artificial-intelligence-generated-content-in-political-advertisements/

Disclosure and Transparency of Artificial Intelligence-Generated Content in Political Advertisements

Regulations.gov: “In this document, the Federal Communications Commission (Commission or FCC) initiates a proceeding to provide greater transparency regarding the use of artificial intelligence-generated content in political advertising. Specifically, the Commission proposes to require radio and television broadcast stations; cable operators, Direct Broadcast Satellite (DBS) providers, and Satellite Digital Audio Radio Service (SDARS) licensees engaged in origination programming; and permit holders transmitting programming pursuant to section 325(c) of the Communications Act of 1934 (Act), to provide an on-air announcement for all political ads (including both candidate ads and issue ads) that contain artificial intelligence (AI)-generated content disclosing the use of such content in the ad. The Commission also propose to require these licensees and regulatees to include a notice in their online political files for all political ads that include AI-generated content disclosing that the ad contains such content.”

Not a record to envy.

https://techcrunch.com/2024/09/03/clearview-ai-hit-with-its-largest-gdpr-fine-yet-as-dutch-regulator-considers-holding-execs-personally-liable/

Clearview AI hit with its largest GDPR fine yet as Dutch regulator considers holding execs personally liable

Clearview AI, the controversial U.S.-based, facial recognition startup that built a searchable database of 30 billion images populated by scraping the internet for people’s selfies without their consent, has been hit with its largest privacy fine yet in Europe.

The Netherlands’ data protection authority, Autoriteit Persoonsgegevens (AP), said on Tuesday that it has imposed a penalty of €30.5 million — around $33.7M at current exchange rates — on Clearview AI for a raft of breaches of the European Union’s General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) after confirming the database contains images of Dutch citizens.

This fine is larger than separate GDPR sanctions imposed by data protection authorities in France, Italy, Greece and the U.K. back in 2022.

In a press release, the AP warned it has ordered an additional penalty of up to €5.1M that will be levied for continued non-compliance, saying Clearview failed to stop the GDPR violations after the investigation concluded, which is why it has made the additional order. The total fine could hit €35.6M if Clearview AI keeps ignoring the Netherlands regulator.

Perspective. (A technique viable in many contexts.)

https://www.npr.org/sections/planet-money/2024/09/03/g-s1-19607/what-can-we-learn-from-millions-of-high-school-yearbook-photos

What can we learn from millions of high school yearbook photos?

Imagine you’re about to get your high school yearbook picture taken and you really want to stand out. What would you wear to distinguish yourself from your classmates? Would bright pink lipstick, a cartoon print tie, or a blue steel pout do the trick? Perhaps all of those things in combination?

Economists can now answer this question using AI – and not only for you, but for every single person who graduated high school between 1930 and 2010!

In a recent paper titled "Image(s)," economists Hans-Joachim Voth and David Yanagizawa-Drott analyzed 14.5 million high school yearbook photos from all over the U.S. Their AI tool categorized each photo based on what people were wearing in it, like “suit”, “necklace”, or “glasses.” The researchers then used the AI outputs to analyze how fashion had changed over time.

Is this what it will take to control social media?

https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/31/world/americas/brazil-x-ban-free-speech.html?unlocked_article_code=1.HE4.5QZx.Mh_pHIM0G_wG&smid=nytcore-ios-share&referringSource=articleShare&sgrp=c-cb

How Brazil’s Experiment Fighting Fake News Led to a Ban on X

To combat disinformation, Brazil gave one judge broad power to police the internet. Now, after he blocked X, some are wondering whether that was a good idea.

As Brazil grappled with a flood of online disinformation around its 2022 presidential election, the nation’s Supreme Court made an unusual and fateful decision: It gave one justice sweeping powers to order social networks to take down content he believed threatened democracy.

That justice, Alexandre de Moraes, has since carried out an aggressive campaign to clean up his country’s internet, forcing social networks to pull down thousands of posts, often giving them a deadline of just hours to comply.

It has been one of the most comprehensive — and, in some ways, most effective — efforts to combat the scourge of internet falsehoods. When his online crackdown helped stifle far-right efforts to overturn Brazil’s election, academics and commentators wondered whether the nation had found a possible solution to one of the most vexing problems of modern democracy.

Then, on Friday, Justice Moraes blocked the social network X across Brazil because its owner, Elon Musk, had ignored his court orders to remove accounts and then closed X’s office in Brazil. As part of the blackout order, the judge said internet users who tried to circumvent his measure in order to keep using X could be fined nearly $9,000 a day, or more than what the average Brazilian makes a year.

So start small?

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41599-024-03587-0

Integrating industry 4.0 technologies for the administration of courts and justice dispensation—a systematic review

The judiciary is a foundation of democracy, upholding the rule of law and protecting rights. Efficient court administration is vital for public trust, justice, and timely proceedings. Currently, courts face challenges such as inconsistencies, adjournments, and absence of transparency, undermining the justice system. Traditional manual processes and paper-based documentation cause significant backlogs, slow resolutions, and limited public access. As case volumes and complexities rise, modernizing court administration through digital transformation is progressively critical. Currently, many countries are integrating technologies in the courts for its administration and other activities. In recent years, courts and judges have been subjected to pressure to improve performance, uplifting judicial effectiveness to a top priority. Subsequently, several countries have integrated simplification and digitization strategies in judicial initiatives to enhance court efficiency. Switzerland’s Justitia 4.0 and Brazil’s PJE are notable initiatives that focused to strengthen court administration through digitalization. These aspects motivated this study to examine the detailed integration of industry 4.0 technologies such as the Internet of things, cloud computing, blockchain, big data analytics, robotics, drones, Metaverse, digital twins, and artificial intelligence for court administration with digitalized infrastructure. According to the study, integrating these technologies in less complex cases helps minimize expenditures and save time, making to resolve cases conveniently, efficiently, and superiorly. The study also identified the challenges and issues associated with industry 4.0 technologies such as evidence gathering, evidence preservation, robot judges for pre-judgment analysis, and judgment delivery, which future studies need to be explored.

Tools & Techniques. (Should work equally well for communication with children or members of congress.)

https://www.makeuseof.com/adobe-animate-characters-from-audio/

This Adobe Tool Animates Characters Using Your Voice (No Experience Needed)

… Animating your graphics, text, and images in the Adobe Express editor is pretty simple thanks to the Animation feature. But this isn't the only animation tool that Adobe Express has to offer.

Enter Animate From Audio, a free Adobe Express tool that lets you animate pre-drawn characters in real-time using just your voice—or any audio really. Every time the program picks up an audio signal, it animates the character along one of the pre-drawn paths.