Digital Rights

Tech Industry Lobby Proposes Data Privacy Laws; Critics Call Them Weak
Xconomy
Bernadette Tansey

The tech industry, which reaps billions of dollars by harvesting personal data and using it to sell targeted advertising and other services, opened the door to federal data privacy regulations today in a proposal by ITI, a lobbying organization for tech companies.

The Information Technology Industry Council, which represents the policy interests of companies including Facebook, Google, Twitter, and Amazon, released a conceptual framework for Congressional legislation that it says “advances the privacy rights of consumers and defines the responsibilities of companies in using personal data while continuing to enable the innovations that transform our lives.”

Critics, however, see the ITI guidelines as a way to shield technology companies from even stricter constraints that might be imposed in the aftermath of a series of company data breaches that exposed sensitive consumer data to criminals, hackers, and political operatives—most notably, Facebook’s loss of control over millions of personal profiles to outside companies including Cambridge Analytica, a data firm that claimed it could influence voter decisions in U.S. elections.

“The ITI might as well have called [its proposal] ‘a data collector’s Bill of Rights,’” says Jeff Chester, executive director of the Center for Digital Democracy, a non-profit advocacy group that focuses on tech-related consumer issues such as data privacy and net neutrality.

Congress has been summoning tech firms to hearings on the privacy issue, and continues to mull possible legislation.

Read more: https://www.xconomy.com/san-francisco/2018/10/22/tech-industry-lobby-proposes-data-privacy-laws-critics-call-them-weak/

Children spending three hours a day on social media are more likely to be obese
The Drum
Taruka Srivastav

A Cancer Research UK report has revealed that children who spend more than half an hour a day online are 79% more likely to be overweight or obese.

The research said those who are online between 30 minutes and three hours a day are 53% more likely to be carrying excess weight than those who were online for less.

The same report also found that for every additional hour of commercial TV that children watched was linked with an increased likelihood of pestering their parents to buy products they’d seen advertised.

Children were four times more likely to buy chocolate and over three times more likely to buy sugary drinks if they watched more than three hours of commercial TV every day, compared to youngsters who didn’t watch as much and 59% more likely to be obese or overweight.

The study further indicates that one in three ‘year six’ children (10-11-year-olds) are overweight or obese and one in every 25 is severely obese.

The UK government has further published plans to halve childhood obesity by 2030 and will be opening consultations on policies including a 9pm watershed for unhealthy food adverts on TV, and how best to regulate on-demand and online adverts.

Read more: https://www.thedrum.com/news/2018/10/22/children-spending-three-hours-day-social-media-are-more-likely-be-obese

Mark Zuckerberg Is Trying to Transform Education. This Town Fought Back.
Intelligencer
Nick Tabor

Last year, several classes in Cheshire, Connecticut’s elementary and middle schools switched to a new classroom model, where lessons were supposed to be tailored to every student. The kids and their parents were caught off-guard that first week of school. “We walked into math class,” recalled Lauren Peronace, now an eighth-grader, “and my math teacher said, ‘Everyone open up your Chromebooks. We’re going to go on a website — Summit.’”

Reactions were mixed. Most everyone in Cheshire, which is between New Haven and Hartford, is there for the public schools, which are among the area’s best. Some parents were skittish about the creep of more technology into the classroom, especially when they found out Facebook was behind the software and Mark Zuckerberg was spending millions promoting it. Others were at least cautiously optimistic. “My son initially thought it sounded cool,” said one parent, Theresa, who asked to have her last name withheld because of all the drama that followed. “The teachers told him, ‘You’re going to be on your own; you’ll be independent; you’re going to move at your own pace.”

The program had come with money for 130 Chromebooks, so every student could have one — courtesy of the Chan Zuckerberg Initiative, Zuckerberg’s philanthropic LLC, and Summit’s other wealthy backers. But to hear the administrators explain it, the technology would be only one piece. The Summit Learning Program, which originated at a series of West Coast charter schools between 2012 and 2013, is conceived as a comprehensive program of “personalized learning” that promises to put students in charge of their own education. It’s now being used in some 380 districts and charter schools nationwide. Rather than having a teacher stand at the front of the room and talk, it emphasizes group projects, dialogue between students, and one-on-one time with teachers, guaranteeing at least a ten-minute “mentoring” session for each student every week. It also makes use of specialized software for regular lessons and assessments. Cheshire’s teachers had gone to training that summer in Providence, Rhode Island, at an event also funded by Summit.

Read more: http://nymag.com/intelligencer/2018/10/the-connecticut-resistance-to-zucks-summit-learning-program.html

Oct. 5, 2018

Facebook Wants Instagram to Know Where You and Your Children Are At All Times – A Dangerous Precedent

Statement of Kristen Strader, Campaign Coordinator, Public Citizen’s Commercial Alert

Note: Published reports indicate that Instagram is testing the platform’s ability to share data on users’ exact location through their co-linked Facebook page even when they are offline. Instagram, owned by Facebook, wants to bring users greater levels of targeted advertising.

Facebook is seeking yet another way to commercialize our daily lives for the sake of corporate profits – and it’s the wrong move. As if the constant barrage of targeted advertising on both platforms wasn’t already overwhelming, Facebook is now considering a new feature for Instagram – which is owned by the company – that would share users’ location history data with Facebook for even greater levels of targeted advertising. The feature would allow Instagram to share users’ location history data even when users are not actively interacting with the app, a dangerous step towards corporate surveillance of our every move.

Even worse, Instagram is not even close to – nor interested in – perfecting its ability to prevent children under 13 from using the platform. According to the Federal Trade Commission’s Children’s Online Privacy Protection Rule (COPPA), data collection of children under 13, including location-based information, requires parental consent. The location information of children under 13 would undoubtedly be mixed up with that of older users, putting Instagram at risk of serious COPPA violations.

For the sake of abiding by children’s data protection rules and respecting the privacy of its users, Instagram should halt all plans to share user location history data with Facebook for targeted advertising.

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Originally Posted: https://www.citizen.org/media/press-releases/facebook-wants-instagram-know-where-you-and-your-children-are-all-times-%E2%80%93

Snapchat rolls out self-serve shoppable ads globally
The Drum
John McCarthy

Snapchat has rolled out self-serve shoppable ads to all advertisers, as it looks to up its e-commerce revenues with a multitude of updates.

The move shows the company is increasing both the sophistication and utility of its Snap ads vertical formats for potential brand partners, removing friction in the process.

Having launched shoppable AR lenses in April, Snapchat has been reported to be testing shoppable ads since June with select partners. Wish.com and eBay were among the first out of the gate.

The company announced some of favourable early statistics from the pilot of this feature. Comparing shoppable Snap ads to standard Snap ads featuring the same products it noted that: eBay reported five-times more engagement; Wish.com’s was 17-times higher; and Guess was 4.1-times higher.

Snapchat will be hoping these figures can help attract more retailers into the service with the promise of high engagement among its some 188 million users. Click-through rates and sales were not released in the study at this stage.

The business is also launching another new feature dubbed ‘product catalogs’ which allows retailers to upload a library of catalogue information in spreadsheet format to best inform those using the app. Information includes image, price and colour. Once on board, the data can be used to speed up the creation of ads across its ecosystem, including story ads, Snap ads and shoppable Snap ads.

Read more: https://www.thedrum.com/news/2018/09/27/snapchat-rolls-out-self-serve-shoppable-ads-globally