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How Silicon Valley is erasing your individuality
by Alberto Cammozzo Sept. 10, 2017

Sept. 10, 2017

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.

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L'intelligenza artificiale "che riconosce i gay" non fa che rivelare i pregiudizi anti-LGBT dei suoi ideatori
by Antonio Casilli Sept. 10, 2017

Sept. 10, 2017

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

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Harvard: "Campaign ’16: how coverage rerouted"
by J.C. DE MARTIN Sept. 9, 2017

Sept. 9, 2017

*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…

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Zittrain: "“Netwar”: The unwelcome militarization of the Internet has arrived" | Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists
by J.C. DE MARTIN Sept. 8, 2017

Sept. 8, 2017

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

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Ad Partner Faces Lawsuit Over Verizon's Super Cookies
by gabriele elia Sept. 8, 2017

Sept. 8, 2017

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.

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PNR del 2014 bocciato dalla Corte di Giustizia UE
by Alberto Cammozzo Sept. 7, 2017

Sept. 7, 2017

The Court declares that the agreement envisaged between the European Union and Canada on the transfer of Passenger Name Record data may not be concluded in its current form <https://curia.europa.eu/jcms/upload/docs/application/pdf/2017-07/cp170084en…> Although the systematic transfer, retention and use of all passenger data are, in essence, permissible, several provisions of the draft agreement do not meet requirements stemming from the fundamental rights of the European Union The EU and Canada negotiated an agreement on the transfer and processing of Passenger Name Record data (PNR agreement) which was signed in 2014. The Council of the European Union requested the European Parliament’s approval of the agreement, and the European Parliament decided to refer the matter to the Court of Justice in order to ascertain whether the envisaged agreement was compatible with EU law and, in particular, with provisions relating to respect for private life and the protection of personal data. It is to be noted that this is the first time the Court has been called upon to give a ruling on the compatibility of a draft international agreement with the EU Charter of Fundamental Rights. []

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Iaconesi: "The Financialization of Life"
by J.C. DE MARTIN Sept. 7, 2017

Sept. 7, 2017

*The Financialization of Life* /Salvatore Iaconesi/ A recent article about the BlockChain appeared on the Italian version of Vice’s Motherboard and raised a series of interesting conversations, and was soon followed up by another one. In that article I was called to express a series of opinions about what was happening with BlockChains and cryptocurrencies, from the point of view of an organization such as the one I lead (HER, Human Ecosystems Relazioni), which deals with data, complex connections between sciences, technology, society, design and art, and the social, political, cultural and psychological implications of these connections and interactions. In my job, everyday, I deal with multiple points of view which confront with these impacts brought on by data, blockchains and cryptocurrencies, with a wide variety of subjects from hyper-technical ones, to entrepreneurs and investors, to policymakers, up to the ones beyond suspicion, “ordinary” people who have to understand what an artwork which uses the blockchain does, or who deals with culture, museums, the city’s neighborhoods. People who — whether they like it or not — have to do with these technologies and practices. A large variety. I have the maximum respect for the blockchain. It possibly is the technology which bears the highest potential for radical innovation and transformation today. With all its limits and problems. My critique is not technical, but psychological. It moves across the domain of perception and of comprehension of reality. In this domain — the one of the psychic processes which are engaged and shared by people and their relations as they interpret the world to understand how to orient themselves and how to act in it — technologies like the Blockchain are a disaster. […] Continua qui: https://startupsventurecapital.com/the-financialization-of-life-a90fe2cb839f

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Verizon: 300$ agli utenti che concedono lo sfruttamento commerciale dei dati di navigazione " which collects, monetizes and shares user internet browing and app usage data with a rotating crop of companies."
by gabriele elia Sept. 7, 2017

Sept. 7, 2017

un trend negli USA .. gabriele Verizon's New 'Rewards' Program Tracks Your Internet Usage -<http://wirelessiq.us8.list-manage.com/track/click?u=5000b2674aa552c31856aa7…> Verizon has revamped the company's rewards program, and now requires that users allow their online behavior to be tracked and sold to participate. Verizon recently unveiled Verizon Up, a replacement for the company's Smart Rewards program. Under Verizon Up, users can earn credits for every $300 they spend on Verizon Wireless products and services. Customers can then use those credits to get discounts on a rotating crop of goods and services, including movie tickets and some streaming services. But to participate in Verizon Up, users need to agree to enroll in Verizon Selects, which collects, monetizes and shares user internet browing and app usage data with a rotating crop of companies. Who those companies are isn't entirely clear, and Verizon's participation agreement doesn't help all that much. "We do not share information that identifies you personally outside of Verizon as part of this program other than with vendors and partners who do work for us," the website says. "We require that these vendors and partners protect the information and use it only for the services they are providing us." Ars Technica recently asked Verizon who gets your browsing and other data, and didn't have much luck gaining clarity. Verizon only pointed the website to the company's privacy policy, which only informs users that the company shares customer data "within our family of companies," as well as with vendors and partners. In short, that could be pretty much anybody. You'll recall that Verizon played a starring role in lobbying to kill new broadband privacy protections at the FCC. At the heart of those protections were the requirement that companies need to be completely transparent about what data is collected, and which companies it's being shared with. If you don't like having your data collected, Verizon's solution is simply not to use the rewards program. "We give our customers choice and control," Verizon insists. "They have the choice to opt in and participate in the program, and if they do choose to participate, they have the choice to opt out at any time,"read comment(s) http://wirelessiq.us8.list-manage.com/track/click?u=5000b2674aa552c31856aa7… [http://i.dslr.net/syms/0b3de145f343381076814d12e9449f5f.jpg]<http://wirelessiq.us8.list-manage.com/track/click?u=5000b2674aa552c31856aa7…> Verizon's New 'Rewards' Program Tracks Your Internet Usage<http://wirelessiq.us8.list-manage.com/track/click?u=5000b2674aa552c31856aa7…> wirelessiq.us8.list-manage.com News: Verizon has revamped the company's rewards program, and now requires that users allow their online behavior to be tracked and sold to participate. Verizon recently unveiled Verizon Up,

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Paper: "Limitless Worker Surveillance"
by J.C. DE MARTIN Sept. 7, 2017

Sept. 7, 2017

*Limitless Worker Surveillance * /Ifeoma Ajunwa, Kate Crawford, and Jason Schultz California Law Review / From the Pinkerton private detectives of the 1850s, to the closed-circuit cameras and email monitoring of the 1990s, to new apps that quantify the productivity of workers, and to the collection of health data as part of workplace wellness programs, American employers have increasingly sought to track the activities of their employees. Starting with Taylorism and Fordism, American workers have become accustomed to heightened levels of monitoring that have only been mitigated by the legal counterweight of organized unions and labor laws. Thus, along with economic and technological limits, the law has always been presumed as a constraint on these surveillance activities. Recently, technological advancements in several fields—big data analytics, communications capture, mobile device design, DNA testing, and biometrics—have dramatically expanded capacities for worker surveillance both on and off the job. While the cost of many forms of surveillance has dropped significantly, new technologies make the surveillance of workers even more convenient and accessible, and labor unions have become much less powerful in advocating for workers. The American worker must now contend with an all-seeing Argus Panoptes built from technology that allows for the trawling of employee data from the Internet and the employer collection of productivity data and health data, with the ostensible consent of the worker. This raises the question of whether the law still remains a meaningful avenue to delineate boundaries for worker surveillance. www.californialawreview.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/3Ajunwa-Schultz-Craw… https://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2746211 Copyright © 2017 California Law Review, Inc. California Law Review, Inc. (CLR) is a California nonprofit corporation. CLR and the authors are solely responsible for the content of their publications.

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"La Commission européenne accélère sa lutte contre les « fake news », vraiment une bonne nouvelle ?"
by J.C. DE MARTIN Sept. 6, 2017

Sept. 6, 2017

*La Commission européenne accélère sa lutte contre les « fake news », vraiment une bonne nouvelle ?** * /BIG BROTHER La nouvelle commissaire européenne chargée du numérique veut constituer un groupe d’experts contre la désinformation et mettre la pression sur les réseaux sociaux…// / Olivier Philippe-Viela C’est un serpent de mer depuis plusieurs mois. Comment lutter contre les « fake news », cette désinformation de masse qui a pesé sur le résultat de la campagne menant au Brexit et l’élection américaine en 2016 ? Selon le réseau de médias Euractiv, la Commission européenne a décidé de passer une vitesse sur le sujet. Nommée le 7 juillet commissaire en charge du numérique, la Bulgare Mariya Gabriel va constituer un groupe d’experts et préparer « une proposition de consultation publique » afin de lutter contre la désinformation en ligne. […] Continua qui: http://www.20minutes.fr/high-tech/2126487-20170904-commission-europeenne-ac…

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