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Category Archives: EU Data Protection

Top EU Tech Regulator – Twitter to Face Stress Test This Month

WSJ [free link to article]: “European Union regulators plan to subject Twitter to a stress test to determine how well it complies with Europe’s new digital-content law, a top EU tech regulator said, ramping up the bloc’s preparations for enforcing the West’s most far-reaching digital-content law. A team of roughly five to 10 digital specialists from the EU plan to put Twitter, and possibly other companies, through their content-policing paces during a visit to San Francisco in late June, Thierry Breton, the bloc’s commissioner for the internal market, said in an interview. The test is voluntary, he said, and Twitter has agreed to be subjected to it. It won’t carry any fines or other enforcement consequences. It will offer companies a dry run for how the EU’s Digital Services Act, or DSA, will be enforced. Twitter officials in Europe and the U.S. didn’t respond to requests for comment. Twitter owner Elon Musk has said the company plans to comply with the EU law. The law takes effect in late summer, empowering European regulators led by Breton to levy a maximum penalty of 6% of a company’s annual revenue in case of violations. The EU has the power to block a service in the case of certain repeated infringements…”

EU names 19 large tech platforms that must follow Europe’s new Internet rules

Ars Technica: “The European Commission will require 19 large online platforms and search engines to comply with new online content regulations starting on August 25, European officials said. The EC specified which companies must comply with the rules for the first time, announcing today that it “adopted the first designation decisions under the Digital Services… Continue Reading

Digital Privacy Legislation is Civil Rights Legislation

EFF: “As Congress ponders legislation to reform “big tech,” it must view comprehensive digital privacy legislation as desperately needed civil rights legislation, because data abuses often disproportionately harm communities already bearing the brunt of other inequalities. Harvesting and monetizing personal data whenever anyone uses social media or even vital online services has become ubiquitous, yet… Continue Reading

Primer – Artificial Intelligence, Human Rights, Democracy, and the Rule of Law

The Alan Turing Institute and the Council of Europe: Primer – Artificial Intelligence, Human Rights, Democracy, and the Rule of Law: “…It is a remarkable fact that rapid advancements in artificial intelligence (AI) and data-driven technologies over the last two decades have placed contemporary society at a pivot-point in deciding what shape the future of… Continue Reading

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, February 18, 2023

Via LLRX – Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, February 18, 2023 – Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on the… Continue Reading

ChatGPT Amendment Shows the EU is Regulating by Outrage

Center for Data Innovation, Patrick Grady February 13, 2023: “The EU is considering placing generative artificial intelligence (AI) tools, such as ChatGPT, in a “high risk” category in its upcoming AI bill, thereby subjecting such tools to burdensome compliance requirements. This sloppy addition needlessly stunts creativity and shows the EU is hitting the panic button… Continue Reading

Meta Was Scraping Sites for Years While Fighting the Practice

Yahoo Finance: “Meta is suing a company for collecting information from its platforms – Facebook and Instagram. It turns out that the social media company had earlier partnered with the same firm — Bright Data — to gather data from other websites. This came to light during the ongoing case filed on January 6 in… Continue Reading

Elon Musk and the new EU rules for transparency for platforms

Tech Policy Press: “Billionaire Twitter CEO Elon Musk continues to face a wave of criticism for his capricious decisions, especially from Brussels and Berlin. Yet, the EU owes Musk a debt of gratitude, says Julian Jaursch, a project director at the not-for-profit think tank Stiftung Neue Verantwortung (SNV) in Berlin Germany. Musk is involuntarily proving… Continue Reading

Data Is What Data Does: Regulating Use, Harm, and Risk Instead of Sensitive Data

Solove, Daniel J., Data Is What Data Does: Regulating Use, Harm, and Risk Instead of Sensitive Data (January 11, 2023). Management Journal for Advanced Research, Volume-2 Issue-6, December 2022, PP. 12-15, Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4322198 – “Heightened protection for sensitive data is becoming quite trendy in privacy laws around the world. Originating in European Union… Continue Reading

Predictive Justice in Light of the New AI Act Proposal

Gallese, Chiara, Predictive Justice in Light of the New AI Act Proposal (September 29, 2022). Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=4286023 or http://dx.doi.org/10.2139/ssrn.4286023  – “In the latest years, there has been an increasing trend for police forces and judicial authorities to employ predictive profiling technologies in criminal justice, posing major risks to the fundamental rights of citizens.… Continue Reading

Welcome to Hotel Elsevier: you can check-out any time you like … not

Dr. Eiko Fried: “In December 2021, Robin Kok wrote a series of tweets about his Elsevier data access request. I did the same a few days later. This here is the resulting collaborative blog post, summarizing our journey in trying to understand what data Elsevier collects; what data Elsevier has collected on us two specifically;… Continue Reading