Thread by @profcarroll

Especially considering how the real ClearviewAI endgame is SCOTUS showdown where surveillance is declared protected speech under 1A à la Citizens United

https://twitter.com/zittrain/status/1494122166803124231

nytimes.com/2020/08/11/tec…

It’s basically a race against time. What happens first? An act of Congress and/or Constitutional Amendment enshrining a generalized right of data protection inclusive of biometrics as a 1A carveout to preserve privacy
or
ClearviewAI gets its shot before Trump’s Scotus

The biggest problem I see is that the USA has to decide that there is a line of businesses that should be explicitly and intentionally banned (eg, facial recog). Our system is almost completely deferential to business interests and public safety propaganda. I’m worried about it.

Let’s imagine a “good” scenario. Facial recog is banned and ClearviewAI is out of business. It simply declares bankruptcy and folds assets into a holding company for repurposing since there’s no such thing as a data creditor. The asymmetry of power is all-encompassing.

Yes this is pretty much what happened with Cambridge Analytica/SCL/Emerdata and it will keep happening because when a company goes into bankruptcy/insolvency/liquidation/wind-up it sheds data liabilities and so it’s really useful as a loophole to get away with horrible stuff.

Biggest lesson I learned from Cambridge Analytica is that if you want to commit data crimes just make a company and then liquidate it into your holding company when you get caught.

If we had dealt with the Cambridge Analytica scandal better as a society then I’d feel better about what’s coming down the road with ClearviewAI. But our system really failed the stress test of Cambridge Analytica. It failed quite badly, actually.

Public institutions failed badly given that the US Senate Intelligence Committee and Federal Elections Commission failed to benefit from information sharing with the UK Information Commissioner’s Office on the matter of the seized Cambridge Analytica servers. A profound failure!

We obviously need a new political force of electeds who believe in the state’s muscular role to curtail and inhibit the interests of businesses (even on their own deathbeds) to exploit personal data for profit at the expense of social good. It’s all about the asymmetry of power.

We need a new generation of electeds who know how to propose data and tech laws that won’t ignite organized bipartisan anti-regulatory backlash originating from the SOPA/PIPA and SESTA/FOSTA missteps that still carry forth today and hold us back from addressing urgent matters.

Lawmakers can’t quit the habit of legislating verticals.
They need to find the courage and the vision to legislate horizontally.

Karen’s interpretation of HIPAA is the dominant notion of data rights and that’s pretty much all you need to know about America’s stupid tech and privacy regulation philosophy. It’s profoundly dumb and broken by design. But weirdly enough, Karen might like the GDPR actually.