ICE spends $7.2 Million to Increase Facial Recognition and Location Tracking of Migrants
By: Business Insider Date: May 2, 2022 US Immigration and Customs Enforcement will be paying surveillance software company Trust Stamp $7.2 million annually to develop tech to track migrants processed at the southern border, new federal documents show. Trust Stamp’s contract, which was renewed in April, has it providing ICE with 10,000 smartphones that include […]
‘Democracy Will Wither’: Barack Obama Outlines Perils of Unregulated Big Tech in Sweeping Speech
By: The Guardian Date: April 22, 2022 Technology companies must be reined in to address the “weakening of democratic institutions around the world”, Barack Obama said Thursday, in a sweeping keynote speech on the perils of disinformation. Speaking at Stanford University in Silicon Valley, the former president made his most extensive remarks yet about the technology […]
SEC Is Investigating How Amazon Disclosed Business Practices
By: Wall Street Journal Date: April 6, 2022 Federal securities regulators are investigating how Amazon.com Inc. has disclosed some details of its business practices, including how it uses third-party-seller data for its private-label business, according to people familiar with the matter. The Securities and Exchange Commission is probing how the technology giant—the largest U.S. e-commerce retailer […]
Google Bans Apps With Hidden Data-Harvesting Software
By: Wall Street Journal Date: April 6, 2022 Google has yanked dozens of apps from its Google Play store after determining that they include a software element that surreptitiously harvests data. The Panamanian company that wrote the code, Measurement Systems S. de R.L., is linked through corporate records and web registrations to a […]
‘Mind-blowing’: Ai-Da Becomes First Robot to Paint Like an Artist
By: The Guardian Date: April 4, 2022 Brush clamped firmly in bionic hand, Ai-Da’s robotic arm moves slowly, dipping in to a paint palette then making slow, deliberate strokes across the paper in front of her. This, according to Aidan Meller, the creator of the world’s first ultra-realistic humanoid robot, Ai-Da, is “mind-blowing” […]
TikTok Brain Explained: Why Some Kids Seem Hooked on Social Video Feeds
By: Wall Street Journal Date: April 2, 2022 Remember the good old days when kids just watched YouTube all day? Now that they binge on 15-second TikToks, those YouTube clips seem like PBS documentaries. Many parents tell me their kids can’t sit through feature-length films anymore because to them the movies feel painfully slow. […]
Ukraine Uses Facial Recognition Software to Identify Russian Soldiers Killed in Combat
By: The Guardian Date: March 24, 2022 Ukraine is using facial recognition software to help identify the bodies of Russian soldiers killed in combat and track down their families to inform them of their deaths, Ukraine’s vice-prime minister told the Reuters news service. Mykhailo Fedorov, Ukraine’s vice-prime minister who also runs the ministry […]
Tech Leaders Face Threat of Prison Under New UK Online Bill
By: AP News Date: March 17, 2022 Tech bosses face criminal prosecution if they fail to comply with proposed British rules aimed at ensuring people are safe online, the U.K. government said Thursday as it unveiled the draft legislation in Parliament. The ambitious but controversial online safety bill would give regulators wide-ranging powers […]
War via TikTok: Russia’s New Tool for Propaganda Machine
By: AP News Date: February 27, 2022 The Russian TikTok video has it all: a cat, puppies and a pulsing background beat. It’s cute, watchable and hardly seems the stuff of state propaganda. In 2014, Russia flooded the internet with fake accounts pushing disinformation about its takeover of Crimea. Eight years later, experts say Russia […]