Marketplace Tech

About a decade ago, Facebook started automatically tagging people whose faces its algorithms had recognized in uploaded photos. It almost seemed like magic. This week, Facebook agreed to pay $550 million over claims that the tool violated privacy rights. The settlement was in Illinois, which has strict laws protecting biometric data. The social giant revealed the settlement agreement at the same time as its quarterly financial results this week. Natasha Singer, a tech reporter for the New York Times, explains to host Jack Stewart what the settlement means.

World Athletics, the governing body for track and field, is set to announce whether it’ll ban certain types of shoes. In particular, Nike’s Vaporfly shoes have been prominently on the feet of athletes responsible for tumbling race records recently. Nike says that the $250 sneakers shave up to 4% off a runner’s time. But is that technology some sort of doping?

Airbnb, Tinder, British Airways, Duolingo, Spotify and even Marketplace are just some of the hundreds of websites that Facebook says have shared my data with the social network. Just from those you can probably work out more about me than I might want to share. This is all part of Facebook’s Off-Facebook Activity, its new tracking tool that went into wide release yesterday. It lists all of the companies and websites that share activity, like views, purchases or even just when you open an app. Facebook uses all that data to allow advertisers to create messages that are tightly targeted to you and your interests.

We’re in a moment right now where we’re sort of mad at technology. Our phones are sucking up all our time and data; our social media platforms are spreading misinformation and divisive arguments; there are privacy and ethical dilemmas around every corner. But there are those who still believe that technological innovation will change our lives for the better.

Now that the California Consumer Privacy Act is in place, lots of researchers and consumers are testing out their new rights under the law to find out what information data companies have about them. It’s now possible to ask companies to delete that data if you so desire, but to really scrub yourself out of the data machine, you’re going have to put in some work. Luckily, Laura Noren, a vice president at Obsidian Security, is using her machete to hack through the data privacy jungle for us.

This week, Cruise, the self-driving car subsidiary of GM, introduced Origin, a fully autonomous vehicle that has no driving controls whatsoever. It’s meant to be a rolling pod that carries passengers on demand, almost like a small bus or train car. But are companies allowed to operate cars without steering wheels on public roads? Both Cruise and Waymo have pushed the federal government to lift requirements on equipment like pedals, steering wheels and mirrors, and they are allowed in certain conditions. States have their own rules. Although carmakers and safety advocates have been hoping for some clear guidance on what will and won’t be allowed nationwide, Jack Stewart, who covers transportation for Marketplace, says that’s not coming anytime soon.

Right now, registrations for websites that use dot-org — like Marketplace — are overseen by a nonprofit organization called the Internet Society. But in November, the Internet Society suddenly announced that it would sell control of those registrations to a one-year-old private equity firm called Ethos Capital for $1.1 billion. That made people worry about the future of nonprofits online due to possible interference with speech or even big price hikes. A group of internet pioneers proposed an all-new nonprofit group to run dot-org. Overseeing all of this is ICANN, the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers, which can approve or reject the sale. Andrew McLaughlin, who helped found ICANN, talks to host Molly Wood about it.

This week, Google/Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai argued that we need to regulate artificial intelligence and also suggested a temporary ban on facial recognition technology. Microsoft President Brad Smith, speaking at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, also said we need to create ethical guidelines and rules for how AI should be used. In a new novel out this week by legendary sci-fi author William Gibson, the tech is good enough to decide for itself. The book is called “Agency,” and it’s a sequel to Gibson’s 2014 novel “The Peripheral.” In that book, a super technologically advanced future society can create new alternate histories called stubs for fun or influence the timeline leading to their own present. Gibson talks about “Agency” and the upcoming TV series based on “The Peripheral” with host Molly Wood.

Google recently announced some big privacy changes for its internet browser Chrome. It’s planning to make obsolete what are known as third-party cookies. Cookies are the trackers that advertisers plant so when you shop for shoes one time, you’ll then see ads for them … forever. It’ll also put a limit on the amount of data websites can collect. Other browsers have already made moves to cut tracking and preserve privacy, but what Google does might be significant in that it may change the way the whole web works.

This year’s census is going digital — the first one in history to be available to complete online, instead of on paper. That’s fitting in a world that’s much more connected, compared to 10 years ago, but our online lives mean there’s some risks, too. Disinformation is a big one — mainly fake news designed to influence people’s thinking, which led to intense criticism of social media platforms after the 2016 elections. The Census Bureau is warning that false information could affect the number of people who take part in the upcoming Census.