September 2017 - nexa - server-nexa.polito.it

How Silicon Valley is erasing your individuality

by Alberto Cammozzo

https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/how-silicon-valley-is-erasing-your-i… Until recently, it was easy to define our most widely known corporations. Any third-grader could describe their essence. Exxon sells gas; McDonald’s makes hamburgers; Walmart is a place to buy stuff. This is no longer so. Today’s ascendant monopolies aspire to encompass all of existence. ... The big tech companies (the Europeans have lumped them together as GAFA: Google, Apple, Facebook, Amazon) are shredding the principles that protect individuality. Their devices and sites have collapsed privacy; they disrespectthe value of authorship, with their hostility toward intellectual property. In the realm of economics, they justify monopoly by suggesting that competition merely distracts from the important problems like erasing language barriers and building artificial brains. Companies should “transcend the daily brute struggle for survival,” as Facebook investor Peter Thiel has put it.

Sept. 10, 2017

L'intelligenza artificiale "che riconosce i gay" non fa che rivelare i pregiudizi anti-LGBT dei suoi ideatori

by Antonio Casilli

Per quelli che leggono il francese, ho messo insieme un paio di commenti a proposito dell'articolo su "le reti neurali che riconoscono le persone gay meglio degli umani" che sta facendo il giro del mondo. E' lunghetto, ma doveroso. UNE INTELLIGENCE ARTIFICIELLE RÉVÈLE LES PRÉJUGÉS ANTI-LGBT DES CHERCHEURS DE STANFORD http://www.casilli.fr/2017/09/09/une-intelligence-artificielle-revele-les-p… 9 September 2017 Buona lettura ---a -- Antonio A. Casilli Associate Professor, Telecom ParisTech Research Fellow, Edgar-Morin Center (EHESS) Member, Interdisciplinary Institute for Innovation (i3 UMR 9217 CNRS) Faculty Fellow, Nexa Center for Internet & Society

Sept. 10, 2017

Harvard: "Campaign ’16: how coverage rerouted"

by J.C. DE MARTIN

*Campaign ’16: how coverage rerouted* /With surprising ease, the far right led mainstream media to cover its preferred issues, massive Berkman Klein study finds/ September 8, 2017 | Editor's Pick By Christina Pazzanese, Harvard Staff Writer If you thought that media coverage during the 2016 presidential election seemed, more often than not, to boost Donald Trump and criticize Hillary Clinton, you didn’t imagine it, a new report says. According to the report from Harvard’s Berkman Klein Center for Internet & Society, which applied data analysis techniques to 2 million election stories to understand better what people were reading and sharing, Trump not only got the most attention from media outlets across the political spectrum, but his preferred core issues — immigration, jobs and trade — received significant coverage and were widely shared online. In contrast, news about Clinton focused negatively on her family charitable foundation, her use of a private email server as U.S. secretary of state, and the 2012 terrorist attack in Benghazi, Libya, the study found. […] Continua qui: https://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2017/09/conservative-media-dominated…

Sept. 9, 2017

Re: [nexa] Roberto Di Cosmo on Proposed EU Directive

by Stefano Quintarelli

ho letto alcuni draft (che tali sono). condivido che mi appare che l'ago della bilancia degli oneri di rimozione di materiale tutelato si stia spostando maggiormente verso le piattaforme che ottimizzano la presentazione ed erogazione di materiale al pubblico. c'e' un punto importante su cui, IMHO, bisognerebbe riflettere non poco. mi pare di osservare che la frequenza di "emergenze" di intervento su nuova regolamentazione che tocca temi ICT, stia aumentando. se si considera che l'informatica diventa sempre piu' pervasiva, la cosa non dovrebbe sorprendere tempo fa, quando c'era una legge "ammazza blog" si faceva una azione di protesta, un po' di clamore, e si interveniva nel merito evitando errori. ma adesso ? il sistema puo' reggere con un allarme alla settimana ? la domanda che sorge spontanea e': come fare ad avere processi di formazione delle decisioni "migliori", piu' basati su conoscenze e dati scientificamente validati e bilanciati negli interessi che vengono rappresentati ? pensiamo ad esempio al prossimo intervento regolatorio sui trojan da parte del nostro ministero della giustizia. che approfondimento e bilanciamento avra' fatto ? i partiti che ospitavano forum di riflessione o approfondimento, sono spariti (o almeno sono spariti i forum) gli informatici/ingegneri coinvolti, da quanto ho percezione diretta, sono poco/nulla coinvolti o ascoltati. penso che sarebbe utile che piu' informatici si impegnassero in politica, pur sapendo che non e' risolutivo ma aiuta solo in parte a mitigare (non e' risolutivo, perche' non e' affatto detto che il ministro/presidente di commissione di turno, come per il caso trojan, sia disponibile all'ascolto, anzi... pero' bisogna provarci...) IMHO occorre una attivita' strutturalmente piu' visibile di riflessione sulle policies che coinvolgono l'ICT e anche un pungolo politico su questi temi "pro futuro".. non e' semplice... ciao, s. On 08/09/2017 18:51, J.C. DE MARTIN wrote: > *Roberto Di Cosmo (@rdicosmo > <https://twitter.com/rdicosmo?refsrc=email&s=11>)* > 08/09/2017, 15:52 > <https://twitter.com/rdicosmo/status/906153150805143552?refsrc=email&s=11> > Forthcoming EU directive endangers our code sharing platforms: learn > more, take action now! savecodeshare.eu <https://t.co/fogMb7S8j0> > @SWHeritage <https://twitter.com/SWHeritage> @gt_ll > <https://twitter.com/gt_ll> @fsfe <https://twitter.com/fsfe> > > > Download <https://twitter.com/download?ref_src=MailTweet-iOS> the > Twitter app > > > (Sent from my wireless device; please excuse brevity and typos (if any)) > > > _______________________________________________ > nexa mailing list > nexa(a)server-nexa.polito.it > https://server-nexa.polito.it/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/nexa >

Sept. 9, 2017

Re: [nexa] Roberto Di Cosmo on Proposed EU Directive

by Stefano Zacchiroli

On Fri, Sep 08, 2017 at 06:51:58PM +0200, J.C. DE MARTIN wrote: > Forthcoming EU directive endangers our code sharing platforms: learn > more, take action now! savecodeshare.eu @SWHeritage @gt_ll @fsfe In particolare, il whitepaper FSFE/Open Forum Europe che si trova qui: https://savecodeshare.eu/WhitePaper-ImpactofArticle13onSoftwareEcosystem-Sa… TL;DR: sembra che nel draft di riforma del copyright abbiano messo un linguaggio così ampio per parlare di piattaforme di hosting per contenuti protetti da copyright forniti da utilizzatori terzi (YouTube e compagnia), che "involontariamente" copre anche il caso dei forge e delle piattaforme di sviluppo FOSS. Questo, se la interpretazione è corretta, forzerebbe gli hoster dei forge operanti in Europa FOSS a comportamenti assurdi ed aumenterebbe di molto le loro responsabilità in caso di uso abusivo da parte dei loro utenti. -- Stefano Zacchiroli . zack(a)upsilon.cc . upsilon.cc/zack . . o . . . o . o Computer Science Professor . CTO Software Heritage . . . . . o . . . o o Former Debian Project Leader & OSI Board Director . . . o o o . . . o . « the first rule of tautology club is the first rule of tautology club »

Sept. 8, 2017

Roberto Di Cosmo on Proposed EU Directive

by J.C. DE MARTIN

Roberto Di Cosmo (@rdicosmo) 08/09/2017, 15:52 Forthcoming EU directive endangers our code sharing platforms: learn more, take action now! savecodeshare.eu @SWHeritage @gt_ll @fsfe Download the Twitter app (Sent from my wireless device; please excuse brevity and typos (if any))

Sept. 8, 2017

Zittrain: "“Netwar”: The unwelcome militarization of the Internet has arrived" | Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists

by J.C. DE MARTIN

http://thebulletin.org/2017/september/“netwar”-unwelcome-militarization-int… (Sent from my wireless device; please excuse brevity and typos (if any))

Sept. 8, 2017

Ad Partner Faces Lawsuit Over Verizon's Super Cookies

by gabriele elia

verizon è sempre aggressiva nei suoi servizi ... ma i suoi partner potrebbero avere problemi Ad Partner Faces Lawsuit Over Verizon's Super Cookies -<http://wirelessiq.us8.list-manage.com/track/click?u=5000b2674aa552c31856aa7…> A California Judge has ruled that a lawsuit against Verizon for its implementation of stealth "super cookies" can move forward. In 2015, Verizon was caught modifying wireless user data packets to inject a unique identifier header (UIDH) that allows users to be tracked as they wander the Internet -- regardless of their personal browser preferences. It took security researchers two years to even realize what Verizon was doing, and another six months of pressure to make Verizon include a working opt-out function. Verizon ultimately struck a modest $1.35 million settlement with the FCC over its snooping, a Verizon ad partner named Turn also received a light wrist slap from the FTC for its participation in the scheme. While Verizon was able to dodge a broader lawsuit due to the arbitration clause buried in its fine print, Turn apparently isn't quite so lucky. Turn lawyers originally argued that the company should be able to piggyback on Verizon's arbitration dodge. But this week an appeals court ruled (pdf, hat tip: Fortune) that Turn can't benefit from the arbitration rules because it was not party to the agreement between Verizon and Verizon's customers. Verizon's decision to track users without telling them in this fashion was one of the reasons the FCC recently approved new broadband privacy rules that require companies are clear about what's being tracked, and always provide a working opt out option. But after heavy lobbying from Verizon and other large ISPs, those FCC rules were killed by the GOP and Trump administration before they were allowed to take effect last March.

Sept. 8, 2017

Re: [nexa] "The ‘internet of things’ is sending us back to the Middle Ages"

by M. Fioretti

On 2017-09-07 21:05, J.C. DE MARTIN wrote: > THE ‘INTERNET OF THINGS’ IS SENDING US BACK TO THE MIDDLE AGES > > […] > > Continua qui: > https://theconversation.com/the-internet-of-things-is-sending-us-back-to-th… su questo tema, tempo fa avevo scritto che la casa DAVVERO smart è quella che di sensori ed elettronica in generale ne ha il meno possibile: http://stop.zona-m.net/2016/01/the-really-smart-home-vs-the-internet-of-stu… Marco -- http://mfioretti.com

Sept. 8, 2017

"The ‘internet of things’ is sending us back to the Middle Ages"

by J.C. DE MARTIN

*The ‘internet of things’ is sending us back to the Middle Ages* September 6, 2017 1.39am BST /Joshua A.T. Fairfield// //Professor of Law, Washington and Lee University // / Internet-enabled devices are so common, and so vulnerable, that hackers recently broke into a casino through its fish tank <https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/innovations/wp/2017/07/21/how-a-fish-ta…>. The tank had internet-connected sensors measuring its temperature and cleanliness. The hackers got into the fish tank’s sensors and then to the computer used to control them, and from there to other parts of the casino’s network. The intruders were able to copy 10 gigabytes of data to somewhere in Finland. By gazing into this fish tank, we can see the problem with “internet of things” devices: We don’t really control them. And it’s not always clear who does – though often software designers and advertisers are involved. In my recent book, “Owned: Property, Privacy and the New Digital Serfdom <http://www.cambridge.org/gb/academic/subjects/law/property-law/owned-proper…>,” I discuss what it means that our environment is seeded with more sensors than ever before. […] Continua qui: https://theconversation.com/the-internet-of-things-is-sending-us-back-to-th…

Sept. 7, 2017