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Economist: “Calls to rein in the tech titans are getting louder” - Daily chart
by J.C. DE MARTIN July 16, 2019

July 16, 2019

Calls to rein in the tech titans are getting louder The big five technology firms have spent billions buying rivals in recent years https://www.economist.com/graphic-detail/2019/07/16/calls-to-rein-in-the-te… (Sent from my wireless device; please excuse brevity and typos (if any))

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NYT Opinion: "Intel Executive: Rein In Data Brokers"
by J.C. DE MARTIN July 16, 2019

July 16, 2019

*Intel Executive: Rein In Data Brokers** * /Congress must act to protect American citizens.// / By David A. Hoffman Mr. Hoffman is associate general counsel and global privacy officer at Intel Corporation. July 15, 2019 https://www.nytimes.com/2019/07/15/opinion/intel-data-brokers.html

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computers and society
by Norberto Patrignani July 16, 2019

July 16, 2019

Carissim*, tra i tanti festeggiamenti dell'estate del 1969, esattamente 50 annni fa il prof. Wasserman introduce questo corso all'universita' Wisconsin-Madison. Probabilmente uno dei primi esempi della storia, credo possa essere utile ancora oggi... ciao! Norberto

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The Toxic Potential of YouTube’s Feedback Loop | WIRED
by J.C. DE MARTIN July 15, 2019

July 15, 2019

https://www.wired.com/story/the-toxic-potential-of-youtubes-feedback-loop/ (Sent from my wireless device; please excuse brevity and typos (if any))

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"Europe eyes stricter rules on facial recognition"
by J.C. DE MARTIN July 15, 2019

July 15, 2019

*Europe eyes stricter rules on facial recognition* /Under new legal guidance, companies and agencies will need explicit consent to use the technology./ By Mark Scott, Laurens Cerulus and Nicholas Vinocur 7/9/19, 6:45 AM CET Updated 7/14/19, 7:31 AM CET Europe's privacy watchdogs are looking to tighten restrictions on the use of facial recognition in a shift that could limit how governments and large companies use the technology. [...] continua qui: https://www.politico.eu/article/europe-facial-recognition-facebook-privacy-…

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Le hostess? Diventeranno chatbot. Come l’AI sta cambiando i viaggi in aereo
by don Luca Peyron July 15, 2019

July 15, 2019

Buongiorno a tutti, i contenuti di questa intervista, nulla di particolarmente nuovo in effetti, mi fanno rabbrividire. Eliminiamo personale e rapporti umani, risparmiando denari ed alzando profitti, in nome di un presunto miglioramento del servizio e, per di più, usando i giovani come scusa i quali, secondo dichiarazioni, preferirebbero interfacciare con una macchina che con un essere umano! Nella Bibbia capita ogni tanto che qualcuno si stracci le vesti, a questo giro me le straccio digitalmente io... che tristezza usare così le nuove generazioni che, per esperienza condivisa sicuramente da molti in questa lista, cercano disperatamente un umano con cui dialogare, fosse solo per chiedere una informazione ed averne in cambio un sorriso! Fine predicozzo e sfogo, buona lettura dl https://www.ilsole24ore.com/art/le-hostess-una-chatbot-come-l-ai-sta-cambia… _________________________ www.universitari.to.it via XX settembre 83, Torino tel. 011 5156239

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UK ISP group names Mozilla 'Internet Villain' for supporting 'DNS-over-HTTPS'
by Giacomo Tesio July 15, 2019

July 15, 2019

https://www.zdnet.com/google-amp/article/uk-isp-group-names-mozilla-interne… UK government and local ISPs are putting the pressure on browsers to drop plans to support DoH protocol. The trade association for internet service providers in the UK has nominated Mozilla for this year's award of "Internet Villain" because of the browser maker's plans to support the DNS-over-HTTPS (DoH) protocol in its Firefox browser. In a statement published this week, the Internet Services Providers Association (ISPAUK) claimed that Mozilla plans to support DNS-over-HTTPS "in such a way as to bypass UK filtering obligations and parental controls, undermining internet safety standards in the UK." The trade association's comments come after two months of constant criticism aimed at both Mozilla and Google, from both the UK government and various advocacy groups, and all are centered around the new DoH protocol. [...] Basically, Google and Mozilla's support for DoH effectively narrows down to the same moral dilemma that surrounds the Tor Project and the Tor network. Browser makers must now decide if it's worth supporting a tool that brings privacy improvements to millions, at the expense of a few that may have to suffer. Currently, DoH is not supported in the stable versions of Chrome and Firefox. Google is still testing DoH support in Chrome, while Mozilla has completed a successful DoH test in Firefox, and officially said it plans to support the feature in the stable branch, but did not give out a timeline. Mozilla is nominated for ISPAUK's "Internet Villain" prize together with US President Donald Trump (for causing a huge amount of uncertainty across the complex, global telecommunications supply chain in the course of trying to protect national security) and the EU's Article 13 Copyright Directive (for threatening freedom of expression online by requiring 'content recognition technologies' across platforms). A Mozilla spokesperson did not return a request for comment in regards to the organization's nomination. ___ E' divertente come si possa vincere il premio giusto, per le ragioni sbagliate. Giacomo

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"Some of Amazon's highly paid tech workers say warehouse worker conditions are 'a source of shame'"
by J.C. DE MARTIN July 14, 2019

July 14, 2019

*Some of Amazon's highly paid tech workers say warehouse worker conditions are 'a source of shame'* /Julie Bort// / A group of Amazon's tech workers are openly supporting the planned strike by Amazon warehouse workers in Shakopee, Minnesota, next week during the online retailer's Prime Day shopping event. Some of them will even be flying out to walk the picket line and give speeches during the strike, Amazon Employees for Climate Justice, the employee activist group organizing this show of support, said. [...] https://www.businessinsider.com/amazon-tech-workers-prime-day-strike-2019-7…

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What are the policy options? A systematic review of policy responses to the impacts of robotisation and automation on the labour market | EU Science Hub
by J.C. DE MARTIN July 14, 2019

July 14, 2019

https://ec.europa.eu/jrc/en/publication/eur-scientific-and-technical-resear… (Sent from my wireless device; please excuse brevity and typos (if any))

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Money’s no object for Facebook, so hit it where it hurts | John Naughton | Opinion | The Guardian
by Alberto Cammozzo July 14, 2019

July 14, 2019

<https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jul/14/facebook-google-fines…> If you want a measure of the problem society will have in controlling the tech giants, then ponder this: as it has become clear that the US Federal Trade Commission is about to impose a fine of $5bn (£4bn) on Facebook for violating a decree governing privacy breaches, the company’s share price went up! This is a landmark moment. It’s the biggest ever fine imposed by the FTC, the body set up to police American capitalism. And $5bn is a lot of money in anybody’s language. Anybody’s but Facebook’s. It represents just a month of revenues and the stock market knew it. Facebook’s capitalisation went up $6bn with the news. This was a fine that actually increased Mark Zuckerberg’s personal wealth. But what it has exposed once and for all is a company that is out of control on a global scale. The investigation was launched in March 2018 after the Observer’s Carole Cadwalladr revealed that the political consultancy Cambridge Analytica improperly harvested the private information of more than 50 million Facebook users. In 2012, Facebook had made a deal with the FTC – a consent decree – to protect user privacy. Facebook to be fined $5bn for Cambridge Analytica privacy violations – reports Read more What the surging share price reflects is the unconscionable profitability of the tech business when it reaches the scale at which these companies operate. For regulators, this should be a wake-up call. Controlling tech companies can’t be done by fines alone. Regulators have to hit them where it really hurts. In the case of the two leading practitioners of surveillance capitalism, Google and Facebook, this means adopting a wide-spectrum approach. There is no silver bullet. First, regulators need to focus on these companies’ capacity to hoover up and monetise the data they extract from their users’ online behaviour. Since much of this data has been accumulated in a lawless (or at any rate law-free) environment and it now constitutes their most valuable asset (not to mention the insuperable barrier to entry for potential competitors), Google and Facebook should be obliged to make the data available to other organisations (including in the public sector) under controlled conditions. Second, given that the entire digital industry runs on data, competition authorities ought to be much more sceptical about the acquisition strategies of digital giants. With the 20/20 vision of hindsight, for example, Facebook ought never to have been allowed to acquire WhatsApp and Instagram. The mistake was to believe that these were distinctly different entities, whereas in fact they were all data companies. Nothing comparable in the media industry would have been allowed, or indeed in many other areas of industrial life. Equally, Google should never have been allowed to buy YouTube, and it should now be compelled to hive it off as a separate outfit. Third, competition authorities should put the opaque, high-speed data-trading marketplaces owned and operated by Google and Facebook under the microscope – as the UK’s Competition and Markets Authority now intends to do. In no other area of industrial life would companies be allowed to be operators of such vast and entirely opaque marketplaces. As in many others areas of life, sunlight can be a good disinfectant. Finally, the perennial bluff of the surveillance capitalists – that they are indispensable agents of innovation – should be called. Much of this “innovation” has come from their acquisition of creative startups rather than the ingenuity of their internal talents. Their standard procedure from the outset has been to acquire potential disruptive startups before they are able to scale up. We need to wise up to this strategy and make it harder to pull off. Fines are a necessary but not sufficient way of getting this rogue industry under democratic control. • John Naughton is professor of the public understanding of technology at the Open University

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