Articles and Columns for October 2021

• Employing My Law Librarian Skills on an Uncertain Road – As we all navigate through the era of Covid, it is critical to learn from the myriad other medical challenges that many Americans, as well as our professional colleagues, are facing separate from the pandemic. Taryn L. Rucinski, Supervisory Librarian, U.S. Court of International Trade, shares her ongoing experience with the diagnosis of acoustic neuroma. Rucinski believes in the value of showing that its okay to take a step back, to step down, to lateral, to just take a breath in the face of challenges and adversity. She continues, saying experience has also shown her that our skills as law librarians are far more valuable than we may give them credit for. She highlights four significant factors that have kept her on the road to recovery: the unflagging support of the LLAGNY community, the flexibility and skills she has honed in her profession, and the importance of self care.
• Is Remote Work a Thing Now? – Heather Grey-Grant is a business strategist, marketing expert and executive coach who works primarily with small to medium sized law firms. In her article she shares lessons learned on how to effectively manage remote working by law firm attorneys and staff along with the significant implications respective to marketing, HR, technology, firm strategy and administration.
• Steve Bannon is held in criminal contempt of Congress, pushing key question over presidential power to the courts? – Stephanie Farne, Legal Information Librarian and Lecturer in Law at Boston College Law School, raises increasingly important issues respective to the bias inherent in artificial intelligence powered search algorithms, both on the Internet and in commercial databases.
• Trump wants the National Archives to keep his papers away from investigators – post-Watergate laws and executive orders may not let him – Professor Shannon Bow O’Brien is a presidency scholar who focuses upon rhetoric. She discusses how the National Archives usually goes on with its work with little attention, but that is now at the center of a political fight about the public’s access to the papers of former President Donald Trump.
• Nonprofit Websites Are Riddled With Ad Trackers – Enterprise reporter Alfred Ng and Investigative Data Journalist Maddy Varner detail how many non profit organizations that often deal in sensitive issues, like mental health, addiction, and reproductive rights—are feeding data about website visitors to corporations.
• Amazon Puts Its Own “Brands” First Above Better-Rated Products – Investigative Reporter Adrianne Jeffries and Investigative Data Journalist Leon Yin document how the online giant gives a leg up to hundreds of house brand and exclusive products that most people don’t know are connected to Amazon.
• Limiting Human Rights during Pandemics – Cassandra Emmons, Cassandra Emmons a postdoctoral fellow with the Weatherhead Center for International Affairs’ Harvard University, discusses how COVID-19 has proven that public health emergencies are not equally recognized in either international law or national constitutions; some international treaties permit “limiting” rights in the name of public health rather than requiring derogation, and nationally some governments authorize emergency measures in practice without ever doing so in name. These parallel processes and conceptual gaps create space for governments to restrict individuals’ rights with little to no international accountability during pandemics.
• Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, October 31, 2021 – Four highlights from this week: You can now remove pictures of minors from Google Search — here’s how; The Identity Theft Resource Center’s Inaugural 2021 Business Aftermath Report; and Millions Of Patient Health Records Now At Risk Through Unregulated API’s.
• Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, October 24, 2021 – Four highlights from this week: Investigating Cybercrime and the Dark Web; Warranty Repairs and Non-Removable Storage Risks; Can Facebook’s Smart Glasses Be Smart about Security and Privacy?; and Study – How Facebook News Feed Works.
• Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, October 16, 2021 – Four highlights from this week: Government Secretly Orders Google To Identify Anyone Who Searched A Sexual Assault Victim’s Name, Address And Telephone Number; Study reveals Android phones constantly snoop on their users; Ongoing Cyber Threats to U.S. Water and Wastewater Systems Sector Facilities; and What Google learned after analyzing 80M ransomware samples: 5 things to know.
• Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, October 10, 2021 – Four highlights from this week: 2021 Guide to Internet Privacy Resources and Tools; It’s time to start taking digital identity seriously; There’s a Multibillion-Dollar Market for Your Phone’s Location Data; and It’s Time to Stop Paying for a VPN.
• Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, October 2, 2021 – Four highlights from this week: Apple’s App Tracking Transparency Feature Doesn’t Stop Tracking; New Chrome feature can tell sites and webapps when you’re idle; Bye Google: 7 privacy-first search engines everyone should try; and Troll farms reached 140 million Americans a month on Facebook before 2020 election, internal report shows.