After the death of a local teen, grieving classmates wore lanyards, said his name, & filmed music videos. NYPD labeled them a gang.

Today, 31 organizations and academics call on the NYPD Inspector General to audit the NYPD's gang database. brennancenter.org/our-work/resea… We believe the gang database’s vague and subjective standards make it unreliable as an investigative tool and result in ongoing discrimination against Black and Latinx New Yorkers. slate.com/technology/202…

This summer, a Black family was arrested and held face-down in asphalt after an ALPR thought their SUV was a stolen motorcycle from another state.

A new @BrennanCenter report analyzes the legal and policy landscape of this pervasive surveillance tool. brennancenter.org/our-work/resea… The basics: ALPRs use cameras and software to scan the plates of every car that passes by. They can log the time and date, GPS coordinates, and pictures of the car. Some versions can even snap pictures of a car’s occupants and create unique vehicle IDs. theintercept.com/2019/07/09/sur…

THREAD: I analyzed Citizen's contact tracing app when they were pitching it to NYC. Unsurprisingly, its approach to privacy is terrible, continues to encourage paranoia-as-a-service, and has wide latitude for law enforcement access.

https://twitter.com/awalkerinLA/status/1303905917814013952

This app collects A LOT of personal information, including location data, copies of gov-ID, COVID-19 diagnosis information, and undefined “health information.” They only commit to deleting Bluetooth data & gov-id in 30 days. Nothing else is subject to any regular deletion policy.

Great piece, featuring very important points raised by leading thinkers in this space.

I would raise a few more, with a focus on the US and its marginalized communities: slate.com/technology/202… 1) Most GIFCT removals are for "glorification." That can capture a broad swath of content, incl. general sympathies with a group or debate about its grievances.

If that sounds fine, consider your own support for BLM or antifa, and our gov's attempt to label them as terrorists.

Twitter has policies that prohibit platform manipulation, violence, terrorism, harassment, and hateful conduct. But today's actions announce a number of ad-hoc decisions that introduce new vaguely defined terms. Why? Here's a short analysis:

https://twitter.com/TwitterSafety/status/1285726277719199746

First, again, you have to read platform announcements in conjunction with a secondary source to understand that's going on. In this case, it's this piece from @BrandyZadrozny and @oneunderscore__: nbcnews.com/tech/tech-news…

Thread on DHS' new PIA for expanding the Terrorist Screening Database to include ppl suspected of association w/"Transnational Organization Crime."

Serious concerns w/vague definitions, bad data, & wide info-sharing; Latinos are likely the most at risk.
dhs.gov/sites/default/… Last year, a federal judge ruled that the terrorist screening database violated the rights of Americans that were on the list. Rather than scale back, this PIA covers an expansion to track even more people. Many of the same concerns apply. nytimes.com/2019/09/04/us/…

This story highlights so many important issues about social media, the press, and the president. They all have a role to play in the "coordinated inauthentic behavior" around antifa. h/t @BostonJoan
washingtonpost.com/investigations… Social media: for all the big announcements around CIB removals of foreign networks in "audience building mode," here's a single account that was able to drive hundreds of people to pick up their guns and show up at a military park. The account had <4k followers.

TODAY: the NY City Council votes on the POST Act, a bill that would require the NYPD to make basic disclosures about the surveillance tools it uses, and what steps are taken to protect the civil rights and civil liberties of New Yorkers.

Stay tuned. The Speaker notes that the POST Act has been strengthened since the hearing. He's referring to this reporting req:

"any potentially disparate impacts of the surveillance technology impact and use policy on any protected groups as defined in the New York city human rights law."

Given last week's escalated tension between platforms and Trump, @laur_hf and I analyzed Twitter’s public interest exception and Facebook’s newsworthiness policy. Below is a thread about these policies, and the differences between policy and enforcement. Both policies try to resolve cases where content breaks platform rules but may be valuable for the public to see. The rationale is rooted in free expression concerns about open access to information, especially about political leaders and matters of public interest.

Today, the New York City Council's Public Safety Committee is holding a hearing about NYPD's disparate enforcement of social distancing. @DRichards13, we also know NYPD has used drones and CCTV as part of this response. Now is the time to call for a vote on the #POSTAct. So far, the Council is showing a united front in criticizing the NYPD. It’s notable they are openly saying we need to stop trying to arrest our way out of social problems.

That said, this is just the latest example of our city’s continued over reliance on unaccountable policing

Interesting discussion around information gate-keeping and shared understandings w/in the scientific community.

How to translate that into a content moderation scheme that balances safety w/the ability to access & share information/challenge government.
theguardian.com/world/2020/apr… Over the weekend someone shared a conspiracy theory w/me that mixed population tracking/forced vaccination with doomsday Christianity.

But it was paired w/knowledge of PWC's planned tracking app, experience w/predatory pharmaceutical cos, and a life under structural racism...

A compelling essay from @SpencerOverton arguing that platforms should be liable for their role in directing and delivering voter suppression ads. I have some thoughts based on a quick read: /1 papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cf… The argument that 230 doesn't immunize this behavior is largely based on the 9th Cir.'s Roommates decision. But if a platform's ad-tech tools play such an active role as to take them out of 230's shield, is there a need to add a specific carveout? /2

Important history lesson from @katolivarius:

"immunity to yellow fever provided privilege and access – only 'acclimatized citizens' who survived the fever could get jobs and bank loans – in a society already deeply stratified by income, race and status."
news.stanford.edu/2020/03/25/new… "Immunity-status impacted where you lived, your salary and even who you married. Many immigrants, especially Irish and German ones who arrived in large numbers during the 1840s, figured their only path to prosperity was to lean into acclimation and actively sought to get sick."

You’re never going to get a more enjoyable analysis of content moderation policy than reading this @hunteryharris interview with @jaboukie.

His account is a living issue spotter of all the bugs in the machine. vulture.com/2020/04/jabouk… On the free speech side: his ongoing suspensions are a good insight into how content moderation policy is ill-equipped to handle biting parody, especially from black voices. It stumps human and AI moderators alike.

This could be anything from drones to social media monitoring to leveraging video analytics and facial recognition systems. 0 accountability.

Combined w/Commissioner's statement that there will be no decrease in broken windows policing, you can predict where the focus will be.

https://twitter.com/Josmar_Trujillo/status/1245724134866333696

Here’s a link to the story, which doesn’t address the full surveillance suite housed in the domain awareness center. ny1.com/nyc/all-boroug…

I’m finally reading Guantanamo Diary. Going to keep a running thread of facts and passages that should be of interest if you follow our work. “People with hatred always have something to get off their chests, but I wasn’t ready to be that drain.”

This morning feels particularly full of bad-faith arguments about security being used to justify all kinds of policies.

To keep from boiling over, I'll say the Liberty & National Security Program here @BrennanCenter exists to push back on this narrative. Here's a snippet: Controversial surveillance technology often finds its way to schools, setting a path to accelerate existing disparities that drive students of color from school to the criminal justice system. nytimes.com/2020/02/06/bus…

I like a lot of the ideas in here, but I think the plan suffers from vague definitions of disinformation, and I'm troubled at how civil liberties & civil rights are an afterthought. Here's a quick analysis:

https://twitter.com/ewarren/status/1222550226126413824

First, we need a better definition of the problem we're trying to address: state-sponsored disinformation. Not foreign interference, not Russian trolls, not fake accounts. If we lose sight of this, we amplify the downstream consequences on ordinary speech.

Even NYPD officers are talking to reporters about the foreseeable issues with Clearview:

"It only takes one cop to put in his ex-girlfriend’s photo in there and see who she’s dating now...They’re playing with fire. It’s going to catch up to them.”
nypost.com/2020/01/23/rog… Cops misusing technology to stalk their exes, crushes, etc. is such a common practice that there's even a word for it: LOVEINT. apnews.com/699236946e3140…

Removals of “terrorist content” are always overbroad because they’re largely automated by algorithms that can’t understand context. codastory.com/authoritarian-… IG is being misleading by saying it’s just complying with US sanctions law. It’s actually just using sanctions lists to inform who IG designates as a “terrorist org” for enforcing its community standards.

It’s partly why these removals rarely address white supremacists.

All the tools and techniques described here are available in the US. So is the foreseeable misuse by police.

NYPD says we’re fundamentally different than China. The line is thinner than believed. #POSTAct
nytimes.com/2019/12/17/tec… NYPD thanks @LegalAidNYC for pointing out the need to expunge juvenile fingerprints from its database.

The #POSTAct would require the NYPD to proactively address retention issues in an impact and use policy.