Category «Civil Liberties»

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, May 20, 2023

Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on the increasingly complex and wide ranging ways technology is used to compromise and diminish our privacy and online security, often without our situational awareness. Four highlights from this week: Artificial Intelligence: Key Practices to Help Ensure Accountability in Federal Use; Don’t get scammed by fake ChatGPT apps: Here’s what to look out for; Apple Employees Forbidden From Using ChatGPT; and How to Enable Advanced Data Protection on iOS, and Why You Should.

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Subjects: AI, Big Data, Civil Liberties, Cybercrime, Cybersecurity, KM, Legal Research, Legislative, Privacy, Search Engines

Whistleblowers Are the Conscience of Society, Yet Suffer Gravely For Trying to Hold the Rich and Powerful Accountable For Their Sins

Lawyer, activist, author, and whistleblower Ashley Gjovik states: “I blew the whistle and was met with an experience so destructive that I did not have the words to describe what happened to me. I set out to learn if what happened to me is a known phenomenon and, if so, whether there are language and concepts to explain the experience. I found it is well studied. This article focuses on experiences like mine, where a still-employed whistleblower takes disclosures of systemic issues public due to inaction or cover-ups by the institution. This article does not intend to discount the other varieties of whistleblower experiences; instead, it seeks to explain, expose and validate the turmoil many whistleblowers in similar positions are often forced to endure alone.” Gjovik’s article is an extensively researched and documented history of major whistleblower cases in the United Stated, across sectors and decades.

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Subjects: Civil Liberties, Constitutional Law, Criminal Law, Legal Research

The Disappeared: Indigenous Peoples and the international crime of enforced disappearance

Catherine Morris and Rebekah Smith of Peacemakers Trust Canada conducted extensive research on disproportionate violence against Indigenous persons in Canada that includes uncounted disappearances of Indigenous children, women, and men. Canada’s decades of failure to prevent and halt disappearances forms part of a long litany of grave international human rights violations against Indigenous Peoples. Continued reports of officially hushed-up violence lead to increasingly clarion allegations of genocide. The authors’ work on documenting enforced disappearance, failure to investigate and prosecute crimes against indigenous people has parallel application to the habitual failure of U.S. authorities to address crimes perpetrated against Native Americans.

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Subjects: Civil Liberties, Comparative/Foreign Law, Human Rights, International Legal Research, KM, Legal Research

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, March 25, 2023

Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on the increasingly complex and wide ranging ways technology is used to compromise and diminish our privacy and online security, often without our situational awareness. Four highlights from this week: Canceling subscriptions is notoriously difficult. A proposed FTC rule wants to change that; Analysts share 8 ChatGPT security predictions for 2023; It’s impossible to review security cameras in the age of breaches and ransomware; and TikTok parent ByteDance owns a bunch of other popular apps. Seems relevant!

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Subjects: AI, Civil Liberties, Computer Security, Cybercrime, Cybersecurity, Economy, Privacy, Social Media, Technology Trends

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, February 11, 2023

Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on the increasingly complex and wide ranging ways technology is used to compromise and diminish our privacy and online security, often without our situational awareness. Four highlights from this week: How to safely use payment apps; NY attorney general forces spyware vendor to alert victims; Welcome to the Era of Internet; and Does Big Brother Microsoft see you on Windows 11?

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Subjects: AI, Civil Liberties, Cybercrime, Cybersecurity, Free Speech, Freedom of Information, Government Resources, Privacy

Going Grey and Facing Age Discrimination: Moving Towards an International Treaty on the Rights of Older Persons

For more than two decades attorney Catherine Morris has conducted research, education, and advocacy in the field of international human rights. Her article illuminates an issue that impacts vast numbers of people regardless of nationality. Concerns for the well being of older persons are rarely framed as human rights issues entrenched in age discrimination. This may now be changing after the shocking revelations of maltreatment and excess deaths of older persons in Canadian care homes in 2020. In the United States, the CDC continues to report that 90% percentage of COVID-19 deaths compromise those 65 and older. In both Canada and the U.S. the epicenter of the mortality burden of Covid is among those referred to as “elderly.” Morris states the abuses exposed in 2020 were predictable consequences of Canada’s longstanding neglect of older persons’ fundamental rights. Decades of efforts by Canadian civil society organizations (CSOs) along with international CSOs, and UN human rights bodies may now be gaining traction in a drive for a United Nations (UN) treaty to spell out and guarantee the fundamental human rights of older persons around the world. But efforts may continue to stall until leaders in Canada and other countries come to grips with the root cause of the abuses – endemic ageism.

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Subjects: Civil Liberties, Elder Law, Government Resources, Healthcare, Legal Research

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, November 19, 2022

Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on the increasingly complex and wide ranging ways technology is used to compromise and diminish our privacy and online security, often without our situational awareness. Four highlights from this week: Google Settles 40 States’ Location Data Suit for $392 Million; FBI Alert: Watch Out for Subscription Renewal Scams; GAO Science & Tech Spotlight: Zero Trust Architecture; and Employee tracking: From your keystrokes to your emails, here’s what your employer can see.

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Subjects: Civil Liberties, Communications, Computer Security, Cybercrime, Cyberlaw, Cybersecurity, Email, Freedom of Information, Legal Research, Search Engines, Social Media, Spyware

Pete Recommends – Weekly highlights on cyber security issues, September 17, 2022

Privacy and cybersecurity issues impact every aspect of our lives – home, work, travel, education, health and medical records – to name but a few. On a weekly basis Pete Weiss highlights articles and information that focus on the increasingly complex and wide ranging ways technology is used to compromise and diminish our privacy and online security, often without our situational awareness. Four highlights from this week: Consumer Data: Increasing Use Poses Risks to Privacy; Border Agents Surveil Americans’ Phones Without Warrants: Wyden; Social Media Execs Submit to Time-Honored Public Lashing Before Congress; and You should know that most websites share your in-site search queries with third parties.

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Subjects: Civil Liberties, Congress, Cybercrime, Cybersecurity, Data Mining, Government Resources, Legal Research, Privacy, Search Engines, Social Media, Travel, United States Law

Confidence in the Supreme Court is declining – but there is no easy way to oversee justices and their politics

Recent evidence showing that Virginia Thomas, wife of U.S. Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, sent at least 29 text messages to former White House Chief of Staff Mark Meadows urging him to help overturn the 2020 election has reignited a long-simmering debate about judicial ethics and the nation’s highest court. Professor Eve Ringsmuth writes, “As a Supreme Court scholar, I think it is important to recognize that there is no formal code of conduct guiding the work of the Supreme Court, which contributes to a lack of clarity regarding the ethical boundaries for justices.”

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Subjects: Civil Liberties, Congress, Ethics, Leadership, Legal Research, United States Law

Surveillance is pervasive: Yes, you are being watched, even if no one is looking for you

Peter Krapp, Professor of Film & Media Studies, University of California, Irvine shares facts that we need to acknowledge. The United States has the largest number of surveillance cameras per person in the world. Cameras are omnipresent on city streets and in hotels, restaurants, malls and offices. They’re also used to screen passengers for the Transportation Security Administration. And then there are smart doorbells and other home security cameras. Importantly, Krapp highlights not only do we live in a surveillance nation, but those who surveil us do so with virtually no constraints or oversight.

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Subjects: Big Data, Civil Liberties, Legal Research, Privacy, Technology Trends, United States Law
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