Tech Policy Leaders

Bio

Elisa Shearer (@elisashearer) is a Research Associate at the Pew Research Center. She earned her Masters in Communications, Culture, and Technology from Georgetown and a Bachelor's in Psychology from Houghton College, from which she graduated Magna Cum Laude.

Americans are Wary of the Role Social Media Sites Play in Delivering the News by Elisa Shearer and Elizabeth Grieco (Pew, 2019)

Pew Research Journalism (Twitter)

Facebook's Menlo Park Police

Motherboard reports on Facebook's comfortable relationship with the Menlo Park Police Department. Apparently, Facebook is paying the City of Menlo Park some $2 million per year – a large some for a small city – to have a dedicated police force for Facebook's campus. One of the things the Facebook unit does is monitor for thefts of bikes the company sets out for its employees. The employees aren't permitted to leave the bikes outside of Facebook's campus, but they often do it anyway.

Sometimes citizens in the neighboring community, East Palo Alto, use the bikes. The majority of citizens on East Palo Alto are black or Latinx. One of the people the cops picked up for using one of the bikes was Latinx. But it turns out the employee was a Facebook contractor. So citizens and advocates have called out the police and Facebook for working together on racial profiling. It's a long read, but you can find the full report in the show notes.

AOC Blasts Facebook for Political Ad Policy

Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez blasted Facebook on Twitter on Saturday, calling the company's political behavior "increasingly disturbing". Connecting the dots, the Congresswoman noted that Zuckerberg claimed he didn't know when Facebook discovered the Cambridge Analytica scandal, that Zuckerberg met with Trump, and the far right thenm started allowing disinformation ads, and that Zuckerberg didn't tell the whole truth about fact checkers. She says that Facebook acts like they're just an innocent bystander but that Facebook's decisions have become more and more disturbing. According to the New York Times, Hundreds of Facebook employees wrote an open letter to Mark Zuckerberg urging him to hold ads placed by politicians to the same high accuracy standard as those placed by any advertiser.

House passes third election security bill

The House has passed a third election security bill designed to prevent foreign interference in the 2020 election. The bill passed 221-181 mostly along party lines. The act is dubbed the SHIELD act and it targets paid online political ads. Republicans raised First Amendment concerns about the bill, and the American Civil Liberties Union said that it sweeps to broadly.

Facebook announces Russian efforts to remain undetected

According to Reuters, Russian operatives attempting to interfere with the platform ahead of the 2020 election are trying to remain invisible by sacrificing followers. Facebook is specifically flagging accounts that grow very quickly.

Google employees claim company is developing a tool to stop organizers

Google employees are claiming that the company is creating a tool to monitor calendar invites to try and prevent staffers from organizing. The tool would apparently flag employees that create events with more than 10 rooms or 100 people. Google denies that the tool is designed to thwart organizing efforts.

Pentagon awards $10 billion contrat to Microsoft

The Pentagon awarded its 10 year, $10 billion Joint Enterprise Defense Infrastructure (JEDI) contract to Microsoft, closing it off from Amazon, which was expected to win the deal, as it was considered by many analysts to have the best capabilities. But Microsoft too has the highest military security rating possible.

A former speechwriter for former Defense Secretary Jim Mattis said that President Trump wanted to "screw over" Amazon and its CEO Jeff Bezos, who also owns the Washington Post—one of the news outlets the president thinks is biased against him. But the Pentagon states that its awarding of the contract to Microsoft is in line with an overall multi-platform strategy, that can't be handled by a single vendor.

Google announces quantum computing milestone

Google announced a quantum computing milestone last week, saying that it had developed a microprocessor that took minutes to perform a calculation that would have taken the world's best super computer thousands of years.

Andrew Free (@ImmCivilRights) is an abolitionist lawyer fighting alongside immigrant communities in the Deep South and across the country to defend deportations and advance civil rights.

Law Office of R. Andrew Free

A Good Provider is One Who Leaves by Jason DeParle

Electronic Frontier Foundation's Resource on Maryland v. King

HEADLINES:

Mark Zuckerberg defends decision to allow misinformation by politicians

Zuckerberg delivered remarks on Thursday at Georgetown defending his company's policy to leave up false political ads. But his speech was roundly criticized.

Both Democrats and civil rights organizations blasted Zuckerberg for deliberately refusing to fact-check ads placed by politicians. Leadership Conference for Civil Rights President Vanita Gupta, NAACP Legal Defense Fund head Sherrilyn Ifill, and Bernice King—the daughter of slain civil rights icon Martin Luther King, Jr.—all pointed to the historical role that disinformation has played in suppressing the voices of and inciting hatred against people of color.

Elizabeth Warren also escalated her attacks against Zuckerberg, challenging Facebook to remove an ad that her campaign posted. In order to illustrate the absurdity of Facebook's policy to leave up false ads placed by politicians, Warren's ad contained a deliberately false claim that Zuckerberg had endorsed Donald Trump for president. Facebook responded that it would prioritize free speech over facts and that it wouldn't step in to police false claims made by politicians.

Joe Biden's presidential campaign sent a letter to Facebook after a political action committee posted an ad that falsely claimed that Biden blackmailed the Ukrainian government to stop investigating his son, Hunter Biden, by threatening to withhold aid. Biden's campaign says the ad wasn't posted by a politician—it was posted by a PAC—and should've been taken down. The ad has since been removed.

On Monday, Facebook announced that it found and disabled misinformation campaigns apparently being conducted by Russia and Iran. The company also announced plans to label content posted by state actors.

Warren pledges to reject donations from big tech

In a blog post ahead of Tuesday's Democratic debate, Elizabeth Warren also pledged to reject campaign funding from executives at Alphabet, Facebook, Amazon, Apple, Microsoft, Lyft, and other big tech companies. Those executives would otherwise be allowed to donate up to $2,800.

Harris and Warren spar over Twitter

During the Democratic debate Tuesday night, Kamala Harris went after Elizabeth Warren for the latter's refusal to support Harris' call for Twitter to disable Trump's Twitter account. Warren responded that her goal is to get Trump out of the White House not off Twitter. Twitter has said that it would not disable Trump's account unless he specifically violates the social media company's rules against threatening individuals, promoting terrorism or self-harm, or posting private information like a phone number.

Bernie Sanders wants to break up big media

Bernie Sanders, on the other hand, is taking a slightly different tack. The presidential candidate released a plan to dismantle the mergers of large media companies that have been approved during the Trump era. Sanders specifically mentioned Disney's acquisition of 21st Century Fox as an example of corporate greed that he would seek to tamp down as president.

Facebook loses support from major Libra allies

Facebook has lost the support of major banks it relied on to make its cryptocurrency, Libra, a reality. Mastercard, Visa, Ebay, Stripe and Latin American payments company Mercado Pago all pulled out of the partnership with the so-called Libra Association, citing regulatory concerns and a number of other factors. The companies joined PayPal, which left the association the week before last. Lyft and Vodafone are still in, according to Reuters.

FCC approves Sprint T-Mobile merger

The Federal Communications Commission voted along party lines to approve the Sprint-T-Mobile merger last week, with Democratic Commissioners Jessica Rosenworcel and Geoffrey Starks opposing based on pricing concerns, including the lack of a resolution regarding the broadband subsidy program known as Lifeline. The deal got the DOJ's stamp of approval in July. But the merger still faces a multistate lawsuit from ten states seeking to block the merger.

AT&T 's keeps hiking prices

AT&T has continued to hike prices by as much as 50%, according to Jon Brodkin at Ars Technica. The company's new "TV Now" package is rising by $15 per month, from $50 to $65. The company is also raising prices on its "Live a Little" plan from $50 to $60 in November. This is the second time the company has raised prices for this plan. In April, it hiked it from $40 to $50—that's a $20 monthly increase over the span of just 7 months.

Ora Tanner (@odtanner) is Assistant Director of the Office of Undergraduate Research at the University of South Florida (USF). She previously worked as a nuclear physicist, science educator, and more recently as a graduate researcher on NSF-funded grant projects related to digital game-based learning and assessment. Ora earned her B.S. and M.S. in physics from Dillard University of New Orleans and USF, respectively, and expects to complete her doctorate in Instructional Technology and Educational Measurement in 2019. She studies the latest emerging technologies and explores how they can be used to empower both K-12 students and teachers in science education.

Resources

Aspen Tech Policy Hub – Florida Schools Project

Right to Petition: A Practical Guide to Creating Change in Government with Political Advocacy Tools and Tips by Nicole Tisdale (Advocacy Blueprints Press, 2019)

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News Roundup

Elizabeth Warren Blasts Facebook for Enabling Trump

Elizabeth Warren's presidential campaign targeted Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg this week in a new social media ad. The ad facetiously alleges that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg has endorsed Donald Trump for President. The assertion wasn't true, of course, but that was the point: Warren says that endorsing Trump is essentially what Facebook and Mark Zuckerberg are doing by allowing politicians to post false ads on the platform.

In recent weeks, the social media giant has refused to remove false ads from politicians. As recently as Friday, Facebook declined to remove a Trump campaign ad questioning Presidential candidate Joe Biden's alleged role in ousting a Ukrainian prosecutor, after the Democratic National Committee called for the ad to be removed. Facebook is uniformly refusing to take down false ads, claiming to prioritize freedom of expression over truth.

But Zuckerberg has also been defending himself for meeting with conservative groups, politicians, and pundits in private dinners and other gatherings. Zuckerberg's terse response to those who criticized the meeting was, "Meeting new people and hearing from a wide range of viewpoints is part of learning … If you haven't tried it, I suggest you do!" Zuckerberg is set to return to Washington on October 23rd, to testify before the House Financial Services Committee, which is chaired by Maxine Waters.

Public demand for government intervention in online extremism clashes with civil liberties groups

According to a recent Morning Consult poll, some 58% of Americans want Congress to take a more active role in moderating online content. But the efforts of Democrats in Congress to push for legislation to curtail online extremism are getting resistance from civil liberties groups, including NYU's Brennan Center.

The Hill reports that the Democrat-controlled House Homeland Security Committee is pushing for a bill that would create a bipartisan, 12-member commission with the power, not only to study online extremism, but also to subpoena certain communications. Civil liberties groups oppose any expansion of government surveillance, stating that such surveillance could have a disproportionate impact on vulnerable communities, such as communities of color.

Meanwhile, online extremists who used to post on 8chan until it was shut down, have now been migrating over to Telegram, according to a new Vice News investigation published last week finding that more than two thirds of the 150 extremist groups on Telegram were established in 2019. And extremist content on YouTube shows few signs of slowing. A violent YouTube video containing fictitious movie footage of a shooting surfaced over the weekend, after it was shown at a pro-Trump event hosted by the conservative group American Priority on a Trump golf course. In it, Trump's image is superimposed on top of ashooter's, and those of his political opponents, including Barack Obama, Mitt Romney, and logos of major media companies, were superimposed on top of the faces of the victims in the movie, to make it appear as though the president was massacring his opponents inside a church. The president stated that he strongly condemns the video, but that he hasn't seen it. On Friday, in an ostensible coincidence, Trump stated at a rally that there is an "unholy alliance of corrupt Democrat politicians, deep-state bureaucrats and the fake news media."

California blocks facial recognition in police body cams

California governor Gavin Newsome signed a bill last week that prevents the police from using facial recognition in body cams. The bill remains in effect until January 1st, 2023. New Hampshire and Oregon have passed similar legislation.

Domino's must make its website and app accessible to people with disabilities

Finally, In a case that carries significant implications for every online platform, the Supreme Court declined to hear an appeal from a lower court ruling that a blind customer can sue Domino's pizza, under the Americans with Disabilities Act, for failing to make its website fully accessible. Fast Company reports though that the U.S. Chamber of Commerce is pushing back, saying that allowing customers to sue can open the floodgates of litigation and thereby harm small businesses.

Data journalist Meredith Broussard (@merbroussard) is an associate professor at the Arthur L. Carter Journalism Institute of New York University and the author of "Artificial Unintelligence: How Computers Misunderstand the World.". Her academic research focuses on artificial intelligence in investigative reporting, with a particular interest in using data analysis for social good. She is also interested in reproducible research issues and is developing methods for preserving innovative digital journalism projects in scholarly archives so that we can read today's news on tomorrow's computers. She is an affiliate faculty member at the Moore Sloan Data Science Environment at the NYU Center for Data Science, a 2019 Reynolds Journalism Institute Fellow, and her work has been supported by the Institute of Museum & Library Services as well as the Tow Center at Columbia Journalism School. A former features editor at the Philadelphia Inquirer, she has also worked as a software developer at AT&T Bell Labs and the MIT Media Lab. Her features and essays have appeared in The Atlantic, Slate, and other outlets.

Artificial Unintelligence: How Computers Misunderstand the World (MIT Press, 2018)

New York Daily News: Google trained facial recognition on 'dark skinned' homeless people

The New York Daily News reports that Google apparently sent out contractors to pay homeless people $5 gift cards to train facial recognition on 'dark skinned' homeless people. The revelation comes after several former Google temp workers came forward. Google has acknowledged the program, though, and said its primary goal is to have a diverse and inclusive data set. Better security is also a goal, said the Google spokesperson, because the company is seeking to protect as many people as possible. But the workers took issue with some of the specific tactics they were asked to employ via their staffing agency, Randstad, under the direction of Google.

DNC goes after Facebook for enabling Trump

The CEO of the Democratic National Committee, Seema Nanda, went on CNN last week and accused Facebook of catering to Trump by allowing him to "mislead the American people". The previous week, Facebook refused to remove posts and ads from politicians even if they violate Facebook's community rules.

Also, Scott Lucas of BuzzFeed wrote a piece on Facebook's growing popularity among older and more conservative voters, and whether Facebook may in fact be Trump's secret weapon against Democrats in the 2020 election.

Sen. Kamala Harris calls on Twitter to suspend Trump

In a letter to Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey, Senator Kamala Harris, who is running for president, called on Twitter to suspend Trump's Twitter account, citing the president's attempts to "target, harass, and attempt to out" the first Ukraine whistleblower. She also referred to the president's tweet stating that there would be a Civil War-like fracture, if he's impeached, saying it was an incitement to violence. The president also referred to the impeachment investigation as a "coup" to which Harris retweeted with a comment saying "Hey Jack … time to do something about this." But Senator Elizabeth Warren and Representative Tulsi Gabbard, both of whom are also running for president, disagreed that Twitter should suspend the president's Twitter account. The two lawmakers said that "we can't just cancel or shutdown or silence those who we disagree with or who hold different views or who say things even that we strongly disagree with or abhor."

Court of Appeals upholds the FCC's net neutrality repeal

The DC Circuit Court of Appeals upheld the FCC's 2017 repeal of the 2015 net neutrality rules. The court sided with the FCC in saying that the internet isn't a "telecommunications service". But the court did say, however, that the FCC didn't make a compelling argument that the FCC preempts state law, clearing the way for states to enact their own net neutrality rules, provided that they don't undermine the repeal order. The court also said the FCC failed to properly consider the effect the rules would have on public safety, serving the underserved, and a wonky area of telecom law that deals with regulations around how ISPs should attach telecom equipment to existing telephone poles.

DHS proposes rule to collect DNA evidence from detained migrants

The Department of Homeland Security has proposed a rule that would allow the widespread collection of DNA from detained migrants. The Trump administration argues that the effort would aid the U.S. in identifying undocumented individuals. But policy experts cited in Roll Call are concerned that the program is just another way to target people of color.

Tim Cook urges Supreme Court to preserve DACA

Tim Cook filed an amicus brief in the Supreme Court urging the Court to protect the Deferred Action for Childhood (DACA) arrival program. If the Supreme Court rules against the program, hundreds of thousands of individuals who arrived in the U.S. as children, some of which work at Apple, could face deportation.

Google can now recognize 9 "data-scarce" Indian languages

Google researchers presented a model that recognizes speech in 9 "data scarce" Indian languages at Interspeech 2019 last week. The researches say the model allows for real-time speech recognition of all of the languages and does so better than other models. The languages include Hindi, Marathi, Urdu, Bengali, Tamil, Telugu, Kannada, Malayalam and Gujarati.

Rep. Maxine Waters and House Finance Committee press Zuckerberg to testify

The House Financial Services Committee, for which California Representative Maxine Waters serves as chair, is demanding that Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg testify regarding its plan to introduce its Libra cryptocurrency. The company has planned to send COO Sheryl Sandberg, but the Committee indicated that sending Sandberg is insufficient. Waters has called for Zuckerberg to testify by January.

Microsoft reports hacking attempts linked to Iran

Microsoft reported a hacking attempt linked to Iran on 2,700 email accounts, of which 241 were successful. Some of the accounts included presidential candidates, according to the Hill, which also noted that an undisclosed source indicated that the Trump campaign was among the targets. The Trump campaign has said that it does not have any evidence of an attack.

UPS gets FAA approval for a drone fleet

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has approved UPS' plan to operate an unlimited fleet of drones nationwide. The drones are permitted to operate at night, but not yet in populated areas. UPS has not announced plans to train existing drivers to pilot the drones.

Charlton McIlwain (@cmcilwain) is Vice Provost or Faculty Engagement and Development; Professor of Media, Culture and Communication at

New York University. His recent work focuses on the intersections of race, digital media, and racial justice activism. He recently wrote Racial Formation, Inequality & the Political Economy of Web Traffic, in the journal Information, Communication & Society, and he co-authored, with Deen Freelon and Meredith Clark, the recent report Beyond the Hashtags: Ferguson, #BlackLivesMatter, and the Online Struggle for Offline Justice, published by the Center for Media & Social Impact, and supported by the Spencer Foundation. Today, Tuesday October 1st, 2019, his new book entitled Black Software: The Internet & Racial Justice, From the AfroNet to Black Lives Matter, releases via Oxford University Press and available wherever you buy books.

McIlwain, Charlton. Black Software: The Internet & Racial Justice, from the AFRONET to Black Lives Matter (Oxford University Press, 2019)

EFF uncovers secret F.B.I. subpoenas for personal info from multiple companies

The New York Times reports that the Electronic Frontier Foundation shared with it scores of documents uncovered in a Freedom of Information Act request that reveal the extent to which federal law enforcement officials issue subpoenas to companies in an effort to uncover personal data about individuals the Justice Department suspects of being a threat to National Security. The Justice Department has issued the so-called National Security Letters (NSLs) to companies as diverse as Equifax, Verizon, Google, and Microsoft seeking things like user names, IP addresses, locations, and records of purchases made by their customers.

Elizabeth Warren proposes more tech expertise on the Hill

Senator Elizabeth Warren is pushing for more tech expertise on the Hill, saying that it would help resist tech companies' growing lobbying influence in Washington. Warren says tech companies' strategy has been to purport that they understand tech issues better than congressional staffers. So she's advocating for the reestablishment of the Office of Technology Assessment (OTA), which Newt Gingrich dismantled in 1995. For about two decades, the OTA was tasked with helping to keep Congressional staffers abreast of tech issues.

NAACP slams Comcast over Byron Allen lawsuit

The NAACP slammed Comcast for asking the Supreme Court to curtail section 1981 of the Civil Rights Act of 1866, which outlaws discrimination in contracting. Comcast and Trump's Department of Justice are asking the Supreme Court to water down the statute by requiring plaintiffs to prove that race was the only motivating factor for why a defendant didn't award a contract, as opposed being one of several factors. Comcast is requesting the more conservative reading of the statute in the context of a $20 billion lawsuit Byron Allen brought against it and Charter for opting out of carrying Allen's cable channels. The Department of Justice filed an amicus brief on Comcast's behalf. Allen is arguing that race does not need to be the only motivating factor in a contract discrimination lawsuit and that Comcast and the Trump administration are conspiring to eviscerate this landmark civil rights law, which was passed in the wake of the Civil War—the first one.

EEOC says companies' Facebook ads discriminated against women and older workers

The Equal Employment Opportunity Commission found that seven (7) companies including Capital One, Edward Jones, Nebraska Furniture Mart, Enterprise Holdings, Renewal by Andersen, Drive Time Auto, and Sandhills Publishing discriminated against women and older workers by targeting ads based on age and gender. The Commission found that while targeting based on ages an gender may be appropriate in some cases, it's not appropriate for housing, real estate, financial services, and job opportunities.

FTC sues Match

The Federal Trade Commission is suing dating platform Match Group, owner of Match, Tinder, OKCupid, Hinge, PlentyofFish and other dating apps, for fraud, TechCrunch reports. The lawsuit targets Match.com specifically saying the platform is overrun by bots and spammers that Match encourages and profits from.

DoorDash hack exposes data of 4.9 million people

Online delivery service DoorDash is one of the latest targets of a hack. This time, the hack exposed the data of 4.9 million people. Even though the hack happened in May, DoorDash didn't discover it until September.

GAO urges FCC to take measures to help Tribal areas access spectrum

Finally, the Government Accountability Office wants the FCC to take more active measures to address a shortage of spectrum on Tribal lands. The report indicates that Tribal lands, especially those in rural areas, lag behind the rest of the country when it comes to broadband access. It says that wireless can help close the divide. GAO says the FCC needs to do more to assess the extent to which Tribal organizations participate in spectrum auctions and to which unused spectrum across tribal lands could be used to deliver broadband access.

Jeffrey Cole has been at the forefront of media and communication technology issues both in the United States and internationally for the past three decades. An expert in the field of technology and emerging media, Cole serves as an adviser to governments and leading companies around the world as they craft digital strategies.

In July 2004 Dr. Cole joined the USC Annenberg School for Communication as Director of the newly formed Center for the Digital Future and as a Research Professor. Prior to joining USC, Dr. Cole was a longtime member of the UCLA faculty and served as Director of the UCLA Center for Communication Policy, based in the Anderson Graduate School of Management. Cole founded and directs the World Internet Project, a long-term longitudinal look at the effects of computer and Internet technology, which is conducted in over 35 countries. At the announcement of the project in June 1999, Vice President Al Gore praised Cole as a "true visionary providing the public with information on how to understand the impact of media." Nineteen years into the project, the World Internet Project, through its unique data on Internet users around the world, is the leading, unrivaled international project examining the ways in which technology changes our lives.

Cole regularly presents trends and insights of the project to the White House, FCC, Congress, Department of Defense and heads of governments around the world. He has worked closely with the CEOs of GroupM, Ericsson, Telstra, Wesfarmers and others. On the advisory side, his long-term relationships have included Microsoft, Sony, Time Warner, AT&T, AARP, CBS, NBC, ABC, CPB, PBS, HP, Coca-Cola and many more as they learn to navigate the digital future. He also sits on Unilever's (the world's second largest advertiser) Global Digital Strategy Board.

In 2016 Cole was one of the founders of the Global Disruption Fund (GDF), a technology investment fund based in Australia (www.globaldisruptionfund.com.au). Cole is one of the members of the Investment Committee identifying innovative companies and those about to be disrupted, making investments based on his work. The Fund is now worth close to $1 billion and growing; it achieved a 40% return in its first year. Since 2017 he has written a popular and widely circulated column on disruption, media, technology and entertainment (www.digitalcenter.org/cole).

Under Cole's leadership, the Center has conducted deep examinations of the entertainment, sports media, transportation and banking industries to identify where the next wave of disruption will occur. More than just identifying trends, the Center works closely with industry to create policies and make the concrete changes that will keep them competitive. That work includes all five (formerly six) motion picture studios, all four networks and now streaming companies, as well as sports networks, leagues, automotive companies and banks.

In the 1990s, Cole worked closely with the four broadcast networks (ABC, CBS, NBC and Fox) dealing with television programming issues under an anti-trust waiver that allowed the networks to work together for the very first time. He issued annual reports to the television industry, Congress and the nation. Upon the release of the 1996 report, Cole held a joint press conference with President Bill Clinton, who referred to the Center for Communication Policy as "the premier educational institution setting trends in entertainment." Nationwide there was unanimous praise for the quality of the reports and their contribution to the television content debate.

Cole has testified before Congress on television issues and has been a keynote speaker at more than 750 conferences on media and technology (many can be seen on YouTube). He has worked with the White House during the Clinton and George W. Bush administrations on media and telecommunications issues. He regularly makes presentations across the U.S., Europe, Asia, Latin America, the Middle East and Africa.

Cole was a member of the Executive Committee of the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences (ATAS) from 1997 to 2001 and was the founding governor of the ATAS Interactive Media Peer Group. At UCLA, Cole taught over 35,000 students. In 1987 he received UCLA's Distinguished Teaching Award.

USC Annenberg Center for the Digital Future

Election security funding bill gets McConnell's support

Mitch McConnell, whom Democrats had started to call "Moscow Mitch", backed a $250 million spending bill last week to help states beef up election security. McConnell had previously blocked two bills that would have boosted security and required paper ballots.

Facebook suspends thousands of apps following audit

Facebook has suspended tens of thousands of apps after an internal audit revealed that they could either have be a threat or didn't respond to Facebook's requests for information. Facebook says the move comes after a review of millions of apps following the Cambridge Analytica scandal. The FTC fined Facebook $5 billion over the summer for privacy violations. Meanwhile, Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg was in town meeting with members of Congress and President Trump at the White House, meetings which sources say were "constructive".

Emmy's awards feature little diversity

Well, there's not much else we can say about the 71st Emmy Awards other than the fact that this year's awards offered shockingly little diversity. National Urban League CEO Marc Morial and FCC Commissioner Jessica Rosenworcel penned a joint Op-Ed in the Hill released prior to the awards discussing this year's lack of nominees of color. For example, not one woman of color was nominated for lead actress in a comedy. This year, just 26 nominees were people of color, compared to 38 last year. Just three people of color ended up winning—RuPaul Charles won for hosting RuPaul's Drag Race, Jharrel Jerome won for When they See Us, and Bill Porter won for Pose. When are we gonna stop begging these people to include us, fam? Seriously.

FCC Open Meeting Agenda

The FCC released its open meeting agenda. The meeting will take place at 10:30 at the FCC. A proposal for $950 million in funding for Puerto Rico's communications infrastructure is first on the agenda.

New York Times ends Spanish language coverage

The New York Times is ending Spanish language coverage. "While the Español site did attract a new audience for our journalism and consistently produced coverage we are very proud of," the Times said in a statement, "it did not prove financially successful". New York Times in Español launched in response to President Trump's hate speech against Mexicans.

NBC/Universal has launched a new streaming service

NBC/Universal has launched a new streaming service dubbed Peacock, which is slated for launch in April. NBC/Universal will join the long list of new Netflix streaming competitors including the likes of Disney, Apple, and HBO Max.

CJ Johnson is an award-winning creative entrepreneur, speaker and internet personality. First known as the go-to "branding guru" supporting hundreds of startups and Fortune 500 companies worldwide with his impactful creative strategies to cultivating hundreds of thousands of social media followers as an influential millennial voice in the fight against social media depression.

Currently based in Los Angeles and New York, CJ is best known for his work in next-generation marketing that includes: creative strategies, the future of work, diversity and inclusion, and influencer marketing.

He was first introduced to the world of business and marketing early in his career but it soared to new heights during the explosion of the startup movement and as the YouTube generation reshaped the industries of the world. Using his professional creative skills, he broke down racial barriers and became a strong voice in the Silicon Beach movement.

After successful ventures overseeing marketing/publicity for several on-demand mobiles apps and startups, he went on to pursue his entrepreneurial passion by creating the digital agency, Januel+Johnson. After a couple of successful years with the agency, CJ and his partner decided to part ways to pursue their own personal passions.

CJ has helped a total of over 128+ Startups, Entrepreneurs, and Fortune 500 companies worldwide find success with effective growth strategies. He now focuses on his primary mission of supporting and inspiring YOU to chase after YOUR dreams.

cjjohnsonjr.com

Twitter takes down violent tweet from Texas state lawmaker

Twitter took down the tweet of a Texas state lawmaker for violating Twitter's policy against promoting violence. The Republican legislator, Briscoe Cain, wrote that his "AR is ready for you" after presidential candidate Beto O'Rourke tweeted "Hell yes, we're going to take your AR-15s". O'Rourke called Cain's tweet a death threat.

Intercept: NRA increased Facebook ad spending after El Paso, Dayton shootings

The Intercept reported that the National Rifle Association increased its spending on Facebook ads following last month's shootings in El Paso and Dayton, in which 32 total people were killed. The Intercept reported that the NRA's Facebook spending reached a high point of $29,000 on August 18th, with $360,000 spent on ads in the month following the attacks. Compared to just $9,400 during the month prior.

Hundreds arrested in global wire scam

The DOJ announced the arrest of 281 individuals worldwide who were allegedly co-conspirators in a pervasive wire scam targeting banks and their customers. The Hill reports that the scammers target bank employees with access to financial information, whom they then persuade to transfer funds to a fraudulent account. More than half the arrests were made in Nigeria but law enforcement officials also made arrests in the UK, Turkey, Japan and several other countries. The DOJ conducted the operation—dubbed Operation ReWired—along with the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, Departments of Homeland Security, State, and Treasury.

Facebook announces efforts to prevent triggering self-harm

Facebook announced its efforts to prevent self-harm as part of its participation in World Suicide Prevention Day last Tuesday. The company said it'll be hiring a health and well-being expert, as well as seek to explore ways to share relevant data with the public that could be used to prevent self harm. Also, Facebook will no longer allow triggering content, such as images of self-harm or cutting.

Facebook penalizes Netanyahu's Facebook page for hate speech

Finally, Facebook suspended a chatbot on Israeli prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu's Facebook page. The chat bot promised site visitors that Netanyahu would pursue a right wing agenda against quote "Arabs who want to destroy us all". Facebook suspended the bot for 24 hours and promised to take additional action if they detect any further violations.

Malcom Glenn (@malcomglenn) is a writer, speaker, and public policy and communications specialist.

Malcom is currently the Head of Global Policy for Accessibility and Underserved Communities at Uber Technologies in Washington, DC, where he leads Uber's worldwide efforts to make the current and future platform more accessible for historically marginalized groups, spearheading the company's work to improve outcomes for people with disabilities, low-income families, communities of color, rural residents, seniors, and returning citizens, among many other groups facing barriers to transportation or work.

Malcom is a member of the board of directors for BUILD Metro DC, an organization that helps high school students from low-income backgrounds learn entrepreneurship skills, graduate from high school, and attend college. He's also on the board of directors for the World Institute on Disability, a Berkeley-based nonprofit that works to fully integrate people with disabilities into their communities. Malcom is a former fellow for the Transatlantic Digital Debates program, a joint venture of New America and the Global Public Policy Institute that's focused on building more long-term transatlantic cooperation in the digital age, particularly between Germany and the United States.

Malcom is a former executive communications manager at Google in Mountain View, CA, where he developed strategic communications for two of Google's Chief Financial Officers, the head of the company's Access and Energy practice, as well as their respective leadership teams.

Before joining Google, Malcom was the director of communications at the American Federation for Children, a leading national education advocacy organization focused on expanding educational options for children from low-income communities.

Malcom previously worked on issue campaigns at the Democratic polling firm Greenberg Quinlan Rosner, where he helped organizations hone their messages.

A native of Denver, CO, Malcom graduated from Harvard College with a bachelor's degree in history, where he was the president of The Harvard Crimson, the nation's oldest continuously published daily college newspaper.

Uber - Community

Uber - Accessibility

Malcom Glenn

HEADLINES:

Google and Facebook come under intense scrutiny as attorneys general throughout the country and the DOJ open investigations , Paypal suspends an account linked to the KKK and can Uber solve transportation inquality? Malcom Glenn is my guest for this, episode 200

50 Attorneys General launch Google investigation

The Attorneys General from 50 states and territories launched an antitrust investigation into Google Monday. Puerto Rico and the District of Columbia are represented among those that filed lawsuits. California and Alabama abstained.

Attorneys General coalition announces Facebook investigation

Another coalition of attorneys general from eight (8) states announced an investigation into Facebook on Friday. The coalition, led by New York State AG Letitia James, will investigate Facebook's dominance in social media.

DOJ requests documents from Google

In addition, the Department of Justice made a document request from Google and its parent company Alphabet on Friday. Alphabet says the document request is for documents released during a prior antitrust investigation.

PayPal suspends account linked to KKK

PayPal suspended the account of the Loyal White Knights of the Ku Klux Klan for six days. PayPal had pledged to suspend accounts seeking to raise money for hate groups. And the Loyal White Knights profile linked to a landing page requesting donations. Now the link points to a page that's no longer accepting donations, the Hill reports.

Flagstaff schools close following breach

Public schools in Flagstaff, Arizona shut down last week following a ransomware attack. In an effort to find the bug and prevent a re-infection, schools closed Friday as the school district investigated all of the computers issued to teachers and staff. Schools re-opened on Monday morning.

14 women sue Lyft alleging that they were attacked by drivers who turned out to be sexual predators

Fourteen anonymous women sued Lyft in San Francisco claiming that they were attacked or kidnapped by Lyft drivers. The lawsuit alleges that Lyft mishandled the investigation of the drivers, keeping them on despite the reports. Five of the women, including one woman who is blind, claimed they were raped.

8chan founder testifies in House hearing

Jim Watkins, the founder of 8chan-the message board on which alleged mass shooters posted manifestos before their rampages, gave a deposition to the House Homeland Security Committee on Thursday. In his prepared testimony, Watkins wrote ""My company has no intention of deleting constitutionally protected hate speech". The statement came the same day a federal court in the Northern District of California ruled that a man was barred by Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act from suing Facebook for treating his alleged hate speech more strictly than similar content posted by white users.

Jen Schradie joined Joe Miller on the WashingTECH Tech Policy Podcast to discuss her work challenging the alleged "social media bias" that has been claimed by conservatives.

Jen Schradie is an Assistant Professor at the Observatoire sociologique du changement (OSC) at Sciences Po in Paris. Previously, she was a Research Fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study in Toulouse, based at the Toulouse School of Economics, as well as at the Maison des Sciences de l'Homme et de la Société, Université de Toulouse. She received her PhD from the Department of Sociology at the University of California-Berkeley with a designated emphasis in New Media from the Berkeley Center for New Media. She also has a master's degree from the Harvard Kennedy School. Her broad research agenda is to interrogate digital democracy claims with empirical data. Despite recent panic about digital threats to democracy, many theorists have still suggested that the Internet can enable a more participatory, pluralist society, but her research challenges these claims, spanning three areas: the digital divide, digital activism, and digital labor. Schradie has found that inequalities, ideologies, and institutions shape participation in our new information society.

Released in May of 2019 by Harvard University Press, The Revolution That Wasn't: How Digital Activism Favors Conservatives, traces what she calls the Digital Activism Gap. Rather than early utopian claims of Facebook and Twitter Revolutions or more recent dystopian ones of Russian bots, state-sponsored hacking, or fake news farms, she reveals a more insidious problem. Instead of the internet spawning democracy or then taking it away, it does not have a life of its own. A Digital Activism Gap is driven by social class inequalities, organizational hierarchies, and reformist conservatism. The prototype of the radical left digital protester did not fit the mold of the 34 groups she studied in North Carolina. Digital activists were much more likely to be Tea Party members than student anarchists. These findings challenge the view of the internet as a pluralist space for social movements. This research, funded by the National Science Foundation, has also generated three journal articles in The International Journal of Communication, Social Problems and Social Media + Society.

She has published four articles on what she coined as "digital production inequality." After articles on this topic were published in Poetics and Information, Communication and Society, the publicity she garnered from these publications earned her the 2012 Public Sociology Alumni Prize at UC Berkeley. Currently, she is examining egalitarian claims of tech start-up entrepreneurs in a comparative research project between France and the United States.

Her current projects are on the digital economy – a comparative study between France and the United States and the role of the state in mediating risk with start-ups, with a focus on gender and class inequality. She is also working on a European Commission funded project with partners in the UK and Italy to analyze online hate speech against Muslims.

Before entering academia, Schradie directed six documentary films, including, "The Golf War – a story of land, golf and revolution in the Philippines." Most of her films, however, focused on social movements confronting corporate power in the American rural South. Schradie's documentaries have screened at more than 25 film festivals and 100 universities. She is also a beginning banjo player and an occasional yoga teacher.

The Revolution that Wasn't: How Digital Activism Favors Conservatives by Jen Schradie (Harvard University Press, 2019)

AOC says it's OK to block Twitter users

New York Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez says that public officials should be able to block certain Twitter users for harassment. Ocasio-Cortez tweeted that she blocks only a tiny percentage of users. She also tweeted that users are free to speak their minds, even if others find that speech offensive, but that no one should have to require themselves to be subjected to harassing or abusive speech. Interestingly, a federal appeals court found that the president, because he uses Twitter in his official capacity, can't constitutionally block users.

FCC activates disaster reporting for Dorian

The Federal Communications Commission activated disaster reporting for Hurricane Dorian as the hurricane moved up the east coast over the weekend. The FCC wants communications providers in affected areas to provide updates on outages via The Disaster Information Reporting System (DIRS) at https://www.fcc.gov/nors/disaster/.

Tariffs on China begin to take effect

The tariffs that Trump promised to impose on China as part of his trade war against the country went into effect on Sunday. The tariffs will affect some $110 billion worth of Chinese imports across a broad range of goods. Another tranche of tariffs on $160 billion worth of Chinese goods like laptop computers and other consumer devices is set to take effect on December 15th.

Google announces hacking attempt

Google publicly announced a hacking attempt that it found and reported to Apple back in February that targeted iPhones. The company said that going to certain websites using your iPhone gave hackers access to your data by installing malware that would run in the background without your knowledge. Hackers were then able to do things like copy your photos or even access encrypted messages sent via apps like Facebook Messenger or Telegraph. Google representative Ian Beer advised consumers to continue to be wary of the possibility of being hacked, even on devices with robust security features.

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey's account hacked

Twitter CEO Jack Dorsey's Twitter accounted was hacked last week. The hackers commenced to tweet racial slurs and other offensive messages until the posts were deleted within the hour, the Hill reports. Twitter says the hackers gained access to the account due to a security oversight by the wireless carrier that exposed Dorsey's phone number.

Report: Google to pay up to $200 million to FTC

Politico reported Friday that Google will have to pay up to $200 million to settle allegations that YouTube violated the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act, which prohibits companies from collecting data from children under 13 without parental consent. Some were disappointed by the news, including Massachusetts Senator Ed Markey, who said the penalty wouldn't be high enough.

Google contract workers vote to unionize

A group of ninety or so contract workers at Google voted to unionize last week, challenging how the company treats them compared to their full-time employees with whom they, in many cases, work side-by-side. With the help of the United Steelworkers union, about 2/3rds of the data analysts and other white collar professionals voted to unionize. The petition now heads up to the National Labor Relations Board which may formally authorize a union vote.

Fort Collins launches municipal broadband

The city of Fort Collins, Colorado is launching its own municipal broadband network offering up to 1GB of broadband for $60/month. Right now, the service targets 20-30 households but the city's looking to ramp up. Jon Brodkin at Ars Technica reported that the cable industry vigorously opposed the effort. But voters approved the build out anyway.

Christopher Lewis is President and CEO at Public Knowledge. Prior to being elevated to President and CEO, Chris served for as PK's Vice President from 2012 to 2019 where he led the organization's day-to-day advocacy and political strategy on Capitol Hill and at government agencies. During that time he also served as a local elected official, serving two terms on the Alexandria City Public School Board. Chris serves on the Board of Directors for the Institute for Local Self Reliance and represents Public Knowledge on the Board of the Broadband Internet Technical Advisory Group (BITAG).

Before joining Public Knowledge, Chris worked in the Federal Communications Commission Office of Legislative Affairs, including as its Deputy Director. He is a former U.S. Senate staffer for the late Sen. Edward M. Kennedy and has over 18 years of political organizing and advocacy experience, including serving as Virginia State Director at GenerationEngage, and working as the North Carolina Field Director for Barack Obama's 2008 Presidential Campaign and other roles throughout the campaign. Chris graduated from Harvard University with a Bachelors degree in Government and lives in Alexandria, VA where he continues to volunteer and advocate on local civic issues.

Public Knowledge

Google Asks Employees to Avoid "Raging Discussions About Politics"

Google updated its internal community guidelines for all employees last week in which the company urged workers to avoid "raging discussions about politics". The key tenets of the new policy are to be responsible, helpful, and thoughtful. The policy change came in the wake of several instances in which Googlers called out the company publicly to protest Google's alleged suppression of conservative voices and its controversial payout to Andy Rubin who was accused of sexual harassment, but left the company with a hefty severance package anyway.

Steve Bannon Seeks to Help Trump with Anti-Huawei Film

Former Trump strategist Steve Bannon announced in a press release last week that he would soon release a new film that's critical of Huawei, the Chinese tech company the Trump administration has accused of collusion with the Chinese government to spy on and steal trade secrets from U.S. firms. "Run by a radical cadre of the Chinese Community Party," the press release states, "China's Communism today is the greatest existential threat the West has ever faced." The Trump administration has banned Huawei from doing business with the federal government. Trump extended by 90 days a similar deadline for U.S. companies to stop doing business with Huawei. Bannon's announcement comes as Trump has been under fire for undermining the U.S. economy via its trade war with China, signals from the Bureau of Labor Statistics that point to slowing job growth, and an investor exodus away from long-term treasury bonds.

Bipartisan Lawmakers Applaud Tech for Taking Down Chinese Social Media Accounts

Republican Representative John Ratcliffe and Democratic Representative Adam Schiff both praised and called attention to the threat of Chinese interference with the 2020 U.S. presidential election. Ratcliffe urged Google and Facebook to view China's removal of content posted by pro-Democracy Hong Kong protesters as a trial run of what could happen in 2020 if China targets the U.S. Schiff applauded Twitter and Facebook for acting quickly to remove hundreds of accounts linked to the Chinese government that garnered over a hundred thousand followers.

ICE Renews Contract with Palantir

Immigration and Customs Enforcement has renewed its surveillance contract with Palantir-the software company founded by Peter Thiel, a vociferous tech sector conservative who also serves as an advisor to President Trump. Tech companies and immigration groups have blasted the administration for working with Palantir, which helps ICE track immigrants. The Hill values the contract at around $49 million.

American Psychological Association Study Finds Fake News Causes False Memories

Finally, A new study by the American Psychological Association found that voters may form false memories from fake news stories, especially if the stories conform to their existing beliefs. The research was performed in Ireland, but researchers expect that there would be similar results in the U.S.