A few quick thoughts below about the DCMS committee report into fake news, rushed out after it was leaked by Dominic Cummings, which says democracy is under threat from micro-targeting, fake news, data misuse. bbc.co.uk/news/technolog…
It’s very similar to the argument I make in my book The People Vs Tech (available in all good etc etc). Many similar recommendations too. Ignore the headlines: though originally about fake news, it’s actually more about platform responsibility & micro-targeting.
While I worry about ‘fake news’ I worry more about the way it’s discussed. There isn’t ‘fake news’ and ‘not fake news’ but rather a million shades in-between. Intentionally false info used maliciously or for clicks is bad; but we do not want govt saying what’s true & not
DCMS committee is right to say the bigger risk is micro-targeting. Psychographics a bit of a red herring here imho: issue is unregulated ads & fragmentation of political accountability. (For more, see my @spectator feature on Cambridge Analytica & Trump: spectator.co.uk/2018/03/big-da…)
One criticism: it repeats the trope about Silicon Valley being a hotbed of libertarianism. Actually Zuck & Facebook are more communitarianism. Imho the problem is they are so optimistic & well intentioned about connectivity they struggle to take responsibility when it goes wrong
DCMS Committee makes several interesting recommendations, some of which I also make in my book. It calls for major investment (and technical expertise) in the ICO so it can regulate data use better. 100% agree. But there’s more. To attract the best & brightest...
Governments need to become more exciting & interesting places to work. Facebook HQ has sweet shops, barista classes, exciting mottos, table tennis tables & hack days. Govt departments have endless corridors, lukewarm tea & The Office style away days. This matters a lot.
Report also calls for a code of ethics. Yes - all algorithm designers, software engineers need some form of Hippacratic Oath. Excellent work from @TimeWellSpentio, @doteveryoneuk thinking about this.
Report wades into the endless ‘platform versus publisher’ debate with a good suggestion: we need a third category as it’s not either. Agree with that. The answer imho is to make them more responsible platforms with tougher measures to take down content when notified.
They aren’t publishers - and if they were defined as such they’d collapse overnight. The social cost would be too high. I’d add one caveat - their adverts should be regulated differently to the content users post. In fact they SHOULD be ‘publishers’ in regard to ads they run.
The one proposal that will almost certainly become law is that all online political adverts must be made public & available to regulators. ICO, Electoral Commission (& my book & others) have made similar suggestions. This is a no-brainer, an absolute must, and urgent.
Some will report this as being about the EU referendum. It’s not about that - it’s about the long-term integrity of elections. It will probably be used by some to discredit the Brexit vote. I hope not, since that will distract from the bigger challenge here of updating democracy
It’s part of the Big Battle over who really runs the Internet. Don’t only think about where we are now but the direction of travel in online advertising & AI and how our laws are already outdated & blunt (My recent @Demos report sketches out trends here demos.co.uk/project/the-fu…)
Anyway it’s worth reading. Full report out in Autumn. If you can’t wait until then, and would like something far better written, you can always try my book The People Vs Tech, available in all good etc etc 😄
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Can anyone explain to me how exactly the Financial Conduct Authority funding model works (i.e. coming from the sector it's regulating). This is the model the DCMS Committee proposes for tech firms funding the ICO. Thanks!
