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Monthly Archives: May 2019

United States Congress Creates AI Task Force

“Today, Congresswoman Maxine Waters (D-CA), Chairwoman of the House Committee on Financial Services, announced the creation of a Task Force on Artificial Intelligence chaired by Congressman Bill Foster (D-IL).  “I am excited to Chair the Financial Services Committee’s Task Force on Artificial Intelligence and I thank Chairwoman Waters for her foresight in creating this important… Continue Reading

Accused of ‘Terrorism’ for Putting Legal Materials Online

The New York Times – “Carl Malamud believes in open access to government records, and he has spent more than a decade putting them online. You might think states would welcome the help. But when Mr. Malamud’s group posted the Official Code of Georgia Annotated, the state sued for copyright infringement. Providing public access to… Continue Reading

Report: Dark Data Plagues Federal Organizations

NextGov: “While government leaders across the globe are excited about the unleashing artificial intelligence in their organizations, most are struggling with deploying it for their missions because they can’t wrangle their data, a new study suggests. In a survey released this week, Splunk and TRUE Global Intelligence polled 1,365 global business managers and IT leaders… Continue Reading

How to stop Google from keeping your voice recordings

The Verge -Keep your ‘Hey Google’ questions off the record (or isn’t it time you used DuckDuckGo) “Home assistants such as Alexa and Google Assistant are becoming ubiquitous, and as that happens, more and more users are discovering how much of their data is actually being collected by these handy items. The Washington Post’s Geoffrey… Continue Reading

Yes, Americans can opt-out of airport facial recognition – and it is not easy

EFF – Skip the Surveillance By Opting Out of Face Recognition At Airports – “…It might sound trite, but right now, the key to opting out of face recognition is to be vigilant. There’s no single box you can check, and importantly, it may not be possible for non-U.S. persons to opt out of face recognition… Continue Reading

Jared Diamond: There’s a 49 Percent Chance the World As We Know It Will End by 2050

New York Magazine – Intelligencer: “Jared Diamond’s new book, Upheaval, addresses itself to a world very obviously in crisis, and tries to lift some lessons for what do about it from the distant past. In that way, it’s not so different from all the other books that have made the UCLA geographer a sort of… Continue Reading

What Democrats Can Learn About Impeachment From the Civil War

The New York Times Opinion – Lesson One: Don’t let Trump take the initiative. By Jamelle Bouie “…I have been revisiting a few popular histories of the Civil War, both for personal interest and future work. It’s almost impossible to count all of the connections to make between that period, Reconstruction and present-day political life.… Continue Reading

Search the list of more than 30,000 police officers banned by 44 states.

A USA TODAY Network investigation uncovered records of thousands of police officers investigated for serious misconduct. “…we’re releasing a searchable database of the most cut-and-dried cases of troubled cops—30,000 officers from 44 states who were decertified by state oversight agencies. Decertification essentially bans those officers from carrying a badge anywhere in the state. Their infractions run the… Continue Reading

How Cold Is That Library? There’s a Google Doc for That

Inside Higher Ed – “What a difference preparation makes when it comes to doing research in Arctic-level air-conditioned academic libraries (or ones that are otherwise freezing — or not air-conditioned at all). Luckily, Megan L. Cook, assistant professor of English at Colby College, published a crowdsourced document called “How Cold Is that Library?” Alas, the… Continue Reading

Terrorism, Violent Extremism, and the Internet: Free Speech Considerations

EveryCRSReport.com – Terrorism, Violent Extremism, and the Internet: Free Speech Considerations, May 6, 2019 R45713: “Recent acts of terrorism and hate crimes have prompted a renewed focus on the possible links between internet content and offline violence. While some have focused on the role that social media companies play in moderating user-generated content, others have called… Continue Reading

CRS – Congressional Access to the President’s Federal Tax Returns

Congressional Access to the President’s Federal Tax Returns, CRS Legal Sidebar, updated May 7, 2019:  “On April 3, 2019, the Chair of the House Ways and Means Committee sent a letter to the Commissioner of the Internal Revenue Service requesting the individual income tax returns of President Trump, income tax returns for various business entities… Continue Reading